were coming up empty. Then, with a disappointed, if silent, curse it fell into place. I looked at the land ahead.
“Guys, we need to proceed very carefully. Let me scout ahead. I can keep out of sight if I go by myself. If we have to stay as a group we could stumble on something we don’t want to stumble on. We have to see what we are getting into without being spotted.”
They all looked at me as if I was nuts. They weren’t going to let me go out there alone.
“Jacobsen? You can hold onto my gun if you want to. I’m just looking.”
He started to object.
“Landon, tell him I know how to stay out of sight. Tell him how it took a whole team hours to find me when Trent was after me. I could lose the whole lot of you in five minutes if I wanted to.”
“Cassidy, you’re serious, aren’t you?” Landon asked.
“One person can sometimes do what six people can’t. I know what I’m looking for. I’ve seen it before. I’ve observed it and kept out of sight before. I’ve dealt with the people before. We are close. We are close enough to smell it. Give me ten minutes.”
“Michaels wouldn’t give you two,” Kent Jacobsen said.
“He knows I can do it though. Who else thinks they can do it? Who knows what we are looking for? Who can stay out of sight, not leave a track and not make a sound? Anybody?”
They all thought they could stay out of sight but I knew I had them when it came to staying quiet. Tracking with them was like tracking with a herd of elephants behind me. Not one of them would bother hiding their tracks.
I shed my pack and started removing my pistol but Jacobsen shook his head. I took that as permission to use it if I needed to. I took off my boots, then turned and got a bearing on the trail. Heading quickly in the same direction the footprints led, I ducked into the trees and within a few steps I was invisible to the men behind me. I went into stealth mode hiding my tracks and creeping up to some unknown danger before me. I knew what I was looking for. I’d been in this situation before and was looking for cabins, or small buildings hidden by trees. I was looking for a field of marijuana plants, keeping a sharp eye out for movement of any kind.
Ten minutes wasn’t much time to scope out a drug lab. My main goal was to locate people. I needed to find our suspect.
I crouched low making myself small, and continued forward hiding from view, hiding my tracks. It all felt so natural. Like stalking deer except I was stalking people; unknown, unknowing people.
The field was just as I had remembered, and I was glad it confirmed the niggling in my head. I wasn’t imagining things and really had identified the smell correctly. Circling the small compound, I could identify two people at the site and made mental notes about their locations. I made sure to remember what each person looked like, cataloging their features like a list so I could recite it back if needed. Not liking what the guys would be walking into, I was careful to take special note of exactly where things were, to provide them with as much information as possible. Then I slipped silently back into the woods and circled around to my nervous team. I made sure I came back to the group silently and gently appeared beside them without startling anyone. It’s not wise to surprise a wary group of cops. They were all anxiously looking down the trail I’d taken until I stepped out of the brush beside them as if I’d been standing there all along.
Removing the sketchbook from my pack, I quickly made a map.
“Okay, listen up and listen fast. Here we are.” I drew an X. “If you go the direction you saw me head you will come to a field of cannabis. There’s a small building, almost a shed, on the far side of it. When I was there our suspect was standing just inside this building. Another man was over here.” I said drawing another X. “Short guy. Short black hair, very dark complexion, baggy oversized blue jeans, white muscle shirt. Tattoos. I only saw the two men. Of course they may have moved some since I was over there. I don’t like the looks of this. If we get one man the other will escape. We don’t have enough firepower to get both. I’m leaving the rest up to you. They are probably armed. They were last time I dealt with a group like this.”
“When did you deal with a group like this before?” Landon asked.
“When I tracked Kelly Green. I ran into a compound bigger than this one. This is a small operation, but it doesn’t mean it’s safer. I don’t like it. It’s going to take more than the six of us to get both these guys.”
“You’ve done your part, Cassidy. You’ve done more than you should. Michaels is going to lynch the whole lot of us when we get back.”
I sat down by my pack and started putting on my boots. The guys went into a huddle. I heard radio talk. We waited, the tension growing.
Jacobsen approached and watched me for a bit while I finished tying my boots. He then sat down on the ground beside me.
“How far is it to the fields?”
“Maybe a hundred yards. The field’s maybe a quarter acre. The building is on the far side.”
“Find a place where you can stay out of sight.”
“I can stay out of sight within six feet of these guys.”
“You know what I mean. I don’t want you in on the raid. I’m in deep enough as it is.”
“You didn’t do anything wrong. I’ll write up the report and I’ll tell the truth. I really did fire my weapon without permission. You won’t catch any flack because of me.”
“It’s not Schroeder I’m worried about.”
It was Rusty.
I heard a helicopter off in the distance and was relieved that the guys would have backup. Four officers wouldn’t have been able to surround that field and someone would have gotten away. I saw them spread out, covering the near side of the field in case the helicopter scared the suspects this way. They closed in.
“I’m going to try and get you a lift out with the copter. You scared of heights? Will you ride a cable up?”
“If I have to. And, no, I’m not afraid of heights. I’ve done the cable thing before.”
The helicopter clattered in closer. Jacobsen called the helicopter pilot over the radio and got me a lift. I started walking toward the helicopter, giving the compound a wide berth, stalking around it in stealth mode. The officers came rappelling down cables, unclipping their harnesses and fanning out to surround the field. One of the first down tossed me a harness and I worked my way into it. A cable was handed off to me and I clipped on grasping it tightly. Half of me was disappointed to be left out and the other half was relieved to be free of it. The place was going to turn into a war zone. I’d have been okay down there and would have done my job, but I could only get into trouble by staying and so far trouble had been nice to me lately. No sense in tempting it. When the cable reached the top I grabbed the handle and pulled myself to a place where I was able to stand. Unclipping the cable I let it go, then found a bench and made myself comfortable. I didn’t know where the helicopter was going, but I was sure it would be a quieter place than the one I had just left.
Tension filled my little niche in the helicopter as the realization of what I had just done began to expand, filling my head, starting the old memories and emotions to churning.
The
