Killshot

by Elmore Leonard

  “So you don’t like the idea of a bird,” Armand said. “What do you want to be?”

  No answer.

  She was there, but she wasn’t talking.

  * * *

  Carmen had the stock of the Remington against her bare shoulder, the barrel aimed at his face, his profile, twelve to fifteen feet away, close; though she was back far enough that she could see everything at the table: the covered shape, the two guns, Richie’s bright one and Armand’s dull-metal automatic, his head turned that way, and on the other side of him, to his right, the shotgun leaning against the table. She saw the light from the window shining on the crown of his black hair, above the slug barrel’s front sight, her mind telling her, You have to kill him. But saw Richie killed as she heard that word, shot through the head, some of him coming out red to smear against the wall. And she lowered the sight to a point between Armand’s shoulder blades, a thick solid shape in the black suit. Do it . . . Or she could shoot him through the cane back of the chair framed in dark wood. She raised her face from the gunmetal smell to look at him quick and make up her mind to shoot high or low but for God’s sake shoot . . .

  Just as he said, “Where are you, Miss?” and half-turned, brought the chair sideways to the table to sit looking at her over his shoulder.

  Standing there in those nice little underpants with the shotgun. She knew it was here all the time, tricked him.

  Armand said, “You found it, ‘ey?” and squinted at that black hole pointing at him. “It looks like the same one you had that other time. Yeah, with the slug barrel.” Wanting her to understand he didn’t give a shit about it. “Let me ask you something. Is it loaded?”

  “It’s loaded.”

  Her voice sounded calm, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t scared. “You sure now. You not bullshitting me.”

  She said it again. “It’s loaded.”

  Maybe she was afraid to say anything else, give away how nervous she was inside her nice underwear. He was thinking he had never gone to bed with a woman as slim and beautifully shaped as this one. He could see the points of her breasts in the undershirt, but couldn’t see her dark place through the white panties. The ironworker’s little wife surprised him then.

  She came into the room, moving sideways to keep the 12-gauge pointed at him, and went to the end of the table to stand by the two handguns. He thought she was going to do something with them, get them out of the way. No, what she did was put the stock of the 12-gauge under her arm to hold it with one hand and with the other lifted the ironworker’s jacket, uncovering the dead punk. It amazed him. To look at Richie? No, to fold the jacket against her body one-handed and lay it on the other corner of the table. Her husband’s, taking care of it for him. This was the kind of woman to have. Live in the city and take her places, but not the Silver Dollar. He could take Donna Mulry to the Silver Dollar or Memphis, Tennessee. He felt tired and wouldn’t mind lying down a while. Then pushed that from his head thinking, Man, what are you doing? Take the fucking gun away from her and use your own, one shot, get it done.

  Armand got up from the chair. He heard wind rattle the windows, glanced over that way, picked up his glass and put it down, nothing in it, moving just a small step closer to her.

  “Look at him, Miss,” Armand said, nodding at the punk, wanting her to see the mess his bullet had made of Richie’s head, his hair matted and dyed black now, some of what little brains he had shot out of him.

  But she wouldn’t look.

  “See? You can’t do it, you’re a nice lady. You don’t shoot people, you won’t even look at dead ones. I’ll tell you something, that slug gun would make a bigger hole than the one there.” He inched one foot along the rag carpeting to take the next step, the big one.

  “Miss, you don’t want to put a hole in me.”

  Saying it to that slug barrel. She had both eyes open but they didn’t tell him anything, the gun aimed at his chest. He was sure he couldn’t talk her into putting it down. Maybe, if he hadn’t shot Richie in front of her; but knew he would do it again, so forget it. He noticed the barrel waver a little. The gun became heavy holding it like that for so long. She had to be scared. Her nerves could make her pull the trigger when she didn’t want to. Though it looked like she did.

  Armand said to her, “You’re not gonna shoot me. You know why?” He raised his left hand slowly and extended it, pointing a finger. “You see that little button? . . . You got the safety on.”

  He had her.

  Saw her eyes change. Saw her finger come out of the trigger guard to feel for the catch, that push button. Armand grabbed the barrel, no problem, got both hands on it and gave it a twist, the gun was his. He took a moment to check the safety. It was off. She got nervous, didn’t remember. Now she wouldn’t need this thing. He threw the 12-gauge across the table to skid and land on the floor, over on the other side, turned back to her and said, “Oh, shit.”

  She had his Browning.

  That fast, Christ, she had it aimed at him, holding it in both hands with her eyes wide open—not scared-to-death open, just open, staring at him.

  He raised his hands to show her, Look, I’m unarmed, and stepped back saying, “Okay, take it easy, Miss,” trying to think of a story to tell her . . . And she shot him. Fired his own gun at him and it was like the sound of it punched him in the belly, made him grunt and double over. He put his hand on the table to straighten up, said, “Wait now,” and she shot him again, socked him in the chest with it so hard he went back against the chair and sat down. She was still pointing his gun at him. He told her, “Jesus Christ, you shot me.” She didn’t say anything to him. He was holding himself and had to take one hand from his body to lay his arm on the table and lean against the edge to keep from falling. She was holding the gun in two hands, her eyes the same as before, still not telling him anything. He was thinking, Never stick them in a bathroom like that nurse and say she didn’t see you good. Never talk to them before. Never let them get hold of a gun you didn’t know was there. He couldn’t believe it, a woman in her fucking underwear had shot him and he was going to die.

  Armand told her that. “You shot me.” Like saying to her, Look what you’ve done. Wanting her to feel sorry for him. He said, “Don’t you know you’ve killed me?” and saw her lower the gun. Now she spoke. What? Said something about her house. He couldn’t hear too good and was slipping in the chair and had to hold on to the table. He said, “What?” and she spoke again, this time loud enough for him to hear.

  She said, “You walked in my house!”

  Mad. He thought, Yeah . . . ?

  She wanted to hit him because he was dead and wouldn’t listen to her. The son of a bitch. The feeling lasted a few moments. The only thing left to say to him was, “Goddamn you,” for making her do it. She phoned the detective with the Michigan State Police and went outside to wait. They had better not ask her if she had an attitude problem.

  Hours later, after they’d gone, she cleaned the kitchen, threw out all the food that was left, the candy, the gum she found in a drawer, the plastic tablecloth, and washed the wall in the dining room. She couldn’t stay in the house. She put on her navy coat, turned the porch light on and went outside to walk in the field and wait for her husband. The wind had died to a cool breeze. Carmen would raise her face to it, her eyes closed.

  “I got stopped,” Wayne said, “goddamn it. I figured the shortest way would be take Fifty-seven up to Seventy, cut across to Indianapolis, catch Sixty-nine, take it up to Ninety-four and follow Ninety-four home. Is that the way you came?”

  Carmen shook her head, standing with him in the porch light, at the foot of the steps. “I took Fifty-seven all the way to Ninety-four.”

  “How’s your mom?”

  “The same.”

  “You go see her?”

  “Not yet. I spoke to her—”

  “I should’ve done that, stayed on Fifty-seven,” Wayne said. “What happened, I missed the turn in Indianapolis, had to keep on Seventy all
the way to Ohio and get on Seventy-five north. Well, you know what happened. Shit. I’m almost to Findlay and see the gumballs closing on me fast. . . . You call that cop?”

  “I called,” Carmen said, nodding, and could keep talking now if she wanted to, but paused.

  “So the trooper comes up to the car, has the hat on. ‘Sir, you know you were going seventy-eight in a posted sixty-five zone?’ I tell him the reason I’m in a hurry there’s an emergency at home.”

  Carmen listened.

  “The guy never changes his expression. ‘Sir, would you follow me, please?’ What’re you gonna say, no? They take your goddamn registration and driver’s license. So I got to see beautiful Findlay, Ohio, and it only cost me fifty bucks.”

  Carmen watched her husband look out at the dark mass of woods, his woods, giving him time . . . maybe giving herself time. What was the hurry? They were home.

  “Less than two weeks to deer season,” Wayne said. “I can hardly wait.”

  She felt his arm come around her shoulders to hold her close, both of them looking out at the woods now as he said, “You want to try it this year?” Gave her shoulders a squeeze and said, “Hey, it’s something we could do together.”

  The Extras

  I. ALL BY ELMORE: THE CRIME NOVELS; THE WESTERNS

  II. SELECTED FILMOGRAPHY

  III. IF IT SOUNDS LIKE WRITING, REWRITE IT

  V. MARTIN AMIS INTERVIEWS “THE DICKENS OF DETROIT”

  This section was prepared by the editorial staff of HarperCollins e-books, who thank Mr. Gregg Sutter, Elmore Leonard’s longtime researcher and aide-de-camp, for his unstinting support and help in the assembling of this material.

  Further riches await the reader at the website that Mr. Sutter maintains, www.elmoreleonard.com, and in “The Extras” sections of other HarperCollins editions of Elmore Leonard’s novels (“All by Elmore” and “Selected Filmography” come standard in each e-book).

  All by Elmore

  The Crime Novels

  The Big Bounce (1969); Mr. Majestyk (1974); 52 Pickup (1974); Swag* (1976); Unknown Man #89 (1977); The Hunted (1977); The Switch (1978); City Primeval: High Noon in Detroit (1980); Gold Coast (1980); Split Images (1981); Cat Chaser (1982); Stick (1983); LaBrava (1983); Glitz (1985); Bandits (1987); Touch (1987); Freaky Deaky (1988); Killshot(1989); Get Shorty (1990); Maximum Bob (1991); Rum Punch (1992); Pronto (1993); Riding the Rap(1995); Out of Sight (1996); Be Cool (1999); Pagan Babies (2000); “Fire in the Hole”* (e-book original story, 2001); Tishomingo Blues (2002); When the Women Come Out to Dance: Stories (2002).

  The Westerns

  The Bounty Hunters* (1953); The Law at Randado* (1954); Escape from Five Shadows* (1956); Last Stand at Saber River* (1959); Hombre* (1961); The Moonshine War* (1969); Valdez Is Coming* (1970); Forty Lashes Less One* (1972); Gunsights* (1979) Cuba Libre (1998); The Tonto Woman and Other Western Stories* (1998).

  As of November 2002: Unless otherwise indicated (*), all titles are available from HarperCollins e-books. All titles are available in print form in dazzling new editions by HarperTorch paperbacks, with the exception of: The Moonshine War (1969); Swag (1976); “Fire in the Hole” (2001). “Fire in the Hole” is available within HarperCollins e-book and William Morrow hardcover editions of When the Women Come Out to Dance (2002).

  The Crime Novels

  The Big Bounce(1969)

  Jack Ryan always wanted to play pro ball. But he couldn’t hit a curveball, so he turned his attention to less legal pursuits. A tough guy who likes walking the razor’s edge, he’s just met his match — and more — in Nancy. She’s a rich man’s plaything, seriously into thrills and risk, and together she and Jack are pure heat ready to explode. But when simple housebreaking and burglary give way to the deadly pursuit of a really big score, the stakes suddenly skyrocket. Because violence and double-cross are the name of this game — and it’s going to take every ounce of cunning Jack and Nancy possess to survive . . . each other.

  Houston Chronicle: “[Leonard is] a sage poet of crime.”

  From the novel:

  She was facing him now, her cold look gone and smiling a little. Of course it’s loaded.

  “You going to shoot something?”

  “We could. Windows are good.”

  “So you brought a gun to shoot at windows.”

  “And boats. Boats are fun.”

  “I imagine they would be. How about cars?”

  “I didn’t think about cars.” She seemed pleasantly surprised. “Isn’t that funny?

  “Yeah that is funny.”

  “There’s a difference,” Ryan said, “between breaking and entering and armed robbery.”

  “And there’s a difference between seventy-eight dollars and fifty thousand dollars.”

  Nancy said, “How badly do you want it?”

  Mr. Majestyk(1974)

  Vincent Majestyk saw too much death in the jungles of Southeast Asia. All he wants to do now is farm his melons and forget. But peace can be an elusive commodity, even in the Arizona hinterlands — and especially when the local mob is calling all the shots. And one quiet, proud man’s refusal to be strong-armed by a powerful hood is about to start a violent chain reaction that will leave Mr. Majestyk ruined, in shackles, and without a friend in the world — except for one tough and beautiful woman. But his tormentors never realized something about their mark: This is not his first war. Vince Majestyk knows more than they’ll ever know about survival . . . and everything about revenge.

  Bergen Record: “First rate . . . an excellent thriller . . . well-plotted and smoothly written and crackles with suspense.”

  From the novel:

  Majestyk was running across the open scrub, weaving through the dusty brush clumps, by the time Renda got out of the car and began firing at him with the automatic, both hands extended in the handcuffs. Majestyk kept running. Renda jumped across the ditch, got to the fence, and laid the .45 on the top of a post, aimed, and squeezed the trigger three times, but the figure out in the scrub was too small now and it would have to be a lucky shot to bring him down. He fired once more and the automatic clicked empty.

  Seventy, eighty yards away, Majestyk finally came to a stop, worn out, getting his breath. He turned to look at the man standing by the fence post and, for a while, they stared at one another, each knowing who the other man was and what he felt and not having to say anything. Renda crossed the ditch to the Jag and Majestyk watched it drive away.

  52 Pickup (1974)

  Detroit businessman Harry Mitchell had had only one affair in his twenty-two years of happy matrimony. Unfortunately someone caught his indiscretion on film and now wants Harry to fork over one hundred grand to keep his infidelity a secret. And if Harry doesn’t pay up, the blackmailer and his associates plan to press a lot harder — up to and including homicide, if necessary. But the psychos picked the wrong pigeon for their murderous scam. Because Harry Mitchell doesn’t get mad . . . he gets even.

  Chicago Tribune: “A splendid thriller.”

  From the novel:

  The Gray Line sightseeing bus was approaching the foot of Woodward Avenue when Bobby Shy started up the aisle in his light-gray business suit and sun-glasses, past the thirty-six heads he had counted from his seat in the rear. They were mostly couples, out-of-town conventioneers and their wives, middle-aged or older, almost all of them wearing glasses and name tags.

  “That beautiful structure on the left is the City-Country Building,” the driver was saying into the mike clipped to his lapel. “And the statue in front is the world-famous ‘Spirit of Detroit.’ Sitting there, that man is sixteen feet high and weighs over sixteen thousand pounds. Ahead of us now you see the Detroit River.”

  As the bus turned left onto Jefferson, heads raised and gazes shifted to look at the river and dismal gray skyline beyond.

  “Across the way, beautiful downtown Windsor, Ontario,” the drive said. “You can get over to Canada by tunnel or bridge. There used to be a ferry, but I believe he was arre
sted some time back. The amazing thing is that, at this particular point, Canada is south of the United States.”

  At the front of the bus now Bobby Shy ducked his head to look out. Straightening again he reached inside the jacket of his light-gray business suit, came out with a .38 Colt Special and placed the barrel gently against the driver’s ear.

  “Give me the mike, man,” Bobby Shy said.

  Swag (1976)

  Three guys with illegal expertise, a plan to snag a tax-free hundred grand, and a taste of summertime Detroit’s sweet life. But it means committing armed robbery. And being smart enough to get away with it.

  Publishers Weekly: “An electrifying novel . . . with a murderous, well-timed suspenseful finale.”

  The New York Times: “Leonard is nobody’s follower, and he has a style of his own. “Swag” is one of the best of the year.”

  From the novel:

  There was a photograph of Frank in an ad that ran in the Detroit Free Press and showed all the friendly salesmen at Red Bowers Chevrolet. Under his photo it said Frank J. Ryan. He had on a nice smile, a styled moustache, and a summer-weight suit made out of that material that’s shiny and looks like it has snags in it.

  There was a photograph of Stick on file at 1300 Beaubein, Detroit Police Headquarters. Under the photo it said Ernest Stickley, Jr. 89037. He had on a sport shirt that had sailboats and palm trees on it. He’d bought it in Pompano Beach, Florida.

  The first time they ever saw each other was the night at Red Bowers Chevrolet Telegraph when Stick was pulling out of the used car lot in the maroon ’73 Camaro. Frank walked up to the side window as the car stopped before turning out on the street. He said, “You mind if I ask where you are going?”

  Unknown Man #89(1977)

  Detroit process server Jack Ryan has a reputation for being the best in the business at finding people who don’t want to be found. Now he’s looking for a missing stockholder known only as “Unknown Man #89.” But his missing man isn’t “unknown” to everyone: a pretty blonde hates his guts and a very nasty dude named Royal wants him dead in the worst way. Which is very unfortunate for Jack Ryan, who is suddenly caught in the crossfire of a lethal triple-cross and as much a target as his nameless prey.