Quicker than that, Good Russell had whipped the pipe around and slammed it against the top of the skinny kid’s hand on the gun. Ferret flinched, expected it to go off, but the kid seethed and dropped the gun and then let out a bad little-boy cry. He curled his hands into his belly and curled the rest of himself into a ball on the floor. The beefy kid was going to make a move, too, but Good Russell spun back and nailed him in the side. Ribs cracked. Another shot to the back, and beefy kid was down.
Ferret was trying to get his bearings back as Good Russell stepped over, grabbed him by the front of his shirt and hurled him against the door. It fell open. He held on. He dropped the club outside.
Good Russell said, “Get out, now, go back to the car and wait. Don’t fucking call anyone. I’ll do that. Go. Now. Wait. No help, you hear? Wait for me. Go. Now.”
Ferret fumbled backward and caught the side of the door on his way down, sliced his palm on a piece of tin. Let go. One foot on the bricks, then he took a leap and landed on a bed of wet leaves. Rolled over. Watched Good Russell pull the door closed. More shouting. Ferret shook the leaves off. The dogs were barking at him now, shaming him. He caught his breath and licked the blood from his palm. He clenched it closed, got up, and walked to the car. He got in. Some dirty fast food napkins on the floorboard, but they would have to do as a makeshift bandage.
What had he seen in there? What was really going on?
The napkins tore as he tried to wrap them around. He gave up and balled them in his fist. He sat with his eyes closed, head against the headrest. Good Russell had said not to call anyone. Not even Pancrazy? Of course they had to tell Pancrazy. But that wasn’t Ferret’s job. Wasn’t his place. Ferret was a driver, that was all.
From the looks of things, not anymore.
It took a good twenty minutes for Good Russell to come back to the car, all roughed-up—split skin over his eye, a bruised cheek, hair slick with sweat, wheezing. Ferret was betting he’d won because the pipe, shit, that thing was bent. He threw it over the top of the car into the trees and leaves, then fell into the driver’s seat like a sack of potatoes.
He turned to Ferret. “You didn’t call anyone, right?”
“Did you?”
A long look before he faced forward again. Nodded. “On their way.”
“Are we going to wait? Is she going to be okay?”
Good Russell cranked up. “Probably. I don’t know. You don’t worry about it.”
Whatever else he was going to say, it didn’t matter. A chill crept over Ferret from his scalp all the way down. He checked out the trailer one more time as Good Russell did a three-point turn to get them on the road out. The trailer door was flapping open in the wind, no one coming to close it.
Ferret said, “No worries.”
*
What was he doing here in Pancrazy’s RV, then? What was a smoking gun going to look like for this guy? Gene Handy had told him something like, “You’ll know it when you see it.” He didn’t have time for that kind of search. You’ve got to know a guy real good before you can see the shit that ain’t normal.
He heard laughter outside. Got him rattled, got him up and crouching to the floor, listening hard. More laughter. He went to the window and peeked out. Several car lengths away, couple of trucks with campers on the back, then a third teardrop trailer, formed a U, with a handful of folding deck chairs surrounding a small fire in a mini-Weber, drinking beer, eating chicken tenders from the Walmart. Laughing. Guys looking for jobs, laughing and eating.
Ferret should be home.
Or, you know, he should go back to the meth trailer and see if the ambulance really did come for that girl. Why would Good Russell lie about a thing like that? It would be fine. But he should still maybe get Gene Handy, go check, just to be sure. Fuck, if the Ferret of last year had found someone hurt like that, it wouldn’t even be a question. He wouldn’t have waited for someone else to make the call. That’s the sort of guy he had become, all over money. Another one of Pancrazy’s minions.
Yeah, there was nothing here, nothing on the surface, no reason to dig. He needed to get out, go home, and tell Gene Handy tomorrow that he wasn’t the right guy for the job.
He slipped out of the trailer, careful to make sure no one noticed, tucked his hands deep into his jeans pockets and got the hell out of there, his stomach clenching the whole time, his skin all goosebumps.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Pancrazio hated meth. He hated Americans. He hated easy sex and he hated being bored.
What he loved was North Dakota, Montana, the Great American West. The vast open spaces. Outlaw lawlessness still alive. That was why he was here. It was what he had been looking for since arriving in America the first time, in college over thirty years ago, before having to go back home and make do as best he could. But then, the war, the escape, those awful years in New Jersey. The West was a place to start again. Not a clean slate, but to pick up as best as he could where he left off back in the homeland.
Then, they called him Blagoje the Cock. He carried a single-barrel shotgun, only used it at close range, and fucked every Muslim cunt that got him going. Most were pretty enough, but he thought fear was better than pretty. He liked them in pain rather than in ecstasy. And if his cock wasn’t up for the job that day, he’d use anything else handy that would make it hurt. Like the shotgun barrel. A lot.
Then he was nearly caught. He lied his way out of Europe, pretended to be one of the Muslim shitstains he had shot in the eyes until he found himself in New Jersey with a decent amount of money, a family who thought he was their cousin, and months alone to practice the English he hadn’t used much since college, but it all came back to him quickly. For fuck’s sake, he was bored. If the war had taught him anything, it was that he had been lucky to be in the middle of a war. A murderer in war is richer than the richest man in all America. And then it was over.
But out West—all that land, all those transient workers living paycheck to paycheck, all those strippers looking for the quick cashout, all those weirdoes trying to live “off the grid” because they hated the very country that gave them the freedom to do just that—out here he could be Blagoje the Cock again. A murderer.
He currently lacked two things: the land to hide the bodies, and the money to buy the land where he could hide the bodies. It was a simple dream. He would buy a manufactured home, a very nice one. The last thing he wanted was one like Ferret was renting, one that still had the truck-hitch on the end. No, he wanted a home that people would see and think, that Pancrazio, he’s another one of those off-grid types. Made his oil money and got out, and now he’s retired. Sitting out in his front yard drinking beer and grilling bratwursts. And he has a bunch of dogs. Whatever makes him happy.
But then he would go out at night and find pathetic drunk men looking for a fight, or a dried-out divorcee who thinks she’s going to slut it up and enjoy the attention of a man for a few hours. And he would murder them. Flat out murder them. He would make them afraid. He would make it hurt. And when he was done, he would drive out to some barren patch of the many, many acres he had bought and bury the bodies. No one would look for these people. No one would think that the old driller with his new house and dogs and solitary life...well, maybe they would, but they wouldn’t find the evidence. And so they would leave him alone.
Not exactly the same as murdering with impunity, in public, and leaving the bodies on the ground as a warning for the next victim. It was still better than he could manage anywhere else. Now, if he didn’t think the Muslims were the vomit of the Earth, he could see doing all this in Afghanistan. The Taliban, the bastards, there were some stone cold murderers. But, alas, fuck Islam. So America was the next best hunting ground—guns aplenty, fierce individualism, lots of alcohol.
He nodded. He liked that. Laughed. But what were the odds? By the time he bought that land, by the time he had placed his home there, by the time he was ready to kill again, would he have the energy? He was waning fast. Maybe he had one g
ood murder left in him. He couldn’t even follow through on the girl—Stevie? Stevie Nicks? He had needed help, and even those two idiots couldn’t pull the trigger. How could he expect to choke the life out of a fat, vacant-eyed American when his fingers and toes were numb all the time, the cold always there?
He was standing alone in his RV. He had smoked so much today that the fumes, which he usually didn’t notice, were closing his throat and making his eyes water. He retreated to his bedroom. He felt stale, like life had passed him by and these were the days mold would grow all over him.
He thought about his boys—Ferret, Gene Handy, Russell and Hunter. Maybe he should lighten up on them. Ferret, he was a good boy at heart. Loyal. All of them had given him so much lately. Why was he so angry with them? They were as close as he would ever have to soldiers again. The closest thing to sons.
He thought about his stash. The checking account, just enough to get him by with cigarettes, booze, food. The savings account, enough to show that yes, he was a saver and he had plans—grand plans!—and that’s why he lived like a hobo. But the cash, it was the cash, in a place not even Slow Bear knew about, that would ensure he never needed to work again. Another year, maybe two. He had to be patient. He had to hold it all in, like a breath. Like this smoke. Acid, earthy, like the shit it had been fertilized with.
He let it out and coughed. Aching. Cold.
There was a good chance Bad Russell was still at the “gentlemen’s club”, brooding, waiting for a punk to fuck up.
Pancrazio needed to see him.
*
The girl-next-door strippers at the Tuxedo attracted the guys who had girlfriends or wives “back home.” They were the men more likely to try striking up a conversation when they weren’t dancing, the ones to offer under-the-table help with the rent, or Christmas presents for the girls’ kids, or “grocery money.” Maybe the men knew the girls were outright lying and didn’t care. Maybe it was just the illusion of real companionship that was enough. They’d taken it for granted in their real lives, but now with the cold creeping nearer every day, it was all they craved.
The boys across town at the pro strip club, those guys had dropped out of community college to come make stupid amounts of money fracking oil. They wanted girls who looked good like from magazines. Fuck real life. Fuck it. So these girls didn’t put out. Fuck it. It was all about the show anyway. Not just the girls performing for the boys, but the boys performing for the other boys.
Men like Bad Russell didn’t need to perform, but he wasn’t pathetic like the middle-aged men who tried to give fatherly “advice” to naked girls the same age as their daughters. He hung out here at The Tuxedo because the girls put up with him if he helped keep the creepers away. For Bad Russell, a good bar fight was like a Kung-Fu movie. Fun fun fun. Everyone goes home a little bruised but no harm, right? He took advantage of that. If they wouldn’t remember him the next morning anyway, it didn’t matter if they woke up in their beds at the man camp or in the hospital.
Pancrazio scooted onto the stool beside him, waved to the bartender. Cigarette hanging from his lips. Older every day, the bar mirror said so. He ordered a bottle of something light and propped his elbows on the bar. “Did Russell tell you what happened?”
Bad Russell hung his head. “You mean at that trailer?”
“You know what the fuck I mean.”
“Shit, we never meant to—”
“Aw, no, you both meant damn well sure what you meant. I said take care of it. What part of that did you not get?”
“It’s not like she’s going to tell anyone. Not like she can.”
“You ever think she might get better? You ever think some idiot might stumble across her and call for help? Or you think those idiots up there might tell their friends? Is there any way some other idiots can make this worse?”
A shrug. “Well, goddamn, boss.”
Pancrazy let that sit there while he took a swig, swished it. Swallowed. “You have a go at her?”
He didn’t have to say that he had, him looking away, gripping his beer tighter. Knowing him, though, he would’ve been good to her. He had knelt by her side at the RV, wiped off the blood and bacon grease from her head while going “Sh sh sh, s’okay.”
Pancrazy said, “Never mind. What’s done is done, and now that’s done. Really done. Your buddy made sure of it.”
The song stopped and there were some claps and Woo hoo and the dancer shouting, “G’off me!” as she nearly tripped on her high heels trying to get offstage as quick as she could. The bartender yelled, “Don’t touch the fucking dancers, I told you!” and there was a whole lot of slurred “Fuck you!” and peanut shells thrown back at him over the heads of Pancrazy and Bad Russell.
Then the driller said, “Remember what I asked you to do on Halloween?”
Bad Russell nodded.
“I’m going to need you to do some more of it.”
A faster nod. “I promise. I’ll do it better.”
“You’ll do exactly what I say.”
“Yes sir, yes sir.” Thinking, Yes sir, yes sir, three bags full.
“I believe in you, son.” The older man finished his beer and patted Bad Russell on the shoulder and walked out the door. Whenever the door opened and let the parking lot lights in, everyone in the joint groaned and cursed a little.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Ferret drove Gene Handy to the trailer park, drove past those same barking dogs, and parked right close to where Good Russell had parked the day before. Before they even got out of the car, Ferret could tell something was wrong. The trailer looked different somehow. But then he put it together. The windows were all open, no blinds or blankets blocking the view. Plus, the brick steps were gone.
“Shit, they’ve done cleaned up.”
Gene Handy looked around. “This is clean?”
“I’m saying it’s cleaner now. But before, it smelled bad, too. All those windows were blacked out.”
“Are you sure?”
“Jesus, why would I—”
“Fine. Fine. Maybe you got confused. Could be this trailer park only looks like the other trailer park.”
“No, it was this one. Wait.” Ferret held up his hand, walked around to Gene Handy’s side, and began kicking at the leaves on the edge of the windbreak, looking for the pipe Good Russell had knocked some heads with. “Help me find the pipe.”
“A pipe?”
“Steel pipe, yes, man, that’s what I said.” Kicking those leaves. More frustration with each kick. “It was all bloody and shit.”
Gene Handy did not help Ferret look for the pipe. He stood there with his arms crossed and he even yawned nice and wide once before saying, “Can we check the trailer now?”
Ferret was breathing hard by then. He stopped. “It was here. We left it.”
“Come on.”
Gene Handy bumped himself off the hood of the car and started towards the trailer, Ferret right behind him. The door was shut, but Gene Handy banged on it a few good times and it vibrated open. The stink of sweat, sex, and ammonia from the day before was replaced with eye-watering bleach. A toxic cloud of clean.
“The fuck?”
Handy was tall enough to lean in from the ground. He peeked around the corner into the kitchen, then turned his head down the hall. “Nothing.”
“There was a whole goddamn...and a couch, and a TV.”
“Want to look for yourself?”
Ferret stepped forward, tried it on tiptoes. The opening was at his shoulders. Gene Handy’s hands were suddenly on his hips, suddenly lifting him and tossing him inside like he was a plastic bag. Ferret landed on his side, feet still sticking out the door.
He got his breath back and sat up. Gene Handy grabbed the inside of the doorway on both sides and pulled himself up and in. What couldn’t the man do? He helped Ferret to his feet and they both looked around. The fumes were strong enough for them both to lift their shirt collars over their noses, even with all the windows open. There were wh
ite spots all over the brown turf carpet. The walls still had major, violent scrub trails all over. The kitchen, empty, all the cabinet doors open.
Ferret walked down the hallway, quicker this time. There was no way they could’ve cleaned up that disaster of a bathroom so quickly. He pushed open the door and expected that they’d given it the old college try, but, shit, what he was looking at was like a completely remodeled room. That had to be a new toilet, never used. The shower insert, the tile, all still with that faint smell of the new. He reached out to the tile, ran his fingers across. Still a little dusty. Shit.
“This wasn’t like this. It was nasty, man. I’m telling you.”
Gene Handy stepped in, swiveled, then stepped out, kept on to the bedrooms. Ferret stood a moment longer, thinking of how long this sort of thing would usually take. A week? Two? He said, only loud enough for himself to hear, “I swear.”
Next room, the carpet and padding had been ripped out. More scrubbing on the walls. Bleach on the baseboards. But then, the last one. Handy was already in there. Arms crossed, staring at the wall. The whole room was white, even the carpet. Must have taken a lot of bleach. And on that wall Handy was staring at, the scrub trails formed two giant letters: F U.
Gene Handy shook his head. “Whatever.”
“She was in here, I swear. She needed help. Those guys. Good Russell. I’m telling you.”
“So what? What do I do if I find them and beat it out of them? How’s that going to help me with Pancrazy?”
“I told you, I couldn’t find anything on him.”
“I don’t think you bothered looking.”
“Say that again?”
“I don’t think you give a shit. I think you’re scared and you want to point in a different direction. Is that the way you think it works? Close enough is good enough?”
“But, Jesus, Gene, what they were doing to her—”
“Which her? Who her? I don’t see any her.” Gene Handy spread his arms, did a slow three-sixty and stopped, eyebrows up. “I’m not going to chase a ghost. I’m not going to take my eyes off the prize. Finn, look at me, Finn, look at me.”
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