Burn Zone

by James O. Born

  All Ike got out was "Wait…" when he saw the pine board rush toward his face and Craig's young, muscular body twist on his swing.

  His vision went blurry, then dark. He felt like he was in an empty, dark hallway.

  23

  ALEX DUARTE DROVE PAST THE HOUSE IN A WORKING-CLASS neighborhood of Gretna, just outside New Orleans. The rental Nissan didn't look like a cop's or anyone else's who shouldn't be in the area. The sun had just disappeared behind a tall oak tree, and the light was fading fast.

  He checked the piece of paper with the information Alice had found for him on Cal Linley. The longshoreman had lived at this address for eleven years and drove a Ford F-250 pickup truck registered to him and Ella Linley, whom Duarte assumed was his wife.

  Duarte scanned the house and yard to see if there was anything that might cause him trouble. He knew to do a recon first. He had learned that lesson in Bosnia, where everyone had a gun-maybe not as many guns as Louisiana, but close. There was a chain-link fence and a gate for the backyard, and that probably meant there was a dog back there.

  The F-250 was in the attached carport. Duarte could just make out a bumper sticker that said WHITE PEOPLE ROCK! He smiled. This guy was a cop-beating, racist thief. Duarte wouldn't have a problem questioning him.

  He parked the Nissan in front of a dark house five up from Linley's, and casually strolled down the sidewalk without seeing anyone or feeling like someone was looking out at him from a window. He had a good sense of when someone was watching him, but you never really knew until they took action.

  He walked just past the house that interested him, noticing the lights in the side window, probably the kitchen and in the rear room. He thought he saw the gray-blue flicker of a TV set as well. He turned on the property line and quick-stepped to the corner of the fence, then crouched.

  Now he could clearly see the backyard, the side and rear of the house.

  He stayed low and still for three full minutes, letting his eyes adjust to the growing darkness and ensuring no dog was going to bound out of the shadows at him. He'd still approach the guy like a cop, ID out and professionally, but he wanted to know all he could before he asked the first question. He crept toward the carport. As he passed the big Ford truck, he felt the hood. The slight heat meant the man had been driving in the past hour or so.

  As he stood looking at the door that probably went to the kitchen, he saw the knob turn and a shadow behind the glass jalousies.

  Duarte purposely stepped out into the light and reached for his wallet.

  The door opened and a large man with a rough face and thinning hair stepped awkwardly down the two steps with a plastic bag of garbage in his hands. He never even noticed Duarte.

  Duarte said, "Mr. Linley."

  That made the man's head snap.

  "What the hell? Who're you?"

  Duarte held up his identification. "Alex Duarte, ATF."

  "ATF. I don't talk to no damn ATF assholes. Besides, I ain't done nothin' with guns."

  "I just had a few questions about a container at the port."

  "Then go talk to the damn port director, sport. I got nothin' to say to you."

  "Sir, can we step inside and speak?"

  "No. I done told you to fuck off. What're you? Some kinda of Mexican that don't understand English?"

  Duarte fought to hide his smile. This redneck had no idea what was about to happen to him.

  ***

  William Ike Floyd felt like he was swimming, then he heard some noise. He opened his eyes and thought he was looking up at the sun until he realized it was a streetlight. An old round glass one that was really low. He lay still and felt something bite into his back. He had no idea where he was or what had happened. He started to sit up, but the pain in his head forced him to lie back down. But that hurt, too. Tiny, sharp rocks dug into his bare skin.

  He sat up quickly, letting the pain sweep through his body but feeling the need to clear his head. He looked at his lap and legs. He was naked. Naked and outside. But where?

  He tried to stand, but lost his footing and tumbled back to the rough, dirty street. He looked up at the low streetlamps and narrow road, then realized he was in an alley. In the alley naked, sore and, most important, without the truck.

  He finally got to his feet. He raised his hand to his head and felt the sticky blood along his hairline.

  A gust of wind whipped down the deserted alley, and he shivered. He looked around for some discarded clothes or even some garbage to cover up, but saw nothing. For a nasty-ass alley, there was little usable trash.

  He had no idea what time it was, what town he was in or even how seriously he was injured. All that paled next to the most important question that the beautiful and deceitful Craig left him with: Where was the truck and its cargo?

  24

  ALEX DUARTE STOOD IN THE SMALL LIVING ROOM OF CAL LINLEY'S house. He wasn't sure if the big longshoreman realized yet that this interview was likely to fall outside the Department of Justice guidelines.

  Linley had a nervous timbre to his voice now. "Look, I told you I didn't want to talk. I told you not to come inside. What the fuck is going on?"

  Duarte didn't speak. Instead he let his gaze drift to a wall with photos and shelves filled with memorabilia. He purposely ignored Linley and stepped to the shelves for a closer look.

  He had his left hand lightly holding his right fist in case he had to snap it out quickly, but he thought he had Linley right where he wanted him-nervous and confused.

  Then Duarte realized what all the memorabilia was. The photo of Hitler in front of the Reichstag, a sketch of Nathan Bedford Forrest, the founder of the Ku Klux Klan, a photo of a much younger Linley receiving some kind of certificate from a man in a uniform with a swastika on the arm.

  Duarte looked over at the smug, smiling moron.

  Duarte said, "So this the kind of stuff you're into?"

  "Ain't no law against it."

  "I'm Hispanic."

  "I'm sorry for you. But I ain't saying shit, and you can get your ass outta my house before you regret it."

  Duarte smiled. Just enough to show Linley that he wasn't intimidated, but in reality he wanted the big man to give him a reason to break a few bones.

  Linley backed away a step, the sixth sense of a street fighter kicking in. "What the hell does the ATF want with me anyway?"

  "I told you. Information about a container out at the port."

  "What container? The fucking port has thousands of them."

  "You know which one. You opened it night before last." He leveled his eyes at the man.

  Linley remained quiet and still.

  Duarte turned to face him. "I have questions about that container and what was in it."

  "I told you I ain't sayin' shit."

  "We'll see."

  "What's that mean?"

  Duarte gave him a slight smile. "You'll see."

  ***

  The music was a little loud to consider the sports bar "intimate," but it was cozier than Alice Brainard had intended. She thought that by telling Scott Mahovich that she'd have dinner with him and then suggesting McKenna's, he'd realize it was purely platonic. She knew that she was using the fact that he was attracted to her to get her own way and that it was wrong, but she had done it anyway. She knew Alex needed the information on the blood she'd scraped from the severed finger.

  "This is nice," the DNA scientist said.

  Alice smiled and nodded.

  "We should do it more often."

  She wanted to say that this was a one-time event, but she remained quiet.

  "You like this place?"

  "I come from time to time. Sometimes with my boyfriend." She hit the word "boyfriend" a little hard.

  Mahovich looked stricken. "Yeah, he's an ATF agent, right?"

  She nodded.

  "That's who needed the analysis of the scrapings, isn't it?"

  She hesitated and said, "Yes. Please don't say anything."

  He didn't
reply; he just seemed satisfied with himself.

  She finished her grouper sandwich, enduring his stare and that stupid grin. He'd go on about how DNA science was going to be the next big frontier and that the sheriff's office wouldn't be able to pay trained personnel like him enough to stay.

  Mahovich made a show out of pulling out a hundred-dollar bill to pay for dinner. "Does your ATF man take you out much?"

  "Not too much."

  "He doesn't know how to treat a lady."

  "No, not really, but he's learning." That was one of the first accurate statements she had made during the entire evening.

  As they left and walked out to their cars, parked side by side, she slowly brought up the one topic she was interested in talking to this jerk about.

  "So, Scott. How long before you have a profile from the sample I gave you?"

  He gave her a serious look. "Ya know, Alice, you can't rush this kind of stuff. I can't ignore one of the real cases brought to us by sheriff's deputies just so some hotshot ATF man can play detective."

  She held her thoughts. "It's not like that."

  "There is a way we could move things along."

  She looked up at him as she leaned against her Honda. "How?"

  He placed a hand on her shoulder and leaned down and nibbled on her neck. Just a quick bite.

  It shocked Alice, but not as much as what he was inferring would speed things up. Without thinking, she balled her fist and swung at his goofy face, and felt the satisfying snap of her knuckles striking him in the left eye. He lost his balance and bounced off his Buick on the way to the asphalt parking lot.

  Alice looked down at him. "You know what will move the case along? You saving your energy for the office."

  ***

  Alex Duarte tried to look at life from other people's perspectives. That was one of the reasons he'd got along in Bosnia. He could see how the Croats and the Serbs thought they each had the high moral ground in the conflict. He'd come to support the Croats based on his personal relationships as well as on some of the Serb activities, but he understood how each side clung to their ancient hatreds. Back home, he listened to political debates and felt he had some things in common with Democrats and some in common with Republicans. At any time, one side or the other could make a decent point. That was why he was an Independent.

  Looking at Cal Linley and then at the Nazi memorabilia on the shelves, he had a difficult time seeing his point of view.

  "You a member of a racist group, too?"

  The big man looked surprised by the question. "Why should I answer? So you can open a file on me?"

  "Look, Mr. Linley, I swear to God there will be no record of my visit."

  Again Linley was taken aback. Duarte didn't think he was smart enough to catch the subtle threat in the comment.

  The longshoreman took a small step back. "What do you want, ATF man?"

  "Answers. That's it. You tell me and I'll leave."

  "What if I threw you out instead?"

  Duarte didn't respond. He rarely did to threats. Instead he picked up a tiny statue of a woman holding a banner with a swastika. "This valuable?"

  "More'n you could afford."

  Duarte heaved it against the front wall, the small figurine shattering almost into dust."

  "You crazy? What kind of federal agent are you?"

  "One that needs answers." He leaned toward the shelves and then flicked a ceramic Black Sambo playing a banjo off the shelf and watched it break into a dozen pieces on the hardwood floor.

  "That's Americana. It's art. I spent my whole life collecting it."

  Duarte looked at the shaken man and said, "The Mona Lisa is art. That thing was insulting. Especially how you look at it." He bumped the shelf, and two candlestick holders with German writing on them clinked together then fell over.

  Linley shrieked, "Dammit! Cut that out."

  Duarte didn't acknowledge him. Instead he reached over and picked up a beer stein with a glass bottom.

  "No, not that. It's engraved to me personally."

  "From who?"

  Linley hesitated, then said, "The commander of the Aryan Army."

  Duarte shook his head. "What was in the crate?"

  "I told you, I don't know."

  Duarte dropped the stein straight to the ground. He heard the man say "Okay," and in a lightning-quick flick of his hand and bend of the knees, he caught the mug an inch off the ground.

  Duarte said, "I'm listening."

  "I did take something from the container, but I swear I don't know what it was exactly."

  "What do you think it was?"

  The big man scratched his chin as he formulated an answer. "I just saw the metal and some wires, but I was thinking it might be some kind of machine."

  "To do what?"

  He hesitated and finally said, "I think it has something to do with oil wells."

  "Like how?"

  The tall man shook his head. "I ain't sure, but I think it might be a drill head or maybe even something to fuck up the oil flow."

  "How'd you figure that out?"

  "I ain't stupid. I know the folks bringing it into the U.S."

  Duarte had a lot of questions, but decided to go with "Where'd you take it?"

  "A motel over in Metairie."

  "Who'd you give it to?"

  Linley paused, appraising the ATF agent again. Duarte lifted his hand with the engraved stein.

  "Okay, okay. I gave it to a young fella from Omaha."

  "Look, you're dragging your feet. Just tell me the whole story, and I'll be out of here. Keep stalling, and I might have another accident." To emphasize his comment, he lowered the stein, but flicked a cast-iron tank a little bigger than his hand off the shelf, then while it was still in the air he kicked it hard. It flew in a straight line directly through a windowpane on the side of the house. He hadn't meant to aim for the window, but he wouldn't admit it to this moron.

  Linley yelled, "Would you cut that out? I'll tell you." He took a breath and said, "His name was 'Ike' and I called him on a pay phone in Omaha. The president of the National Army of White Americans, Mr. Jessup, hooked us up. All I did was deliver the crate to him. Mr. Jessup spent his whole life in the oil business."

  "The NAWA? You're kidding me, right?"

  "Nope. We're allowed representation."

  Duarte sighed, then said, "How much they pay you?"

  "Nothin'."

  "Then why'd you do it?"

  "To help my country. They is gonna use whatever it is to help build a stronger country."

  Duarte eyed the man. "A stronger country for whom?"

  "Americans, you dumb-ass. You seen what's going on in this country? We need to do something, and I done my part. I ain't ashamed of it either. Figured the association has some way to set things straight."

  "Like what?"

  The big man's eyes shifted, then he said, "Maybe taking control of oil production. Hell, I don't know." Sticking to his same story.

  Duarte questioned him some more about "Ike" and the motel. At least he had a lead.

  When he had all the information he could use, Duarte said, "Look, Mr. Linley. Give me the phone number to this Ike and whatever else you know, and you can forget I was ever here."

  "But I'll know by my smashed stuff."

  Duarte looked at the remains of the few items he'd broken and at the hole in the window. Then he looked up at Linley. "Believe me, you got off easy."

  25

  IN THE LOBBY OF THEIR HOTEL, ALEX DUARTE SHOOK HIS HEAD. He had just recounted all that Cal Linley had told him the night before.

  Lina looked at Félix, then back to the ATF agent and said, "Oil doesn't fit in with our sources here in the U.S. I don't see it as a possibility."

  He looked over at Félix. The DEA man had seemed more and more disturbed by the death of his informant, Gastlin. Often cops took the full brunt of responsibility for the deaths of people who worked for them. Duarte had seen the subtle signs that Félix was being eate
n alive by this. Félix had made a note of Cal Linley's name on a small pad.

  Félix finally said, "He does sound a little crazy, bro. Why would he do shit like that for no money? And what would 'help the country' in a crate that fit in the back of a truck? Could oil equipment be more valuable than pot?"

  Lina sounded interested now. "What would be more valuable than the pot?"

  "Coke or maybe even heroin. That would bring in a hell of a lot more cash than pot."

  Duarte sighed. "There's something wrong here. It may have to do with our load, and it maybe points to Ortíz."

  Lina said, "Or it might distract us from working on the case. It could work both ways."

  Duarte nodded and said, "Regardless, I'm staying a few more days until I'm satisfied."

  Félix said, "I'm with you then, bro. Maybe I can help." He paused and then said, "You really think this guy Linley might know something about Gastlin?"

  "He might know someone who does. It's a long shot, but I feel like I have to follow up on it."

  Lina became more agitated and said, "You're both foolish. It was a load of pot, and you feel guilty your snitch got killed. That's it."

  Duarte kept his dark eyes on the FBI agent. "Lina, it's not like I'm asking you to jump in on this. I just have a few leads to run down. Maybe it is nothing."

  "You have a report on your interview?"

  "No report on that interview."

  She shook her head like a frustrated teacher.

  Duarte let her calm down a little and said, "Have you seen the colonel? I've got a few questions for him."

  Lina shook her head. "No, he's been gone since early this morning."

  Félix shot a look at her. "Keeping pretty close watch over him, aren't you?"

  "That depends, Félix."

  "On what?"

  "On whether it's any of your fucking business." She turned and stalked off toward the elevators, leaving Duarte and Félix in the little sitting area of the hotel lobby.