Hidden Palms

by Harry Bryant

  Hack hadn't been trying to shake off an imaginary dog. He had an ankle holster, and he had been trying to get away from the gun strapped to his leg. The ammunition had cooked off, and it had done what it was supposed to do. Unfortunately his foot had been in the way.

  Before I could more than shake my head at the universe's gruesome sense of humor, I heard a woman's scream.

  My gaze snapped up to the old shack.

  The front door. That sagging mouth.

  It hadn't been open before . . .

  CHAPTER 27

  At some point during my first conversation with Natalie, she had told the story about El Illustro's first year on this land—back when the world was new and dinosaurs still roamed the middle part of the continent. He had built a house for himself, and spent a year inside meditating or cogitating or masturbating—or whatever the coy term was for sitting in a shack by yourself for a year. Trying to see through your navel, or line up your chakras, or learn how to breathe through your pores. The sort of people who voluntarily remove themselves so as to "search for inner awakening" are full of it, frankly. They've never spent any time in real isolation. A week in solitary at CCI—hell, a weekend—was more than enough alone time for any human being.

  Up here, in the woods, by yourself for a year? That's pure crazy. If you weren't when you started, you would be by the end.

  The shack looked like it was an early project by a self-taught isolationist, and not in a good way. The walls leaned in, and the roof sagged along the front. There had been an attempt to build a porch, but the idea hadn't stuck around for more than a weekend. There were two windows in front, one on either side of the front door, and they were different sizes. The frame of the front door wasn't level, and as a result, the door hung crookedly.

  It also made a lot of noise.

  I backed up a step as soon as the door started its wretched groan. So much for sneaking up on whoever was inside. I crouched next to the uneven steps and waited for something to happen.

  The door reached the end of its swing, and then started back. I waited until it was done. "Anyone home?" I called out.

  I didn't get any immediate reply, but when I dared to peek inside the shack, a gun flashed. The bullet whizzed by my head.

  "I take it that's a no," I said.

  "Run away, Mr. Bliss," Wilson shouted. "I'll kill the girl if you come any closer."

  "You're going to kill her anyway," I pointed out.

  Wilson didn't bother to argue otherwise. We were at an impasse. I wasn't going anywhere, and there was only one way into the shack. Could I afford to wait him out?

  The fire at the well was spreading to nearby grass. That was going to be another problem in a little while. I spotted a dancing light among the trees, like a lantern.

  Like Terrance, coming back after hearing the gunshots.

  Well, three problems now.

  "Shit," I muttered, summarizing my feelings about this mess.

  "You've made me realize something, Mr. Bliss," Wilson said, drawing my attention back to the shack.

  "What's that?" I asked.

  "I am going to kill her anyway, so—"

  His sentence was punctuated by a gunshot.

  You know what you learn in solitary confinement? You don't learn how to be a better person. You don't learn forgiveness. You don't invent a personal system of body building that uses your entire skeletal structure as a resistance machine against gravity. What you learn is patience. Every second that passes is one you will never get back, but you don't freak out and go all bug-fuck nutty about how much of your life is slipping by—second by second. You learn to how to wait. You learn if you've waited a year, then a week means nothing. If you've waited a month, then a day is like taking a long nap. And if you've waited a second, you want to wait one more. And one more after that. And one more after that.

  And that's when I heard Wilson sigh.

  I didn't hear the sound of a body falling to the floor. Or the last breath escaping from lungs suddenly slack. I heard nothing that sounded like it had come from Dolly. I just heard Wilson exhale.

  And that's when I charged into the room.

  There was another window on the wall opposite the front door, and given the location of the front door and how it opened inward, I expected that the original arrangement of the living area would be split in half. Living area on the right; sleeping and eating and what-not on the left.

  If I was Wilson, I'd be on the left because that was where he'd get a second more to react.

  I got three steps inside and ran into a black iron stove that was in the exact center of the room. I flailed my arms and knocked out the chimney pipe that went from the stove to a hole in the roof.

  Wilson fired his gun, and the bullet whizzed by my head with an angry buzz. As I suspected, he was on my left. I dropped to the floor, hoping there was no other black furniture hiding in the murky and swampy darkness. He had been in the room longer than I, and his eyes had had more time to adjust. He would see me before I saw him.

  There was a thick area rug under me. I crept forward several inches, and was starting to get a sense of the various shades of darkness, when I put my hand down on something soft and cool. Like a woman's leg, but one that had been lying out in the rain for most of the night. Not like the leg of a woman who was reclining, nude, on a bearskin rug in front of a roaring fire.

  I jerked away, unwilling to face what a cold leg meant, and I backed into a fucking bell tree. Like one of those chains of mystical prayer bells hung on a thick cord near an altar. The ones you ring after you light a stick of incense and leave some paper money for the special godlings who watch over clumsy idiots or foolish women who insist on coming to the rescue of those same clumsy idiots.

  I'm ringing your damn bells, little godlings. Are you laughing at me now?

  I heard the distinct click of a hammer descending on a gun, and when nothing happened, I heard Wilson swear gently.

  I exploded off the floor, and promptly tripped over Wilson, who was closer than I thought.

  Wilson had been fussing with his gun, but he left off as soon as I got my hands on him. He tried to kick me, and I took a hit on the shoulder—the other one, thank you, little godlings in this crazy prophet's lean-to. I slipped under his leg and pushed it up. I was between his legs and I felt the fabric of his robe stretching beneath me. I banged around with my knees until I hit something soft, and he made a noise like a whoopee cushion.

  The butt of his gun bounced off my head, and I tucked my chin down as I grabbed leg and robe. He tried to hit me again as I picked him up.

  It's an old technique I learned from watching professional wrestling. Mr. Chow wouldn't have approved.

  If you do it right, it's flashy and makes a lot of noise, but no one really gets hurt.

  If you do it wrong, you will break something important in your opponent's neck.

  I really hoped I was doing it wrong.

  And I did it a couple of times to be sure.

  The second or third time I heard the gun hit the floor.

  Had Wilson shot Dolly? I hadn't been sure. If I had gone charging right in after he had fired his bullet in the dark, he would have put a bullet in me, fair and square. But I had waited, and he had sighed, and I thought maybe it had all been a ruse. That maybe he had just fired blindly into the wall of the shack.

  But I wasn't sure, and so I kept banging him against the floor until he stopped squirming.

  I dumped Wilson's body, and felt around for the gun. It had to be nearby. When I didn't find it right away, I wondered if it was under Wilson's body. I shoved it out of the way, and it was nothing more than a side of beef. Dead weight.

  I spotted the gun finally. It had bounced farther away than I had thought.

  And the reason I could see the gun was because Terrance was standing in the doorway of the shack, a lante
rn in his hand.

  He looked at me. I looked at him. We both looked at the gun.

  I got to it first.

  CHAPTER 28

  The night clerk at the hotel had his feet up on the desk. His book had bored him into sleep, and his head was down. I banged on the glass, and he spooked. He nearly fell out of the chair, and disoriented about being caught sleeping on the job, he hit the button that unlocked the front door before he really processed what was going on. And once I was inside the hotel lobby and he got a better look at me, all the sleepiness fled from his eyes.

  "Oh shit—" he started, and then he ducked to avoid getting hit by the coffee urn. It was mostly empty, and I was still running on adrenaline. I had picked the urn up and flung it without any concern for what or who I hit.

  Oh, I had had lots of time to keep my anger stoked during the drive back from Hidden Palms. Lots of time to get more and more pissed off. Lots of time to fit all the pieces into the puzzle.

  The coffee urn bounced off the counter, and took out the computer monitor on his desk. Stupidly, he popped his head up after a second, and I was right here. I grabbed his collar, hauled him up, hit him in the face a couple of times, and then hauled him over the counter and dumped him on the floor.

  "Wha—wha—what do you want?" he blubbered.

  I had Wilson's gun in my hand. There was one bullet left, chambered and ready.

  "I'm checking out," I said.

  "Oh, okay, okay. Just—you can just leave your key on the counter there," he said. The relief on his face was plain.

  "But I'm not leaving quite yet."

  "Oh." His face fell.

  "The first night I stayed here. You remember that?" I shook the gun, and he nodded furiously. "I said I was looking for a few things. Food. Drink. Drugs. Remember? And then I said I was going to get some girls, and that was when you got all nervous. I was just fucking with you then, but I'm not fucking with you now."

  "Okay," he whined.

  "You knew where I could get something to eat, didn't you?"

  He nodded.

  "And a drink, right?"

  He nodded.

  "And drugs."

  I kicked him in the thigh when he didn't nod right away.

  "Okay, okay," he shrieked. "I know where you get can some drugs."

  I hauled him off the floor and threw him against the breakfast table. I grabbed one of the ceramic mugs and bounced it off his forehead.

  "Ow!" he cried.

  "Did you give those two bikers a key to my room?" I asked.

  "Wha—ow!"

  I picked up a third mug and asked the question again.

  Holding his hands in front of his face, he nodded vigorously.

  "Okay," I said. I stepped back from the table. "We're almost done."

  He lowered his hands, saw the gun was still pointed at him, and then put them back up.

  "Come on," I said. "I don't have all night."

  His hands came down again.

  "What's your name?" I peered at his shirt, trying to read his name tag, which—truth be told—had some blood on it.

  "Mar—Marty."

  "Okay, Marty, here's what we're going to do. We're going to go into the back room there, and you're going to make a phone call for me, and then we'll be done."

  He started to whine, and I kicked at his foot. "Stop that," I snapped.

  "You're going to kill me, aren't you?"

  "Maybe," I said. "It depends on how long this all takes. You understand?"

  He did, and he scrambled to be helpful. I followed him into the back office, and sat him down in the fancy chair behind the manager's desk. "Now," I said, making sure he could see the gun in my hand. "You're going to call Clint for me."

  "Who?"

  I smacked him in the forehead with the gun, and when he was done feeling the gash in his head and staring at the blood on his fingers, he nodded. "Okay, yeah, Clint. I know a guy named Clint."

  "You're going to tell him you need to speak to him about citrus farming."

  "About what?"

  "Growing oranges, Marty. Clint is going to be real interested in what you have to say about splicing and stemming and all that shit they do to grow oranges."

  Marty didn't believe me, but he was a good kid and did as I asked. It only took Clint ten minutes to get to the hotel. His bike rolled into the parking lot, and before the echo of its engine had faded, he was off the bike and through the front door of the hotel lobby, which I had left unlocked.

  "What the hell is going—" He stopped in his tracks when he caught sight of me sitting behind the desk.

  "Hiya, Clint," I said. And then I shot him.

  He went down. I wiped down the butt of the gun and left it on the counter. I checked that the door to the back room was slightly ajar, and then I went into the lobby where Clint was thrashing about on the floor. The blood coming out of his thigh was making a mess on the carpet.

  "Shit, Clint, that looks bad." I leaned against the breakfast table. "You should get that looked at."

  He was shaking and sweating, but the look he gave me said if it weren't for the hole in his leg, we would be having a much different conversation.

  Or trying to, at least. Last time, he had Brace do all the hard work, and look what happened to Brace?

  "What the fuck are you doing?" he spat.

  "Me?" I said. "I'm leaving town. I figured you and I should talk before I go."

  "Talk? Talk about what?"

  "About who's working for the DEA and who isn't."

  That got his attention.

  "Now, and you should correct me if I get any of this wrong, but there's a lot going on in Los Alamos, isn't there? We've got a bunch of guys farming weed up in the National Forest, and they're trucking it out through that hippy commune retreat center up there. And we've got a bunch of self-stylized crazy mother-fuckers who are running cocaine up and down the 101. It's not a bad stretch of road, really. You've got Lompoc and Vandenberg. No end of customers, right? And if you can get a guy in the sheriff's office who is happy to look the other way, well, then it gets really easy? Right?"

  Clint didn't say anything, which I took to be tacit acknowledgment that I was telling a good story.

  "Now, the DEA doesn't really want a gang of roughneck riders controlling the drug trade right next to a federal prison and an Air Force base, do they? That's bad for everyone, but they do like splashy announcements. If someone could just wrap this whole thing up in one nice package, they'd be thrilled. How am I doing so far?"

  He had dragged himself over to one of the overstuffed chairs by the wall. He grabbed one of the pillows of the chair and applied it to the wound in his leg. He glared at me, and I smiled back.

  "So, the DEA embeds a guy," I said. "They tat him up and give him some believable cover story—hell, maybe this guy has been doing the renegade biker dude cover for a couple of years now. Roaming from gang to gang, busting heads and pipelines as he goes. I mean, it's not as clever a cover as ex-porn star, ex-con, but it's functional, right?"

  Clint spat on the floor. Some commentary, finally.

  "So this guy is embedded for awhile, and he figures there's enough going on here for more than one guy to get a piece. There's not one crooked cop in the SBSO, there are two, which makes things a little more complicated, but not impossible. But then—and this is where it all goes a little sideways, right?—one of the cops gets nervous. He realizes if everything goes south, it's going to get hung on him. The other cop? He's not some patrol flunky. He's a rising star in the organization. He might even have aspirations for an elected position. It wouldn't be good for him to be involved in a drug scandal, right? Another reason for the first guy to get nervous."

  I shifted my weight against the counter, not taking my eyes off Clint. Who was watching me as carefully as I was watching him.


  "And so this guy—the patsy—he calls the DEA. He wants to cut a deal. Wants out. Wants protection. But not just for him. It turns out he's got some skin in this game—there are some innocents he wants protection for too. Now, the guy at the DEA who takes the call tells our boy they'll consider the deal. They call you, and you wave them off. You say it's not a good time. You don't have confidence that all the bad guys are going to get rolled up. You say to put the deal on hold.

  "But the cop? He's persistent. He calls back. Really wants out. Even goes so far as to set up a passphrase to identify him to whoever they send out. Which, hell, you don't need because you already know who this guy is."

  Clint grimaced as a wave of pain rolled through his body.

  "But you're under a bit of pressure to deliver, aren't you? The office isn't happy this is still an open investigation. They might even be concerned that they've lost you. You've been doing this a long time. Maybe you turned on them, right? And so you're not sure they won't send a guy anyway. But, hey, if they do, you'll just intercept him and tell him to go home. Tell him that you have this covered. You'll tell him to be—what was it? Oh, yeah. To 'be smart.'"

  He shook his head. "It's a bullshit story," he said. "Who are you going to tell it to?"

  I shrugged. "Yeah, you're right. It probably is a bullshit story. But how about this one instead? Wilson, the guy who runs the Hidden Palms Spiritual Center? He's in charge of the pot farm, too. Not too long ago, Wilson killed two people. A man and a woman. They were threatening to bring too much attention to the whole area."

  Clint sneered, clearly not interested in this story.

  "No, really," I said. "Shot them both. Dumped their bodies in an old well on the property. Take a team up there and haul 'em out. Oh, and they'll find Deputy Hackman up there too. Right on top. That'll complicate things, won't it? Good thing he was shot by the same gun that shot the other two, right? Makes ballistics easy. And if you can find Wilson—maybe get swabs off his hands—you could prove he did all that shooting."

  Clint licked his lips, and his eyes darted back and forth. He was thinking about my story.