Strong Justice

by Jon Land

  “That the way it was for you, Caitlin Strong?”

  “Nope. It was quite different. My mom died when I was four and my dad was out being a Texas Ranger. My granddad was around, Earl Strong, maybe the most famous Ranger of them all. But I grew up quick mostly.”

  “My boys witnessed their mother being gunned down. They did a lot of growing that day.”

  “They’ll never get past that living in Scottsdale.”

  “Says who?”

  “You ever run from anything in your life, Cort Wesley?”

  “Not a single time.”

  “Then what makes you think your boys should?”

  Yup, Caitlin had things figured right. And Cort Wesley figured if he had to question the wisdom of saying something, he was better off saying nothing at all. So he had let Dylan keep hold of Maria’s hand, glad that finally pulling into the driveway would make the boy break his grasp, if nothing else.

  Luke was out of the truck almost before it came to a halt, off sprinting down the street.

  “Luke!” Cort Wesley called after him to no avail. So here he was, one of the most feared men in modern-day Texas, having one son with hormones bursting out of his jeans and another trying to run down an ice cream truck before its annoying speaker-fed jingle hit its next loop.

  “Two of you get in the house,” he told Dylan and Maria.

  “Can’t we go get a—”

  “Get in the house,” Cort Wesley repeated, already chasing after Luke. “I’ll bring you back something.”

  Dylan took Maria’s hand again, as they headed up the walk. It felt tiny and warm in his grasp, and the way she squeezed his back made him ache in places he was just beginning to know he had.

  As he unlocked the door and held it open for Maria, Dylan was struck by the fact that it was the first time he had mounted the front steps since his mom died without thinking of her being shot here a year ago. It made him feel peculiar and a bit guilty. He stiffened and something made him pull his hand from Maria’s when they stepped over the spot where she’d fallen, as if he was being disrespectful of her memory.

  Once inside, Dylan locked the door behind him and peered through the nearest window to look for his father until he heard Maria gasp.

  The boy swung toward her and saw the human monster he’d glimpsed yesterday from afar now up close and personal, sitting casually on the living room couch with hands cupped behind his head.

  “Buenos dias, señorita,” the monster said to Maria.

  39

  SHAVANO PARK; THE PRESENT

  “I’m not scared of you,” Dylan said, planting himself in front of Maria who shrank back against the drapes.

  “Then why are you shaking?” the man monster asked him, revealing a knife with an eight-inch blade in his grasp.

  Dylan tried to find more words, but couldn’t form any with his thoughts.

  “Where’s your father?”

  Dylan’s hands balled into fists. “I’m not talking.”

  The man monster stood up, revealing a glimpse of the IV bag tucked into a pouch on his belt, the afternoon sun glistening off his blade through the windows. Its rays framed him like a spotlight, making his skin look milky and corpselike, tissue-paper thin.

  “Where’s your father?” he repeated, his tone not changing at all.

  “You’d best be gone when he gets here.”

  “I saw him pull the truck in the driveway. What did he do, send you in here first in case there was fire to draw?”

  Dylan dry swallowed some air, felt something heavy in his throat at the same time his eyes started to mist over with tears.

  “Do you know how many people I’ve killed?” the man monster asked him.

  “What should we get for Dylan and his girl?” Luke asked at the ice cream truck.

  Cort Wesley’s gaze was fixed back on the house, something tugging at his senses. “She’s not his girl.”

  “What should we get for Dylan and the girl?”

  “Think you’re funny, don’t you?”

  The boy swiped at the cone with his tongue. “Yup.”

  “Make sure you get yourself a napkin.”

  “Why you keep staring at the house?”

  “Something’s not right.”

  “What?”

  “Don’t know.”

  Luke went back to his ice cream cone. “You got that look on your face.”

  “What look?”

  “That look.”

  Cort Wesley glanced at his younger son, amazed the boy could read him better than he could read himself. “What’s Dylan always do soon as he gets home?”

  “Open a window, even when the air-conditioning’s on.”

  Cort Wesley realized that was what was bothering him, all of the windows on the first floor he could see from here still closed. “Yeah.”

  “You didn’t answer my question,” Macerio said, gaze locked with Dylan’s as if Maria wasn’t there.

  “It’s not gonna work.”

  “What?”

  “You staring me down so Maria will try to run and you can get her in the back with your knife.” Dylan felt his cell phone vibrating in the front pocket of his jeans, ignored the hip-hop ring tone, felt the tips of his boots rubbing against each other.

  Macerio grinned, showcasing twin rows of teeth turned yellow-brown by the chemo. “I don’t kill them that fast. Would you like to hear how I do it?”

  “No,” Dylan managed.

  “Different ways. Depends on my mood.” The man monster stopped, something seeming to occur to him. “You know, nobody ever asked me why, what I do it for. Ask me.”

  Dylan opened his mouth but nothing but air came out and then that stopped too. He’d never wanted to see anyone as much as he wanted to see his father come crashing through the door right now with guns blazing to drain the man monster’s blood, though he wondered if it’d be red. And against that scene pictured in his head, the ice cream truck’s jingle started sounding again.

  Di-dah-li, dah-li, dah-li . . .

  “Ask me why.” The man monster’s tone a bit firmer.

  “You wanna tell me, just do it.”

  “I’d rather show you,” the man monster said and rose from the couch. He started forward, the fluid sloshing about his IV bag as he angled toward Maria.

  Di-dah-li, dah-li, dah-li . . .

  Louder, as Dylan sidestepped to remain between them.

  The man monster looked at him curiously, knife flashing in his grasp. “You don’t want to do that.”

  Dylan found a place in his mind where it didn’t matter anymore; his hatred for this pasty assemblage of a man who smelled like a lab project gone bad in fifth period chemistry was there and nothing else.

  The man monster’s expression remained utterly flat. “She has to go first, so you can watch me.”

  Di-dah-li, dah-li, dah-li . . .

  Really loud now, which just wasn’t right, all wrong.

  What happened next unfolded before Dylan like a splotchy video recorded on his cell phone, jumping from one scene to the next with part of the middle left out.

  First, the man monster surging forward with an arm that looked like a knobby tree branch sweeping toward him.

  Then di-dah-li, dah-li, dah-li sounding like the ice cream truck was right against the house.

  Because it was. Because in the last moment before the man monster’s arm brushed Dylan aside with a force that rattled his teeth and sent his brain ping-ponging against his skull, the boy saw the living room wall cave inward under the ice cream truck’s charge.

  He was sure he saw his father leaning out the truck’s side, covered in plaster and glass, firing his Glock in what felt like a dream, because it had to be a dream. And in the dream the man monster had somehow avoided the bullets, and the truck, flying through the air as if he’d sprouted wings.

  Dylan’s eyes were closed by that point but somehow, somehow, he heard glass shattering ahead of the rapid clack of more bullets pouring from the Glock, accompanied by
the rattle of the expended shells pinging against the hardwood floor.

  Cort Wesley couldn’t know, couldn’t be sure. Closed windows weren’t much to go on.

  But it was more than the windows. It was like sensing the blistering heat outside while the air-conditioning purred quietly, spreading its chill. You couldn’t really feel it, but you knew it was there all the same. Your senses told you. Instinct told you.

  Instinct.

  And right now instinct told Cort Wesley something was very wrong in that house. He’d honed that sense while inside The Walls, when any moment you let your guard down could find a shank drilled through your kidney. You even learned to sleep awake, rousing at the slightest sound or stirring and learning to fall back into what passed for sleep just as quick.

  Yup, something was all wrong.

  Instinct.

  But a fine line separated it from imagination. Cort Wesley reached into his pocket for his cell phone, coming up empty since he’d left it in the truck.

  “Damn,” he mumbled.

  “Here,” Luke said, “use mine.”

  Cort Wesley took it and pressed in Dylan’s number. It rang unanswered until voice mail picked up.

  “He didn’t answer?” Luke wondered.

  “Nope.”

  “He always answers.”

  “Yup,” said Cort Wesley, eyeing the closed windows and wishing he could see through walls.

  Instinct.

  “Sir,” he said to the man scooping out a fresh cone for another customer, “I’m gonna need to borrow your truck.”

  . . .

  Dylan was sure he was unconscious and yet he smelled gun smoke wafting over the room.

  Do you know how many people I’ve killed?

  “Dylan, Dylan . . .”

  Ask me why?

  “Wake up, son, wake up now!”

  I’d rather show you.

  “Open your eyes, boy. Come on, open your eyes.”

  Dylan finally did, meeting his father’s, expecting the man monster to be there too, and finding his breath when he wasn’t.

  Cort Wesley started to lift Dylan back to his feet and felt the boy crumple up against him. He clutched his son tightly, holding his gaze on the window Macerio had plunged through, as if expecting him to leap back inside.

  PART FOUR

  You may withdraw every soldier . . . from the border of Texas . . .

  if you will give her but a single regiment . . . of Texas Rangers.

  —Sam Houston

  40

  WACO, TEXAS; THE PRESENT

  “Sir?” the woman’s voice called, disturbing Paz from his reverie. She was small and slightly hunched with a bee’s nest of gray hair and a nametag reading CLARA BEEKS. “You said you were looking for information about Earl Strong.”

  Paz turned from viewing the contents of the display case toward her. Since entering the museum, he’d been captivated by the displays of old Samuel Colt pistols, saddles, Winchester rifles. Each of the exhibits held behind polished glass made him understand Caitlin Strong better, his fascination with her legacy taken to a whole other extreme. Paz was more convinced than ever that whatever he was looking for could be found here, where the past was beautifully preserved forever.

  “I am,” he said politely to the woman.

  “Well, normally an appointment to research on site is required.”

  “This is an emergency.”

  The woman’s face flushed with concern. “How’s that, sir?”

  “His granddaughter’s life is hanging in the balance. That’s why I’m here, to find out why. Something in the past, Earl Strong’s past.”

  The woman nodded, even though it was clear she didn’t totally grasp what Paz was saying. “Well, it’s not hard to find answers to questions about Earl Strong. Know quite a bit about the great man myself. Everybody here does.”

  “Really?”

  “Uh-huh. Had the privilege of setting up a special tribute in his honor some years back. His son was still alive, as I recall, and donated a box of letters, correspondence, commendations, even Earl’s original holster and pearl-handled Colts. As a matter of fact . . .” Clara Beeks slid sideways to another display case. “Yup, here they are, and that picture there’s of Earl himself.”

  Paz joined Clara Beeks in front of the case, dwarfing her in his shadow. The holster was draped over a wooden pallet much like an old-fashioned horse tie. The pearl-handled revolvers Earl had brandished in Sweetwater lay angled against each other atop a dark-wood stand just below a retouched picture enlarged to poster size featuring Earl wearing both guns with rifle slung casually over his shoulder. Different from the one hanging on the wall of the Sweetwater Saloon.

  Twenty minutes before, Paz had driven the stolen truck up the paved dirt entryway of the Texas Ranger Hall of Fame and Museum set between twin waist-high stretches of rock slab walls. Those walls extended higher at the entry, creating the effect of a nonexistent gate. The one-story building stretched well back into a thick grove of elm trees, what looked like a wing added after the original construction angling to the left into the grove itself. Pillars braced a shaded overhang extending out from the sloped roof. The building could have been a fancy home, a school, or, from a distance, an assemblage of corrals and stalls.

  “It’s Earl Strong’s time in Sweetwater that interests me the most,” Paz told the woman.

  “Lots of legend there mixed in with the truth, I’m afraid.”

  “Did Al Capone really send gunmen out of Chicago after Earl raided his freight yard whorehouse?” Paz asked.

  Clara Beeks grinned. “I see you’ve done your research.

  “Some.”

  “Well, that’s one of the parts of the story where legend and fact get mixed together. But I’ll tell you what I know, if you want to hear it.”

  “I’d love to,” said Paz.

  41

  SWEETWATER, TEXAS; 1931

  Earl Strong’s challenge to The Outfit out of Chicago put the Rangers in a difficult spot. With their diminished ranks already stretched thin by the spread of boomtowns throughout Gregg and other counties, the Rangers just didn’t have the spare men to give Earl the support he required. The hope in Austin was that the threats lodged by the fat pimp Earl had shot were all bluster and no army would be coming from Chicago to reinforce his efforts and make an example of the man who had crossed Al Capone.

  That hope didn’t last long.

  The Outfit saw the string of East Texas towns swollen with oil and bursting at the seams with all manner of men as prime fodder for the wares they dispensed from women, to booze, to gambling. Sweetwater was just the first place where Al Capone had staked his claim and, as such, it had to work as the prototype for The Outfit’s plans to expand the model. With no law enforcement to speak of, at least not staffed to the point of offering viable resistance, the gangsters saw a dream come true, especially with the efforts of federal authorities substantially curtailing their efforts up north.

  For his part, Earl Strong just went about his business, his efforts supplemented by his two Ranger deputies who, like Earl, came from stock bred off a frontier ethic. Tim Bob Roy and Frank “Sandman” Sanchez were both rawboned, strapping men who’d worn out their welcome in every rough-and-tumble town to which they’d been posted. They were not at all adverse to violence and were as much prone to causing it as cleaning it up.

  One day, maybe a week after Earl’s one-man raid on the freight yard, a young boy came running up to the shack the Rangers used as an office next to the church-turned-jail, huffing for breath.

  “Easy there, son,” Earl said, laying a hand on the boy’s back.

  “They’re here,” the boy gasped.

  “Who’s here?”

  “Bunch of men in suits. I was tossing stones in the freight yard when they come in.”

  Earl took his hand off the boy’s back and stiffened. “How many you figure?”

  “I think eight, but it could’ve been more.”

  “Carryin
g bags?”

  “Uh-huh,” the boy nodded. “More like satchels or duffels, though. Plenty heavy, too.”

  Earl turned his gaze down the street as if expecting the men to be there.

  “Who are they, Mister Earl?”

  “Nobody good, that’s for sure,” Earl said, patting the boy’s head. “But don’t you worry none. Rangers got things buttoned up tight in your town. One thing, though, son.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Be best not to play in the freight yard for a time.”

  It was late that afternoon, the sun burning lower in the sky, before the eight men walked straight down the main thoroughfare into the center of town, abreast of one another with every other man holding a tommy gun at the ready. Their suits were sprayed with dust and dirt, their Florsheim shoes already ruined by muck and mud. Their feet actually swished as they walked, adding to the clear displeasure on faces streaked with the grimy residue that had coated the Sweetwater air since the oil drilling began.

  The Chicago men found Earl Strong sitting in a rocking chair on the porch of the doctor’s office, double-barreled shotgun laid over his thighs and pearl-handled revolvers splayed to either side. The men took up a wide berth directly before him, big and broad enough to block out a portion of the lowering sun that had been shining in Earl’s eyes. One of them stepped forward while the others remained in the line, their tommy guns held casually in the crooks of their arms with tips pointed downward.

  “Mr. Capone sends his regards, Sheriff.”

  “That’s good, ’cause I hear he might be going away for a while. And, by the way, it’s Ranger, not sheriff.”

  “Think you’re a big-time badass, don’t you?”

  “That’s what some will tell you.”

  “That might be true down here in Shitsville, but you’re dealing with Chicago now. You may have made your bones killing Indians and Mexicans, my friend, but we are not Indians or Mexicans.”

  “I’m not your friend,” Earl told him.

  “I’m trying to do this the easy way, not the hard. Those are my orders, Ranger, whether I approve of them or not. That makes this your lucky day.”