The Next Time You Die

by Harry Hunsicker

  “Nothing like the big city to turn a country boy’s head.” Billy peered out the window at the concrete-and-glass labyrinth of the central business district.

  I took the Pearl Street exit and headed north, past the Federal Reserve Building and the Crescent Court Hotel.

  “Hot damn.” Billy peered out the front window as the Parisian-inspired Crescent whizzed by. “This is the fancy part of town.”

  I cut through Routh Street, heading toward Central Expressway. That was a mistake.

  “Hey.” Billy grabbed my arm. “What’s that place?”

  “It’s a bar.” The Gingerman was in an old house, near the Quadrangle and a side street full of art galleries. The place had four or five million lagers and ales on tap and outdoor seating in a beer garden.

  Billy suggested getting a drink. I suggested not. Tess told me I was a wuss. I stood my ground until Billy started twitching and running his hands over the barrel of the Ruger. I parked and the three of us walked inside. The room was all dark wood, even the tables and chairs. A bar ran the length of the place on the right, the wall dotted with hundreds of taps for various brews. A jukebox was opposite the bar, next to a dartboard. The Monday-evening happy hour crowd was small but lively, most of them twenty-something men in business attire.

  Billy and Tess went to the bar together. I stood a few feet behind them. A long discussion ensued between Billy and the bartender, a skinny woman with enormous breasts barely contained in a denim halter top.

  Billy wanted something different, beerwise. The bartender jiggled her way to a stack of menus near the wait station. She opened one. Together she and Billy pored over the choices, arguing the merits of a Chimay wheat versus a more traditional lager from a new Pacific Northwest microbrewery.

  Tess looked at me and rolled her eyes. Billy asked for a sample and the big-bosomed bartender obliged, filling three tiny plastic cups with different brews. Billy tasted each one as if he were the sommelier at Spago. He made a big production of smelling and then swishing the beer in his mouth.

  “Ahhh.” He smacked the last cup down. “That’s the one. We want three pints.”

  The beer was from a microbrewery in Arizona called the Goat Scrotum Ale Company of Tucson. The bartender set down three glasses. I took a sip of mine and placed it back on the bar. The muddy liquid tasted like peat moss and compost.

  “Oh, yeah, that’s good stuff.” Billy took a long pull and surveyed the room. For just a moment he lost the hard-nose look. In the low light he appeared younger and almost innocent. After a few moments I realized what was happening.

  Billy Barringer wasn’t scanning the room looking for trouble. He was looking around to see if he fit in. Billy was in the big city, and just a mite insecure.

  I took a few more sips of the nasty beer and then ordered a Shiner Bock. Billy and Tess approached a couple at the dartboard.

  The man’s tie was loosened, his cuffs rolled up. The woman wore a tailored linen skirt and a sleeveless blouse. Both had e-mail/cell devices attached to their waistbands. They were young and attractive, professionals who worked in one of the nearby office towers. Billy said hello, asked if they wanted to play a game of darts. They said hello back and invited them to join.

  Everybody introduced themselves except for me. I milled around a few feet back and watched as Billy Barringer, a murderer and extortionist and the onetime leader of a vast network of pimps, bookies, prostitutes, and thieves, hung on their every word.

  After a while, Tess and the woman sat down while Billy and the man played some more. I leaned against a post near the dartboard and listened to my friend talk to the other man.

  Billy asked him what he did for a living. He asked what part of town he lived in, where he was from, what movies he’d seen lately, where were the cool places to eat and drink.

  After each response Billy nodded sagely, as if that were the expected answer, as if they were two people of similar background and education sharing a few beers after work. At that moment I felt something for Billy Barringer that I never thought possible.

  I felt sorry for him.

  Why did we wonder what our future would hold when the path pointed only one way? Did Billy Barringer have a choice, or just the illusion of one? Do any of us?

  They played another two games. Tess and the girl giggled and smoked. Billy and the man laughed and drank tar-colored beer. I nursed another Shiner Bock. After an hour, the man and woman said their good-byes, paid their tab, and left. Billy and I joined Tess at the table where she’d been sitting with the young woman.

  “Have fun with that city boy?” Tess drained her beer. “I thought you were gonna let him fuck you up the ass.”

  The temperature at the table dropped a dozen degrees. Billy’s eyes went narrow. His fingers flexed, and his breathing was shallow.

  “Shut up, Tess.” I leaned between them, eager to diffuse the situation. “Billy had a few beers with the guy. No big deal.”

  Tess laughed but didn’t say anything.

  Billy licked his lips, flexed his fingers again.

  “Let’s get out of here, okay.” I kept my tone upbeat.

  Tess got up and wandered to the front door. I started to follow her until Billy put a hand on my forearm.

  He said, “Don’t ever pity me, okay, Hank?”

  CHAPTER FORTY

  By the time we left the Gingerman it was almost nine o’clock. The sky was moonless, stars partially obscured by what looked like thunderclouds. A Hummer stretch limousine made its way down the street. I waited and then pulled away from the curb and pointed the Bentley north on McKinney Avenue. We passed the Hard Rock Café and a half dozen trendy restaurants and nightclubs.

  “Let’s go to your house and figure it out,” Tess said.

  I nodded to her in the rearview mirror and headed east, across Central Expressway. The refurbished cottages of the M-street section of Dallas, so named because all the avenues started with that letter, gave way to the rougher-edged area near my place of residence. A few minutes later we turned on Sycamore. I was going to pull in the driveway until I saw my Tahoe there. Nolan, my erstwhile partner, must have seen fit to return it after her reunion with Larry. The spots on the street were limited, so I parked the Bentley a couple of houses down, and we all got out.

  “How come you don’t live in a better neighborhood?” Billy spoke for the first time in a quarter of an hour.

  I ignored him and headed toward my home, making my way in the darkness down the drive to the rear entrance. I unlocked the back door, stepped inside, and stopped.

  The alarm wasn’t beeping. It chirped once, indicating the door had opened. I drew my Browning and jacked a round in the chamber.

  “What?” Billy stepped inside the kitchen, the Ruger in his hand.

  “The alarm’s off.” I strained to hear.

  Faint footsteps from the hall. I pointed the Browning at the doorway leading to the rest of the house. Billy eased to the left, his gun trained in the same direction as mine. I heard the refrigerator compressor kick on, then a woman’s voice.

  “Hank?”

  “Nolan?” I lowered the Browning.

  “What the hell are you doing here?” My partner appeared in the doorway, a Glock semiautomatic pistol in her hand, muzzle pointing at a forty-five-degree angle to the floor.

  “It’s my house, remember?” I drew a deep breath and placed the Hi Power on the countertop.

  “Who the hell is that?” Nolan tilted her head toward Billy.

  “Who the hell are you?” Billy kept the Ruger pointed at her.

  Tess walked into the kitchen and took a look around. “This is a cluster fuck.”

  Nolan frowned at me. “Where have you been?”

  “Somebody tell me who this is.” Billy was sweating now.

  “Put the gun down.” I placed a hand on his arm. “That’s my partner.”

  “Partner?” Billy lowered his weapon a fraction.

  “Yeah.”

  I looked at Nolan. “T
his is Billy Barringer.”

  Before she could respond, I heard a popping sound and the lights went out.

  CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

  I felt on the counter for the Browning, willing my night vision to improve. Nobody said anything.

  My fingers brushed the grip of the pistol right about the time I heard movement outside the kitchen window. I ran toward the front of the house and collided with Nolan, her head ramming my cheekbone. We went down in a jumble of arms and legs.

  Shots fired, and I knew it was Billy’s Ruger. The sound of the tiny .22 was like a champagne cork popping. Each round was a spark in what was otherwise darkness but showed me nothing other than Billy’s outstretched hand.

  Nolan extricated herself from where we lay in a tangle on the floor. There was just enough ambient light from outside for me to sense her moving to the dining room.

  I did the same as a quick burst of fully automatic fire swept the kitchen. I heard my new refrigerator gurgle as a round hit.

  In the dining room, I felt my way toward a cardboard box in the corner. Among other things, the container had a new pair of night-vision goggles that Olson had given me. I found the box and rummaged through it as quietly as possible.

  “What the hell is going on?” Nolan brushed against me, her voice a whisper.

  “No clue.”

  “Billy is alive?”

  “Not now, okay?” I found the goggles and put them over my eyes, my finger fumbling for the ON switch. I clicked it up, down, side to side, and every way in between. Nothing happened. Then I remembered taking out the batteries to use in the TV remote.

  “Shit.” I ripped the goggles off.

  “What?”

  “Nothing.”

  Another string of gunfire ripped through the silence.

  “What about trying the front?” Nolan said.

  I started to say something but was interrupted by a whoomp from the back of the house.

  “Don’t shoot, it’s me.” Billy’s voice was a whisper. A barely visible figure scuttled into the room on his hands and knees. “What was that?”

  “Hell if I know.” I stood up.

  The room grew brighter. And hotter.

  “Holy shit.” Nolan got to her feet also.

  Billy hopped up as the first of the flames became visible. They were coming from the part of the house where my bedroom was.

  “The front door.” He motioned toward the street side of the house. “We’ve got to get out.”

  I shook my head. “No. They’ll be waiting.”

  “Then what do we do?” Nolan said.

  “Follow me.” I ran toward the fire. Once in the hallway, I looked left. The flames had engulfed half of the house already. To the right was a small door leading to the basement.

  “Uhh, Hank.” Billy’s voice was high-pitched now. “It’s pretty damn hot right here.”

  “Hang on.” I opened the door and plunged down the narrow stairs, hands out on either side to feel my way along the brick walls.

  I reached the bottom without tripping. The darkness was total now. I bumped my way past exercise equipment and a workbench. In the far corner was shelving where I knew I could find a flashlight.

  My hand explored the area and touched an aluminum tube. I turned it on and a thin shaft of light illuminated my cluttered basement. A gun safe was in one corner, next to a heating and air-conditioning unit.

  Billy and Nolan tripped down the stairs, stumbling toward the light.

  On the far wall another short row of stairs led outside. At the top was a set of doors at an angle to the house. Ten seconds later the three of us were standing in the side yard next to my neighbor’s place, on the opposite side from Mr. Martinez. The wooden privacy fence was all but a ghost and we slipped into the next backyard.

  I turned and looked at what was left of my home, a bonfire of my worldly possessions.

  Nolan touched my arm. “Hank, I am so sorry.”

  I didn’t say anything.

  “I don’t know where Tess is.” Billy leaned against a fence post and watched the flames burn.

  “Who did this?” Anger surged through my body. “Who were you shooting at?”

  “Rundell’s people,” Billy said. “He’s found out where you live.”

  We snuck through two more backyards and finally emerged where the Bentley was parked. A siren howled nearby but it was hard to tell if it was headed our way or just part of the general mélange of crime in my little section of Dallas.

  I took a step toward the car but Nolan grabbed my arm. She pointed to a figure sitting on the parkway.

  The three of us aimed our weapons. I turned on the flashlight with my free hand. Tess sat on the grass, leaning against the side of the Bentley.

  Billy got there first and knelt beside her.

  She held her arm close to her body, as if it were injured. There was a patch of blood on her forehead, and her clothes were covered in soot and dirt.

  I knelt beside Billy. “What happened?”

  “There was an explosion.” She was stuttering and shaking.

  I placed a hand on her shoulder. “Did you see anybody?”

  “The fire was so fast.” She looked at me and then at Billy.

  “It’s okay.” He stroked her hair.

  “How many were there?” I said.

  “Don’t know.”

  “How many did you see?” I was eager to get as much information as fast as possible. She looked as if she could go into shock at any moment.

  “Get off her ass, Hank.” Billy shoved my arm. I lost my balance and fell over.

  I jumped up, one hand out, the other close to my torso for a quick punch. Billy lunged, going for a bear hug. We rolled together and fell into the gutter next to the Bentley. Billy landed on top, knocking the breath out of my lungs. I braced for a blow and brought my hand up for a strike of my own when he was suddenly gone.

  I sat up. Nolan had Billy flat on his back, with the Glock pointed about a foot from his forehead.

  “Maybe you two could settle who’s got the bigger dick later.” She looked at me for a millisecond before returning her attention to Billy. “Because we got a shitload of problems at the moment.”

  Billy and I looked at each other.

  “Let’s get out of here.” I stood up and got in the car, everybody else doing the same.

  I headed away from the flames. Nolan rode in the front seat, Billy and Tess in the back. They might as well have not been there. He held her close and whispered things in a soothing tone.

  “Sorry to have scared you like that,” Nolan said.

  “Where’s Larry?”

  “We broke up.”

  “That didn’t take long.” My shirt was stained with something greasy from rolling around in the gutter. I tried to wipe it off but only got more of the substance on my hands.

  “Go ahead.” She crossed her arms. “Get it out of your system. Say I told you so.”

  “I told you so.”

  “He said all the right things.” She shook her head. “Then he went and got drunk and punched out the manager at Sizzler and we got kicked out and then he starts in on me like it’s my fault and—”

  “I still don’t get why you were at my house.” I turned onto Gaston and headed toward downtown.

  “Larry went a little crazy. Started stalking me.”

  “So he’s out there, too?”

  “Doubt it. I’m pretty sure he ran into a parked car and got thrown in jail again.”

  I kept driving through the dark streets of Dallas.

  CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

  The powers that be in this city have always had a schizophrenic, love-hate relationship with adult entertainment venues, specifically topless bars.

  On one hand, the city fancied itself a convention town and went after the big-money trade group meetings with a vengeance. An important element of the hospitality business that nobody really talked about was the desire of convention-goers to partake in some of life’s spicier offering
s, activities not always available back home in one of those Midwestern states that begin with a vowel.

  On the other hand, the moralistic streak that permeated so much of the southern United States ran deep in the fiber of the city.

  The result was a hodgepodge of laws designed to appease the puritans while still allowing the middle-aged tool-and-die salesman from Des Moines the chance to watch a twenty-year-old mother of three shake her silicone breasts to the thumping rhythm of a 1980s hair band.

  Connie the Crack Whore had told me that Rundell hung out at a strip club on Industrial Boulevard, on the west side of town. I decided to clean up a little and make that my next destination.

  I mentally debated the options for a few seconds and then headed to Delmar and Olson’s house.

  “Where are you going?” Nolan said.

  I told her.

  “With them?” She tilted her head to the backseat.

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Is that smart?”

  “I’m out of ideas.”

  She didn’t reply.

  When I was a block away I dialed Olson’s cell phone.

  Delmar answered. “Yeah.”

  “It’s Hank.”

  “What the hell do you want?”

  “Where’s Olson?”

  “Where’s my car?”

  “I’m bringing it back.”

  He hung up without replying.

  Billy stuck his head in front. “Who’re you talking to, Hank?”

  “I’m gonna take you someplace safe.” I turned onto Delmar and Olson’s street. “And get us cleaned up a little.”

  Billy pulled out the Ruger and dangled it between the two seats. “You wouldn’t be trying to trick-fuck me, would ya?”

  Nolan sucked in a loud mouthful of air.

  “Don’t you think we’re a little beyond that now?” I parked in the driveway, underneath the magnolia tree. By the time I stepped out of the Bentley, Delmar was on the front porch.

  “Who the hell is in my car?”

  “Hey, Delmar.” I walked across the yard.