Seth smiled sadly. “I owe you, Tell. Seems right I do at least a little something right.”
It happened fast: Seth’s hand moved to his lap.
From under untucked shirttails, Seth pulled out his service weapon.
Firelight on that matte finish; Tell saw it was a gun.
Tell hesitated firing just an instant—stunned that Seth pressed the gun under his own chin. Tell held his fire the extra half-second Seth required to pull the trigger on himself.
ACROSS THE
BORDERLINE
Extracts from the New Austin Recorder:
Vale County Sheriff’s Death Ruled a Suicide
By Barbara Ruskin
New Austin Recorder
Staff Writer
Horton County coroner Casey Parks has found in favor of suicide in the death of Vale County sheriff Walter Pierce.
Shortly before taking his life with a single shot to the head with his own service weapon, Pierce had become a suspect in the rape-murder of Thalia Ruiz, 35, a New Austin single mother. Ruiz’s body was found in a field adjacent to the New Austin Kid’s Association ball diamonds …
… New Austin police chief Tell Lyon, citing inadvertently filmed footage of the dumping of Thalia Ruiz’s body—footage that he uncovered—confirmed Vale County sheriff’s deputy Luke Strider and Pierce as his primary persons of interest in the rapes and deaths of Ruiz and three other area women …
… Strider’s body was found in his red Dodge Ram pickup truck—a truck seen in the film found by Chief Lyon. The Ram was found alongside an access road to the New Austin Kid’s Association’s ball diamonds’ parking lot.
… According to Coroner Parks, Strider was killed with a single blow to the head with a sledge hammer found at the scene. “Death would have been instantaneous,” Parks told the Recorder.
… Chief Lyon told the Recorder, “The pressure was on the two of them—Strider and Pierce—and they apparently cracked … had some kind of falling out.
“We had secured evidence against Pierce and in fact had one of his own deputies lined up to testify against him in the rape and murder of Ms. Ruiz,” the chief continued. “We’re forced to conclude there was some sort of argument and Pierce evidently killed Strider. Then Pierce walked out to that field where the two of them had dumped Thalia Ruiz’s body. On nearly the same spot where Thalia Ruiz was found, Walt Pierce took his own life.”
FIFTY EIGHT
Tell slowed as he neared the park. Springsteen’s “My Father’s House” was playing low on the radio. Tell saw the silhouette of a big pickup truck idling next to a white house that backed up to the ball fields. Only Dodge Rams were built to that over-the-top scale. Tell saw the glow of a cigarette butt jitter once on its way from a mouth to an ashtray and back to a mouth again.
He turned left onto a side street, away from the ball diamonds. He could see the lights from the fields’ parking lot, but not much else.
He parked curbside, doused the lights and took out his riot gun. He tossed his white hat onto the front seat and looked down at his tan uniform, cursing Patricia for having talked him out of the black one now that stealth was required. Tell closed the door to his cruiser as quietly as he could and then walked behind the open yards of three houses so he could double back to where the pickup was parked.
Tell crossed the street and walked back in the direction of the entranceway of the ballpark. He slid up close to a darkened, white house. He crept around behind an ornamental shrub planted at the corner of the house. Tell peered around the edge of the evergreen at the pickup truck. It was a Dodge Ram, and it was red. The license plate was the same as the one issued to Luke Strider.
Tell figured if Strider was watching the perimeter, Walt might already be lurking on the diamonds somewhere.
A dog barked a few backyards due west. Tell hoped the neighbors and Luke would take it for harmless yammering. The moon was in quarter phase; not much ambient light. A row of pines still obscured the ball fields’ parking lot from view.
Tell looked at his sidearm, weighing it. Then he looked at his riot gun. Both were too much. He didn’t necessarily want to kill Luke Strider in cold blood. He wanted to arrest him. Make Strider face jail in some institution where he’d receive all the special treatment accorded a bent ex-cop. He also had to assume Walt Pierce was close by, so he couldn’t be too noisy. Tell wanted to retain some element of surprise before confronting Pierce.
The concrete porch of the house whose shrub he was hiding behind caught Tell’s eye. It was partly demolished—some homeowner’s ill-advised attempt at a do-it-yourself improvement project. A big sledgehammer was propped next to the porch. Tell tucked his riot gun between the tree and the house and picked up the sledge, hefted it. Fucking heavy.
He stooped low and ran back to the shrub, lugging the hammer. The house had a four-foot hedge running across the front lawn and down the side to the backyard. There was a gap in the hedge about four feet from the tailgate of where the Ram sat with its lights off and engine on—a gap wide enough for a riding mower to pass through.
Tell crept along the interior edge of the hedge and down the side to the gap. He was stooped low and pressed up tight to the foliage. Tell watched the silhouette of Luke Strider’s head and when it was looking west, in the direction of the barking dog, Tell ran low and fast and stopped at the tailgate of the Dodge. He walked slowly on his knees around the back and along the passenger side of the Ram, staying down low under the reach of the passenger side’s mirror.
Tell reached the front of the truck. Staying down, he positioned himself in front of the driver’s side front bumper. He hefted the sledgehammer, positioned it, then stood up just enough to help his swing.
The sledgehammer hit the front bumper and Tell heard a curse. Then there was the hiss of the driver’s side airbag deploying. Tell hefted the sledgehammer for another swing and ran around to the driver’s side door. Strider was pinned to his seat by the airbag, struggling to draw his gun.
Tell again swung the hammer.
He realized his mistake too late to check his swing.
Tell had swung in anticipation of breaking tempered glass to get at the driver. But the window was down.
Too late to check the momentum of his swing, Tell winced as he heard Luke Strider’s skull crack. Tell nearly gagged. The entire side of the deputy’s head was caved in. A dead man, like that.
Sickened, Tell pulled out a handkerchief and wiped down the sledgehammer’s handle. He walked quickly back to the shrub where he’d left his riot gun and exchanged the hammer for the shotgun.
Tell took a last look at Luke Strider’s caved-in head and then sprinted off toward the ball diamonds. He saw a Horton County cruiser and a Vale County cruiser parked alongside.
When Tell reached the main diamond, he saw something glittering close to a dugout. He crept closer and saw it was a handgun. With his handkerchief, he picked up the gun and shoved it down his waistband. He looked around—saw no sign of Able, and no sign of Walt Pierce.
He walked back toward the more remote ball diamonds. He heard angry voices, coming from the direction of the field where Thalia Ruiz’s body had been found.
Cautiously, Tell crept toward the voices, moving slowly but steadily through the high weeds.
The rasp of Walt Pierce’s voice: “You going to shoot me, just fucking do it, but it’ll be your fucking ruin, Hawk.”
Tell heard Able say, “Only thing staying my hand for the moment is I don’t want to make it that fast for you, Pierce.”
Tell was close enough to see them both now. Able stood by the tree where Thalia had been found, pointing his gun at Walt’s head. Crime scene tape remnants still dangled from the tree.
Pierce was on his knees in the ivy, his hands thrust into the front pockets of his pants. Tell put down his shotgun and holstered his own weapon. Hands in the air he said, “Don’t shoot Able, it’s Tell Lyon.”
Startled, Able looked his way; Walt Pierce too.
“It�
�s okay now, Able,” Tell said. “Strider’s dead.”
“You killed him?”
“Not intentionally.”
“Good he’s dead,” Able said. “I’ll do this one, and we’ll be all done.”
“We can arrest this one,” Tell said. “We’ve got him tight. I’ve got the MS-13 gang member he sent out to kill you and me. I’ve got the one who shot Amos, and I’ve got a signed statement from him, admitting he was sent out by this one to kill us both. But it’s even better. I’ve got one of Pierce’s own deputies who will testify Strider confided to him that Pierce raped and killed all those women. That Walt and Strider were a team in raping and killing those women. We’ve got him, all the way up, Able.”
“In custody, he’d burn me and Amos down anyway,” Able said. That reminded him. “Any more word on Amos?”
“You should be there at the hospital,” Tell said.
Able scowled. “Amos fading?”
“No,” Tell said. “When I left, there was no change. But you’ve got a great-granddaughter waiting to meet you.”
Walt Pierce grinned meanly. “Fuckin’ touching. You two are amusing. Lyon, Able’s right—I will burn him and his grandson down for that license scam. They’ll both rot in jail and Able will die in there. But you’re too straight-arrow to let Able kill me in cold blood. You said yourself Strider’s death was an accident. A fucking Boy Scout—that’s how I read you, Lyon. Figure I stay here on my knees long enough, I’ll see you two come to blows over what to do with me.”
“You’ve misjudged me,” Tell said. “I’ve concluded you don’t read men well.”
Pierce shook his head. “Like hell I have misread you.”
Tell thought about it—assessed all the angles.
He made up his mind. Again.
But first, he wanted to know how it had been. “What was the arrangement, Pierce? Did Luke rape them and you beat them?”
“I got me some action too,” Walt said. “They’s just Mexican cunts.” He grinned. “You know how good they are. Hell, you’re going to marry one.”
And I buried one.
But Walt maybe didn’t know that. And he couldn’t know that Tell had already crossed that bloody borderline to secure justice for his own.
If Pierce knew that, then he would know that Tell was the last man on earth to be expected to deprive Able Hawk having his own private “reckoning” for what had been done to his grandson and for his friend, Thalia.
Tell said, “So how was it? When Thalia left that apartment where she slept with Shawn O’Hara she had no car. Did you pull up in your cruiser and offer her a ride? Called your buddy Luke for a bloody rendezvous?”
“That’s close enough,” the Vale County sheriff said.
“That’s all I want to hear of this,” Able said. “You want any more from this cocksucker, Tell, you best get it fast, because I aim to put him down now.”
“No,” Tell said.
Walt Pierce smiled, misreading Tell’s answer. Then the Vale County sheriff frowned as he watched Tell walk over to Able.
“There’s a better way to do it,” Tell said. “You use this, instead. He reached carefully behind his back and pulled out the sidearm he’d found near the dugout. “This is Walt’s gun, I’m guessing.”
Able smiled now—a frightening smile. “It is his gun. And it is better. You were running late, Tell. I got antsy. Hid in the dugout and waited to make sure it was you. About halfway across the field, it was obvious from the silhouette it was this short, fat cocksucker. I got the drop on him. Figured this was the right place to put him down.” Tell almost smiled at that. Walt’s shape was so distinctive that Tell had made tentative logical leaps regarding identity based solely on the husky Lego man inadvertently captured by the sport photographer’s camera.
Tell said softly, “It’ll do. If it was me, I’d do it up close, to the right temple.”
“Make it look like a suicide, you mean,” Able said. “That works.”
“Particularly since I’ll be the one finding the body when I come to investigate this murderous bastard’s abandoned cruiser come first light,” Tell said. “We’ll get Doc Parks here and truck his corpse to a Horton County freezer before Pierce’s own even know he’s missing.”
“This ain’t fuckin’ funny,” Walt said, tobacco juice dribbling down his chin now. “You ain’t gonna let this bastard shoot me in cold blood, Lyon. We both know that. That’s a fucking bad joke’s what that is.” His stained chin was trembling.
“It’s no joke,” Tell said, pointing his gun at Walt Pierce’s head. “Try to stay still. Take it like a man, Walter. At least you know it’ll be quick, like it wasn’t for Thalia. Try and be the tough guy now. Might go easier on you in some way. Though I honestly can’t see how.”
Then Tell hesitated. He said, “Thalia’s body was left over there, Able.”
Able Hawk nodded. “I know, and yonder would make it perfect, Tell. But this spot where Walt’s kneeling? It’s my ground. It’s smack in Horton County, I mean.”
Walt was startled to feel the barrel of his own gun suddenly up tight to his temple. His eyes darted sideways toward Able Hawk. “Jesus, Able, stop kidding! This ain’t fucking funny!” He wetted his lips. “I swear, I won’t say nothing to hurt you and Amos. I swear to God.”
“Yeah.” Able said, “Keep swearin’. Now close your eyes, Walt. Think of Mexico.”
* * *
Walt Pierce lay face down in the bloodied grass. Able pulled Walt’s hands from his pockets. Then Able wiped down the Vale County sheriff’s gun, pressed it into Walt’s dead right hand, and fired another shot into the ground. He plugged the hole with some sod. Able said, “Think that’ll fool you come morning, Tell?”
Tell was in no mood for jokes—gallows humor or otherwise. He said, “It’ll do fine.” He picked up his riot gun. “We best get out of here, Able. Just in case anyone heard the shots.”
“They’ll think it was kids with firecrackers,” Able said. “But I’ve got to get back to the hospital.”
He hesitated, said, “You weren’t lying to try and talk me out of shooting this bastard? I mean, you saying that Amos is still hanging on?”
“No, I wasn’t lying, Able. But you should get back there. Sofia needs you … Evelia too.”
“You coming too, Tell? Meet me there?”
“Not right away. I’ve got a sledgehammer to dispose of.”
Able looked confused. Then he said, “There aren’t words enough to tell you how grateful I am for you lettin’ me do this, Tell.” He nodded at Sheriff Pierce’s corpse. “With him alive, Amos and I would never have a future. You were right enough on that score.”
“Just hope it doesn’t cost you later,” Tell said. “I mean your conscience.”
“Fat chance,” Able said. “I’m just pleasantly surprised you let me go ahead with it.”
Tell frowned at “pleasantly surprised.”
What a ghastly way to put it.
Tell said, “You read about my family. There were never any arrests, never any trials.”
“I know,” Able said softly. “Sorry you didn’t get your closure.”
“I got my fucking so-called closure, Able,” Tell said. “Though there was nothing like closure in doing what I did to the ones who killed mine. And God evidently didn’t care for Walt, so why should I? But there is one big loose end here that can fuck us both up. Troy Marshall saw that e-mail you sent me, asking me to meet you here. And he knows I was headed here to try and keep that meeting. Troy’s the one who tipped me to where I was supposed to be. He tipped me to that a few minutes to eight. If he ever talks … ?”
Able slapped Tell’s arm. “No sweat. Troy won’t talk. I’ll go see him now, in fact.”
“Good,” Tell said without enthusiasm. “That’s good.”
Tell walked alone across the field, back toward the baseball diamonds, his shotgun heavy in his hand.
* * *
Tell walked back across the field with something heavier:
the sledgehammer he’d used to kill Luke Strider. He wiped off his own prints again. Frowning, he positioned the grip of the hammer in Walt’s fat, still warm hands and forced them closed.
He used a blanket to carry the hammer back to the Ram. He dropped it curbside.
Fighting off a shiver, Tell started his car and got her rolling with the headlights off. He drove three blocks in the dark before turning them on.
He checked the clock on the dashboard: ten minutes after nine. Tell called his cousin’s house. Chris Lyon answered. Chris said, “What are the damages?”
Tell said, “It’s over now, Chris. It’s all over. If you can handle the drive, I’d like to meet you again in Morton Springs come tomorrow afternoon. Get my lady.”
Chris said, “Nah, Tell. Figure tomorrow’s same as forever. How about tonight instead?”
“Can’t put you out like that, Chris.”
“You’re not. I hear it in your voice, Tell. I’ve been there, more than once, where I think you are now. Power’s been off, but I have a battery-operated radio and caught some newscasts. I also have cop sources out your way from old days. You need Patricia back with you tonight. But before then, I expect you’ve got places you should be rather than driving out to Morton Springs. Keep your cell phone on, Tell. Patricia or I will call you when we reach Horton County. All that said, I wouldn’t say no to your couch tonight.”
Suddenly a shade hoarse, Tell said, “Thank you, Chris.”
His cousin said, “You really want to thank me, then tell me while it’s still early enough for me to call him that you’ll take Roy Atchity’s job. Let me get a crew started digging a foundation for your place, pronto.”
“Do it,” Tell said. “Between the two of us, two weeks from now, I don’t ever want to step foot in this godforsaken county again.”
FIFTY NINE
The service was over and the mourners were dispersing. It was stifling heat in which to be wearing black, so consequently everyone was fanning themselves and wiping or swiping sweat from their foreheads with black sleeves or gloves.
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