Blood Standard

by Laird Barron

Valens sipped beer. His stony expression didn’t alter.

  “Gonna be hairy. I wish you luck. Can’t help you, though.”

  I considered arguing, decided against it.

  “Worth a try. There’s still the matter of that photo.”

  The men laughed, except for stone-faced Valens. He knew the score.

  “Look, boys,” I said. “Last thing I want is to throw down with your squad. I’m not leaving without that pic.”

  “Yeah?” Tucker said. His eyes glinted with joy. “You’ll have to kick my ass first. Wanna shot at the title? Please say yes.”

  I rolled my neck.

  “Wait! Wait! Wait!” the bartender said. “Take it outside, would ya please?”

  Tucker led the way through a back door to a horseshoe pit. He peeled off his shirt and flexed. Muscular and supple, an Army tattoo over his heart. My ribs ached even more from watching him strut and preen like one of those fighting roosters that gamblers bring up from South America and tape razor blades to their spurs. For a man like Tucker, maiming and killing was second nature.

  According to the jacket, Valens’s crew split its leave between boozing at the local watering holes and punching one another in the head or firing a lot of rounds down at the range. Tucker’s flattened nose and scarred knuckles confirmed the report. Presumably, rape and pillage occurred at the margins.

  I leisurely unbuttoned my shirt, removed it, and folded it neatly. Stalling for all I was worth as the other men gathered around the pit. When I crushed Tucker’s balls and snapped his neck, would the rest pile on or whip out their guns and put me down permanently? Depressing, either way it went. Bruises, contusions, freshly scabbed lacerations, I was a mess, no two ways about it. Already, my breath came heavy and labored. Sweat rolled down my body.

  “He’s a sunset,” Hawkins said from the shade of a dogwood. “Sergeant, for Chrissake. Fucker is bleeding.”

  I wasn’t bleeding, although the fresh bandages around my ribs were stained dark. The sunset comment was dead on, however. I’d seen myself in the mirror that morning. Enough bruises covered my torso that it resembled an abstract painting done in purple, yellow, and brown.

  “Coleridge, what are you doing?” Valens said.

  “Fixing to put this knuckle-dragger out of commission.”

  “That’s one possibility. However, larger picture, you can’t prevail. You understand, right? I assume your pappy did not sire a retard. This is an unwinnable scenario.”

  “My profession, there aren’t many people you can trust. Fewer you can call friend.” I unclenched my fists and glanced from man to man. “Lionel Robard is my brother-in-arms. I have no choice here.”

  Valens studied the ground for a few moments. He cut his hand at Tucker.

  “Stand down. Give the man his photo. Come on in for a drink, Coleridge. You win. We’ll powwow about your banger problem.”

  FORTY-ONE

  I couldn’t be certain whether the FBI had us under the microscope, so I erred on the side of caution. Around sunup, Lionel and I flattened under a tarp in the bed of Jade’s Toyota. She tooled around New Paltz, dithering at the bank, post office, and feed store. She parked at the supermarket and gave me a grim nod in the side mirror as we slipped away.

  Valens had left the dark blue van at the edge of the lot with the keys on the tire. The gear I’d purchased lay neatly stacked in back near the panel door. Full tank of gas and the radio dialed to a country-and-western station. In went our duffel of weaponry and we were under way.

  After a few minutes on the freeway, Lionel snicked the top of his Zippo and lit a cigarette.

  “Hate to look a gift horse in the mouth. Hate to do it.” Then he did indeed look at me, smoke curling from his nostrils.

  I fished the snapshot of his girl from my breast pocket and passed it over.

  “You didn’t exaggerate. She’s a beauty. Too bad she’s fucking her way across the South of France.”

  He wore a set of amber-tinted shooting glasses that disguised his expression. The muscles of his jaw twitched. He turned the photo over in his fingers, then dug out his wallet and slipped the pic inside.

  “Kill anybody?” he said after a couple of miles.

  “We reached an amicable agreement.” I winced to recall sliding that lunch box full of cash across the table to seal our treaty. It represented a loss of more than half my remaining stake from the Outfit. Blood and money. I’d certainly sprung leaks since setting foot in the Hudson Valley.

  “Valens is a mad dog.”

  “Won’t argue with you. He has that gleam in his eyes.”

  “He burned a village to the ground near Kabul. I was there, man.” He hesitated, as if chewing the words and swallowing them. “We came to blows. A bad scene. Real bad scene.”

  I kept quiet.

  He shook his head and stared at the countryside.

  “Long as you realize, one way or another, this’ll come back to bite us in the ass.”

  “I’m under no illusion that we’re all high-fiving chums. It’s a truce, nothing more. The mercs are providing materials, fire support, and extraction. I also convinced them to get off your case for a while.”

  “Fire support?” His jaw clenched again.

  “We won’t see much of them, amigo. Valens sent two of his boys. They’ve got their task and we’ve got ours.”

  “We need them to do this?”

  “To do it right, yeah, they’re necessary. You’re the expert when it comes to kicking in doors. If it’s a trap or if things go bad, those eyes in the woods might be the difference.” I waited a beat, then laid it on him. “This isn’t about you. It’s about Reba and her family. You’d eat ground glass if that was on the menu.”

  He got all stony.

  “Let it ride, then. Just let it ride.”

  * * *

  —

  THE CABIN NESTLED ON A WOODED RIDGE in the Catskills, northwest of Saugerties. An old hunting shack owned by the family of a member of the White Manitou. Survey maps I borrowed from Virgil indicated one road in, mostly impassible come winter. The nearest town had become largely deserted during the Recession. Neighbors were few and of the hermit variety. Gunshots echoing along the draws wouldn’t attract much attention.

  I passed the turnoff and hid the van behind an abandoned gas station we’d selected the evening prior. It’d be a two-mile walk cutting straight across through the woods. I left the key in the ignition. One of Valens’s soldiers would be along to valet the van back to us at the cabin if the mission succeeded.

  “Good theater for a killing ground.” Lionel zipped his camo windbreaker and stuffed extra shells into the pockets. He’d painted his face to resemble a death’s-head to counter my own conservative tiger stripes.

  “Much as it pains me to say, let’s keep the killing to a minimum.” I dressed in loose, dark clothes, gloves, and hiking boots. Throw-away garments. Both of us bulked up with Kevlar. I keyed the collar mic on the walkie-talkie Valens had provided. “Hercules and Aeolus at staging, over.”

  “Roger,” Hawkins said through a swirl of static. “Eagle Eye 1 in place, over.”

  “Eagle Eye 2 in place, over,” said Tucker.

  “Going dark. Radio check in thirty. Hercules out.” I shut down the radio, transferred the necessities into a mesh backpack, and shrugged it on. I carried the twelve-gauge pump in my left hand.

  “Hercules. Ain’t we grandiose?” Lionel poked my biceps. His mood had brightened upon examining the goodies provided by the Black Dog team. He too carried a shotgun and slung a grenade launcher over his shoulder.

  “What can I say? It’s the nickname the Outfit gave me.”

  We moved away from the road and into the woods. Fortune smiled upon us. Partly cloudy with a high in the seventies. The trees blurred in the creeping shadows of sunset. I fell in behind Lionel and let him navigate through t
he dense undergrowth. He traveled, loose of limb, head on a swivel, his gait precise.

  It didn’t take long to reach our destination.

  A rutted dirt lane angled to our right and we paralleled that until Lionel settled on a catbird seat behind a deadfall about fifty yards from the cabin. Smoke wisped from the stovepipe chimney. Two SUVs sat in the yard, one with Massachusetts plates. The building had electricity and plumbing. I would’ve loved to know how often they split apart to resupply, or whether someone brought supplies to them, or if they were hooked to a phone or Internet. The latter struck me as doubtful—guards would carry cell phones; no landline necessary.

  I checked in with Tucker and Hawkins. The two were nearby and ready to snipe if it came to that. Hawkins reported at least three hostiles, but no movement in the past ninety minutes.

  Lionel broke off a hunk of jerky. He rolled over in his nest of dead leaves and pine needles and stared at the sky through the canopy.

  “I tell ya. It’s like I never left the Corps.”

  “Spent a few nights this way?”

  “You said it. A whole lot of nights. And you?”

  “Camped in the Brooks Range when I was a kid. Dad insisted. As for the Outfit, jobs are usually a walk-up or a drive-by. We didn’t storm any bunkers. City slicker gangsters don’t appreciate nature. Too many mosquitoes.”

  “So you’re sayin’ gangsters are pussies.”

  “Your run-of-the-mill wiseguy doesn’t care to stray far from the bar, is all.”

  “Why didn’t you enlist? You’d have been a machine.”

  “Dad,” I said.

  We fell silent and listened to the forest. Birds chirped. Branches creaked as a breeze riffled through them. Lights came on in the cabin windows. Occasionally, figures moved around inside. The front door remained shut. A fox screamed in the near distance. Another answered, much farther into the trees. The clouds rolled back and a sprinkle of stars shone through the canopy.

  Around 9 p.m. Lionel tapped my arm, raised himself into a crouch, hesitated for several seconds, and then disappeared with nary a snapped twig. I ate jerky and sipped water from a canteen and waited. Longest forty-five minutes I could recall. He rematerialized opposite the direction I’d anticipated and hunkered beside me.

  “Three hostiles. Three friendlies. I spotted an Uzi on a table.”

  “Man, how close did you get? Under one of their bunks or what?”

  “Close enough. The gang looks bored. Three weeks holed up in a shack with no cable is cruel and unusual punishment. Saps are watching VCR tapes of Fantasy Island and The Love Boat.”

  “Harsh. These guys must’ve annoyed a VIP to get exiled to Siberia.”

  Lionel turned in such a way as to disguise the lighter flare and fired up a cigarette.

  “In a few hours, they’ll feel the thrill again. Nervous?”

  I didn’t dignify that with a response.

  “Kidding, Hoss,” he said. “I got that covered for both of us.”

  * * *

  —

  WE MOVED AGAINST THEM as a bloodless dawn glow filtered through the canopy. SOP assault tactics. Whoever slept would be in the depths of REM, stuck to the flypaper of dreams. Those awake weren’t likely to be alert.

  Lionel covered the back door and I took the front. Hawkins and Tucker were ready to derail any reinforcements coming along the road.

  “Going live in five seconds, over,” I said into the mic. I counted down five and fired the grenade launcher. A canister of CS punched through the kitchen window. The next one went into the bedroom. I dropped the launcher and cinched my gas mask. I immediately approached the cabin, shotgun at the ready.

  White smoke seethed from the busted windows. Lionel reported he was at the target and ready to breach. I told him to go on three. By then, I’d mounted the porch and moved to the left of the door. Wood splintered on the opposite side of the cabin followed by a metallic thump and a flicker of bright light as he detonated a flashbang grenade.

  The front door flew wide and a shirtless Hank Stephens lurched out and down the steps. I hit him in the middle of his back with a beanbag round. He accelerated in a Superman pose, arms outstretched, and skidded on his face.

  Two closely spaced rifle booms erupted inside.

  I ducked through the doorway. Pea soup fog dripped and coiled. A man lay motionless near a counter. A man groaned nearby. Somebody else scuttled on hands and knees, making for an exit. I clubbed him with the shotgun butt.

  Lionel emerged from the murk, sidestepping with alacrity. He swung his shotgun around and fired at a shadow toward the rear of the room. Sparks arced upward from the barrel of an automatic rifle as its owner flew backward and slammed into the wall. Bullets pinged through metal and glass and tore across the roof. Then everything became still except for the rasp of my breath reverberating in my ears.

  “You okay?” The mask distorted Lionel’s voice, sharpened it.

  “A-OK.” I took a moment to lean on the counter and suck air. It might have been healing, but my body wasn’t pleased with the calisthenics.

  Lionel prowled the cabin ascertaining no more bogeys lurked and gave me the thumbs-up. I signaled Hawkins and Tucker with our success.

  “Extraction in twenty,” Hawkins said.

  FORTY-TWO

  The secret is this: things are seldom as complicated as they seem upon first blush.

  Whenever I reach the end of my endurance, when I’m lost and confused and can’t decide what to do, I do what Alexander did with the Gordian knot. Pull out my sword and chop through all those tangled threads to get to the heart of it. What’s at the heart of any man-made mystery, no matter how convoluted, is sex, love, or money. Usually money and everything that comes along with a fat stack of folding green. The sages weren’t kidding when they declaimed it as the root of all evil. Sex and love aren’t far behind, though.

  The Three Amigos were the knot and Donnie Talon had handed me the cleaver.

  We zip-tied the heavies and left them behind the cabin. The Amigos sat, Indian-style, in the front yard. They were bruised and battered, eyes swollen, noses leaking. Yellowknife and his greasy ponytail were only vaguely familiar from a glance I’d had of him when he visited the farm once. I recognized Martinez as the one who’d tried to drag Reba away during the night of the Fire Festival. Sallow, callow, ex–white supremacist Hank Stephens definitely wasn’t so tough with his wrists zipped together and terror in his eyes. Blood streaked his cheeks from where he’d skinned them plowing dirt with his face.

  Neither Lionel nor I had removed our gas masks and we loomed over the trio like a pair of storm troopers. There were subtler methods, to be sure, but time was most definitely not on our side. I wanted to be long gone before more gangbangers or the FBI arrived.

  Lionel gave me the high sign. He went around back to have a word with the Manitou heavies.

  “We were sent to ice you punks,” I said, enjoying the cowing effect my voice had on the Amigos. “Maybe that doesn’t have to happen. Maybe one of you is going to sing and I’ll let you fly away.”

  That elicited a burst of whining and pleading.

  “Why? What’d I do?” Hank said.

  “Shut your mouth, white boy,” I said. “You know too much, Martinez. As for you, Yellowknife . . .”

  Yellowknife had a few years on his compadres. All three were nasty little pieces of work, but his eyes were the hardest. He’d done much and seen even more. He sneered; afraid, yet not ready to crack.

  “Gonna shoot us, then shoot us,” he said. “Otherwise, say your piece and get out a my face.”

  I kicked him in the ribs and felt them crunch. He writhed in the dirt, unable to breathe. I meant it as a message to the other two rather than a rebuke of Yellowknife. I also hid the fact that delivering it hurt me almost as much as it hurt him.

  “Reba Walker. Where is she?” I
stared at Martinez.

  Martinez’s expression remained one of blank fear.

  “I dunno. At her apartment. How would I know she’s at?”

  “Try again. Nobody’s seen her since you three punks went into hiding. We figure you helped her disappear too.”

  “I dunno, man. That bitch is just a connection. We fuck around. I always keep a piece on the side.”

  I unfolded a skinning knife. The blade made a nice loud snick.

  “Been a while since I castrated anybody.”

  He squealed and pleaded while Hank sobbed. Yellowknife continued to moan and squirm in the dirt. A symphony of misery. All in all, it was going quite well, I thought.

  * * *

  —

  I DRAGGED MARTINEZ AWAY FROM the others and said, “Give me the story or sing falsetto forever more.” Then I poked him in the calf with the knife. That wasn’t strictly necessary. However, I recalled the punch he’d dealt Reba at the festival and had to resist the impulse to take it further.

  He opened his lips and babbled.

  On the day Modine had sent various Manitou subordinates into hiding, Martinez tried to secure some pills and pussy for the trip into the Catskills. Yeah, so much for his being a married family man doing the FBI a solid. He admitted to picking Reba up at her apartment with a little sweet talk and implied menace. She’d come along more or less willingly, at first, and they’d driven into New Paltz to score weed from a dealer who ran a head shop. Somewhere along the line, Reba caught on to reality: her gangbanger buddies were going underground at some shanty in the hills with her as the proposed entertainment. Jade and Virgil knew their granddaughter. Reba might be rough around the edges. She smoked some pot and hung around a dark element. That didn’t make her a bad kid. It only made her a kid, period. She told Martinez to shove it where the sun didn’t shine.

  A screaming match ensued. It culminated with Reba exiting the vehicle at a four-way stop on Springtown Road. She’d been so pissed and frightened, she left her purse lying on the seat. About then, some Manitou heavies pulled alongside and ordered the Amigos to board a company SUV. The red Suburban was taken elsewhere and torched. Reba ducked in to the trees until the dust cleared. She went her way, shaken and raging but unmolested.