Next Last Chance

by Jon A. Hunt

  Paradise had never been assigned its own zip code, either. It did claim two area codes and five G. Andrews. The 775 prefix had only been in service since 1998, so I concentrated on the two listings that used the original 702. Something told me Rafferty’s penciled hint had meant a person who’d been around for a while.

  The right Gabe Andrews picked up on my first try.

  Most people answer a phone with a question. Gabe Andrews plainly never had. He said “good afternoon.” A statement, not a question. Mr. Andrews’ day had been just fine and he had no problem telling me so. His voice had the measured authority developed after decades in the military or law enforcement. I introduced myself.

  “Little Jerry’s friend from Nashville.”

  “The only thing little about the Jerry I know is his office,” I said.

  Mr. Andrews had a chuckle like honey on a slow boil. Definitely law enforcement. Military throats are too rough from yelling to make that kind of sound. “He said you might call. What were you drinking?”

  “Oatmeal stouts. Two pints each, nothing crazy. He settled the tab.”

  This satisfied him. “I’m not much of a long distance talker. Weather’s great here. Church on Sunday.”

  “You want me to visit you there?”

  “Naw, the wife goes for services, not me. I just go to confession.”

  Sunday? The cloak and dagger bit made sense if Rafferty’s friend had an inkling of who else was involved. But if I planned a trip out West for the weekend it would be on the FBI’s radar before I left Nashville. I didn’t have that kind of time.

  “You, uh, ever go to confession on Fridays?”

  Honey boiled again on the other end. “Whenever they’re open. I got a lot of sins.”

  “All right. I’ll give you a call tomorrow when I’m in town.”

  “Till then,” he said and hung up. Maybe he felt another transgression coming on.

  I put the car in gear and dialed the main number for Cool-Core downtown. The corporate operator greeted me and put me through to Danny Ayers.

  “Hey, Ty. What’s up?”

  “You’ll be happier not knowing,” I promised. “Any more visitors in suits?”

  “Not so far.”

  “Good. I’ll bring the Viper in tomorrow morning if you promise to keep it downstairs.”

  I knew precisely how Danny had sounded as a ten-year-old on Christmas morning, because he sounded that way now. “Cool! Downstairs is perfect. Can you bring it in through the research delivery entrance? I’ll have everything ready by five.”

  Danny was the perfect supercar babysitter. All he wanted was to plug it up to Cool-Core’s million-dollar sound system and rev the engine. How much trouble could he get into doing that? I wished him a good evening and ended the call. Part of the “everything” he’d have ready by five would be a replacement for my compromised phone. We’d arranged that ages ago, if I ever called in through the switchboard instead of Danny’s direct line.

  I holstered my gun and negotiated congealing traffic. For as many times as I’d considered using the Smith & Wesson lately, it would be a good idea to be sure it fired how I wanted it to when I got around to pulling the trigger. An hour at the range might help get my mind off of the married woman and the phantom killer who both seemed to have my number.

  Customer rapport wasn’t the kid’s strong suit. He plunked three boxes of ammunition and a package of earplugs onto the glass countertop and barely let go of three syllables during the transaction. I worked the ammo boxes into a stack I could balance in one hand and did a perfunctory survey of the place.

  Nothing about the gun shop seemed physically changed from the last twenty times I’d been there. Racks of cases, carry rigs, shooting glasses and other accessories occupied the carpeted floor between front doors and back wall. The aisles were broad and the racks were low enough to see over. Gun folks as a rule are happier being able to see over things. Sound-deadening glass looked into the shooting range opposite the sales counter. An arrhythmic pop-pop-popping beat against the glass. I knew all of the shooters from their stances or rate of fire. The faces shopping nearby were familiar, too, and the usual rifle and shotgun assortment stood at attention on the wall behind the counter. Thirty-two of the range’s most impressively perforated paper targets hung prominently over the rifle muzzles. My own best grouping held the ninth slot from the left. Everything felt just like home, except that no one wanted to say hello.

  I wasn’t in a particularly talkative mood, anyway. I hefted the ammo and claimed a spot on a bench facing the range to check my gun.

  “Good afternoon, Mr. Bedlam.”

  The sensation of being purposely avoided might have just been paranoia. The general manager had come out to sit on the bench next to me. Steve Mathers had survived five tours in Afghanistan, though, so if he was uncomfortable in my presence it wouldn’t show.

  “Sighting in your spare?”

  “I am. How’d you know this was my spare?”

  “Somebody brought in a bobtail .45 this morning and said it was yours. It’s one of the two you bought last summer.”

  “Who?”

  “He didn’t leave a name. We can talk about it in private.” Steve’s eyes narrowed and the creases he’d earned squinting in the desert deepened. He got up and left me to puzzle. I crammed the plugs in my ears and took my gun and ammo into the range.

  Peaceful gunfire thudded in my stopped ears like greyhounds with their mouths full of marshmallows. I ignored it. They weren’t shooting at me. Indoor ranges have rules against that. I held the button till my target chugged out to ten yards. A black, faceless torso with concentric white ovals around a red midpoint where the heart should be—someone out there saw that when they looked at me. The Smith & Wesson snapped up and emptied itself in seconds.

  Not bad, eight ragged holes in an area as big as my fist, but they were down and to the right. I dialed the rear sight with a screwdriver on my keychain. I reloaded, memorized the damage I’d already done, then killed the innocent paper man eight more times.

  The other shooters had stopped. Their stares were practically tangible against the back of my head. Maybe I had a target back there, too.

  The target didn’t have much heart left. Pressing the button sent it five yards farther away and I shot it in the head instead.

  Eject the magazine. Reload. Weapon on the bench, action up and open. Recall the target, hang a new one, send it out twenty-five yards. Close the slide and shoot. Eight more holes in the stiff paper, nearly touching. The slide was hot but I worked it fast enough not to get burned. Now I spaced the shots a second apart, mentally tracked how the gun felt each time, made sure each shot went in the same place. After I’d burned through all three boxes of ammunition I felt a little better.

  I bypassed the crowd out on the bench while they tried to look busier than they were and took myself to Steve Mathers’ office to ask what the hell was going on.

  Mathers recommended shutting the door, which I did. When he flipped open a shipping box on his desk, another bobtailed Smith & Wesson .45 gleamed up at me, identical to the one warming my holster except for a half-inch scratch on the trigger guard. I’d put the scratch there last winter during a scuffle with three drunks and a brick wall in Printer’s Alley.

  “You don’t lend your guns out, do you?”

  “No,” I said. “Who does?”

  He crossed his forearms. A pale scar tracked from his left wrist to the elbow, a souvenir from the Middle East and probably easier for him to ignore than worse injuries no one ever saw. I’d yet to experience the kind of hell Steve Mathers had known, even after the bloodletting at Mount Olivet. I respected him deeply for that.

  “The man hadn’t been in before this morning. He brought this, shot a box of ammo through it and put it on the counter and said it was yours.”

  “Wait a minute: he shot it first?”

  “Did he ever.” Mathers scooted his chair back and retrieved a pair of paper scrolls that had been leani
ng against the wall behind him. Crackling paper resisted flattening till he passed his scarred arm firmly over it on the desk a few times. He dropped the rubber band to one side and watched me intently. First he’d shown me the gun I’d assumed gone for good, and now he presented me with my prize target that we both knew was still tacked on the wall behind the sales counter, number nine from the left.

  “About ten o’clock, this guy comes in. Average-sized, athletic, dark hair and skin. Maybe Hispanic, though you’d never tell by the accent. His clothes weren’t anything special but you’d swear he was a millionaire. Does that make any sense?”

  I smirked. Some people just come across that way no matter what they’re wearing. Sandra Donovan certainly had, shrugging out of the same tired leather jacket I wore now. Putting a hand in a pocket, I discovered a damp wad of expensive lace we’d both forgotten.

  “He asked if you might be coming in today,” Steve said. “I said I didn’t know.”

  He waved off my thanks. “The targets on the wall interested him a lot. I didn’t see harm in telling him which was yours when he asked. He stared at it for a minute, then he bought the ammo and paid for time in the range. And he did this. Twice.”

  Mathers unrolled the second target. I lined the corners up. Holes in the upper target aligned perfectly with the holes in the lower one. Mathers’ desktop showed through them.

  “He shot these groups from memory?”

  “You want Alan to bring in your original?”

  “No.” I’d received Rico’s message loud and clear. Another piece of holed paper wasn’t going to help me interpret. “Could we look at your security footage?”

  A man who’s carried pieces of friends off the battlefield learns some grim expressions. Mathers wore a doozy now. “Love to, if I could. Somebody hacked into the system and erased every file. Even with backups we’ve got nothing newer than last month. There’s a connection?”

  “Probably,” I admitted.

  “You know this guy?”

  “Not like he knows me.”

  I lifted my other gun from the box. The last person who’d handled it had wiped the weapon with an oiled rag. There’d be no fingerprints; and even if there were, the FBI hadn’t been successful with prints throughout Rico’s career. The action and magazine were empty. I tucked it into the waistband of my jeans at the small of my back. Not many dumber ways exist to carry a firearm, but my pockets were full of wet lace.

  Mathers rerolled the targets, snapped the rubber band around them, and passed them across the desk to me when I rose.

  “I doubt he’ll be back,” I said. Repeat customers didn’t live long in Rico’s line of work.

  “I’d prefer he didn’t,” said Mathers. “This one was trouble.”

  I paused with one hand on the office door. “What ammo did he shoot? I might want to pick up a couple boxes.”

  Steve Mathers smiled. Still grimly. “You already have. He shot the same jacketed hollow-points you always do. He didn’t take any with him, though.”

  No, I supposed he wouldn’t have. Rico made his own bullets.

  Twelve

  I hadn’t earned Cool-Core’s billions. Had my adult self been able to choose his parents, I wouldn’t have inherited them either. But my father had mustered enough organic passion to sire a descendent before throwing body and soul into a sea of microprocessors and liquor bottles. Dad was gone now. The world still had plenty of liquor. The microprocessors remained and the fortune they’d built came with a board of directors and other stewards to nurture it. Most of the time I left my better loved corporate sibling to its own devices. But I didn’t particularly mind using company assets like they were my own.

  Twin Pratt & Whitney turbofans scarcely altered their low-frequency purr from the moment they’d flung the gray and gold LearJet into the sky. I was the only passenger. A mile-long asphalt stripe fell away, not Nashville International Airport but smaller John C. Tune field to the city’s west. Only the two-man crew knew my destination. The Viper was tucked discreetly in the basement of Cool-Core’s downtown research facility, covered with probes so Danny Ayers could listen to it, and I’d hustled from the top of the building to the airfield aboard the Cool-Core Sikorsky helicopter. I’d gotten out of Nashville quicker than any with less lofty means could match. With any luck, Del and Nick, Special Agent in Charge Pennington, and even Rico wouldn’t know I’d been gone till I returned. Smally only knew not to wait up for me.

  I sank into beige leather as the cabin lights dimmed. Nevada was four hours of blue sky with an unbroken cloud floor away. The new phone I’d picked up from Danny winked a turquoise eye at me. My hat, jacket, and shoulder holster with straps curled around the unloaded .45, lay on the opposite seat. I wasn’t sure why I’d brought the scratched gun. Danny had stressed the new phone couldn’t be used till it had downloaded my contacts, call history and other data from the Cool-Core server, which carefully checked for tracking signatures. I tapped the electric switch to recline the seat. A five-hundred-mile-an-hour nap was my best option.

  Thankfully, I didn’t dream.

  The copilot roused me via the intercom when we were over Lake Mead. He was quiet and courteous. I did, after all, own most of the company that owned all of the plane.

  Deep clear sky stretched all the way to a jagged horizon, and the reservoir’s inky surface slid by beneath us. Hoover Dam’s bone-colored intake towers passed quickly. Mountainous terrain subsided to less rugged foothills, which in turn gave way to residential squares dotted with blue swimming pools. Beyond the squares everything looked dry, flat and brown.

  I strapped on the shoulder rig and parked the Smith & Wesson in its holster. I resisted adding the extra round to the chamber while we were still in the air. My cell phone’s LED still pulsed industriously. I slid the useless device into a pocket.

  The engines got louder. Wing flaps whirred and landing gear thumped into position. Details on the ground gained clarity and apparent speed. Beyond the irrigated suburbs lay more than what from higher altitudes had seemed only dead brown dirt: clusters of sagebrush proved life had existed before civilized man and his imported water. It still didn’t look like Paradise.

  When the arid Mojave winds embraced me on the LearJet’s stairs, I appreciated having swapped my usual leather jacket for a lightweight nylon windbreaker. This was short sleeves weather but if I was going to wear a gun openly on my hip I’d have brought a pearl-handled Colt and worn boots and a Stetson. A white passenger van advanced over the shimmering tarmac as the jet’s engines spun down. Two men from the van stayed to tie down the wings with orange straps. The driver shuttled me to the terminal building.

  Henderson Executive Airport had one restaurant upstairs. The windows overlooked the runways, and there were dangling model airplanes overhead. I ordered a Million Dollar Burger and a cola to cure my growling stomach. There must have been a special going because the meal only cost $18.50. I took my time. It didn’t help: the light on my phone hadn’t finished strobing.

  When the redhead at the information desk asked if she could help, I’d reconsidered ringing Andrews’ number. Even if I’d gotten away cleanly I couldn’t assume he wasn’t watched.

  “I’m looking for a Catholic church in Paradise,” I said. Aren’t we all?

  “Which one?”

  “How many are there?”

  The other woman behind the counter suppressed a giggle. The redhead blinked a couple times, decided I was serious, tapped the words into her keyboard. “Um….fifty-three.”

  I guessed I couldn’t blame Andrews for not being more specific.

  “Most of them probably aren’t having mass in the middle of the day, though,” the redhead added. “Wedding or funeral?”

  I was wearing blue jeans and had an automatic under my arm. “Just meeting a friend.”

  “Well, I can print these out and we can see where they are on the map. You’re sure it’s a Catholic church, right?”

  “He said he’d be in confession while th
ey were open.”

  The redhead started to say something when her comrade finally joined in. “Did your friend mean confession in a house of God, or Confession, the bar? There’s a tavern called Confession over on South Nellis. I know they’re open on Friday afternoons.”

  Confession on South Nellis Boulevard didn’t live up to its gimmicky name. Cleverness ended with the crude sign over the door, which opened onto an alley. Stalls waited across the alley for twenty cars, and after I parked my rented Malibu, room remained for fourteen more. I stopped just inside to let me eyes acclimate.

  Lights with metal shades made a valiant effort but were overwhelmed by garish backlit displays featuring dollar signs, fruit in groups of three, and cartoon women struggling with their bikinis. Only two of the slot machines had customers, spinsters with insufficient strength of will to let go the handles before they died of boredom and stale air. At least the place didn’t stink. An enormous NO SMOKING sign occupied an entire wall, Confession’s lone originality in a notoriously smoky city. Three campaigners leaned against it, cue sticks and drinks in hand, and squinted at me across a pool table that needed new felt. Country music from the Seventies floated around. I’d been looking forward to a rendezvous where alcohol wasn’t served. This was what I got for not setting up my own appointments.

  The bartender was eighty if a day. His spectacles might have been cut from the bottoms of shot glasses. He glanced up when I got near enough to engage his peripheral vision.

  “Gabe Andrews,” I said.

  “What’ll you have?” His voice was a lot smoother than his face.

  I ordered Jack on the rocks. A glass met me on the counter before I had my billfold out.

  “Back booth off the end of the bar,” the old-timer told me. “He knows you’re carrying.”

  I winked at him. Then my glass of Jack and I went to see Mr. Andrews.

  A clichéd tune about ordering another round, because nobody waited at home, followed me the length of the bar. There were no other sounds, no slot machine bells, no clacking billiard balls, no alcohol-loudened conversations. The noise makers were watching me. A man with craggy features and short-mowed silver hair grinned from the shadowy corner. His teeth seemed to glow. As I stepped closer his eyes appeared, close-set yet bright as two sapphires set in creased suede. He’d buttoned his shirt right up to his throat the way a person who wore uniforms most of his life would. I kept my hands where he could see them.