STATELINE: A Dan Reno Novel

by Dave Stanton

  “Well, Edward,” I said finally. “You ready to head out to the cathouse?”

  “Sure, just for the experience—I mean, just to see what’s going on.”

  “Hey, whatever you do is your own business,” I said.

  “Yeah, monkey business,” Cody said, his bulletproof vest tight and bulky across his torso.

  We piled into Edward’s Crown Victoria and eased our way through the traffic lights on 50, rolling slowly past the casinos, heading out of town. A blanket of whiteness covered the dirt and grit of the city, and snowflakes drifted lazily from the heavy sky. It seemed unusually quiet for Stateline, as if the town was muted by the weight of the snow.

  Once the road turned east the forest thinned out, and was gradually replaced by the lonely landscape of the desert. We climbed over Spooner Summit, the Ford’s big motor pulling us up the grade. The pass was nearly deserted.

  “Edward, I called Iverson and told him it’s Julo Nafui he’s looking for,” I said.

  “What is it with Raneswich and Iverson?” Edward glanced at me as he drove. “Are you sure they’re in league with these bad cops? Or maybe they’re just really incompetent? It doesn’t seem like they ever made much progress on the murder.”

  “That was by design,” I said.

  “What do you think, Cody?” Edward said. Cody was sitting in the back, leaning against the door with his legs stretched out across the seat.

  “They’re getting paid off. But their free ride is coming to an end.”

  As we came off the mountain and glided onto the desert floor outside of Carson City, a jackrabbit darted in front of the car so quickly that Edward didn’t have time to react. We ran straight over it.

  “Jesus!” he exclaimed.

  “Lookit that,” Cody said, his head turned to the back window. “Lucky bunny made it. Probably just singed his ears on the oil pan.”

  I wondered if it was an omen.

  • • •

  The Tumbleweeds Ranch was doing what I assumed was brisk business for a Monday night. We sat at the bar, watching the action. The girls rotated steadily in and out of the parlor, and every few minutes new ones appeared. Edward’s head turned like it was on a swivel. He kept tapping his fingers on the bar, and finally I said to him, “Hey, man, why don’t you pick one you like?”

  “Huh? No, no, that’s not why I’m here, you know that. I’m just looking.”

  “If you say so.”

  “Maybe you should just buy a souvenir cap,” Cody said, pointing at the caps, shirts, and assorted promotional items behind the bar.

  “Well,” Edward said a minute later, “if I was to partake, who do you think I should pick?”

  “What, I’m the expert?” I said.

  “Hey, go tear off a piece if you want. They won’t bite,” Cody said.

  Edward tried to smile his way through it, but his face was turning red.

  “You’re man enough, ain’t you?” Cody said.

  “Take it easy, Cody,” I said.

  Eventually a bleached blonde with cantaloupe-sized breasts sat next to Edward, and after a while she led him down a hallway.

  While he was gone, I spotted the Asian prostitute who had told me where to find Samantha Nunez. I doubted she would recognize me, but she caught me looking at her and sauntered over.

  “My favorite position’s doggie style,” she said, flashing her million-dollar smile.

  “Woof, woof,” Cody said between sips off his beer.

  “Hey, you. I remember you.” She slapped me lightly on the arm with the backs of her fingers. “Did you ever find Samantha?”

  “Nope,” I said.

  “Yeah, she didn’t stay in Vegas for long. You didn’t get to tell her about her sick family member, huh?”

  “Never had the chance.”

  “You still looking for her?”

  “Why?”

  “She called me the other day, said she can’t reach her boyfriend. Is he the one who’s sick?”

  “Yeah,” I said. “Unfortunately he didn’t make it.”

  “He died?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Oh, my god, Samantha doesn’t know.” She put her finger on her chin and looked down and then looked back at me. “What did he die of?”

  I thought of Michael Dean Stiles, lying with his legs in the Truckee River, his beard glistening with vomit, his face bloodless, his last breath leaving his body. What did he die of? Greed probably, and certainly foolishness. A career criminal, a drug dealer and a killer, dying like a fool on a winter night in a cold desert canyon. I had a bizarre notion that if I went back there, I would find his clothed skeleton, grinning at me as if he’d had the last laugh.

  “Tell Samantha to leave me a message at this number if she wants to know.” I scribbled my office number on a cocktail napkin, then excused myself and went to the head. When I returned she was gone, but Edward was back at the bar with an ear-to-ear grin.

  “You didn’t fall in love, did you?” I asked.

  “Other way around,” he said, laughing, punching me on the shoulder.

  “Way to go, Casanova.” Cody reached out and mussed Edward’s hair.

  I bought the boys a round, and we toasted the good times, fun and laughter that could be had for the price of a few drinks, and free love, or at least love that didn’t cost any more than money.

  • • •

  We left around midnight. The gravel crunched under our boots as we walked to Edward’s Ford. I saw something move out of the corner of my eye, and in that dark instant my mind flickered with a vision of my father’s death. Then a man holding a shotgun burst from behind the truck parked next to us. When I recognized the identity of the man, the synapses in my brain exploded with alarm. It was Julo Nafui.

  He pounced like a cat, his shotgun aimed at Cody. He wasn’t more than two feet away when he pulled the trigger. I could see the mucus in the corners of his eyes when the gun went off, the blast erupting into the still night like an angry curse. Cody had been standing next to me, and the next instant he was gone, his body flying back over the hood of Edward’s Ford as if he’d been hit by a bus.

  I jumped forward and grabbed the hot barrel of the shotgun with my left hand. Nafui yanked it back, but I stepped up and got my right hand around his wrist. He jerked the barrel upward, trying to wrench it from my grip. I ran at him, pushing, locking my forearm around the stock as he kicked out at my shins. He started whipping his powerful arms back and forth in a frenzy, trying to break my grip and throw me off. I held on with everything I had, squeezing desperately with my frostbitten hands.

  Then from out of nowhere Edward leapt on to Nafui’s back, growling and snapping like a rabid dog. We whirled around the parking lot, gravel spitting beneath our feet. Edward wrapped his hands over Nafui’s face, and gouged at Nafui’s eyes as if trying to reach the brain. Nafui wrenched his head to the side, and I pushed forward, slamming him into the cab of a yellow pickup truck. The stock of the gun shattered the side window, and Edward’s head cracked hard against the window frame. I lashed out at Nafui’s face with my right hand, catching an eye, and pushed with my thumb as hard as I could. Nafui roared in pain and dropped the shotgun so he could swat my hand off his face, then the heels of his hands hit my shoulders, and I stumbled back. The shotgun had dropped to the ground next to the truck, and Edward lay collapsed on top of it.

  For a split second Nafui and I faced each other, gasping for air, our chests heaving. We were no more than five feet apart. I went for the Beretta, but he pulled his backup piece a fraction faster. I felt the twenty-five-caliber round splat against my vest, and I returned fire as I was falling back. At that range there was no need to aim. The hollow-point bullet tore through his chest like an auger bit from hell and sent a bloody fountain out his back, streaking the door of the yellow pickup. Amazingly Nafui remained standing, his lips curled in a sneer, staring at me with eyes that had turned blood red. He raised his pistol again, and my finger tightened on the Beretta’s
trigger.

  A thunderous shot exploded behind me. I felt a hiss of air, then the right half of Nafui’s face vanished into a red mist, slivers of bone and brains spraying into the air like a sudden geyser. His legs kicked out and he fell on his back, the pulp of his head slapping the gravel with a liquid crunch.

  Cody walked past me, his .44 Magnum smoking in his hand. His face was white as bleached stone in the moonlight, his eyes coal black. We stared down at the gore of Julo Nafui in silence. Cody’s new green parka had a jagged hole in the center, and his body armor was scored and blackened.

  My eyes fell back to Julo Nafui. I swore I saw his corpse shudder, then I had an eerie sense his soul was leaving his body. For a second I felt his presence watching me. I froze, staring into air charged with electricity, then the sky flashed, and I saw his spirit being sucked into the earth, like sand falling through an hourglass in fast motion. I staggered back, the hair on my arms and back of my head standing straight out, my face on fire with needles and pins. A small dust twister appeared, danced around Nafui’s body for a few seconds, then vanished.

  I didn’t notice the door to Tumbleweeds open, didn’t see the people spilling out until the crowd had formed around us. But I did notice a dark truck parked in the shadows at the far end of the lot, its engine idling. Cody and I looked at each other. “Pace,” I said, and then I was running through the parked cars, crouched low and approaching the idling truck from behind.

  I heard the transmission clunk into drive, and the truck started forward. I sprinted full out, the Beretta clenched in my fist, and just as the driver began accelerating toward the exit road, I dove into the truck’s bed. The driver turned his head, and I saw Conrad Pace straining to look back. He floored the gas, and I tumbled and shoulder-rolled against the tailgate as the truck fishtailed on the gravel. I pulled myself up, balanced on one knee, and fired a round through the plastic window behind the cab. The slug split through the plastic and spider webbed the windshield.

  The truck was catching traction and gaining speed. I crawled up to the cab, yanked the sliding plastic window open, reached in and grabbed Pace by the hair, then heaved with all my strength. He came off the seat and I jerked his head back through the window. His feet could no longer reach the pedals and the truck slowed, left the road, and began bouncing over the terrain of the desert.

  I rammed my gun into Pace’s cheekbone. “Payback time, motherfucker,” I said.

  “You know the penalty for killing a cop?” Pace said through gritted teeth. “You’ll ride the needle.”

  “You ain’t a cop, Pace. You’re a crook.” The truck had slowed to just a few miles an hour and was careening over a series of deep ruts. The unmanned steering wheel was spinning back and forth wildly as the truck’s suspension twisted in every direction. I saw Pace trying to work his hand toward his holster. I gripped his hair tighter and pushed his neck against the window frame.

  “In a day or two, your operation’s gonna be fully exposed, Pace. You’re done. You’re gonna have journalists crawling up your ass, and everyone’s gonna want a piece of you, the locals, the feds, the IRS. It’ll be a hell of a party.”

  “You ain’t got the balls, punk,” Pace said.

  “It’s too late for your bullshit, Pace. Nafui’s dead, and the only reason I don’t send you to hell with him right now is so you can spend the rest of your pathetic life in a cage.”

  “Time for you to die,” he rasped, and his hand went for his gun.

  “Don’t do it!” I jammed the Beretta hard into the flesh of his face.

  “Fuck you.” He pointed his revolver over his shoulder and pulled the trigger. I dropped down low, and four shots popped over my head, the slugs ricocheting off the steel tailgate and singing out into the night. I was still holding him by the hair, but the truck lurched down a steep bank and almost flipped. I lost my grip on Pace and flew across the truck bed, my fingers clawing for a handhold. Then Pace hit the gas and the truck leapt forward, dropping into a shallow gully. The suspension bottomed out, and when the shocks rebounded I was launched from the bed. I landed sprawled in the dirt, and my gun flew out of my hand and disappeared in the darkness.

  Pace swung a wide arc and was heading back toward the road. But the truck’s front end washed into deep sand and the back tires came off the ground. The motor revved but the tires couldn’t find traction. I pulled myself up and ran toward the truck, high-stepping through the scrub. I caught a glimpse of Cody’s silhouette running across the terrain, hundreds of feet away. Then Pace jumped out of the cab and drew down on me with his pistol.

  His first shot missed, and I kept running. His next shot winged me in the side, tearing a streak through the outer mesh of my vest. The impact twisted me around and I almost lost my balance, but my legs continued to propel me forward. Then I heard the hammer of his revolver click on an empty cylinder. And then once more. He tried to back away, but I hit him at full speed flush in the chest, my shoulders hammering into him with the satisfying impact of a well-executed tackle. Our feet left the ground, and I body-slammed him to the desert floor. His eyes rolled madly, like a wounded animal’s. I swung down on him with a right and drilled him in the mouth. His head snapped back, and I felt the imprints of his teeth on my knuckles. “That’s for trying to drown me,” I said.

  “You’re a dead man,” he hissed. He spit blood in my face and tried to throw me off, but I held him by the neck and punched him again. Blood burst from his nose and soaked his mustache. “And that’s for leaving me without a coat,” I said. I could see the fury in his face as I pulled him to his feet and flung him against the truck. He bounced off and came at me swinging. He’d done some boxing in his time. But his time had passed. I blocked a left and a right, then slammed my fist into his gut, and his eyes went round with shock. “And that’s for fucking with my friend Edward.”

  Pace gagged and fell to his knees. Then I heard Cody from behind, and I turned and saw him coming like a freight train, like I remembered him on the football field, eyes crazed, his beard red and wild. He snorted like a bull, grabbed Pace by the neck and crotch, and heaved him over the truck.

  “Fly away, shitbird,” Cody said. Pace hit the ground with a groan of pain.

  I stuffed Pace’s revolver in my jeans and backtracked until I found my automatic. When I returned, Pace had pulled himself to his feet and leaned heavily on his truck. Cody grabbed him by the collar and started marching him back to the cathouse. I heard sirens in the distance.

  “That’s right, dumb-ass,” Pace grunted. “The cavalry’s coming. Who do you think they’re going to believe, me or you?”

  “Keep moving,” Cody said.

  “You’ll be arrested before you can spit,” Pace said.

  The crowd was waiting for us in front of Tumbleweeds. Edward had pushed himself into a sitting position against the front tire of the yellow pickup truck. One of the hookers was kneeling beside him, her eyes wide with concern.

  “Edward,” I said, but he responded with an incoherent mumble. I bent down to him; the back of his head was matted with blood.

  “Someone call a goddamn ambulance!” I yelled at the crowd. I sat down next to Edward, oblivious to the bits of flesh strewn about the gravel. “Take it easy, buddy,” I said. “You just got your bell rung.” He turned his head toward me, but his eyes were distant and unfocused. Cody kicked Pace’s legs out from under him and threw him to the ground. The prostitutes, their customers, the madam, and the bartender all stared at us as if they were watching a movie, waiting to see what would happen next.

  “Could one of you people get me a damn beer?” Cody shouted hoarsely.

  25

  The Carson City police raced into the parking lot a minute later, sirens blaring, and skidded to a stop in the gravel, raising a huge cloud of dust. One squad car lost control, spun out in a 180, and ended up stuck in a ditch. I counted a total of three sheriff’s cruisers, two Carson City PD squad cars, two unmarked cars, and one ambulance. The cops surrounded us, getting
in each other’s way, arguing, talking over one another. Pace yelled for everybody to shut up, and a plainclothes officer led him aside. Another plainclothesman, a pudgy, middle-aged man, took control, getting Edward loaded into the ambulance, telling another cop to cover the dead body for Christ’s sake, and instructing the others to interview witnesses.

  Cody and I sat where we were, watching the ambulance leave. The plainclothesman in charge knelt next to the covered corpse of Julo Nafui.

  “I sure hope you guys have licenses to carry those weapons,” he said.

  “The dead man was a hitter hired by Conrad Pace,” I said. “I shot him in self-defense.”

  “Sure you did,” the detective said, in that unmistakable tone that comes from being lied to on a regular basis. “Get up. We’re going to the station.”

  At least he had the decency to cuff our hands in front. As we walked with Lieutenant Gordon DeHart to his squad car, I looked out past the commotion and saw Pace easing his truck through the desert. Two uniformed cops with shovels were hiking back toward us. When Pace reached the paved road, his tires screeched and the motor revved loudly as he went through the gears. The sound slowly faded into the darkness, like a long echo that didn’t want to die.

  • • •

  It was three A.M. before Lieutenant DeHart gave up trying to sort out my story of the tangled events. I found myself unable to explain what happened in a way any sane person would believe. I finally told him to lock us up so we could get some sleep. They put Cody and me in a clean holding cell, and I immediately fell into a dreamless slumber.

  • • •

  “I think I’ve got a broken rib,” Cody said when we woke the next morning. His jacket and vest lay on the floor. He pulled up his shirt to show me the six-inch round bruise in his flesh the shotgun blast had left. “There’s not much a doctor can do,” he said, grimacing as he prodded his side with his fingers. “They’ll just wrap it.”