Brake lights flashed from the back of the Impala and Todd pulled off to the side of the dirt road. The sudden change in momentum jolted Kori from his stupor. He looked up and wondered how long ago they had left the highway. He had lost all track of time while concentrating on keeping the effects of the crank under control. With the car stopped, the speedy sensation crept back in. The overwhelming need to empty his bladder came without warning. He stepped out of the car and let loose a stream onto the hard packed dirt without bothering to shut the door.
Held captive by the marathon pissing session, Kori surveyed his surroundings. He could barely make out a faint light in the distance. It was several miles further down the road, which was not much more than a cow path surrounded by fields. He assumed that the source of the light was the place that they were headed. Seeing it gave him an uneasy feeling. He felt like running, but where would he go? Through some dark field in the middle of nowhere, fifty miles from home? His heart threatened to leap out of his chest just from pissing. He could only imagine how far he could get before keeling over, dead.
“I always wondered if you did that standing up, college boy.” Soup was leaning over the hood with his elbows propped under his chin, watching him. His lips formed a devilish grin through the mouth hole of his mask. He let out an impatient sigh and asked, “Are you done yet?”
“Uh, yeah,” Kori replied, zipping his fly. He felt his face become flush with embarrassment. “Sorry.”
“Then load up. I don't want to spend all night here.” Soup turned away and walked back to the Impala, where the others busied themselves with last minute preparations. Todd pulled a pair of gloves and a mask from the trunk, warning him to shake them out first. Short aluminum ball bats were doled out next. Kori reluctantly accepted one and tested its weight in his hands.
The feeling was surreal. The wheels were set into motion and there was no turning back.
The moon was nonexistent and navigating the road without headlights proved more difficult than Soup had planned. The entire job hinged on the element of surprise, so it was decided that they would abandon both vehicles much sooner than they would have liked to. This meant nearly a half mile hike separated the crew from the house at the end of the road. Kori and Todd took up rear and purposely lagged behind.
“This would have never happened if Brenden was here. This is all bullshit, Kori. Something ain't right about this,” Todd complained. He lifted his mask and sniffed the air. “Smell that?”
“What?” Kori sniffed, smelling nothing but his own stale breath beneath the fabric.
“Fucking anhydrous.” He pulled his mask back down and cursed.
Kori had no clue what that meant but it didn't sound good, whatever it was. “What do you want to do?” He glanced over his shoulder at their vehicles, guessing the time it would take to run back if necessary. The paranoid sketchiness eased its way back into his psyche. He started to wonder if the effects of the drug were going to linger forever. He promised himself that he would never touch hard drugs again.
“I don't know. Just stay close and keep your head down.”
They caught up to the others as they crouched behind a row of low shrubs at the edge of the property. An exterior light was mounted on a pole between the house and a garage. It hummed as it cast a yellowish glow over the sparse lawn between the two buildings. Its range fell just shy of their hiding place. Every window in the house was dark. The only activity came from the garage in the form of music, heavy with bass and guttural vocals.
While the others discussed the plan of attack, Kori killed time by watching Chris. He had first noticed the little guy's peculiar behavior before they had set off on foot. Chris was extremely fidgety under normal circumstances, but even more so that night. He was down on all fours, combing through the grass and carrying on a conversation with no one but himself. Every so often he would press an ear to the earth, listen for a moment and then smile widely. Several times he abruptly sat up and glanced around with an expression of bewilderment on his face. Kori made the decision right then to steer clear of him if at all possible.
As Soup did his best to lay out a workable game plan, Todd sidled up and shoved him hard enough to knock him over. Soup fell face first into the bushes, snagging his mask on the lower branches. It sat slightly askew on his head, revealing a look of astonishment. Todd hovered over his prone body, seething. “Did you know this was a goddamn cookhouse, you idiot?”
Soup grunted as he got back to his feet, using the bat for support. His hands choked up on the handle and he lifted it in the air, glaring at Todd with fire in his eyes. He held it there for a moment before lowering it back down. Leaning close to Todd, he pointed at the house and answered in a low voice, “This is the address they gave me, man. I don't give a rat's ass what goes on here. Not my business. All I know is that we're all gonna get fat off this job. But if you ever...”
“How fat?” Todd interrupted.
“What?” Soup straightened the mask, his eyes darting nervously around at the rest of the group. They all watched the two of them intently.
“You heard me. How fat?” Todd kept his tone low, but made sure that everyone else could hear him as he put Soup on the spot for an answer. He waved a gloved hand around the group. “How much are we getting paid?”
“Really?” Soup threw his arms up and rolled his head back. “Do you really want to discuss this now?”
Todd shook his own head in frustration. “Never mind. Let's just get this over with.”
“That's what I thought,” Soup said. He reached over and slapped Chris on the back of the head. The blow seemed to bring his dazed cousin back to land of the living. “Let's do this.”
They turned their attention back to the garage and quietly stepped out of the darkness, slowly creeping across the yard. The others went directly to the walk-in door of the garage and positioned themselves on either side. Todd tugged Kori's arm, leading him to the backside of the building and motioned for him to stay down. Kori was more than willing to sit in the dark and wait out the ensuing shit storm. He was fearful that Todd intended to leave him there and join the others, but Todd stayed put beside him.
A stack of firewood provided cover from the light, but did little to muffle the heavy bass thumps coming from inside the garage. Kori was not exactly sure what genre of music it was, but it sounded to him like someone being tortured. The chemical smell that Todd had recognized right away was much stronger behind the garage. He was thankful that the mask provided at least some protection from the stench. Regardless, he held his breath as much as possible and took shallow breaths when he could not.
Suspicious of their whereabouts, Little Chris stepped around the corner and whispered their names. His own level of paranoia was in overdrive and the argument between his cousin and Todd had only made it worse. They crouched lower as Chris's footsteps crunched across the gravel, stopping right above them. He peered over the top and called out loudly, “What the hell are you two doing back there?”
It was no surprise that he spotted them so easily. There was barely enough room for them both to fit behind the small stack of unevenly cut logs, let alone hide there. What did shock them was the violent reaction that ensued after they were discovered. They watched with horrified fascination as Chris burst into a tantrum, fueled by speed and days of sleep deprivation. Spittle flew from his mouth, along with a flurry of insults as he kicked at the pile of wood. Kori blinked as pieces of bark sprayed his face.
“Jesus. He's gonna get us all killed,” Todd said. He whispered the words but it was futile. Chris's voice carried across the yard, loud enough that windows in the house began to light up. Somewhere close, a dog started to bark.
Chris continued his attack on the logs to the point of nearly tipping the stack on top of them. He rambled incoherently at the top of his lungs, “Are you gonna flake on us now, you pussies? You think you can hide behind your fucking tinfoil badges!”
“What the hell is he talking about?” Kori yelled,
doing his best to avoid the falling pieces.
“He's spun bad,” Todd replied, no longer bothering to keep his voice down. “We gotta bail before he gets us all killed.” He stood up, pulling Kori to his feet as he went. Immediately, the barrel of a gun was shoved in his face.
Chris held the pistol in one outstretched hand, while the rest of his body turned sideways. He kept the barrel pointed at Todd, while he slowly sidestepped in the other direction. His other hand waved back in a come hither motion to something or someone that only he seemed to be able to see. He kept the hand outstretched as if holding the apparitions at bay. Satisfied that his hallucinatory reinforcements had his back, he lowered the gun down. He giggled and said, “Somebody's gonna get killed alright, but it ain't going to be nobody from my team.”
Kori blinked and tried to comprehend what happened next. One minute he and his friend were in a standoff with a deluded speed freak and his imaginary army; the next thing he knew Chris was on the ground writhing in pain. The dog had lunged from out of the darkness and latched onto the outstretched hand with such ferocity that the sounds of bones cracking were audible, even over the screaming. Every time Chris attempted to free himself from the bite, the dog shook his head and dug deeper into the hand.
Kori and Todd stood, frozen as the chaos unfolded. Self-preservation eventually trumped panic and Chris remembered the gun in his free hand. He raised it to the dog's muzzle and fired twice. Jaws ruined from the blasts, the dog relaxed its grip and dropped dead on the ground. Chris fell backwards and landed sharply on his back. He giggled uncontrollably and raised his hand to access the damage. The laughter quickly ceased as he saw the stump where his hand used to be, the hand that he had just shot off.
Kyle Collins rounded the corner of the garage to see what the commotion was about. The precious element of surprise was completely gone and he figured there had better be a damned good reason for it. If there wasn't, someone was going to bleed. He emerged from the shadows of the building and saw Chris laying on the ground, studying something mangled and bloody in the light. Startled by the sudden movement, Chris drew the pistol with his one good hand and shot Kyle in the face. Kyle fell backwards, dead before his body touched the gravel.
Chris stumbled to his feet and cried out in triumph. A woman stepped out of the house and onto the front stoop, screaming the dog's name as she went. She was little more than a silhouette in the foreground of the lamplight, but Kori clearly saw the shotgun in her hands. She raised the weapon to her shoulder and fired a shot in their direction. The buckshot missed Chris by mere inches. It sailed past him and slammed into the woodpile, where Kori and Todd ducked for cover.
The steady thumping of music ceased from inside the garage, replaced by a barrage of gunfire. The woman screamed in pain and discharged her shotgun again. Todd pulled Kori up by the arm and the two of them fled in the opposite direction. They ran aimlessly across the unlit fringes of the property as fast as their legs would take them back to the dirt road. Behind them, the crescendo of firepower and angry voices intensified. Something exploded with enough force to vibrate the ground beneath their feet, but neither of them dared to look back.
Kori's shoes slapped the dirt surface as he furiously pumped his arms. He had no problem outrunning Todd, whose smoker's lungs wheezed in protest with every step. Adrenaline prodded him beyond his limits as the distance between himself and the chaos widened. Only when the Corolla was nearly close enough to touch did he stop to let his pounding heart relax. He doubled over and sucked in much needed oxygen as Todd caught up and did the same. They walked the rest of the way to the car, still panting as they climbed inside.
From the path that they had just traveled, a figure emerged out of the darkness. They both gasped as they watched Chris sprinting straight toward them. He held the remains of his left arm in front of him, high in the air like an Olympic torch bearer. Blood spurted from the stump with every beat of his weakening pulse. They watched helplessly as his knees collided with the front bumper. Momentum pushed him forward as his torso and face slammed down on the center of the hood, leaving a shallow dent. The arm that was a hand longer than the other hit the windshield first. The stump connected a split second later. A wide swath of blood smeared across the glass as his body came to a halt.
“Where the hell did he come from?” Kori yelled.
“Same way we did, I guess,” Todd replied. He cautiously stepped out of the car and felt the side of Chris's neck for a pulse, keeping the open door between them in case he miraculously sprang back into action. He personally hoped not to feel any sign of life from the little bastard that had nearly gotten them killed, but saw right away that he was still breathing. He sighed and looked to Kori. “What do you want to do with him?”
As much as they would have rather pulled him free of the hood and left him lying in the road to die, neither had the heart to do so. They quickly lifted him up and shoved him in the backseat next to the canvas bag that the newly deceased Kyle Collins had left behind. Looking at it as they sped away, Kori could not help but to wonder once again, just what was in that bag?
Chapter 27
Detective Hazelton watched the young deputy frantically search through the rooms of his disheveled trailer, growing more frustrated with each passing minute. This behavior had been going on since he had arrived. He could not help but to feel at least partly responsible for the current mental state of the man he had come to think of as his friend. Sure, he had exploited the obvious history Dale had with the county when he had recruited him for the assignment, but he also assumed that he had the natural fortitude to handle it. Doubt about that assessment was starting to creep in.
“It was right here, Bobby. I swear it.” Dale pointed to the spot on the carpet, just inside the doorway to a spare bedroom. It was one of the few areas of the trailer that was not sopping wet and reeking of stale piss.
Hazelton poked his head beyond the door frame and studied the room. He had heard about the darkroom that Dale had assembled, but was still taken back by the number of photographs that covered the walls. The absence of light prevented him from making out any of the subject matter, but he had a good idea of what the general theme was. He nodded to the broken latch and asked, “Other than the door getting busted in, does it look like anything else in the room has been disturbed?”
“Nothing except for the missing bag of, er...” Dale paused for a moment. “Except for the evidence.”
Evidence that you failed to inform me about until it grew legs and walked away. Hazelton kept the thought to himself, not wanting to further Dale's agitated state. He pointed to the part of the door where it had been kicked open. “Well, there's no chance that whoever did this used the knob to get in, so that means no prints. I don't know what else has been touched since you got home, but I'm going to ask you to stop now. I'll get a couple of techs in here to dust the place down. Okay?”
“Okay.” Dale had a hand gripped around the outer frame of the door. He quickly pulled it away and stared at it sheepishly. “Sorry.”
“Don't sweat it,” Hazelton said, offering him a comforting smile. He hoped that Dale had not inadvertently destroyed any possible prints that his crew could lift from the place during his brief meltdown. It was understandable, given the recent events. Watching a good friend eat his own gun was enough to put the zap on anyone's head. He took out his phone to call in the lab techs, asking Dale a few questions as he waited for dispatch to pick up on the other end. “Any idea who did this? Any pissed off exes, anybody you've dealt with on the job, neighbors with a beef?”
Dale's eyes narrowed at the last suggestion. “I know exactly who did this.”
“Care to share?” He relayed the address to the operator and snapped the phone shut.
“That piece of shit across the street, Collins.”
“Collins?” The name rang a bell for some reason. Hazelton racked his brain to find the connection. He raised his eyebrows and looked at Dale, quizzically. “Not one of the same Collin
s that had the run in with your pal, Fisher?”
Hearing Stu's name spoken stung like a slap, especially when used in the same sentence as one of the Collins scumbags. Images of the last few minutes of Stu's life flashed through Dale's mind. A renewed anger surfaced in his heavy heart. Without being aware of what he was doing he pulled at the straps of his shoulder holster, cinching them painfully tight against his torso. He started for the door as he answered, “Not the same one, but might as well be.”
Hazelton grabbed his arm and spun him around as he passed by. Dale stiffened against his grip but did not try to pull away. Dark circles under the deputy's eyes accentuated the wrath that they harbored within. Underlying sadness flickered beneath the angry stare like a wavering flame, desperately trying not to shine through. Bobby found himself staring into a face that had aged decades in the past few days. He wrapped an arm over his shoulder. “And where do you think you're going?”
“To find the fucker who pissed on my walls!” he hissed.
“And do what? Arrest him, kill him, beat him to a pulp? Without a shred of proof?” Hazelton pulled him closer and pressed a finger into his chest. “You are a good cop, Dale. Start acting like it. Okay?”
“They came into my home, Bobby.” Tears streamed over the stubble on his cheeks. His lips quivered as he wiped at the waterworks with the back of his hand. The tough guy persona crumbled and he leaned his head against Hazelton's shoulder, sobbing. “My goddamn home.”
“I know, buddy.” Hazelton nodded his head and pulled him back toward the darkroom. “All the more reason to wait until we have solid evidence. If there are prints, my guys will find them. Collins is in the system. If he was here, we'll know it. Then, and only then, you and I will go get him. Until then, why don't you come back in here with me? I think you have some pictures to show me, huh?”
Chapter 28
Dimebag Bandits Page 17
