One Rule - No Rules

by Lawrence Ambrose

  "I prefer a larger caliber," she hissed out.

  The barrel was now directly under Rick's chin. His eyes had widened beyond surprise to sheer terror.

  "Last chance," she said.

  His grip on the rifle relaxed, and a moment later so did Alec's. The two men released their hold and started to back off. She noted the contracting muscles in their right shoulders telegraphing a strike, and beat them to the punch – kicking Rick in the groin and whipping the rifle stock into the big blond's jaw. The crunch of breaking bone presaged his rag doll flop on the floor, while Rick had assumed a prayerful position on his knees before her. Socrates' jaws were inches and from the dark-haired man's throat and closing.

  "Enough, Soc," she growled.

  Socrates shook off the man's feebly clutching hands and backed away with a frustrated snort. Now everyone was sprawled on the kitchen floor except Rick, who was still bent over in apparent prayer. Thalma gave him a light kick to his chest, and he joined his fellows on his back.

  She was startled by footsteps on the stairs behind her. Louis came bounding up, a huge grin on his face as he surveyed the carnage. His gaze met Rick's glazed eyes.

  "Looks like the lone wolf just kicked the pack's ass," he laughed.

  "Fuck you, pussy." Rick spit blood from his mouth. Louis's grin faded. He was surprised by a powerful urge to plant his foot in the fascist's bleeding mouth. But then he saw the pain behind the words, behind the mask that was his disdainful face, as drug-fueled compassion drowned his baser emotions.

  "I thought I told you to stay down there," Thalma said to him.

  "I guess I'm not that great about following orders."

  They stood there listening to the fallen men's wheezing breaths for a while.

  "So what are we going to do with them?" Louis asked.

  Thalma had been frowning, considering that very question. Then she smiled and nodded to herself.

  "I have an idea," she said.

  SHERIFF MARTSON smiled thinly and shook his head as he watched the black SUV wobbling two and fro across the road, just as the anonymous caller had described.

  "Man," said the deputy beside him. "That clown is seriously wasted."

  His radio crackled, and Martson lifted the mike. "You see them?" he asked, peering at the cruiser parked behind him in the rearview mirror.

  "Kinda hard to miss, boss."

  "Let's do this," said the sheriff. "And watch your nine. The caller claimed to see weapons on board. Approach with guns out."

  "Roger that," said the deputy in the car behind him.

  They lit up their lights as the SUV weaved toward them. It careened off the road and into an adjoining soy bean field before scraping to a stop. The cruisers zoomed in, halting on either end of the car. Sheriff Martson and his three deputies scrambled out, guns drawn but pointed down, and swarmed in both sides of the SUV.

  The driver's side window rolled down, and Rick offered them a bleary-eyed smile. "What's up, Officer? Is there a problem?"

  Adrenaline spiked in Martson's brain as he spotted two M4s cradled in the laps of the two men in back.

  "Guns spotted," he said.

  The officers' handguns snapped up level with the windows. Everyone inside immediately raised their hands.

  "They're not even loaded," Rick protested. "She removed the clips."

  "Exit the vehicle," Sheriff Marston barked. "Keep your hands up."

  The five men crawled, scrabbled, and clawed their way out of the SUV to flop on the ground or cling half-upright to the sides of the car.

  "How much have you men been drinking?" Martson growled.

  "No drinking," Roger slurred. "She drugged us, man."

  "Who drugged you?"

  "That crazy bitch back at the farm!" Roger pointed vaguely.

  A deputy popped open the trunk. He held up two large plastic bags filled with greenish-brown plant matter for the others to see.

  "She planted that shit on us!" Rick cried. "We don't use that stuff!"

  "Again, who are you talking about?"

  "Engstrom. Ms. Fucking Rambette."

  "Thalma Engstrom?" Martson bit back a scowl. His deputies looked at him. They'd been with him on the raid of the farm property.

  "Yeah," said Rick. He squinted up at the sheriff, and shielded his eyes, even though they were standing in the shade. "You know her?"

  "What drug are you on now?"

  "I have no fucking clue." He turned to the others, who shook their heads. "It ain't dope, that's for sure. I'm hallucinating up the wazoo here. I mean, this shit is so strong you're looking almost sexy."

  "Damn, that must be some pretty strong shit," one of them snickered, drawing a glare from the sheriff.

  "You're all under arrest," he said. "Lie face down and place your hands behind your backs."

  As they cuffed the dazed men, Sheriff Martson's gaze drifted north, toward a particular farm property and its peculiar tenants.

  SWIRLING COLUMNS of smoke rose from the grill as Louis turned the lamb chops. The red-tailed hawk circle high overhead, as if imbibing the sweet, meaty odors. Socrates lay stretched out on the porch in a slim slice of shade. His ears twitched as a squirrel at the edge of the yard chirped for him to come out and play.

  The last dog days of summer, Thalma thought. Whatever the heck that meant. She drank her ice tea and smiled at Louis, his long hair spilling out over his tanned shoulders, and allowed herself a deep breath of pure contentment.

  The white Breton County Sheriff's Department SUV cut that breath short as it rolled around to the gravel on the near side of the backyard.

  "Man," said Louis. "That guy must have a crush on you."

  Thalma's thin smile curled downward. "I have a feeling it's not about that."

  "Oh. Right." Louis rolled his eyes at his own denseness. "It's about Rick and his merry band of fascist goons."

  "We knew they'd be giving the police an earful about us."

  "True." Louis was starting to look worried. "But they've already searched this place and found nothing, so I figured..."

  He trailed off as Sheriff Martson stepped out of his SUV, hitching up his pants. He strolled over to them. Socrates released a low growl but didn't bother to rise.

  "Sheriff," said Louis.

  "Louis," said Sheriff Martson. "Miss Engstrom."

  He leaned against the porch railing, eyeing them both with a neutral expression that struck Thalma as contrived. She drank her ice tea and regarded him flatly.

  "We've got some people in our county jail who are making a number of allegations about you," he said.

  "What are they saying?" Louis asked.

  "That you run a large grow operation here, that you're armed to the teeth and rigged high explosives everywhere - that you drugged them, planted drugs on them, and then called the police anonymously after sending them on their way."

  "But the DEA and you guys didn't find anything when you searched the property," Louis croaked.

  "They say your grow chambers are underground. You enter them through a sump pump. We never checked out that possibility."

  Despite the heat from the grill, Louis's face had assumed an ashen hue. Martson gave a low chuckle.

  "You should advise your boyfriend never to play poker, Miss Engstrom."

  Thalma was torn between fear and fury – the fury mostly aimed at herself. Her cute, merciful little prank against the mercenaries was starting to look like it might backfire. She hadn't thought it all through, obviously, but then time had been short and the options limited. The safest thing probably would've been to just kill them and drop them off somewhere. She'd had every excuse and reason in the world for that – everything but the stomach to do it.

  "Did they say what they were doing here?" Thalma asked.

  "They claim they were hired to investigate you by a private firm you owe money to. Though they failed to provide any proof of that or even to name their employer."

  "Not too surprising," said Louis.

  "Which part?
"

  "The part that's b.s.," said Thalma. "That is, all of it."

  Sheriff Martson nodded as if that went without saying.

  "So how do they say this all happened?" Louis asked. "How did Thalma manage to drug them all in the first place?"

  "They claim she invited them in and doped the coffee. The next thing they knew they were driving down the road, stoned out of their minds. On LSD, according to our lab."

  Martson smiled. Louis scowled at Thalma, who just shook her head.

  "Was there a point to your coming out, Sheriff?" asked Thalma.

  "I just thought you might want to know."

  "You're warning us?" Louis frowned at him in disbelief.

  The sheriff spread his hands apart on the railing.

  "Are they planning to issue another search warrant?" Thalma's expression revealed nothing.

  "You know I can't tell you that," he said.

  Thalma tried to appear calm, but inside her doubts and fears were churning apace with the anxieties Louis was wearing on his sleeve. She was having trouble divining the sheriff's motivation. It was almost as if he was giving them a heads-up. Still, she couldn't imagine that they would issue another warrant on the say-so of a bunch of drug-addled mercenaries.

  "Do you want a beer, Sheriff?" Louis broke the silence with an artificially cheery tone, glancing at Thalma for support. "We could throw some more lamb on the grill, if you haven't eaten. Couldn't we, Thal?"

  "Thanks, son, but I believe your lady friend and I have already tried getting warm and fuzzy, and it didn't fly."

  Thalma was thinking fast, struggling not to surrender to paranoia – even while knowing that paranoia and assuming the worst had saved her life more than once.

  "You're welcome to a beer, Sheriff," she said. "Even if we don't get warm and fuzzy."

  Martson smiled. "Since I'm off-duty, I'll take you up on your kind offer."

  "I'll get it," said Louis. "And more meat."

  When Louis retreated, Sheriff Martson raised his eyebrows to Thalma, as though he expected her to complete a thought.

  "Something on your mind, Sheriff?"

  "I was just wondering. There are more than a few things in their account that don't make sense, but to me one thing stands out. Why would you dope their coffee with LSD? Why not a poison like cyanide? Why let them live?"

  Thalma smiled – more at herself for having the same thought. "Good question. Do you have a theory?"

  "Well, my theory is that you didn't invite them in for coffee." A smile flickered on his face. "I think they were hired by that mysterious corporation you work for or a competing one, and came out here to either negotiate or do something worse."

  Louis emerged from the house, beer and extra lamb chop in hand. He handed Martson the beer, and dropped the lamb on the grill, sliding the cooked lamb to an unheated area. Thalma set her ice tea aside, wishing she had something stronger, but thinking it was probably better to keep her full wits about her.

  "At which point," Sheriff Martson continued, saluting her with his beer, "you handed them their asses."

  "Five men?" Louis injected incredulity into his voice.

  "And not just five men. Ex-military, probably some Special Forces training. Think they're God's gift to soldiers. I know the type. I ran into more than a few of them in the Gulf War."

  Louis tended the grill, studiously not glancing at Thalma. Martson mounted the steps, incurring a baleful stare from Socrates, and settled down in one of the four patio chairs.

  "They're hired enforcers," said Martson. "Mercenaries. Guys who would kill their own mother for money. Hell, they'd assassinate Mother Mary if you paid them enough. I once watched a group of them open fire on traffic from a bridge just for the hell of it. Some of us made a stink about it, but it all got swept under the rug."

  Louis glanced at him from the grill, and then at Thalma, his golden-brown eyes glinting with the first hints of approval.

  "They sound like awful people," said Thalma.

  "The worst. All that training, fighting to defend our country, only to turn into paid thugs."

  "Those wars were never about defending this country."

  "I'm not going to debate politics with you."

  "Are you looking for a confession?"

  "I'm looking to understand." Sheriff Martson turned to face her. "I'm not looking to bust your balls. This is completely off the record, I give you my word. You saved this young man from prison. You put your life on the line for a stranger. Some DEA agents told me how you disarmed some meth heads and instead of shooting them tossed their gun away. Thugs showed up at your door four days ago armed to the teeth, and instead of killing them you sent them driving off in a drug-induced haze. By letting them walk away, you put yourself at considerable risk. I'd like to understand why."

  Louis flipped the lamb chop, and fresh sizzling filled the silence as Thalma traded glances with Louis before resuming her contemplation of the backyard.

  "I don't want to hurt anyone," she said. "I just want to live my life."

  "As far as I know, there's no law that says someone has to live as a criminal."

  "Only if you want to live as a free person. Then there are thousands of laws saying you're a criminal."

  "Come on. I'm free, and I'm not violating a thousand laws."

  "That's because you accept being told what to do - accept that your life and your property don't belong to you. A person living in a cage could consider himself free if he's content living in a cage."

  "I'm not living in any damn cage."

  "You don't see it as a cage, because you're okay with being confined. I'm not."

  Martson shook his head. "You're not making any sense to me."

  "I didn't expect to."

  Louis served up the lamb while Thalma brought out coleslaw and mashed potatoes. The sun descended and cast a deep, golden glow over the backyard as they ate. Socrates yawned wide, one eye on the sheriff, as if showing off his large, gleaming canines. The red-tailed hawk had settled in on the oak tree at the back edge of the yard, watching them eat with dark, wary eyes.

  I wonder what Martson would think if he saw me fly, Thalma thought.

  Chapter 11

  AFTER SHERIFF MARTSON DEPARTED, Thalma made a quick decision, at Louis's urging: it was time to "clean house." Everything illegal had to go. It was either that or lose the farm.

  "The writing's on the wall," said Louis. "Did you see Martson's expression when he left? He wanted to say something, but he didn't want to betray his people."

  "He said enough."

  Thalma felt half-sick at the thought of destroying her underground gardens, but Louis was right. She'd seen the bleak look in Sheriff Martson's eyes when he'd paused at the bottom of the porch stairs. He'd done everything but flat-out tell them to clean up their act. The good news was that there was a lot of dried product that was ready for packaging and sending. They'd do that and destroy the rest.

  "How long do you figure we have?" Louis asked.

  "I don't know," she said. "It might never happen, but we're not taking any chances. Are you up for working all night?"

  "Sure. I doubt I'd be able to sleep anyway."

  It was a tedious process. First they weighed and packaged the dope and Purple Haze, then they bagged the plants, and finally they cleared out the two safes. The cash, precious metals, weapons, and last remnants of LSD 35 would be moved to a safe place. The bagged plants would be dropped at various dumpsters throughout the area.

  As the sun came up, Thalma was driving to the nearest secure depository with dozens of product-filled boxes – the utility building two miles from her property. It was a moment of high risk. Someone monitoring the farm could either intercept her or follow her there, but her half-hour of driving the roads around the farm before making the move had persuaded her that no surveillance operation was yet in place.

  Thalma dropped off the boxes and the safes' contents at the utility building as the first rays of sunlight struck the ground and
a mist from last night's rain shimmered over the fields. She continued on through some nearby small towns, unloading garbage bags in various dumpsters, while at home Louis was busy scrubbing and mopping plant residue from the grow areas. He'd looked half-dead on his feet when she'd left him, but there would be plenty of time for rest later. After overcoming her initial emotional reaction, she wondered why she hadn't done this ages ago. The income from her grow operation, compared to all her other sources of income, had never justified the risk. The appeal of producing something with her own hands and making use of the farm's resources had overwhelmed her good sense, but now with Louis in the equation she had other priorities.

  Her cell rang. It was Louis. She smiled.

  "Hey," she said. "Should I pick up pizza -- "

  "They're here! Jesus, all over - " He gasped out the words, as if he were running. "Shit - they just shot Socrates!"

  For an instant Thalma's world went dark, as if the sun had fallen from the sky. She was steering the pickup through a murky, nightmarish landscape, her every rational thought on hold.

  Then the roar of adrenaline filled her ears, and the light switched back on, so bright it was as if a nuke had just detonated in her head.

  "Louis –" The line was dead.

  Thalma slammed on the brake and whipped the pickup around in a tire-screeching U-turn. She punched the gas pedal and hurtled down the county road.

  Socrates.

  An image of him lying in the yard, punctured with bullet holes, burned through her brain. She clenched the steering wheel so hard that the plastic crackled. She forced her fingers to loosen. No, she thought. No, no, no.

  The countryside passed with agonizing slowness while her thoughts raced. Will they find anything? She and Louis were still cleaning up. They might've missed something – or maybe there'd be enough residues to prove they'd been growing illegal substances. She wasn't sure about the legal niceties. But she couldn't imagine they'd leave empty-handed this time. One botched million dollar raid was bad enough. Two simply wouldn't be acceptable to the powers that be. They'd dig up some dirt – or plant some.