The Last Town (The Wayward Pines Trilogy 3) (13 page)

VI

HASSLER

GAS WORKS PARK
SEATTLE, WASHINGTON
1,816 YEARS AGO

Hassler flips burgers on a grill in the shadow of the remnants of the Seattle Gas Light Company, a collection of rusted cylinders and ironwork that looms in the distance like the ruins of a steampunk skyline. The expanse of emerald grass runs down to the edge of Lake Union, which sparkles under the late afternoon sun. It’s June. It’s warm. The entire city seems to be out taking advantage of this rare, perfect day.

Sailboat masts add triangles of color to the lake.

Kites sprinkle color in the sky.

Frisbees slice through the air and the bright noise of children’s laughter echoes from the plant’s exhauster-compressor building, which has been renovated into a “play barn.”

It’s the annual company picnic for the Secret Service’s Seattle field office, and Hassler can’t shake how odd it is to see his team sporting all those bare legs and sandaled feet in place of crisp black suits and pantsuits.

His assistant, Mike, walks up carrying two empty plates and a couple of bratwurst requests.

As Hassler spears one of the brats, he spots Theresa Burke moving away from the group she’s been standing with, heading down toward the shoreline at a pace substantially faster than a leisurely stroll.

Hassler sets down the fork and looks at his assistant.

“Did I mention I’m promoting you?” Hassler says.

Mike’s eyes go wide with self-interest. The young man has only been working with Hassler for eight months, but he has, on a number of occasions, demonstrated a complete lack of awareness regarding the fact that his main purpose in life is answering the phones, pouring coffee, and typing up the special agent in charge’s dictation.

Mike says, “Seriously?”

Hassler lifts the white-and-red checkerboard apron over his head and appoints his apprentice.

“Your new duties include asking people if they’d like a hamburger, bratwurst, or both. And also, not burning shit.”

Mike’s shoulders sag. “I was getting a plate for Lacy.”

“That your new girl?”

“Yeah.”

“Tell her to come over so you can fill her in on the big news.” Hassler slaps Mike on the shoulder and abandons the grill, moving down through the buttercup-dotted grass.

Theresa stands by the water.

Hassler walks to the shore and stops twenty feet away, pretending to take in the splendor of the view.

The radio towers at the top of Capitol Hill.

The house-covered hillsides of Queen Anne.

After a moment, he glances over.

Theresa stares hard across the water, her jaw tight, eyes intense.

He asks, “Everything okay?”

She startles, looks over, wipes her eyes, and musters up a pathetic smile.

“Oh, yeah. Just enjoying the day. Wish we got more like this.”

“No kidding. Kind of makes me wish I knew how to sail.”

Theresa glances back toward the park where the rest of the party is mingling.

Hassler looks too.

The breeze carries the pleasant reek of beer in plastic cups.

He spots Ethan Burke and Kate Hewson standing off to the side, just the two of them, Kate laughing as Ethan gestures his way through what appears to be a story or a joke.

Hassler closes the distance between himself and Theresa.

“You’re not having much fun, are you?”

She shakes her head.

Hassler says, “These work parties must be weird for the families. My agents see each other day in, day out. Probably spend more time together than with their own spouses. Then you come here, feel like an outsider.”

Theresa smiles. “You pretty much nailed it.”

She starts to say something else, but stops short.

“What?” Hassler prods, venturing a step closer. He can smell her conditioner, whatever body wash she used that morning.

Theresa’s eyes are clear and green. The electricity goes in through his eyes and travels down into the pit of his stomach. He feels, all at once—sick, exhilarated, terrified, alive.

Radiantly so.

“Should I be worried?” she asks.

“Worried?”

She lowers her voice. “About them. Ethan and”—it’s like she doesn’t even want to say the word, like it brings a bad taste to her mouth—“Kate.”

“Worried how?”

He knows. He just wants to hear her say it.

“They’ve been partners, what? Four months now?” she asks.

“Yeah, something like that.”

“That’s an intense relationship, right? Partner-partner?”

“Can be. You work cases together. Often long hours. You have to trust each other with your lives.”

“So she’s like his work wife.”

Hassler says, “I’d be hard-pressed to name any pair of agents under my supervision who aren’t close. The nature of the job pushes people together.”

“It’s just hard,” Theresa says.

“I can’t imagine.”

“So you don’t think
. . .
”

“I haven’t personally seen anything that would make me suspect Ethan is anything other than a devoted husband to you. He’s a lucky man. I hope you know that.”

Theresa blows out a sigh, puts her face into her hands.

“What’s wrong?” he asks.

“I shouldn’t have—”

“No, it’s fine. Please.”

“Do me a favor?” Theresa asks.

“Name it.”

“Don’t tell Ethan about this conversation. You don’t know me that well, Adam, but I’m not a jealous person. It’s just
. . .
I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”

“Lips are sealed.” Hassler smiles. “And you should know, I’m pretty good with the whole confidentiality thing. The word ‘secret’ is in my job title, for chrissakes.”

Now Theresa smiles at him and he can barely stand it, knows he will think of little else in the days to come.

“Thank you,” she says, and puts her hand briefly on his arm.

He could live a year in this moment.

“I could stay here,” he offers. “Keep you company
. . .
”

“Oh no, you’ve got a party to get back to, and I’ve got some big girl panties to pull up. But you’re sweet to offer.”

Theresa starts back up the grassy slope and Hassler watches her go. What it is about this woman that rips his heart out, he can’t exactly say. Truth be told, they’re just acquaintances. Have talked only a handful of times.

When she breezed through the office to bring Ethan something.

A bump-into-each-other at the symphony.

A cookout he was invited to at the Burke house.

Hassler has never been married, hasn’t been in love since high school, but in this moment, as he stands on the shore of Lake Union watching Theresa arrive at Ethan’s side and wrap her arm around his waist, he feels a flicker of blinding jealousy, as if he’s watching the woman who belongs with him falling for another man.

ETHAN

He crashed the CJ-5 through the rock-facade door. A piece of metal struck the windshield, sent a long, branching crack straight down the middle of the glass.

Ethan had half expected a brigade of Pilcher’s men to be waiting for him, but the tunnel stood empty.

He shifted into third gear.

Thirty-five miles per hour up the steep grade was the best he could do.

Lights streamed past overhead.

The bedrock dripping on the fractured windshield.

Every time he rounded a curve, he expected to see a roadblock, a line of Pilcher’s men with assault rifles and orders to shoot on sight.

Then again, it was possible Pilcher’s people had no idea what he’d done.

The only camera feeds in the superstructure were in surveillance HQ and Pilcher’s office. Surveillance techs could be sealed off, locked up, bribed, killed. Pilcher’s inner circle no doubt held a delusional sense of loyalty toward the man, but Ethan couldn’t let himself imagine all of them just standing by while he murdered the last of humanity.

His ears popped.

He was getting close and still no sign of resistance.

If he had to bet, Pilcher was planning to make certain that every last resident of Wayward Pines had been wiped out and then tell his people there had been a terrible accident. A fence failure. Nothing to be done.

Ethan eased his foot off the gas as the entrance to the superstructure came into view around a long, gentle curve.

He rolled into the massive cavern and brought the Jeep to a stop.

Jammed the gearshift into first.

Killed the engine.

He picked the Desert Eagle up off the floorboard, tugged the slide back and let it reset so the gun looked loaded. Digging through his pockets again, he only found two boxes of twelve-gauge slugs and his Harpy.

Opening the door, he stepped down onto the stone. The ark was quiet, no sound but a soft hiss—the rush of forced air—coming from the blue-lit suspension center.

Ethan unzipped his parka and tossed it into the Jeep, shoved the impotent Desert Eagle down the front of his mud-smeared, bloodstained Wranglers.

Approaching the thick glass doors that led into Level 1 of the complex, it dawned on him that he didn’t have a keycard.

A camera pointed down at him from above the doors.

Are you watching me now?

You must know I’m here.

A voice behind him said, “Put your hands on your head. Interlock your fingers.”

Ethan raised his hands and turned slowly.

A kid in his early twenties with a bandage around his head stood fifty feet away beside the closest of the massive cylindrical reservoirs in the ark, pointing an AR-15 at Ethan.

“Hi, Marcus,” Ethan said.

Marcus moved toward him, and in the jaundiced illumination of the hanging globe lights, looked mad as hell. To be fair, he had cause. During their last encounter, Ethan had pistol-whipped him.

“Mr. Pilcher knew you’d come,” Marcus said.

“He told you that, huh?”

“He told me everything you did.”

“Everything I did?”

“And he also told me to shoot you, so—”

“People are dying in Wayward Pines, Marcus. Women. Children.”

Marcus had halved the distance between them and Ethan could read enough rage in his eyes to suggest he might actually pull the trigger.

The glass doors opened. Ethan glanced back, saw a big blond man enter, aiming a pistol at his heart. Ethan remembered him from that day in the morgue. Alyssa’s friend, Alan—Pilcher’s head of security.

Ethan looked at Marcus, the kid now shouldering the machine gun, preparing to shoot.

Ethan said to Alan, “You have orders to shoot me on sight as well?”

“Better believe.”

“Where’s Ted?”

“No idea.”

“You might want to hear me out first,” Ethan said.

Marcus was closing in. As Alan pointed his pistol in Ethan’s face, Marcus reached forward and tugged the Desert Eagle out of Ethan’s waistband, threw it across the stone.

“You have no idea what’s going on out there,” Ethan said. “Either of you. Last night, Pilcher turned off the fence and opened the gate. He let a swarm of abbies into the valley. Most of the town has been massacred.”

“Bullshit,” Alan said.

“He’s lying,” Marcus said. “Why are we even listening—”

Ethan said, “I want to show you something. I’m reaching slowly into my pocket—”

Alan said, “I swear to God that’ll be the last move you ever make.”

“You just took my weapon.”

Marcus said, “Alan, we have orders. I—”

“Shut the fuck up,” Ethan said. “Adults are talking.” He looked back at Alan. “Remember when we met in the morgue? Remember what you asked me to do?”

“Find who killed Alyssa.”

“That’s right.”

Alan fixed his eyes on Ethan.

“I found who killed her,” Ethan said.

Alan’s jaw tensed.

“It was your boss. And Pam.”

Alan said, “You come in here with an accusation like that you better be able to—”

“Prove it?” Ethan pointed at his pocket. “May I?”

“Slowly.”

Ethan reached in, fingers probing until he felt it. Lifting out the memory shard, he held up the square shaving of metal, and said, “Pilcher and Pam killed Alyssa. But first they tortured her. The head of surveillance gave this to me. It shows everything.” Alan kept the gun trained on Ethan, his expression unreadable. “I have a question for you, Alan,” Ethan said. “If what I’m telling you is true, where does your loyalty fall?”

“He’s playing you,” Marcus growled.

“One way to find out,” Ethan said. “What does it cost you to look at this, Alan? Unless avenging Alyssa isn’t something that interests you.”

Behind the glass doors, Ethan saw another armed man sprinting down the corridor.

He was dressed in black, armed with a Taser, pistol, machine gun, and testosterone. As he approached the glass doors, he spotted Ethan and raised his weapon. Alan suddenly wrapped his right arm around Ethan’s neck and held his pistol to Ethan’s temple.

The doors whisked open.

Alan said, “I’ve got him. Stand down.”

“Kill him!” Marcus screamed. “You have orders!”

The new arrival said, “Alan, what the hell are you doing?”

“You do not want to shoot this man, Mustin. Not yet.”

“What I want and don’t want doesn’t have a whole helluva lot to do with it. You know that better than any of us.”

Alan tightened his grip on Ethan.

“Sheriff says the town’s been overrun with aberrations and that the bossman opened up the gate. He also says that Mr. Pilcher and Pam are responsible for Alyssa’s death.”

“One thing to say it,” Mustin said. “Another to prove it.”

Ethan held up the memory shard.

“He claims it has footage of Alyssa’s death.”

“So what?” Marcus said.

Alan leveled a wilting glare at the young man. “What are you saying, son? That on the wild assumption any of this is true, you’d be a-okay with Mr. Pilcher killing one of our own, his own daughter, and trying to hide it? You’d just go along with that?”

“He’s the boss,” Marcus said. “If he did something like that, I bet he had—”

“He’s not God, is he?”

A scream raced up the tunnel and went reverberating through the ark.

Alan released Ethan and said, “What was that?”

“Sounds like some of the abbies found their way into the mountain,” Ethan said. “I drove through the entrance to the tunnel.”

Alan looked at Mustin’s weapon. “What do we have that’s meaner than an AR-15?”

“An M230 chain gun on a rolling mount.”

“Mustin, Marcus, get on that chain gun. Call everybody up. The entire team.”

“What are you going to do with him?” Marcus asked, jutting his chin toward Ethan.

“He and I are heading up to surveillance to take a look at what he’s got.”

“We were told to kill him,” Marcus said, raising his gun.

Alan stepped toward Marcus, the barrel of the AR-15 digging into his sternum.

“Would you mind not pointing your weapon at me, son?”

Marcus lowered his gun.

“While you and Mustin make sure we don’t all get eaten, I’m going to look at what the sheriff says is proof concerning what happened to my friend. And if it’s anything less than advertised, I’ll execute him on the spot. That all right with you?”