∞
Tom Coleman sat up from the floor and gingerly felt his head.
What had just happened?
The pounding in his head was almost unbearable, causing even the slight noise of the voices around him to echo painfully inside his skull. A strange metallic taste filled his mouth, and his throat was dry to the point of burning. He opened his eyes and, as if his wish had instantly been granted, noticed a tall glass of water sitting next to him on the floor. He picked it up and quickly drank back the cool liquid, ignoring the pain in his throat as he greedily emptied the glass. Feeling better, Tom slowly raised his head and blinked the blurriness from his vision. For some unknown reason, he was sitting in the middle of the saloon. He looked over at the bar and, to his surprise, noticed four men sitting with Chip. Tom could hear Chip talking with the man next to him in a low tone, but he couldn’t make out what they were saying.
He needed to get closer.
Tom leaned forward and rose shakily to his feet. He was nearly standing when a sudden wave of dizziness struck him. Losing his balance, he staggered and fell heavily onto his back. Chip and the other men turned at the sound of the commotion to find him sprawled across the old wooden floor.
“Glad you could join us again, Tom,” Chip said cheerfully, his blue eyes staring down at him. The other men watched silently with an undisguised look of pity.
Tom propped himself up on one arm and rubbed his head.
“What the fuck happened to me?
“You were subjected to a form of compressive asphyxia that, pathologically speaking, brought on a state of generalized hypoxia,” the dark-haired man sitting next to Chip replied. “Said a simpler way, you were just strangled.”
Tom gazed up at the man with a puzzled expression. What the hell did he just say? And why did he look so familiar? He looked over at the man named Max sitting at the far end of the bar and suddenly remembered what had happened.
“You motherfucker… you tried to kill me!” He rose from the floor again before clumsily hurling himself towards Max. As he did, the blonde-haired man sitting next to Max quickly stood and intercepted him, pinning Tom’s arms behind his back.
“Alright, alright… settle down,” the man said calmly in an Australian accent. He spun Tom around and gently dropped him back onto the floor. “Just settle down now,” he continued, pointing towards something behind Tom. “Or else you’re going to end up like that.”
Tom shook his arms free and glared at the man angrily before turning to see what was behind him. His expression instantly turned to shock. A few yards away, Jeri’s lifeless body was stretched across the floor.
“Is she dead?” he asked, his voice a low whisper.
“Don’t worry about Jeri, Tom,” Chip replied as he swung around on his bar stool and faced him. “I’d rather talk about you.”
Tom glanced at the faces along the bar before fixing his stare on Chip.
“What the fuck’s going on Chip? Who are these guys?”
“Who do you think?” Chip said, looking over and giving the men a brief nod. At his cue, Max, the Australian, and a short, pudgy man sitting next to them stood and walked over to Jeri’s body. Max gently lifted her off the floor as the other two men opened the door that led to the back alley and quietly escorted him out.
“Where are they taking her?” Tom demanded.
“That’s not your concern now,” the dark-haired man replied.
Tom looked at the man more closely. “Wait– you’re… you’re him.”
“Him who?” the man asked.
“The man in the photos,” Tom whispered, looking over at the shrine of letters on the wall. “You wrote those letters, didn’t you?”
“Indeed I did.”
Tom eyes darted to Chip. “Jesus… I was right. It was you, wasn’t it?” he asked, shaking his head in disbelief. “All those messages within the letters. They weren’t meant for Jeri, they were meant for you.”
From his seat at the bar, Chip smiled and nodded his head.
“That’s right, Tom. I have to say, when you first walked up to the bar that night and started asking me about the letters, I thought you were just some local idiot passing time. You can imagine my surprise when you suddenly started connecting the dots.” He paused and shook his head. “You impressed me, Agent Coleman. Of course, you also forced me to find out just what the hell you were up to. When I discovered you were an agent for the Department of Homeland Security, I knew I could relax a bit. But when I realized your real motivation for solving the case was to get the attention of your brother-in-law in the CIA, I knew we could use you to our advantage.”