Sucked Up

Late in the afternoon of Sunday, May 22, 2011, a Category Five tornado touches Earth west of Joplin, Missouri, and rips twenty-two miles easterly through the town. It kills 162 people and does two point two billion dollars worth of damage. Thirty-nine-year-old Brad Carson rides his motorcycle east of town. He sees the funnel cloud coming his way and tries to reach the safety of a highway overpass. After the tornado passes a resident finds Brad's Harley-Davidson in his front yard near...
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Late in the afternoon of Sunday, May 22, 2011, a Category Five tornado touches Earth west of Joplin, Missouri, and rips twenty-two miles easterly through the town. It kills 162 people and does two point two billion dollars worth of damage. Thirty-nine-year-old Brad Carson rides his motorcycle east of town. He sees the funnel cloud coming his way and tries to reach the safety of a highway overpass. After the tornado passes a resident finds Brad's Harley-Davidson in his front yard near the highway. The headlight is on and the bike is in gear. Brad is nowhere around. A week later 156 people remain unaccounted for including Brad Carson. A month after the tornado all missing persons are accounted for except for Brad Carson. Chad Carson, Brad's twin brother and sole beneficiary, files a claim for two million dollars in life insurance, but the company wants proof of death. Rather than risk negative public relations, it negotiates a monthly payment settlement with Chad and sends private investigator Dan Ballantine to Joplin. Dan learns Chad has a rich and reclusive uncle, Martin Weaver, living on eight forested acres in northeastern Oklahoma and suspects Brad may be hiding there. When Dan visits the property, he spots and tests an infrared security system screwed to the fence. Soon somebody in the trees unloads a pump shotgun loaded with nine rounds of double-aught buckshot at him. Dan manages to escape. When he returns to the house later that day, he discovers a vehicle recently left and nobody is home. With Pearl the Girl's hacking help, Dan gets a description of Weaver's vehicle and tracks him to find out why the man tried to kill him.