Short Straw

by Stuart Woods

  Then he sat bolt upright in bed, his eyes wide open. Pep Boys. It was at his first meeting with Joe at the county jail. In his account of his afternoon, on the day of the triple murder, Joe had said that, while working on Cartwright's car, he had had to go to Pep Boys, the auto parts place, for a fan belt. At something like three-thirty in the afternoon. Eagle had been so preoccupied with Barbara's absconding that he had forgotten about it.

  Eagle placed Pep Boys in his mind: it was out on Cerrillos Road, a busy commercial thoroughfare, not far from Airport Road. Joe could have gone to Pep Boys, then to his trailer, and he could have been there in five minutes, with good traffic. Then back to Cartwright's, and the whole thing, the triple murder, could have been accomplished in half an hour, tops.

  He sank back into bed. Why the hell hadn't he remembered that sooner? Then he thought, "What would I have done if I had thought of it sooner?" He thought about that until he finally fell asleep.

  Twenty-nine

  CUPIE WOKE UP VERY EARLY, NEEDING THE BATHROOM.

  That accomplished, he passed a window on the way back to bed and was struck by what he saw. Barbara and Vittorio were emerging from the Pacific Ocean, hand in hand, laughing and naked. They walked back toward the cottage and flopped down on a blanket, shielded from the view of the rest of the empty beach by a screen of palm fronds. Then Barbara rolled over on top of Vittorio. Cupie went back to bed.

  JOE BIG BEAR turned up at the Santa Fe County Correctional Center in time for visiting hours and asked for Harold. Soon they were seated across a table from each other.

  "So?" Harold asked, looking at Joe narrowly.

  "So, Harold, I think you and I are going to do some business."

  "What business? We got no business."

  "Listen to me careful, Harold," Joe said. "First of all, I want a phone number for Mrs. Eagle."

  "You said she was in Mexico."

  "She's coming back, Harold," he lied.

  "Why do you want her phone number?"

  "Harold, I got friends in this place who would mash you into the ground for twenty bucks. Give me the number."

  Harold blinked a couple of times, then recited it from memory.

  Joe wrote it down. "Now, Harold, I'm going to take over Bobby's role in your little plan."

  "You mean you're going to off Eagle?"

  "That's right."

  "But you said I get to keep all the money."

  "That was then, Harold; this is a whole new now."

  "You're going to do the job?"

  "Don't make me repeat myself, Harold."

  "For the same as Bobby?"

  "For twelve and a half grand, Harold, up front."

  "But I already paid Bobby a thousand."

  "That's between you and Bobby, cost of doing business."

  "I'm not giving you that kind of money up front."

  "Sure you are, Harold. Remember my friends in here? There's that, and then there's the fact that if you don't get on board with this right now, I'm going to go see your old lady and take all the money from her, and when you get out of here, you'll have nothing."

  Harold blinked some more.

  "So here's what you do: you go back in there and call her, and tell her to bring twelve-five to the parking lot outside, and right now. You got that?"

  Harold thought about it.

  "Time's up, Harold. Get it done now, or by the end of the day, you're going to be broke, and nobody who knows you is going to recognize you for a long time."

  "Okay," Harold said, finally. "Twelve-five outside in an hour. But I want the job done before I get out of here. You got five days. Agreed?"

  "Agreed," Joe replied. "Twelve-five, outside, sixty minutes," he repeated, just to be sure Harold had it down.

  Harold nodded, got up and went back through the door behind him.

  Joe left the jail and drove up to Garcia Street, where there was a coffee shop he liked. He bought a double espresso and a newspaper and sat outside in the morning sun for a while, then he dialed the number Harold had given him. It rang four times before she answered.

  "Hello?"

  "Mrs. Eagle?"

  "Who's this?"

  "My name is Pepe," he said, "and I'm calling to do you a favor."

  "Who are you, and what do you want?"

  "I told you, my name is Pepe. I'm going to kill your husband for you."

  "What are you talking about?"

  "You know the other hombre you hired to do the job, Harold? Harold went and got himself busted; he's in jail, and he ain't getting out any time soon."

  "What do you want?"

  "This is about what you want, Mrs. Eagle. If you want your husband dead within four days, it will cost you twenty-five thousand dollars, cash, wired to me in Santa Fe."

  "How do I know you're not a cop?"

  "Well, I guess you don't know, but you're in Mexico, so the cops can't touch you. And look at it this way, the insurance company is paying for the work, not you." Joe was guessing that Ed Eagle had mucho insurance.

  A long pause. "How can I reach you?"

  "You can reach me by wiring twenty-five thousand dollars to me today. There's no other way. If I don't receive it within twenty-four hours, your husband will go right on living, and you will collect nothing, and I'll remind him to change the beneficiary on the life insurance policy. I don't think you're going to have another opportunity to arrange this hit from Mexico before he does that."

  She was quiet for a moment. "What name do I wire it to?"

  "Well, let's make up a name," Joe said. "Wire it to Pepe Oso Grande"-he had a driver's license with that name on it-"care of Western Union, Santa Fe." He spelled the name for her.

  "Let me think about it," she said.

  "Think about it all you like, but if the money isn't in Santa Fe by noon tomorrow, Ed Eagle lives, and you lose, big time. I'll look forward to hearing from you," Joe replied and clicked off.

  Joe looked at his watch, finished his coffee and drove back to the jail. He had only a five-minute wait before the woman in the pickup turned into the parking lot. He walked over to her. "Good morning," he said. "Harold sent me to pick up twelve thousand, five hundred dollars."

  The woman looked at him with hatred. "Harold says if you don't do it before he gets out, he'll find you and kill you, Joe Big Bear."

  So Harold had found out his name. "Thank you for that message," Joe said. "Give me the money."

  She handed him a red bandanna, tied up in a bundle.

  Joe peeped inside. "I'm going to count it later," he said. "If it isn't all there, Harold is going to get hurt today. So are you."

  She started the truck, backed out of the parking space and drove away.

  Joe went back to his truck, got in and counted the money. It was all there. "Jesus," he said aloud, "why didn't I go into this line of work sooner?"

  BARBARA PUT DOWN her cell phone and turned to Vittorio. "How long are we staying here?"

  "I figure one more night, just to let things cool off."

  "I have to go to a bank or a Western Union office today."

  "Are you nuts?"

  "My sister has an emergency, and she needs money. Don't argue with me, Vittorio; it has to be done."

  Vittorio drove her into town, parked in front of a bank, checked the street in every direction and waved her inside. Half an hour later, she was back.

  "Everything go okay?" he asked.

  "Perfectly," she said.

  "Then why do you look so nervous? I never saw you look nervous before."

  "Shut up and drive," she said.

  Thirty

  EAGLE DIALED SUSANNAHS CELL PHONE NUMBER.

  "Well, hi there," she said.

  "Are you moved in yet?"

  "In a manner of speaking," she replied. "I mean, the boxes have all been dumped here; now they're unpacking them."

  "I'm glad you've got help," he said.

  "I've got four guys here, working like beavers. If I can keep them from breaking the crystal, I
'll have this place in shape by dinnertime."

  "I wish I were there to cook for you."

  "You cook?"

  "When you're a bachelor for as long as I was, it's a survival skill. When are you coming back? I hope you're not waiting until the closing."

  "Well, I was going to, but once this place is livable I don't really have anything to occupy me here, until I get some work."

  "Come here, and I'll occupy you. In fact, I'll see if I can't get the closing brought forward. I know that the owner has already moved out. And I have a comfortable guest suite, and I'd be very pleased if you'd stay at my house until the closing."

  "That would be very nice. See what you can do about the closing, and I'll go ahead and have my furniture shipped."

  "Do you have enough to fill the house?"

  "No, not with splitting my things between two places."

  "I'll give you a list of all the best shops."

  "I'm going to need a housekeeper and a secretary, too."

  "I'll put my secretary on that right away."

  "You're a doll, Ed Eagle."

  "I hope you'll still think so a year from now."

  "Why a year?"

  "I reckon that's how long it will take you to find out."

  "We'll see. I've gotta run. Somebody just dropped a Baccarat goblet."

  Eagle hung up feeling like a new man, but then it occurred to him that he hadn't received the FedEx package from Vittorio. He called the Apache's cell phone.

  "Hello?"

  "Vittorio? It's Ed Eagle."

  "Good morning, Mr. Eagle."

  "Why haven't I received the FedEx package from you?"

  "I was planning to send it from the airport yesterday, but I got held up. It'll go out today, I promise."

  "Everything all right?"

  "Couldn't be better," Vittorio replied.

  "Give my best to Cupie."

  "Will do." He hung up.

  Eagle wasn't going to feel comfortable until he had those blank pages in hand.

  * * *

  JOE BIG BEAR SAT outside the Western Union office, reading a paperback novel, a western. He glanced up at the storefront, watching the clerk inside for some sign that he had received the wire. Nothing. He looked at his watch: eleven-forty. She wasn't going to send it.

  Oh, well, he thought, I'll just have to get by with the twelve-five from Harold. At that moment, the clerk left his counter, went to the front door and waved Joe inside. His heart leapt, and he hurried into the office.

  "Your wire is in," the man said. "How do you want the money?"

  "In cash."

  "You sure you don't want a cashier's check? It's safer."

  "Nah, I've gotta pay for a car in cash."

  "Give me a minute," the man said. "I'll have to see if we've got that much." He disappeared into a back room.

  Joe took a chair, picked up a magazine and tried to be cool.

  Five minutes later, the clerk returned with a large brown envelope. "I don't have it all in hundreds," he said, "so I had to give you a lot of fifties and twenties."

  "No problem," Joe said.

  The man handed him the envelope. "Count it, please."

  Joe riffled through each stack of bills, counting quickly. "It's all here," he said.

  "Sign right here, Mr. Grande," the clerk said, offering him a pen. "Pepe Oso Grande," the clerk mused. "Doesn't that mean Joseph Big Bear in English?"

  "Something like that," Joe replied. He signed the document, took his money and walked out. Back in the car, he didn't trust himself to drive for a moment. His heart was pounding, he was breathing rapidly, and he was sweating.

  "Thirty-seven thousand, five hundred dollars," he said aloud, mopping his brow. He'd never had more than two thousand dollars at once in his life. He took some deep breaths and started the car. He had no idea where to go, so he just wandered slowly in the direction of home. What would he do with all this money? He hadn't allowed himself to think about that until now.

  "Buy a safe," he said aloud. He turned into Sam's Club, stuffed the cash under his seat and locked the pickup. He was back in twenty minutes with a heavy, cardboard box on a dolly. With the help of a clerk, he muscled it into the pickup and unlocked the cab, checking to see that the money was still under the seat.

  He drove back to his trailer, got his toolbox and bolted the safe to the floor under a kitchen cabinet. Then he set the combination into the electronic lock and practiced opening it a few times. Satisfied, he took the money out of its envelope and placed it on a shelf in the safe, along with the twelve-five from Harold, then he closed and locked the safe and got a beer from the fridge.

  He sat, sipping it, thinking about what he could do with thirty-seven thousand, five hundred dollars. It was all his, and he didn't have to do a fucking thing for it. The woman didn't know who she'd wired the money to.

  Then the beer went sour in his mouth. Harold knew who he was, and he had promised to find and kill him if Eagle wasn't dead before he got out of jail.

  Joe swallowed hard. It was the first time it had occurred to him that he was really going to have to kill Ed Eagle. And he was probably going to have to kill Harold, too, when he got out. And his wife; she knew his name, too.

  Thirty-one

  BARBARA WOKE UP BEFORE DAWN. VlTTORIO WAS SLEEPING soundly beside her. She picked up her handbag, then walked to where Vittorio's bag stood open and felt inside, coming up with the Federal Express envelope. She took it into the bathroom, locked the door and turned on the light.

  It was just an ordinary FedEx shipping envelope; he hadn't affixed the label, yet. She pulled the tab that opened it and removed the signed blank sheets of paper inside. Then she opened her large handbag and took out the FedEx envelope and blank paper she had gotten from the bank. She stuffed the blank sheets inside, sealed it, then put the old envelope and the signed sheets into her handbag. Then she switched off the light, unlocked the door and tiptoed to Vittorio's bag. She put the FedEx envelope containing the blank sheets into the bag, then crept back into bed. "What?" Vittorio said.

  "Nothing," she said. "I just went to the bathroom."

  He reached for her, and she melted into his arms, feeling for his crotch. Gotta keep him sweet, she thought, and she ducked under the covers, giving herself to the enterprise.

  WHEN SHE WAS DONE, she nestled in his arms.

  "That was wonderful," he said.

  "You know what would be wonderful?"

  "What?"

  "If we could just stay down here."

  "In Mexico?"

  "Yes. I like it down here, and you can live dirt cheap."

  "Your three hundred grand wouldn't last all that long."

  "I've got more coming," she said. "A lot more."

  "From where?"

  "From Ed," she said.

  "I don't think that's going to happen," he said.

  "It'll happen, if you don't FedEx him those signed sheets."

  "That wouldn't work," he said.

  "Why not?"

  "Cupie."

  "What about him?"

  "He wouldn't sit still for that."

  "So, don't tell him. We can just send him on his way."

  "But when Eagle doesn't get the signatures, he'll put Cupie on us. Cupie is very smart; he'd find us again."

  She wondered if she could talk him into killing Cupie. Probably not. "I guess you're right," she said. She turned over, putting her back to him. He reached for her ass, but she removed his hand.

  "Look, baby," he said, "I took the man's money; I have to finish the job."

  "You took my money, too."

  "And I'm going to finish that job. I'll get you back to the States."

  She said nothing.

  "And then there's the Mexican police: they're still looking for you."

  He had a point. She couldn't stay in Mexico. But if he sent Ed those blank sheets, the hunt would be on again, at least until this guy Pepe did the job. If he did the job. There were too many loose ends to th
is; she was going to have to think of a way to tie some of them up. When Eagle was dead, then she'd have everything she needed.

  What she had to do now was buy time, until Pepe did his work. If Eagle died without a signed settlement agreement, she'd get his estate and the life insurance. That was the best way.

  CUPIE PUT HIS BAG in the trunk of the Toyota, then leaned against it, gazing out across the Pacific. Something was wrong, he figured, maybe a lot. First, he had to get straight with Vittorio, then they could discuss the rest.

  Vittorio came out of the casita, carrying his and Barbara's luggage, and put it into the trunk.

  "We've gotta talk," Cupie said.

  "I'm listening," Vittorio replied.

  "Your new, ah, relationship with the lady is screwing up this job."

  "How?"

  "She's gonna try to talk you out of going through with it, and I'll be left with an angry client."

  "She's not going to talk me into anything," Vittorio replied. "I'm getting laid; I'm enjoying it. All I have to do to complete the job is to FedEx Eagle those signatures, then get the lady to the U.S. Eagle will be happy, and she'll be happy, then we can all say bye-bye."

  "Has she asked you yet not to send Eagle the signatures?"

  "Of course, but I'm going to anyway. I'll find a shipping office in Mazatlan and FedEx them from there. That will take care of our client, Ed Eagle, then all we'll have to do is take care of our client, Barbara Eagle."

  "You're sure you're on board for this?"

  "I'm on board, Cupie. Besides, I wouldn't want you dogging my ass."

  "Then there's something else we have to talk about," Cupie said.

  "Shoot."

  Barbara came out of the casita and headed for the car.

  "We'll talk later," Cupie said.

  "Okay."

  They got into the car, and Vittorio started the engine.

  Cupie was looking at the map. "I got an idea," he said.

  "What's that?" Vittorio asked.

  Cupie pointed at the map. "You see this dotted line that runs from Mazatlan over to La Paz, in Baja, California?"