Hogdoggin'

by Anthony Neil Smith

  As he started for the car, Margherita and Savannah in tow, he remembered Desiree. Last time he saw her, she was on the floor, confused, begging him not to leave her alone. But he had to. She wouldn’t understand. He had to do it in order to get back what he’d lost. Fucking Lafitte mentally castrated him. Man can’t let something like that go.

  Out the door, into the light crisp breeze that passed for cold weather down here these days. He’d have to call Desiree from the hospital, and he needed a story. Don’t think of it as a lie. Just…a need to know sort of thing. As long as he came back alive and re-tooled, she would forgive him again.

  And if he didn’t come back this time?

  Man, Desiree would be so pissed.

  NINETEEN

  McKeown’s plane flew into Sioux Falls, for god’s sake, which then meant he had to stomach another hour and a half drive as a passenger with a Trooper who wouldn’t shut up. Even when McKeown said he had some calls to make or some email to answer, the guy kept going. Mostly about how the meth business was giving the State Police more to do in these little farming towns. Otherwise, not much crime at all.

  McKeown read it as Small timer trying to impress Federal Agent. Like Deputy Nate before he went and got himself killed. Idiot. McKeown had really wanted to rent a car. Would’ve been nice, maybe an SUV, something to make him tower over the State patrol cars and also have some time to himself. Instead, the Troopers volunteered. Kind of surprising that South Dakota would let the Minnesota cops escort him, since most of the drive was on the Interstate running straight north and south through SD, but whatever the local politics was, McKeown didn’t give a shit. All he wanted was to question the witnesses, find Lafitte, pitch the deal, and get back to Memphis.

  Memphis. Took long enough to get out of there. Slept on the plane for two hours. Changed into his suit, but left off the tie. If the Minnesotans thought he wasn’t formal enough, fuck them. Let them put it in writing, then. It was now nearing dawn, the sky was an unfocused blue-gray that fucked with your vision. And his mind was back on Alex again. Pictured him barely covered by the sheet. Caused some tingling. Should have woken him, let him know something instead of just running away.

  Did Alex even know McKeown was gone yet? Could still save this, explain it all, if Alex had slept right through and not noticed the absence. He risked a call. What was the worst that could happen?

  It rang five times. Around the second ring, the Trooper said, “It’s just another something to do. Not like they’re bad kids or anything. Even the guys making it, some of them don’t know any better.”

  “That’s great. Could you wait a minute, please?”

  The machine clicked on. Took forever for Alex’s voice to start in, and McKeown knew it was bad news: “I’ll call you back when I feel like it. And if this is Josh…don’t bother.”

  McKeown thought about hanging up, but changed his mind. The beep went and he said, “Let me explain. Pick up the phone.”

  Nothing. McKeown could feel Alex hovering over the phone. You could really feel it.

  “I didn’t want to wake you, but I’m calling now. Isn’t that something? I’ll be back as soon as I can.”

  More nothing.

  “It was one of the best nights of my life.”

  Another beep, then the line went dead and clicked him off.

  He lowered the phone to his lap, stared at the cell’s wallpaper—the Starbucks logo. Didn’t seem so funny any more. The Trooper said, “I’m sorry. Trouble at home?”

  McKeown was set to pull his FBI intimidation routine, do a You guys seem to take things pretty casually here, don’t you? or a That’s confidential. He couldn’t really blame the guy, though. What was it like to be coming up fast on forty and realize the excitement you’d signed up for was only a fairy tale? With McKeown, it was almost the opposite—he’s expected his share of reports and endless bureaucracy, but it turned out life in the FBI was more fun than not. At least until Rome showed up, and even then you had to admit that tracking down a dangerous wanted man was a thrill. It was just the boss who made it suck.

  The radio squawked and Trooper Louwagie picked up, said, “Yeah?”

  “You got the FBI with you?”

  McKeown got his “casual” line ready again.

  “Roger that,” Louwagie said. “We’re about an hour away.”

  “No need to hurry. The Deputy handled the questioning, so we let those folks go back to bed.”

  What? McKeown said, “Ask him which deputy? We didn’t authorize any deputy to handle this.”

  Louwagie relayed it back. Got the answer: “But she said she would report it back to you and see if you had any follow-ups.”

  McKeown took the handset from Louwagie. “Why the hell would I fly up here if I’d already assigned someone to question them?”

  The radio cop said, “I don’t know how you people work. Look, we’ll wake everyone back up if you need me to, but they won’t be happy about it.”

  “Hold on.” McKeown took his finger off the switch, took in a deep breath. Louwagie was trying not to pay attention, eyes straight ahead. McKeown clicked in again. “Okay, who was it? If it’s not your fault, let me yell at her, then.”

  “She’s already gone. But I know her pretty well. She’s from Yellow Medicine, and she knew all about you, said you had been helping her boyfriend get in at the academy.”

  McKeown closed his eyes and thumped the handset against his forehead. It had to be a nightmare. Click. “Blonde, young, kind of stocky?”

  “Well…”

  “It’s Colleen, isn’t it? Yeah, I know her. Shit. Listen, can we radio her car, get her back to where you are?”

  A long silence on the other end before, “That was kind of the weird thing, I guess. She wasn’t in her squad. She was in this old hot rod. Said it was her boyfriend’s. I’ve never met him.”

  “Not in uniform either?”

  “Can’t say she was, no. I was thinking you must have called her on short notice. I’m telling you, though. Shouldn’t be hard to find her. She’s a beauty.”

  “What, you think the Deputy is pretty, and that’s supposed to help?”

  “I meant the car.”

  Time for another deep breath. He cut a look at Louwagie, who said, “Need something?”

  Eyes back to the road. “To be back in Memphis for a start.” Click. “She didn’t happen to head west instead of turning around and going home, did she?”

  “How’d you know?”

  *

  A South Dakota Trooper grabbed Colleen barely five minutes after the Chevelle’s description was radioed out, as she was rolling along a county road south of Watertown. McKeown had Louwagie backtrack to meet up. They found the Chevelle and the Trooper’s patrol car on the shoulder, Colleen handcuffed and in the backseat. McKeown said he wanted to talk to her alone, asked the Trooper to pull her out behind the squad.

  Colleen didn’t want to look anyone in the face, eyes down and her lips pouting, bundled tightly like whatever she was feeling would burst the seams of her denim jacket. McKeown had only met her once when first connecting with Nate, but in nearly every conversation after that, he could tell that Colleen was back there pulling the strings, feeding Nate questions, pushing her man to be more aggressive in dealing with the Feds. Good woman to have behind you, if you could stand it. McKeown saw the attraction—although she looked pretty plain in the face, pale, nothing special, and her body was more like an Olympic gymnast’s in all the wrong, overmuscled ways, Colleen still radiated something special. Maybe it was confidence. Right now, it was rage.

  McKeown sidled up beside her, mirrored how she was leaning against the car, crossed his arms. “Listen, I’m real sorry about Nate.”

  She snorted. “Yeah, okay. Everyone’s sorry about Nate, but I’m the only one who’s angry about it.”

  “Maybe that’ll come later.”

  “By then it will be too late.” Then she huffed, putting on a good show. “Guess you don’t have to worry about hi
m now. Out of your hair.”

  “Hey, that’s not fair.”

  Colleen shook her head and finally lifted her face. “Are you telling me you guys didn’t use him? Isn’t that how you work? Use him and then toss what’s left?”

  McKeown had had enough. He thought of Alex saying the same exact thing. McKeown stood back up and reached for Colleen’s cuffs, yanked the chain down hard. Got in her face. “What did I tell him to do? I told him to stay put. Don’t go after Lafitte. We didn’t want him to think we were onto him. So shove your attitude up your ass. I’ve only had three hours sleep.”

  The cuffs were biting into her skin but she bit her lip to keep from complaining. Good girl, thought McKeown. He loosened his grip.

  She said, “How awful for you. Oh, and I watched my boyfriend burn to death in my car.” Narrowed her eyes. “So sorry about that.”

  McKeown twisted the chain, watched Colleen’s eyes go wide. “You’re looking for revenge. I get it. It’s not going to happen.”

  Her voice squeaked with pain when she said, “Fuck. Off.”

  McKeown let go, caught the Troopers trying to listen in. He flashed them his “annoyed agent” mask and they turned away, started mumbling back and forth. Jesus, they acted like children up here. A little respect, please?

  He leaned close to her and said, “What did you get from the witness?”

  “What? What witness?”

  “How the hell do you think we found you? You went and talked to my witnesses. What, have you got a scanner in the car?”

  Colleen lowered her chin, shrugged, looked off. “You’re crazy. Just let me go home.” Her voice trailed away. Looked like she was about to cry.

  “Come on, give this up. What are you doing here anyway? You had like three or four hours head start on me, but you’re still dicking around the backroads. So what did they tell you to keep you nearby?”

  “Can’t say.” She tightened her lips and closed her eyes.

  “Damn it, Colleen—”

  Louwagie yelled out, “You two doing all right back there? Can’t we take this inside?”

  McKeown ignored him. “Here are your options. Take me along to help you look, or I charge you with something really awful and send you off with our helpful State Police here to a really bad jail cell, and I promise I’ll lose the paperwork until well after the funeral.”

  Colleen scratched her nose, then tried to rub her wrist. Jittery. McKeown wondered if she had taken diet pills or something before heading out. She said, “What happens if I help you?”

  “You can go home once we’re done.”

  “And Lafitte’s going to jail? That’s all?”

  Well, fuck. Lie to her. Anything. Just lose the Keystone Cops already. “You want him. Rome wants him. As long as he answers my questions, I don’t give a shit which one of you gets him first, understand?”

  She didn’t respond at first. A bit of a mouthbreather, McKeown thought. Out for revenge? These days? Hilarious. He was hoping she would calm down by the time they caught up with Lafitte. If not, well, he’d deal with it, especially if she was as hot to trot for the FBI as Nate was.

  He pointed to the Troopers. “Them,” and to himself, “Or me.”

  Colleen stared at the ground, lolled her head around. “My scalp itches.”

  “If you’ve got the info I think you have, those cuffs can come off.”

  It wasn’t much of a grin, but it was better than what she’d shown him so far. She said, “Okay, I might know a thing or two.”

  TWENTY

  Lafitte woke to Perry and Fawn shouting at each other. Opened his eyes, and he could make them out in the gray dawn light pulsing in slowly from the high window of what looked like a cinder-block basement. Then he realized he was seeing all of this through only one eye because the other wouldn’t open. It hurt, sort of. He was still pretty out of it, the smell of leftover paint fumes blending with the backed-up sewage wafting from the drain on the floor beside him. It should make him want to puke, but he couldn’t get up enough energy to gag.

  Still alive, which was something, but not much. Fuck, kill him, that would be fine. He didn’t mind dying. If it came too close, you fought it off, sure, but that was just instinct. When he really thought about it, dying itself wasn’t the problem. It was the way he was in this basement. Helpless was worse than dead.

  So, okay. Lafitte needed to string some thoughts together. He had a mission, goddamn it.

  The argument between Fawn and Perry was mostly attitude and cursing in that weird Minnesotan cadence. Lafitte didn’t bother digging into the actual words beneath the accent until Perry said, “—can’t turn him over looking like that! There’s no fucking reward for that!” Pointing at Lafitte with each that.

  Fawn held a knife in one hand. Some bloody handprints on her jeans, blood on her shirt, fingers. Not good. She placed her free hand on her hip and waved that knife around. “Oh, no, yeah. Don’t give me that shit. You knew what I wanted.”

  “Jesus, woman, maybe some cigarette burns, that’s what I was thinking. Holy fuck, look at him!”

  Made Lafitte wonder if he still had that eye after all. It was cool in the basement, but Lafitte was shivering, sweaty, and his skin stung. Especially his chest. Looked down to see he was bare-chested, hands pulled behind him. He tugged, felt rough wood against his back and arms. Tied to a beam, probably with wire. It wasn’t giving way.

  What worried Lafitte most was his chest, covered in blood, all gashed up like Fawn had tried to carve out his heart or something. Took in a deep breath—hurt like a bastard—to see if that gave him a better look. Almost like…letters. She’d carved some fucking letters into his skin. Hard to tell upside down and backwards and with one eye. First one could’ve been an “8”, like a digital one…No, a “B”, really boxy. Then an “A” Then there was another “B” and then a “Y”. There was another word under the first. Puffed his stomach out. Looked like it bookended with “R”s. Another “A”. He had it then. She’d carved “BABY” on top and “RAPER” beneath. “BABY RAPER.”

  Oh, that bitch.

  She’d carved deep, too. Definitely going to leave scars.

  Perry kept on, “We take him in now, shit, they’ll throw us in with him. That’s fucking assault!”

  “No way! They’ll think that shit’s funny. Put his ass in jail with that on his chest, you know what’s going to happen.”

  “Yeah, I’ll know for sure. Because I’ll see it in person from the next cell. This isn’t some fucking TV show. Cops’ll go after anything bad, and—” Stabbing his finger towards Lafitte. “—that’s fucking bad.”

  Fawn crossed her arms, blade sticking up. “Just say we found him like that.”

  They wandered into another room and the conversation grew cloudy. A basement with rooms, the walls looking makeshift, homemade. Lafitte strained his neck looking around to get some idea of where the hell this was. He couldn’t remember much about the night before. Knocked out, in a car, Goof staring at him in the back seat, then lights out again. Dragged across the ground. Down some stairs. Then it was a blur—face kicked, sides kicked, Fawn whispering dirty shit in his ear and then laughing because it pissed Perry off, Goof doing his gangsta routine and landing a few weak punches to Lafitte’s gut. They had searched his pockets. Goof said, “Cash and a cell phone. No ID.”

  Perry said, “How much cash?”

  Goof flipped through. “Like a hundred bucks.”

  Lying punk. More like four hundred. Goof slipped most of it into his shorts.

  “Give me that.”

  Then another blackout.

  After that, he remembered Fawn sitting on his lap for a long time, breath hot and close against his skin. Stinging. Lots of stinging. Grabbed one thing she said out of midair: “Should’ve just fucked me nice. Hell, I would’ve gladly handed over the car if you’d have done that.”

  In the corner of the basement, some cardboard boxes. Beer logos on them. A keg nearby. Maybe this was a bar. Plenty of empty bott
les and cans. Black garbage bags overfull, stretched out in spots. A big freezer in the corner, white but stained, one like you’d see in someone’s garage. So it wasn’t a big bar, maybe one of those small town joints out in the middle of nowhere. Did Perry own the place? Did anyone else know Lafitte was down here?

  He looked up, saw that the post they’d tied him to was part of the stairs. If they’d only tied his hands, maybe he could inch himself up, get some leverage on the wire that way. He lifted his knees, put his feet together. His left ankle hurt, and that gash from the wreck was still throbbing, but not enough to make him stop. He breathed himself a rhythm then held a deep lungful. Started to push. Lafitte’s back raked across the rough wood, splinters digging into the skin, and the cuts on his chest felt like they were re-opening, ripping further. And then the fumes, goddamn, those paint fumes nauseating him. A bit too much. He collapsed to the floor and his stomach lurched and something was coming up.

  Lafitte turned his head but not quickly enough as he spewed stomach acid and Doctor Pepper onto his beard, chest, and lap, all over the floor beside him. It got up in his sinuses and he gagged when he tried to pull in fresh air. Another round of hot slime up and out. It burned into the letters on his chest. He kept spitting, trying to keep his throat from clogging up. Zapped all his strength, and he couldn’t afford to lose any more right now.

  Perry and Fawn rushed back into the room, Fawn laughing while Perry panicked.

  He said, “Oh, god, oh no. Jesus.”

  Fawn pinched her nose shut. “Ewwww. Guess that means no more fun with you. That’s disgusting.”

  “Shit, we’ve got to clean this up.”

  “I thought we weren’t turning him in now?”

  “I still have to clean up Grandad’s basement before he finds out, right? He’ll be here by ten-thirty.”

  Fawn bitched it up some more, seemed to enjoy Perry acting like a pussy. She even told him, “You’re acting like a pussy. Calm the fuck down.”