Chapter 67 - The Ambush on Route 201
We left the cabin by 4:45 AM.
The snow was coming down harder now, laying a treacherous three-inch blanket of slick slush across the logging road. Thomas sat in the back of the Explorer, his hands resting on the leather-bound 1904 ledger in his lap, staring out the window at the dark Maine woods he hadn't left since Ronald Reagan was in his first term.
"Arthur has spotters," Thomas said calmly as Ross navigated the slick curves of Route 201 south toward Skowhegan. "He pays a deputy in Somerset County fifty dollars a month just to let him know if anyone asks about the 1985 fire records."
"Ross checked those records through federal channels," I said, glancing in the rearview mirror. "Arthur doesn't know we're here."
"Arthur has been stealing land for fifty years, Marcus," Thomas replied, not turning his head. "He didn't survive this long by trusting government clerks to keep their mouths shut."
Ten miles north of Solon, the two-lane highway dipped into a long, dark valley flanked by steep pine ridges. There was no cell service. The GPS map on my phone was spinning, searching for a tower signal that wasn't there.
Behind us, two sets of halogen headlights crested the ridge.
Ross watched his rearview mirror. "Vehicle approaching fast. Too fast for these conditions."
"Is it a state cruiser?" I asked, turning in my seat.
"No," Ross said, his voice instantly tightening. "Black Chevy Silverado. Heavy-duty brush guard. No front plate."
The truck surged forward, closing the fifty-yard gap between us in seconds. Its high beams flared, blinding our mirrors in harsh white glare.
"Hold on," Ross commanded, shifting the transmission into manual mode and downshifting to third.
The Silverado didn't try to pass. It slammed into our rear bumper with a sickening metallic crunch that threw us forward against our seatbelts.
The Explorer fishtailed on the ice, tires screaming as Ross fought the wheel to keep us from careening into the ditch.
"Federal marshals don't ram government vehicles," Thomas said from the back seat, his voice eerily steady. He didn't drop the ledger. He braced his boots against the front console. "That’s Arthur’s timber crew from the Kennebec yard."
The Silverado pulled up alongside our driver’s side. The passenger window rolled down, and a man in a black knit cap leaned out, holding an iron tire thumper, gesturing violently for Ross to run off the shoulder.
"Ross!" I yelled. "He's going to pit us into the guardrail!"
"Not today," Ross growled.
Instead of braking, Ross tapped the throttle, matched the truck’s momentum, and cut the steering wheel sharply into the Silverado's front quarter panel.
Steel screamed against steel. Sparks sprayed across the frozen asphalt like fireworks.
The impact knocked the heavier pickup off balance. The Silverado’s rear tires hit an ice patch on the shoulder. It spun ninety degrees across the road, slammed sideways into an ancient granite mile-marker, and rolled into the shallow ditch, steam hissing violently from its ruptured radiator.
Ross didn't slow down. He accelerated past the wreck, his knuckles white on the steering wheel, his breath coming in short, sharp bursts.
"Are you hit?" I asked, checking my own ribs where the belt had cut in.
"Suspension's pulling right, but the axle held," Ross said, checking his mirrors. "They weren't trying to kill us. They were trying to keep us north of Augusta until two-thirty."
I looked at the dashboard clock.
5:30 AM.
Nine hours until Judge Garcetti banged her gavel in Courtroom 4B.
"They just committed an assault on a federal officer," Ross said, picking up his satellite radio receiver. "Arthur Vance-Pemberton just signed his own arrest warrant."
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"Only if we make it to Boston with that ledger," Thomas said quietly from the back. "Step on the gas, Agent Ross. My brother waited twenty-five years for this morning. I'm not going to be late."
***
