Chapter 19
Dane Amleth Waking up had never really been Dane's strong suit. College had been a great change of pace: Living on a ranch meant early mornings--at least, it did until Dad's work really started to pay off and they could hire out enough to keep them out of the fields--throughout his middle and high school days. During his first semester, Dane made the mistake of scheduling his biology class at eight in the morning. It had been a close call that he passed--mostly because he hardly recognized his professor by the end of term he'd been to class so infrequently. Waking up at this moment, however, was significantly harder. First up: Pain. Lots and lots of pain. His right leg, the skin on his arms, the stiffness in his neck…everything, honestly, gave him enough pain that he wanted to either cry or scream--possibly both at the same time. Secondly: Confusion. Where was he? Everything was blurry and indistinct, making it difficult to figure out what was what. Bright blobs, fuzzy sounds, restricted movement. Why was this happening? How did he get wherever he was? Thirdly: Amnesia. He remembered his name. He remembered taking biology at 8:00 AM for his first semester in college. He knew that his father had done…something…to get Elsinore Ranch into the black. He knew he had a father…had a father. He could remember that: Papa Dane was dead. How? The funeral had happened. Dane hadn't cried. Why? The harder he pushed on the idea, the less clearly he could see it. Lastly: Thirst. An aching thirst in the back of his throat. And the front of his mouth. And on his bone-dry tongue. Breathing hurt (everything hurt), but he could scarcely think to breathe because of the thirst. The darkness pulled him back down and he slid into something resembling the great blank of nothingness, save that he had bad dreams. Squealing of tires; shrieks; crumpled metal and shattered glass. Blood. Blood that poured in rivers. More and more darkness. Then it faded into brightness and Dane opened his eyes. Hospital room. That made sense. There had been an accident. He could remember that. Mom had been there…but the rest was empty. That was okay. He could tease it back. It'd return. That also explained the pain. He couldn't remember what exactly happened to give him each injury. That was also okay. He'd be fine if it never returned. Once he found the nurse-call button, which he pressed weakly. A nurse entered a moment later, dressed in forest green scrubs and her blonde hair tucked back into a ponytail. "Hey, Mr. Amleth. You're awake!" He grunted. "Your friend told us she saw some response earlier today, but it didn't turn into anything." The nurse spoke with a smile, a saccharine lilt that Dane didn't particularly appreciate. "Is there anything I can get for you before I call in the doctor?" Dane tried to ask for a drink, but it came out as a dry croak. He tried to gesture, but that didn't work out, either. The nurse tried to figure out through some pantomiming and questioning, eventually coming to the conclusion that he wanted some water. It was incredible how much better he felt with just that alone. The nurse excused herself to fetch the doctor; Dane closed his eyes. Every moment of wakefulness was pain-threaded and miserable, but at least he was alive. Considering how he had been on the brink of swallowing a bullet, this was a positive step forward. How long it took for the doctor to come, Dane couldn't say. The man talked to him, explaining how lucky he was, asking if he wanted his family to know he was awake again. Other things that didn't seem to matter. The only thing that Dane could really get out of the explanation was that, aside from a broken leg and some neck problems, he was in surprisingly good shape. He didn't feel it. Drugs were administered; Dane slid back into sleep. When he awoke again, he felt groggy and discombobulated. Harmony showed up after some time awake, which cheered him enough that he even smiled when she walked in. "What's going on?" he asked. "I feel like I've gone through a columbine." Harmony nodded, though she looked distracted. This helped sober him enough to be able to ask, "What's wrong?" Harmony shook her head, then said, "Did you find it? After all we did, did you find it?" The blanks of his memory filled as he spoke, relating to Harmony all that he could recall about finding the SD card and showing his mother the video. "We were watching and then…" He trailed off. Eyes widening, he looked at her with a sudden panic. "Did I…did I kill someone?" Harmony swallowed hard, then bobbed her head. "Oh, no." "Sheriff Madsen." Dane closed his eyes. This was bad on a lot of levels, not the least of which was that he had likely committed vehicular manslaughter. That it was his girlfriend's--rather, his ex-girlfriend's--father was horrible, too. And, though it was only a suspicion, there was enough circumstantial evidence for him to think that maybe Paul had been a part of the conspiracy to kill Dane's father. If that were true, then this would seem even less like an accident and more like revenge. His heart sank. The pain in his body seemed nothing compared to the worry of his soul. Everything seemed to be falling apart, endlessly moving from one tragedy to the next. How could he fix this? What could he do? "There's more," said Harmony. He opened his eyes and looked at her. "You've been in a coma for about a week." She paused, then gave him a slight smile. "On the bright side, you missed Thanksgiving." He snorted. "Yeah, could you imagine if you went to Thanksgiving and had to put up with your crazy uncle, except that he was now your father, too? That would've been awkward." Harmony smiled, but the reaction melted soon. Sitting on the hard chair near his bed, she said, "I've been visiting as often as I could, but things are escalating with Northern Way Ranch." "What?" he asked, sitting up--and wincing as he did so. Harmony briefly sketched the problems she was seeing with regards to the land acquisitions. "And," she said as she finished up, "George and Ryan have been making a power play." She hesitated, then glanced at the door as if to double check that no one was eavesdropping. "They have been, I think, passing on information from Northern Way Ranch to Clawson." "They're, what…spies?" Harmony nodded. "Essentially. I poked around--hooray for my Millennial google-powers--and found out that they had been getting into trouble at NWR for a while now, mostly health-related." "Health-related?" She waved her hand. "They were part of the turkey farm. Doing a bad job of keeping the place clean, something like that. The point is, I think they're trying to get into Clawson's good graces by dishing information about NWR, which in turn is strengthening his hand when it comes to this land deal. The whole thing is fishy--and crazy complicated--but it also makes a lot of sense, doesn't it?" Dane thought for a long moment. "Yeah," he said, his voice distracted. "Yeah, it does." She shook her head as if to clear it. "We're getting distracted. What about the video? Did you upload it or anything?" Dane opened his mouth, then closed it. "I…I didn't. I mean, there are still gaps in my memory, but I don't think I did." He let loose a string of obscenities, then glanced at Harmony and apologized. "It's okay," she said. "It's just that…well, your phone was left in the car, which has been taken to the scrapyard already. I think that's gone now." "Dammit." A wave of frustration washed over him. What could he do now? Between the wreck and the loss of the evidence, he was back to square one. Although…"At least we know one thing that we didn't before." "What's that?" His voice was cold as he said, "Clawson did kill my father." Harmony opened her mouth, but stopped whatever it was she planned on saying when a tap came from the door. Without waiting for a response, the nurse pushed open the door. "There are a couple more people out here wanting to talk to you, Mr. Amleth, but you're limited to two visitors at a time." She gave him a professional smile. "Doctor's orders." "Right," said Dane, shooting a glance at Harmony. She took the cue, patting him on the hand and saying, "I'll come back later." Dane nodded, which Harmony understood as a goodbye and the nurse interpreted as permission to send in the next guests. Dane sipped the tepid water from the jug on the food tray, grimacing at the heavy plastic taste the long bendy-straw left in his mouth. It wasn't the greatest of indignities being in the hospital entailed. Not at all to his surprise, Ryan Stern and George Cranston walked in. Both had smiles that, Dane assumed, they thought were genuine, but he could see something conniving in them. Or perhaps he just imagined it. "How ya doing, friend?" asked Ryan, his pale face accented by the brightness of his red-tipped ears. "We heard you were doing better." "Oh, you know," said Dane, raising his hands as if to indicate Look at me, stupid; how do you think I'm doing? "Time heals all wounds and other clichés of that nature." George glanced at Ryan and said, "Right." "What brings you to my prison, friends?" Ryan forced a laugh. "First you ask us why we're in hell, now we're in prison?" "I'm not at liberty to leave. How else would I look at it?" "Fair enough," said George, sitting down where Harmony had sat a minute before. "We're here, though, to deliver a message." It was only then that Dane noticed Ryan's position by the door--it was almost as if he were standing guard, his back almost touching the handle. Like he didn't want anyone interrupting. "You've always been a good messenger boy," said Dane, clicking his eyes back to George. "Good at the reports, I've heard. Unless they're about health, of course." The subtle jab wasn't lost on either of them, and George's body language shifted from a relaxed air to a more aggressive one as he leaned forward. Whatever wisps of a smile had been on his face when he sat were gone now. "Your father's not very happy with you." "Oh, you commune with the dead now, do you? Did you bring your Ouija board with you on this 'unexpected trip' out to Elsinore Ranch?" "You know what I mean," said George, his face drawing down into a frustrated frown. "Clawson is pissed." "Well, he should drink less; it'd be better for his liver anyway." "That's not--" George cut himself off, took a deep breath, then said in a low, insistent voice. "You're meddling, Dane. You wrecked his car--" "--not actually his, you know--" "--and you injured Jenny," George said, ignoring the interruption. "You've been snooping in his office. These things…well, they'll have repercussions." "Oh, glorious," said Dane rolling his eyes. "Vague threats. I'm feeling very intimidated right now." "Oh, please," said Ryan from the door, one hand tightly squeezing his other, the ropes of his veins visible on his bare forearms. "You can't even move. If something were to happen to you…" Dane actually barked a laugh, though the action was painful from a number of places. "Please. This isn't a movie. You're not a Mafioso. You can't do anything to me here." "You won't be here long," said George. "But it isn't your injuries that we're here about." "Oh?" "It's your mother's." Dane didn't have a sarcastic reply to that. Guilt clawed at him for what he'd done--and for what he'd said to her. It was not his best moment, he readily admitted. Nevertheless, he still felt justified for being upset at her decision to marry her own husband's murderer. Of course, that proof was gone now. That did make the next step tricky. "This comes from Clawson directly," said Ryan, pulling Dane's thoughts back to the matter at hand. "If she dies," and George pointed past Dane, signaling that Jenny Amleth was nearby, "you die." Dane chewed on that for a moment. "Well, friends, it's nice to know that we finally cut through all of your bullshit and can talk openly. If nothing else, that's a nice change of pace." "You dumbass," said Ryan. "Don't you know that you're in the worst possible position? You can't do anything, and Clawson isn't the kind of guy you can piss off and walk away from him." "Thank you, Ryan," said Dane with mock enthusiasm. "I'm going to file that away under More Things Ryan Stern Doesn't Know Jack About." Ryan took an aggressive step toward the bedridden man, but George held out a hand. "Look, Dane: We're here because we care." Dane snorted. "We do. We're your friends." The word that he'd intuited when they'd first arrived, when he'd indulged his suspicious itch, came back to mind: Spies. "And," continued George in a measured, if strained, voice, "as your friends, we're only looking out for you." "Are you now?" "Yes," said George. He reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out his phone. He turned it on, tapped in a four-digit code, scrolled about for a moment, then handed the device to Dane. "See? We've always been like this." It was a picture of the three of them, from their time in high school, during a fishing trip up the creek. They all stood together, arms around each other's shoulders, grinning manically. George wore ridiculously short shorts, while Ryan had on a wet suit and Dane a typical pair of swimming trunks. They were standing in the river, which only came up to their shins. Dane remembered that day. It had been a good one, filled with jokes, lies designed to impress the others, and essentially no fish. A perfect example of what they had. "And now you come to threaten me," he said, setting the phone on the side of the bed away from George. "You come into my hospital room, with me barely being out of a coma, and you tell me that my uncle is more important to you than I am." "No, I--" "Get out," said Dane, barking sharply. He hit the nurse button with a thumb. "Get out! Keep your forked tongues in your heads and get out of my life!" The nurse tried to enter, but Ryan was there. "Excuse me!" she said, her voice muffled by the door. George looked up at her, and Dane took the distraction to slide the man's phone beneath a fold of sheets. "Sir, I need you to move." "Remember what we said." Ryan's dramatic effect was ruined by the fact that the nurse pushed harder on the door and knocked him forward a step. He moved out of the way and, under the glares of the nurse, made an exit. George followed after him. "What can I help you with?" asked the nurse as the door swung shut behind her. "I'm really tired. Can you keep anyone from visiting for a while?" "Yes, yes. Of course." She smiled. "Anything else?" He shook his head. "That should be fine." "Okay." She retreated, closing the door quietly, and Dane pulled out George's phone. He had watched carefully when George had tapped it in--the code was a simple 2-2-4-6 combination, which let Dane into his former friend's phone. The picture of the three of them was still on the screen. Dane dismissed it with a press of the home button. He fired up the email app, then searched for emails from Clawson. Over a dozen of them popped up. Without bothering to read any, he forwarded each of them to Tim Brahns. He then closed the app and set the phone on the side of the bed. Closing his eyes, he willed his mind to settle down. If they were willing to betray their friendship to Dane by being stooges for Clawson, it was nowhere near his conscience if they ended up reaping the rewards of their treachery. Slowly, painfully, Dane managed to fall back asleep. |