The clerk at Desert Airstream Services moved from behind her counter to greet the old woman in the wheelchair and her physician.
“Dr. Hegel. Everything’s ready. That’s a pretty scarf Mrs. Duggan,” the clerk said after summoning the ground crew. They assisted Hegel getting his patient, Heather Duggan comfortably aboard her chartered jet, for her one-way flight to Orange County.
Duggan, a reclusive casino heiress, had a terminal condition, her doctor had explained a few weeks earlier. It was her wish to die in California where she was born. Hegel had arranged the trip, paying cash in advance. He’d included large gratuities for respecting the eccentric woman’s privacy.
The fresh cut roses in the jet were a nice touch, Two Knives thought as the small Cessna Citation shot over the Spring Mountains, about ninety minutes after Scout had driven off with $3.7 million in unmarked cash.
That evening after dinner in the restaurant of the Ramada in Santa Ana, Two Knives told Scout that he wanted to do something he’d dreamed of doing all his life and they drove to Newport Beach where they watched the sun set on the ocean.
“I never really knew you Jessie,” he said as they walked near the surf. “I was angry at Angela for being with a white man. I’d thought, how could my sister betray her people, her blood. I was consumed with anger. I’d lost my way in the world and ended up in a cell.”
Gulls cried above them.
“I never meant for that man, the armored car guard, to die like that in San Diego. It was a terrible mistake. A terrible thing and I paid for it with twenty-five years of my life.” The sun painted the creases of his sad, weary face with gold as he searched the horizon. “I did a lot of thinking in those twenty-five years, thinking how I could set things right.”
“My mother was angry that I’d written to you in prison. She said you were no good, Joe.”
“She has a right to her opinion of me. Especially now. I heard she has less than three months with her illness.”
Scout nodded.
“Jessie, your letters kept me alive during my darkest times. Gave me a reason to want to make up for deserting my own blood when they needed me.”
“You’re the only one who knows the truth about all the things that happened when I was young.”
“It hurt me more than you’ll ever know, to read of your pain. I knew in my heart you did nothing to deserve it. I believe you were owed a life, and that I could help you get it.”
Scout took her uncle’s hand and squeezed it.
“Remember, you must never call your mother, or see her. Once the FBI puts everything together, they’ll watch. If you’re going to survive you must let her spend her last days thinking you are dead. It’s better this way. You’ll see her in the next world.”
Scout brushed a tear from her cheek.
As if reading her mind, he said: “Not even a letter, Jessie.”
She nodded. They’d gone over every detail.
“This looks like a good spot.” He stopped, pulled a hotel towel from his bag and began to undress. Jessie was surprised. He was wearing swimming trunks. “I’ve always dreamed of swimming in the ocean,” he said.
At fifty-four, he had the firm muscular body of a man thirty years younger, a dividend of keeping in shape during his time in Folsom. Scout noticed a small tattoo over his shoulder that looked like a storm over mountains.
“What’s this mean?”
“Ah, that,” he said. “I got it from an old chief I met on C-Yard the second year I was inside,” he said. “Funny. I wanted an eagle. But he was very insistent that I have this one.”
“What is it, what does it mean?”
“He said it was for the entity who delivers calm after the storm. Pretty cool, don’t you think?”
Jessie nodded.
“The old man called it, The Lightning Rider.”
Two Knives walked into the ocean, leaving Scout standing alone on the beach brushing her tears, feeling the warmth of the fading sun.
Author’s Note
Lightning Rider is the story of a damaged woman determined to achieve what she believes she is owed. It came to life when the International Association of Crime Writers put out a call for short stories to be considered for Murder In Vegas, an anthology edited by Michael Connelly. The call required stories be about crime connected to Las Vegas. I had something in mind arising from trips I had made to Las Vegas. I was intrigued by armored car heists and drafted a story for submission. I was thrilled when it was accepted for inclusion. The Crime Writers of Canada selected the story to receive the 2006 Arthur Ellis Award for Best Short Story. It is also featured in Deadly Bride and 21 of the Year's Finest Crime and Mystery Stories, Edited by Ed Gorman & Martin H. Greenberg, and the anthology Les Prix Arthur-Ellis-2 edited by Peter Sellers.
Lightning Rider is also included in Dangerous Women & Desperate Men, my small four-story anthology available only as an E-book. The three other stories in the collection are: “Three Bullets To Queensland”, “As Long As We Both Shall Live” and “Blood Red Rings”. “Blood Red Rings”, the collection’s lead story, is free wherever E-books are sold. I hope you will consider adding Dangerous Women & Desperate Men to your E-library. You can also obtain each story individually online. Each story has its own spectacular cover and additional content about my work.
If this is your introduction to my writing, you might want to consider longer works of mine that are available in E-format. Some samples are presented in the following pages.