Wright & Wrong

by W. Glenn Duncan Jr.

“Protestors? Hells bells, Rafferty.” Hayells-bayells. “You gone and got yoreself mixed up with god-botherers again? What is it ’bout you and god-botherers? I ain’t never seen a man—”

  “They’re not god-botherers, Cowboy,” I said. “Well, maybe some of them are … anyway, it doesn’t matter. Besides, it’s not me. I don’t go looking for them.”

  “If’n you say so. Alls I know is I’ve seen more religious loonies while working with you than anywhere else in my li—”

  “You interested or not?”

  “Shore,” he said. “Think it needs Meems, too?”

  “I’m not sure what it needs, yet. We’ll see how things pan out. Mimi can come up later if we need her.”

  “Thass no problem. She migh’ need a coupla days’ notice so’s she can get Adam over to her sister’s, but I’m shore it’d be fahn.”

  “Okay. Tomorrow morning?”

  “Yep. Your place?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Need transport? I can boost a truck.”

  “Nah, bring your own wheels this time. I want to stay clean with DPD.”

  “Hmmph. Protestors. Actin’ legal. I purely am worried about you goin’ soft, boss-man.”

  “Take a number.”

  I would have liked to keep shooting the shit with Cowboy, but it was time to get moving.

  I needed a beer.

  Chapter 18

  Seven a.m. Thursday, Cowboy’s truck squeaked to a stop in my driveway, the big whip antenna swaying back and forth.

  I was sitting on the front porch filling my system with the requisite caffeine and nicotine to start the day right.

  “Howdy, boss-man,” Cowboy drawled from the truck. “What happened to the pony?” He nodded at the Pacer sitting serenely by the curb.

  I shrugged. “I accidentally put it in the dryer and it shrunk.”

  “Ah yuh. Well, we need to chase us any jaywalkers in Highland Park, you’ll be set and ready.”

  “Yuk, yuk.” I shook my head. “You want coffee?”

  “Naw,” he said. “Let’s git ’er done.”

  “Yeah.” As Cowboy wheeled back out into the street, I bashed my pipe out into the flowerbed, locked the house, and slipped into the Pacer. It started on the first twist of the key and I found I could live with that. I pulled out and started leading the way to the Wrights.

  About halfway to the motel I started thinking about what we were doing and began looking for a tail. There was almost zero chance that anyone who wanted to get to Charlene would try it through me. Not that I thought I was that good; I just couldn’t see a way anyone could figure I was involved, though after Paul’s comments a day earlier, I’d started to get a new appreciation for just how effective the Dallas grapevine was.

  Couldn’t see any vehicles that looked like they may have been following us, but made a couple of loops around various blocks in case. Pulled over and rummaged in the glove box while Cowboy drove past, in case a car had locked onto him. After I didn’t see anything to be worried about, I retook the lead and Cowboy dropped farther back, giving more space for anyone to show themselves.

  No-one did. I found it strangely disappointing; I wanted something, anything, to happen, but in the absence of that at least it felt good to be in motion.

  Pulled into the motel parking lot and reversed as close to the room as possible. Watched Cowboy park on the other side of Harry Hines Boulevard with a clear view in both directions. He’d be ready to high-tail it into the parking lot if I needed help, or to remove anyone who tried to chase us as we left. Again, I figured it low odds that any of the sign-waving populace from the Charlene’s front yard were going to cause us major troubles but, like the Boy Scouts say, it never hurt to be prepared.

  And carrying weapons.

  Ray was ready to go, but it took Charlene twenty minutes to get organized. She was lethargic, absentminded.

  Finally, she was ready and they squeezed into the back seat of the Pacer while I stood near the front fender, the .38 in my right hand and out of sight. Cowboy’s head swiveled with the morning traffic. All was quiet.

  No trouble on the drive to the Wright house, contentment starting to overtake my disappointment, but I wasn’t ready for it to take root. This wouldn’t be like coming home after a quick shopping run to Piggly Wiggly.

  “Pull that blanket up over both of you,” I said over my shoulder, “and whatever you do, keep your heads down.”

  “What are you going to do?” Ray asked.

  “Need to check out the house, make sure those folks on your front yard haven’t been helping themselves to your liquor cabinet. You two are gonna stay in the car until I come back and get you. Understood?”

  “Yep.” Nothing from Charlene, but in the rearview mirror I saw her pulling the blanket up over her head. At least she was listening.

  Turned the corner, gunning it—such as was possible—as we approached the property line to arrive with some element of surprise, lurching to a stop on the driveway an inch and a half shy of the garage door.

  I was out, stepping toward the porch, watching the protestors gather their collective courage and moving to intercept me. I showed them the .38 and they slowed.

  They didn’t stop, however, so I angled away from the house to meet them in the middle of the lawn.

  “There she is!” shouted a skinny guy in the second row, pointing over my shoulder, at about the same time I heard the car door squeak open.

  Turned in time to see Charlene wriggling her way out of the back seat with Ray trying to grab her arm. “Charlene. No!” I yelled, causing her to turn away from the car and stare at me—and presumably the crowd behind—with wide eyes.

  We all held that scene for a couple of breaths, then she flicked her head toward the front door and I knew it was too late. I shouted at Ray. “For god’s sake, catch her and don’t let her get in the house. I’m coming.”

  He was having trouble getting past the stupid fold-down seat and out of the car, but the part of my back between the shoulder blades started itching, so I ignored him, turned around, stepped back and brought up the .38.

  The crowd hadn’t started to press forward yet, but it wouldn’t take much and, once they did, I wasn’t sure I’d be able to get them stopped again.

  “Okay, hold it right there, everybody.”

  Took a cautious step backwards, feeling for the lawn.

  “We are all going to calm down right now. Got it?”

  Heard Charlene’s sandals slapping on the concrete path. Listened for Ray’s heavier steps. He was out and running. Couldn’t be far behind her. I just needed to keep these turkeys under control until the three of us could meet on the porch, and we could at least sweep the house together.

  Wasn’t a great plan, but it was all I had.

  Swung the gun back and forth on the crowd, shouted over my shoulder. “Do not let her get in the house. You hear me, Ray?”

  Took another step backwards.

  “Uhh, Rafferty …”

  “I don’t want to hear it, Ray. Just do not let her get inside the house.”

  “Uhh …”

  Two or three steps more and I’d be on the path, then I could move sideways to the base of the porch stairs and this would almost be over.

  And then a voice I didn’t recognize growled, “I’ve been waiting all week for this.”

  I pivoted, bringing the gun up as I did, trying to work out what to aim at and whether I should be turning my back on the people I’d just been pointing a gun at.

  Ray was about halfway along the path from the driveway, looking at me, then at the bottom of the porch steps where his sister was being held by a bearded man with wild eyes.

  His arm draped over her left shoulder, across her chest, palm resting against her ribs under her right breast. It could have been a lover’s embrace.

  The Smith & Wesson he pressed to her right temple said different.

  Charlene blinked staccato at me and Ray continued his head-swiveling approach to the situatio
n.

  “Easy there, buddy,” I said. I ticked the .38 up a notch, focused it on the end of his bulbous nose to make sure he could hear me.

  “Don’t fucking tell me to take it easy, man! You have any idea what her kid did? Do you?”

  I felt like the contestant on a game show where any answer I gave would be wrong. Instead of answering, I settled my feet a bit firmer on the driveway, gripped the pistol a little tighter and shut the hell up.

  “He killed my angel! That’s what he did! He took her away, and he won’t be around to pay for what he done.” Beard pushed the S&W’s muzzle harder into Charlene’s temple. She tried to tilt her head away from the pressure. He tensed his arm, holding her in position. “So don’t tell me to … Take. It. Easy.”

  My mouth was dry. Ray was still doing his tennis-spectator impersonation in my peripheral vision. What worried me more was what the folks on the front lawn behind me were up to. I didn’t think they could conjure up a backbone between them, but all it would take is one weekend warrior with a twitch in his trigger finger and this could turn to shit real quick.

  I heard one of the news van doors creak open and a few raised voices. Just what we needed: Live coverage from our team on the scene.

  “Why’n’t you tell me why I shouldn blow Momma’s head off right now. Huh?” Beard said. Charlene closed her eyes and started to slump. I wasn’t sure if Beard would notice the extra weight, but I didn’t want anything to rattle him further right now.

  So I started talking.

  “What’s that gonna solve?” I said. “It won’t bring your girl back. You know that.” Christ, I hated this shit. “It’s not gonna help anything. You kill her, I kill you. More dead people. That’s all.”

  That’s all? As lines go, that one sucked like an industrial vacuum cleaner. No wonder I hadn’t gone into hostage negotiation when I was on the force. Do you feel lucky? That’s more my style. Still, this turkey didn’t deserve to die. He was having a shitty day and needed to take it out on someone else.

  But it wasn’t gonna be my client.

  “So what? I don’t care anymore, man,” Beard said. “She was my everything. My whole world.”

  I couldn’t stop myself from asking. “What’s her name? Your girl.”

  “Her name was Rebecca, man.” His eyes flashed and I knew I’d fucked it up. “And she’s never coming back. Because of what her son did. And now she—”

  I didn’t hear any more, I’d started to move by then. Knew he was gonna do it, the only hope I had was to get moving towards him and draw his fire before he put a bullet through Charlene’s brain.

  I got two steps, Beard started to move his gun arm toward me, I wished I’d put the bullet-proof vest on this morning but I hadn’t thought there’d be a need for it and could I get a shot past Charlene without hitting her and there wasn’t a lot of Beard to aim at and now that I was running my aim would be off and what if my first shot missed and I wished I had the Colt instead of this pissy little .38 and … and then Cowboy stepped lightly out from behind the corner of the house and placed the muzzle of his shotgun at the base of Beard’s neck.

  “When the boss-man tells you to take it easy, pardner, best you take his advice.”

  After we got Beard disarmed and Charlene and Ray inside, I started a pipe to shut my nerves up. I stood on the porch and glared at the protestors now reassembled on their patch near the curb. All the cameras were out now and there was lots of focus towards the house, trying to get a shot through the foliage of Beard who sat, legs crossed, with his hands behind him, cable-tied to a porch post. His head was down and other than the drips of tears landing on his lap, he might have been taking a nap.

  Cowboy eased against the porch railing beside me.

  “Missus Wright’s layin’ down,” he said. “She found some Valium, so I ’spect she’ll be out for a while.” I nodded. “What we gonna do with him?” He jerked his chin at Beard.

  I wasn’t ready to deal with that yet. I was still coming down from either being shot or shooting a man who’d done nothing more than been gripped by a tragedy he had no control over.

  I wasn’t sure which was worse. Continuing to think about both didn’t seem to have a lot going for it either.

  “He’s not going anywhere for a while,” I said. “May as well do something useful. Move your truck into the driveway and unload. We’ll swap cars around later.”

  “Shore.”

  I leaned on the railing. Watched the protestors and camera guys watch Cowboy as he humped his stuff into the house. No reason at all for him to take his guns out of their cases before carrying them across the yard, but the effect on the assembled multitude was fun to watch.

  If only they’d seen the toys he left in their bags.

  On the third trip back to the truck, I said. “Hey. Thanks.”

  “What the heck for? Woulda bin here las’ week if’n I’d known it were gonna be this much fun.”

  Chapter 19

  The sun had set but the sky glowed clear in the west.

  Charlene was still sleeping, and I think Ray was inspecting the bottom of a Scotch glass when Cowboy and I had a little heart to heart with the would-be retributor.

  His name was Gibbons, Frank Gibbons, and he wasn’t a bad guy. He had a fair right to be pissed off with the world after being told his daughter was one of the first killed, in the hallway slaughterhouse.

  Still, motivations aside, anyone who holds a gun on me or my clients has some explaining to do.

  Cowboy slashed him free from the cable ties and the three of us sat on lawn chairs I’d found in the yard shed. If we’d had beers and a grill going it could have been Memorial Day weekend and we would have been jawing about who we liked in tomorrow’s game.

  Instead, Cowboy and I had Frank backed into a corner of the porch. I tapped Frank’s S&W against my thigh, in case he suffered any sudden memory loss about what was going on. Cowboy sat a couple of feet behind my left shoulder and grinned as he sharpened his hunting knife on a leather strop.

  Frank’s eyes were really interested in that knife.

  “Now then, Frank,” I said. “I’ve got a problem here. Maybe you can help.” Frank’s eyes flicked to me for a second, then back to Cowboy’s handiwork.

  “Yoo hoo … Frankie.” I snapped my fingers in front of his eyes and he flinched. “Over here.” Looked back at me. “That’s better,” I said. “You should know it displeases me greatly when someone ignores me while I’m talking.” I had his attention now and his eyes trembled as he stopped himself from looking toward Cowboy. The hiss of the blade on leather was captivating, I had to give him that.

  “What are we gonna do with you, Frankie, old boy?” He blinked and his head shook. “My colleague here thinks we should take you on a little one-way ride out to Lake Ray Hubbard.” That got his attention. I shrugged to show him that I didn’t care one way or the other.

  “Whaaa …?”

  “You said it yourself. You don’t care. Be a bunch easier if it all came to an end, wouldn’t it? Might even be doing you a favor.”

  Frank shook his head so quickly I thought it might come spinning off. “Noooo,” he started.

  “Of course, there’s also the matter of you holding a gun to the head of a friend of mine, not to mention looking a bunch like you were gonna shoot me, too. Gotta be honest, acting like that doesn’t make me want to keep you on my Christmas card list.”

  His mouth opened and closed several times.

  “Something you want to say there Frankie?” I said. “’Cause now would be a good time.” I leaned back in the chair and disinterestedly thumbed the hammer on the pistol. Wondered if I was overdoing it but Frank took it right to heart.

  “I … I … I’m sorry,” he blurted. “I didn’t want to hurt anyone. Really, I didn’t. It just hurts so …” He reached up—Cowboy’s knife ministrations stopping in time—to press his thumb and forefinger against his eyes. His nails were dirty and ragged. “So much.” He lowered his head.


  “If we let you go,” I said, “you gonna try this shit again?”

  “Nope,” he said, shaking his head. “No way.”

  “Okay.” I blew out a breath. “I don’t care what you do: get drunk, get laid, get in your car and drive to Alaska, whatever, but we …” I flicked my thumb between me and Cowboy. “will be here, waiting, and if either of us sees your ugly mug again, we will shoot first and ask questions later. Got that?”

  He looked up at me, half as large as when he was holding the gun and my client.

  “Yes,” he whispered.

  “What? I didn’t catch that.”

  He sat up and exhaled a big breath. “Yeah. I got it.”

  “Okay then. Piss off.”

  I stood and moved my chair to let him through. He stood, crossed to the stairs, and started down. Two steps from the bottom he paused a couple of seconds, shook his head, jammed his hands in his pockets and headed across the lawn. The crowd swirled around him and he ignored them all, walked down the street. Two reporters and camera crew bustled out of the news vans and surrounded him, jabbing microphones and fill lights at him as he walked. The caravan continued like that for forty yards, until he stopped at an old Pontiac, pushed one of the camera guys out of the way so he could get in, and drove away.

  We watched the taillights disappear around the corner at the end of block.

  Rafferty’s Rule Forty: Any day you can end without getting shot is a good one.

  The last vestiges of penumbra leaked out of the sky and we went inside.

  With our interrupted arrival at Casa Wright and no chance to grab supplies, there wasn’t much in the way of food in the house so Cowboy went out to pick up burgers and beer. I sat on the porch with the light on, my feet on the railing and the shotgun across my lap while the curbside gathering eyed me eyeing them. I wasn’t ready to let go of the thought there might be another Frank Gibbons in their midst.

  They were a weird mob. Their outrage was palpable, and righteous indignation followed every step but no-one had yet made a move toward the backyard. Wasn’t sure whether that was a conscious decision to honor the sacred private space of a homeowner, or an understandable fear that Cowboy might be waiting back there with a Bowie knife.