“Yup, but don’t worry, you’re not late. Just relax now.” She started toward him and instinctively he took a step backward.
“I’m going to ask you to call my office next time you need-” He bumped into something that hadn’t been there the moment before. He spun around and saw a very large man with long stringy hair and a Metallica t-shirt standing behind him. The man wrapped massive arms around his head and neck in some kind of sleeper hold.
Dennis Jordan struggled vainly against the man’s grip, but the embrace was immutable fact and soon he felt himself slipping out of consciousness. As his legs failed and he went limp, the large man gently sat down with him on the bed. Irm hovered over him and spoke one word that swirled around and above as he felt the void reaching up for him, and he grasped at it like a drowning man, though it didn’t seem to mean anything.
“Cinnamon.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
MONDALE
Jimmy called Bob Musil and said he’d be by to pick him up. In the car he explained it the way Tate Dill had laid it out for him. Tate was taking over for Chowder with an outfit out of Kansas City. Chowder was done for, whether he wised up and fled the hills or stuck around and went to prison, he wouldn’t be running shit by this time next week. Tate had found the K.C. outfit and approached them on his own, laying out the plan and letting them sniff around for themselves. And guess what? It looked A-okay to them. Worth investing in.
“So what’s our play?” asked Musil, pulling up outside the back of the station where deputy Townsend was waiting, holding a shotgun in each hand and wearing his Kevlar and sunglasses at sunrise, badass via accessories.
Jimmy winced at the image, but it was better than the alternative: scared and unprepared. Without a word, Townsend opened the door and slipped into the back seat. He laid both shotguns across his lap and removed a Mountain Dew pop from one of the cargo pockets down the leg of his pants. When he cracked the tab and took the first noisy sip, Jimmy turned to look at him and received a thumbs-up.
Mondale addressed Musil across the front seat from him. “There’s a meet ‘n greet set up in an hour. I’ll think of something by then.” He started to put the car into gear, then turned back to Townsend again. A beat passed and the deputy, mouth full of soda pop, cocked his head slightly in a silent question, which Jimmy answered.
“Seatbelt.”
TERRY
He had to ride in the trunk again. No socks in his mouth this time, though. Little better. He had all the way to Jeanette’s house to think about his family and all the friends and strangers he’d caused to suffer in his lifetime. He didn’t though.
CHOWDER
The pictures had made him laugh for sure. He hadn’t known Eli’s name, but as soon as Terry’d described him, Chowder’d known exactly who he meant. He was glad he hadn’t killed the little shit without giving him a chance to talk.
Even if the money wasn’t where he said it’d be, these pictures were worth something. Chowder reevaluated Terry Hickerson. He had balls - Chowder had seen the proof - and he had a plan. But he was just too stupid not to fuck it up. Hell, why was he sticking up Mexican liquor stores with his buddy while they were waiting on a big score to pan out? Because they were losers. Adrenaline cowboys. Get a little liquor or coke or crystal in em and they couldn’t sit still.
The sun was beginning to peek over the horizon when they turned onto the street Terry had indicated. Chowder pulled up in front of the yard with the pickup. He looked up and down the street for signs of life before popping the trunk.
He hauled Terry Hickerson’s skinny ass out and pointed him toward the front door. Terry nodded and led the way up the drive with Chowder’s gun leveled at the base of his spine. Terry tried the door first, but it was secure. He reached into his pocket for something to pick the lock with, but Chowder just motioned him out of the way before expertly and easily busting through the old frame.
The noise wasn’t much outside, but from within they heard that someone was now stirring from sleep. An elderly woman’s voice called out, “Who’s there?” Terry looked at Chowder and then answered.
“Terry Hickerson, ma’am. I’m Calvin’s friend.” They moved through the darkened front room, the musty smell of age assaulting their senses and growing stronger as they approached the back of the house.
“Calvin’s not here,” Jeanette called out. “Go away.”
Terry and Chowder reached the bedroom and Terry paused before pushing the door open. Before them stood Jeanette Dotson dressed in a nightgown worn to near transparency and clutching a handgun that would surely break her wrists if she fired it. She gestured with the gun. “Go away,” she repeated. Terry stepped backward and Chowder let him. When the old bat took a step toward them, Chowder reached for her hand and easily tipped the pistol out of her grip. “Oh,” she said, and Chowder followed Terry into the room.
“Where’s your diaper bag?” said Terry delicately.
Jeanette looked from face to face as if to decide whom she should be addressing. “What?”
Chowder bent to retrieve her gun and spoke in his gently commanding voice, “Calvin left something for us in the bag. He told us to come get it.”
“Calvin’s dead.”
Terry went into to the bathroom, turned on the light, opened the medicine cabinet and began tossing the contents onto the floor. Then he looked through the cabinets beneath the sink and above the toilet. When he finished searching the room, he came back out and headed for the closet. He threw open the door and got on his hands and knees to rummage beneath the hanging clothes. “Where’s the fuckin diaper bag?”
Jeanette just looked confused. Chowder gestured for her to have a seat on the bed and helped her ease down. Between the bed and a nightstand, Chowder spotted a vinyl toiletries bag. He reached down and picked it up. Inside he found a two-thirds full box of Depends, some wet wipes, ointment, baby powder. He took the box of adult napkins out and pulled the diapers aside. Behind them, he found a padded manila envelope.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
MONDALE
The house sat off the gravel road up a dirt driveway fifty yards. It was impractical for getaway, but also impossible to approach unheard except on foot. Mondale made his way slowly up the drive, parked his cruiser and got out. He knew Bob Musil and Deputy Townsend had flanked the house by now and were positioned at the back door and side windows, but it still sounded stupid to go in. There were no lights visible, but he knew he’d find at least three armed men inside. The variables were hardly worth considering at this point.
He called out as he knocked on the screen door. “Sheriff’s office. Open up.” The silence that followed seemed to stretch on forever in the crisping autumn night.
“Fuck the police,” came the eventual reply, followed by a nervous chuckle.
Mondale shifted his weight and straightened himself, hands resting on his belt and the handle of his service revolver. “C’mon, Tate. I got things to do.” He heard three deadbolts sliding and a chain being removed before Tate’s scruffy, gaunt face displeased his eyes.
Tate moved back, out of the sheriff’s way. The inside of the clapboard shack was stuffy with a dampness that was all too ordinary even for the hour. A small rotating fan pushed the tepid air around like sweeping up a puddle. The wood floors were dark and scuffed with a collection of divots in one corner, the ghosts of dining arrangements from decades past. One ratty couch shoved against the wall and a single kitchen chair were the only furniture to be found.
There were three representatives from Kansas City, each wearing well-tailored suits and the usual collection of prison tattoos, crosses, eagles, swastikas and double lightning bolts, on their necks and the backs of their hands, tear-drops in the outer corners of a couple of their eyes.
Mondale spotted the bulge of shouldered weapons under their jackets and reflexively tensed his right arm. He forced himself to stand up straight, resisting the urge to crouch defensively and hooked both thumbs into the buckle of his belt.
Tat
e faded to the background, introducing only one of them: “Sheriff Jimmy Mondale, meet Zack Ryan.”
The tall man with the long hair stepped forward, and said in a voice that sounded like gravel, “Tate says you’re the man to see.”
“Depends.”
“We’re willing to keep your current salary plus a half-percent. Throw in busts when you need them. Two or three annually, more in an election year.”
“In exchange for what?”
“The usual arrangement.”
Inwardly, Mondale bristled at that– peckerwoods assuming he and all law were for sale. Outwardly he smiled. “What about Chowder Thompson? He’s a community fixture. Got sway with the bike gangs that want to move in. Got the whole thing consolidated and regulated.” Then to the obvious point. “He’s not going to just step aside.”
Ryan exaggerated a slow exhalation of breath, as if explaining things to a child. “Tate takes over local representation with your cooperation. Everybody gets in line or fuck ’em. This deal comes with brand recognition.”
“Big brand, though. Kansas City feels a long way off to most people here.”
Ryan smiled humorlessly. “I know what you mean.”
“Thompson?”
“Your responsibility.”
Mondale’s smile spread slowly till his upper lip disappeared. He shook his head. “I’m not a greedy man. Current arrangement is just fine. Never had a problem with Thompson either.” He gestured with his chin at Tate. “Why are you so eager to back this cocksucker, anyhow?”
Ryan glared at Tate, and Tate stared hard at the spot on the wall just over Mondale’s right shoulder. “Sheriff, maybe Tate here didn’t explain things too good or maybe you’ve just been the swinging dick in a small pond too long to believe it, but this meet is a courtesy and nothing more.” He took an envelope out of his back pocket and tossed it toward the sheriff.
Mondale let the package fall at his feet.
“That’s our buy-in and the one and only olive branch you’ll see. We’re here with or without your cooperation.”
Mondale let his gaze sink to the envelope on the floor. Gingerly he crouched and retrieved it. His knees and back creaked and popped with the motion. The heft of the envelope was substantial. When he stood back up he employed both hands in the examination of its contents. He counted hundreds for a few more seconds before placing it into his own back pocket. “Well, thanks for this.” When his right hand came back around front it was holding his service-issue revolver.
Tate jumped and sputtered. “Hold on there, sheriff. Come on now.”
“Shut up, Tate.” Mondale looked at the three men from Kansas City. He patted the envelope in his back pocket. “I’ll keep this as a gesture of good will and it’ll get you out of Hamilton County without hassle from police, but Thompson is not my problem, he’s yours.”
Ryan grew three inches standing still. It was a prison yard trick Mondale had seen before. Negotiations were just about over. “Thompson doesn’t figure into our plans. We go through Tate.” He stared hard at Mondale, telling him the way it was. “If you’ve got a problem with that–”
Mondale shot Tate through the top of his nose. The light coming from the single bare bulb on the ceiling of the cabin turned pink and the body dropped straight back without the top of its head. The men’s suits were ruined, misted with gore, but their faces looked comfortable enough.
The stick and stink of blood was immediate, but no one moved to wipe it from their faces and everyone waited for Mondale to speak. After a moment of silence, he did in a measured, even tone.
“I’ve got a big problem with that.”
TERRY
He watched Chowder open the package. He could see the biker counting money while the old lady watched, unsure she was in the right house. “What’s going on,” she asked. “Calvin put that in my bag?”
“Shut up,” Terry said. He got up off the floor and approached to get a better look, but Chowder leveled his gun at him and Terry stopped.
“Sit down,” the biker growled.
Jeanette spoke. “He left something for me? He left me money?”
Ignoring her, Terry said, “So? We’re good?”
Jeanette went on, “That’s my money. Calvin gave me that money.”
Chowder finished counting and looked up, but not at anybody. Thinking.
Terry said, “C’mon, we should get out of here, split it in the car.”
“Calvin loved me,” said Jeanette. “He wanted me to have that money.”
“We gotta get movin,” Terry advised, “and if you think I’m riding in the trunk again–“ He never got the chance to finish the thought.
Chowder shot him.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
CHOWDER
The old lady shit herself. The sound was a short, wet blast and the smell hit him almost immediately. “Oh,” she said.
The redneck dropped onto his back with blood bubbling out of his chest. He looked bewildered. Chowder dropped the old lady’s smoking gun onto the bed beside her and stepped toward her. “Lay down,” he commanded, and she did. He was careful not to step in blood or shit as he reached behind her for a pillow. She lay down beneath him obediently, like she was at the dentist. She looked expectantly into his eyes.
“Calvin’s dead,” she offered.
“I know,” said Chowder as he gently lowered the pillow onto her face.
MONDALE
Tate’s expression looked as perplexed and ill at ease in death as it had in life. So much for resting in peace.
Zack Ryan held up a steadying hand to the goons from K.C. and they waited for Mondale to continue. When he was ready to, he did. “Kansas City is not welcome here and Chowder isn’t going away. You want to talk to him, stick around, but I don’t think he’s gonna give your offer a fair shake. He doesn’t like being circumnavigated and neither do I.” Jimmy put his pistol away and backed toward the door. “Like I said, this envelope buys you a free ticket out of town.” He forced himself to go slowly and keep steady. “But if you ever come back, I’ll shoot you and then say hello.” Once out of the room, he turned around. He didn’t make it down the front steps before the first shot splintered the screen door. Awkwardly, he jumped off the porch.
Mondale twisted his knee when he landed and he rolled clumsily under the front porch, dropping the envelope he’d just collected. White bolts of pain shot through his leg and were answered by surging adrenaline flooding his body. The men from Kansas City ran out the front door bringing enough fire-power with them to make him evaporate. He still had his gun out and used it, firing straight above him, blasting nickel-sized holes in the rotted-out boards of the porch.
The return fire chewed up more kindling, but Mondale escaped puncture. The whole world shook and he heard confused and angry yelling above him. The porch shuddered and collapsed behind him and Zack Ryan dropped into the dust. Cordite and dirt stung Mondale’s eyes. Blood and bile filled his mouth. Half blind, he aimed at the Kansas City man’s face and spent the last of his ammunition in three hot bursts.
His knee screamed at him as he tried to keep moving. So he stopped and lay flat on his back beneath a still standing section of the porch, rubbing his eyes, tears trying to work the dirt and blood out of his vision. The whole world was enveloped in a strong vibration that he surrendered to. He stopped trying to hear anything and squeezed his eyes shut. He felt the rotation of the earth speed up and he held on tight, trying not to slip off the edge.
CHOWDER
Hettie was waiting for him when he got home. She reported, “Safe is cleaned out, and we’re ready to roll.”
He patted her rump on his way through the door and continued on to the bathroom. Once inside, he sat down on the toilet. He called to his wife on the other side of the door, “Gas in the truck?”
“Shoot. No. Otherwise ready, Chowder.”
Chowder was relaxed. “We need to stop by Darlin’s anyhow. You can fill it, while I tidy up.” He breathed contentedly and deeply
and felt his bowels comply. It was going to be a bright, bright, sunshiny day.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
MONDALE
Musil’s voice cut through the ringing inside his head. It sounded far off and underwater. “Jimmy? You alright under there?”
Jimmy stared up at the daylight struggling through the perforated lumber. He thought back to camping trips he’d taken with Eileen and Elizabeth when they were just kids, lying on their backs beneath the stars. He’d had to explain the universe and its order every night just to make sure it hadn’t changed. Jesus loves little girls and forgives daddies. Big animals eat little ones. Lazy drips of blood found the holes in the porch and took their time pooling around the rims before drooling onto him.
Mondale finally rolled out carefully from beneath the rickety porch and stood, favoring his right knee, brushing sawdust out of his eyes and plucking a sharp, three-inch wood chip out from the back of his neck. It set off a blood flow that would ruin his shirt. “Shit. Somebody got a hankie?” Deputy Townsend produced a neatly folded silky piece that Mondale caught with his already-sticky right hand. “Thanks,” he said as he applied it to his neck.
Bob Musil clapped his shoulder and said something Mondale couldn’t hear, then went inside presumably to check out the basement. When he came out a few moments later, Jimmy’s ears had popped and he could hear his deputy. “Bingo. All the fixings, just no product.”
“S’alright, there’ll be plenty of trace amounts on the equipment,” said Mondale, stepping back into the cabin. Townsend followed and found him in the kitchen washing the blood off of his hands.
“That little turd on the floor sure looks surprised,” the deputy observed.
Jimmy turned and regarded the still body of Tate Dill. “Shouldn’t be. He was working toward this end his whole life.”
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