Memphis Legend

by Brian Crawford

  My right hand smashed into his face. I both felt and heard the crunch of cartilage as his nose broke. He did not go down, though; instead, he managed to pull off another shot with his revolver. Although the bullet was nowhere near me, I felt the heat from the blast on my hand. Instinct told me to let go, but I ignored my instinct. Training told me to hold on tight to the gun to prevent the cylinder from turning so that he could fire another shot. My right arm cocked back to prepare for another blow; however, in what must have been a delayed reaction, Chief Parker let go of his revolver and his eyes rolled up into the back of his head before falling to the ground. I easily had 80 pounds on the Chief, and I had let him have every ounce of my weight. His adrenaline must have kept him standing a few seconds longer after his brain function got interrupted, because, ultimately, a concussion is a concussion, and Chief Parker’s brain could not do anything to help fight off the disabling effects of being knocked unconscious.

  CHAPTER 39

  Chief Parker regained consciousness approximately 20 seconds after hitting the floor. More than enough time for me to pat him down for any other hidden weapons. The Smith & Wesson was his only gun. Chief Parker lifted his head and then dropped it back down onto the floor in despair. He had played his cards. He had come up short. The only thing left was to wait and see what I had in store for him.

  “I’m sorry,” he said, “I had to try.”

  I waved off his apology. I was not in the mood. “Well, you failed. You know why?” He shook his head no. “Just like your son, you lacked commitment and conviction. You were wrong, and you knew it.” The realization was all over his face. “So, what’s the contingency plan? Smart guy like Jackson would have a contingency plan?”

  “Why would I tell you?”

  “Because you are sorry. Truly sorry. However, you still hope to come out of this with your son not going to jail, and you’ve suddenly realized I am your best hope.”

  “I have, have I?”

  “Yes, you have.”

  He sat up and leaned against a table leg of the large kitchen table. His wheels were spinning as he weighed and reweighed his options and counter-options. It looked like he was having one hell of an internal struggle.

  “Funny thing about truth, Chief. It always wins in the end. Be on the side of truth. You can still wear the white hat in this story. You know, be a good guy. Help me he—.”

  My sentence was cut short by the sight and sound of breaking glass slightly to my right, followed by the report of a high-powered rifle. Chief Parker didn’t need to speak; I had just discovered the contingency plan. Instinctively, I flattened myself against the floor and crawled over to the window. Tried to spy around and see where the shot came from without getting my head blown off. Another shot hit the wood just below the window frame. In a regular frame house, I probably would have been shot as the bullet traveled through the exterior siding, insulation, and interior drywall. I smiled as I realized that bullets would have very little chance of penetrating the thick exterior logs.

  Once the men outside realized their bullets were not penetrating, the next logical step would be to breach the house. Entrances needed to be secured. The deadbolt on the back kitchen door was still in place. Regardless, I shoved the heavy kitchen table against the door. It would not prevent them from entering, but it would slow them down enough that I should be able to pick off anyone that tried.

  “Chief! You on my side or not? Help me with the front door. Let’s get that sofa over there.”

  Chief Parker stood up, yet hesitated, still unsure if he should help the man he tried to shoot a few minutes ago. Screw it; I’ll get the couch over there myself. I bolted for the front door. Too late. The front door flew open. A man holding a pistol was standing just outside the doorway. He was prepared to shoot. I dropped onto my belly to get out of the line of fire. At the same time, a grimace appeared on the man’s face as he jerked his right foot. Instead of shooting, he howled in pain. For some reason, it looked as if the man’s right foot had partially exploded.

  Contemplating his foot for more than a split second would have been a waste of time. The man was still standing. He was still holding the gun. Still on my belly, I pulled my Glock from my holster, aimed, and squeezed off four quick successive shots. Each shot landed center mass. Momentum equals mass times velocity, and what the .45 ACP lacks in velocity, it more than makes up for in bullet mass. A fact impressively displayed as the man was knocked off the front porch into the yard.

  Panic started to creep in as I realized the man I just shot was one of Strasser’s men from the bar. Chief Parker had said that Jackson and Strasser had reached an agreement; however, I expected the Estes boys to be the ones attacking me, not Strasser. Maybe Jackson and his crew were out there as well. Either way, I was not sure how many men were outside waiting for me. I showed up seven hours early, and I still got played. Damn it.

  I rushed to the front door and locked it, then pushed the couch in front of the door. The open layout of the house allowed me to see both the front door and rear door simultaneously, as well as all windows in that half of the house. However, I was going to be vulnerable to anyone that climbed through a bedroom window. Once again, I created a barricade, this time between the hallway to the bedrooms and myself. I threw the Chief’s recliners on top of each other as well as using his kitchen chairs and a coffee table. To my surprise, nobody fired any shots through the window during that time.

  “Chief, if you’re not going to help, at least throw me those Speedloaders.” He just stared ahead. “Chief, the damn Speedloaders. Now!”

  Without a word, he handed over three Speedloaders. Eighteen rounds, plus the four remaining in his revolver. Nine left in the Glock, along with 13 rounds in an extra magazine, 44 rounds total. Half in a gun that I had never fired before. Great. Unfortunately, the other two magazines for my .45 were in the Jeep, along with my 9mm and its two extra magazines.

  It was quiet. Too quiet. They were planning something out there. I just knew it. Unlike in the stupid movies where the bad guys simply shoot into the house from every direction with automatic weapons, it never happens like that. They would try to breach the perimeter somewhere.

  ***

  For the first time in his life, Boyd shot someone.

  Before getting set up in the woods above Chief Parker’s cabin, Boyd sped back to Emmettsville in time to witness Strasser and his men getting a room at the hotel across from Falco’s. Strasser checked into Room 119. The rest of his seven men filled various other rooms. He had no idea what they were doing in Emmettsville. It didn’t matter. They needed to be watched. So he watched them. Around six, all the men except Strasser loaded up into two of the three cars and headed out. Within minutes, it became obvious that the men were heading to Chief Parker’s cabin. He wished he could say he had been surprised.

  When they stopped at the entrance to Parker’s driveway, Boyd drove on past. At the first available turnout, he parked the car and unloaded his .300 Win Mag and H&K. He loaded ammunition into a backpack and ran off into the woods. The house was to his east. Exact distance was unknown. Running on the leaf-covered, uneven ground reminded him why no police force would ever hire him. His fused ankle made it difficult to compensate for the tiny surface variations. It did not hurt; it simply made running difficult and slow. His doctor said the fusion would always affect his proprioception. Boyd had to look that term up to fully understand it. It simply meant the fusion made it difficult for his brain to interpret where his foot was in space. He never really noticed when walking on even ground, but after his first trip to the white sandy beaches of Gulf Shores, he understood what the doctor meant.

  It wasn’t pretty, and he nearly fell twice, but Boyd managed to find the cabin. From the top of the long hill to the west of the cabin, he had a great view of the front side of the cabin and a portion of the back yard. L.T.’s Jeep was parked near the front, but no sign of L.T. Boyd noticed a small flicker of movement on the front porch. A small animal maybe. The movemen
t disappeared and reappeared a second later. He set the binoculars to the maximum magnification. Something small disappeared and reappeared again. Boyd laughed when he realized what he was seeing. L.T. was swinging on a porch swing, seemingly without a care in the world. The overhang of the porch had blocked Boyd’s view. What he was seeing was L.T.’s foot disappear and reappear as he swung.

  Boyd guessed he was about 250 yards from the house. Getter closer had not crossed his mind until he realized his view of the front door was blocked. It only took a few minutes to reposition himself a little further down the hill with a slightly better view of the front door.

  The sound of tires crunching on gravel reached Boyd while he was scanning the woods around the cabin for other signs of human life. It was a police cruiser. Boyd watched it travel along the winding driveway and stop near L.T.’s Jeep. A small, wiry man exited the car alone. Chief Parker. In full-service uniform. Wearing a duty belt. Interesting.

  And odd. Boyd had secretly observed Chief Parker before and noticed he never wore a gun. Boyd could not help but wonder if the Chief was expecting trouble of some sort. Which made sense. What didn’t make sense was how the Chief drove directly past Strasser’s men without any apparent problems. Something fishy was going on.

  The Chief walked up to L.T., who stopped swinging but did not stand up. There was a minute or two of conversation before Boyd observed both men enter the front door of the beautiful log cabin.

  Boyd set up his observation area as a potential sniper position. He extended the bipod on the Win Mag and inserted a magazine while placing two extra, fully loaded magazines on the ground to the right of the rifle. His laser range finder verified he was 227 yards from the front door. He put on his tactical belt and loaded two thirty round magazines for the H&K and four magazines for his SIG.

  He didn’t have a ghillie suit, but he did have a camouflage blanket in his backpack, which he extracted and placed over his back before assuming a prone firing position. All in all, Boyd realized he had a pretty good shooting position. Plenty of trees for cover, yet the woods were thin enough to allow him multiple shooting lanes through the trees. Elevated position with a good view of the front of the building. No brush that needed to be cut back in front of him. Sun was behind him. The wind was coming from behind him as well. And 227 yards was an easy shot, even with the changing elevation from position to target.

  He was ready. Hopefully, all his firepower would not be needed, but he wasn’t getting a warm fuzzy about those chances. All that was left to do was wait. Something he was damn good at.

  Movement in the timber on the back side of the house caught Boyd’s eye. He panned his scope in that direction. Two men were standing just outside of the perimeter of the yard. They were not standing together. Shit, it’s Tyler and Junior. Both had rifles slung over the shoulders. Junior was smoking a cigarette. Tyler was resting against a tree. The civilian method of waiting, but what were they waiting for?

  Things just kept getting more interesting. Chief Parker and L.T. were inside the cabin. Junior and Tyler were in the timber behind the cabin. Jackson was nowhere to be found. And Strasser’s men had parked at the entrance to the driveway, although Boyd highly doubted they were still sitting there.

  Boyd started panning his rifle on the woods in front of the house. His suspicions were correct; he spotted five different men fanned out in front of the house a few yards inside the line of trees. They were also waiting. Two men were unaccounted for.

  Boyd mentally tagged the location of the men he spotted, including Junior and Tyler. He frequently shifted his attention looking for any sign of a change in the status quo. Any sign of aggression. Strasser and the Estes brothers had probably declared war on each other, and Boyd’s friend was in the middle. When the Hatfields and McCoys started shooting at each other, hopefully L.T. would remember to duck and let them take themselves out.

  More movement at the back of the house. Through the Leupold scope, Boyd observed Junior finishing his cigarette and readying his rifle. Tyler pushed himself away from the tree and unslung his rifle. They glanced at each other. As if on cue, both men raised their rifles and aimed them at the cabin, or so it seemed from his angle. A couple of seconds later, Junior fired. A 30-06, no doubt about it. A popular hunting round among whitetail deer hunters. A second shot rang out.

  Boyd was preparing to fire at Junior when a man holding a handgun bolted from the woods and ran to the front door of the cabin. The man reached out and opened the front door, then raised his pistol. The son of a bitch was getting ready to shoot inside the cabin. Maybe he was aiming at L.T. The man took one step forward, which due to the angle of the roof overhanging the porch meant the only thing Boyd could see was the man’s feet. He did the only thing he could think of. He shot the man in the right foot.

  For the first time in his life, Boyd shot someone.

  The man jerked his right foot in an obvious reaction to the pain he must have felt as the large 180-grain bullet tore through the tiny, fragile bones in his foot. Boyd had no time to contemplate the pain the man must have been feeling because less than a second later the man was thrown backward off the porch into the front yard. A split second after that, Boyd heard the sound of four quick bursts of gunfire.

  Oh shit, this is getting real. Boyd realized L.T. must have shot the man. The ten times magnification on his scope enabled him to see blood oozing from the man’s chest from four different holes. Relief washed over Boyd as he realized that meant all four shots he heard came from inside the cabin.

  The man on the ground was as good as dead. His limbs were moving, which meant his brain was still functioning, but he would bleed out and die of exsanguination. Focusing on the dead or dying was a waste of time, so Boyd started scanning the front of the house for other immediate threats.

  He spotted five of Strasser’s men, six if he included the one dying, which meant one was still unaccounted for. The five men were all hiding behind trees. None were looking in his direction. They were whipping their heads around trying to find where Boyd’s shot came from, but none were focusing their attention in his direction. Contrary to popular belief, suppressors do not completely silence a gun, especially when the gun is a high-powered rifle. It’s basically impossible to do that, especially considering because a supersonic bullet still causes a crack as it breaks the sound barrier. The “whoosh” sound a person hears in the movies is bullshit. But it still masks the location of the shot, which was good enough for Boyd. He really, really loved his suppressor.

  Boyd directed his attention to the back of the cabin again. Junior was no longer visible. Tyler was standing up against a tree with his rifle aimed at the house, probably covering the windows as Junior or Jackson advanced. It was time to provide L.T. some more help. The tree prevented a kill shot into the body, but Tyler had one knee jutting out from behind the tree. 270 plus yards and his target was a knee. Well, he hit a foot earlier with no time to line up the shot like he wanted, so the knee seemed like a piece of cake.

  Aim. Relax. Breathe. Squeeze. Fire. An 180-grain bullet hitting a human knee at over 3000 feet per second is truly disastrous. With over five times the energy of a bullet fired from a pistol, even an extremity wound caused by a rifle can be deadly. Bone can turn to dust. Arteries completely severed. Luckily for Tyler, the bullet ripped through the tissue a couple of inches above the knee. Any lower and he might have lost his right leg. Either way, he ran the risk of dying due to rapid blood loss; Boyd got the impression his shot hit Tyler’s femoral artery.

  Tyler seemed to no longer be a threat, so Boyd panned his rifle to the front of the cabin again. The suppressor was still doing its job. Strasser’s men were looking around for the source of the crack. He could hear them yelling, asking each other where the shots were coming from. None of them were moving from their perceived safe spots.

  He panned the rifle to the right once more trying to find Junior. He was still not visible, although Boyd noticed Tyler was on the ground holding his leg trying to
stop the rapid flow of blood from his leg. An arterial wound, and a bad one at that. If he did not get medical care soon, he was probably as good as dead within a couple of minutes.

  For the moment, all was quiet. Boyd was unsure how to proceed. Should he shoot some of Strasser’s men and force them to leave the current battle zone? Or should he wait until one of them became aggressive again, which would force him to shoot? He was pretty sure he was going to be responsible for Tyler’s death soon. The idea of more bloodshed was not appealing. Waiting seemed like the best option, except he realized that three men, Junior, Jackson, and one of Strasser’s men were still unaccounted for. That realization was unsettling.

  ***

  Something strange was going on. I knew it. I saw that man’s foot explode before I shot him. It made no sense. It also made no sense that no one was trying to get inside. I crawled to the front window and peeked around one of the edges fully expecting to have shots fired at me. However, that was not what happened, so I grew a little bolder and took a longer look. The man I shot was twitching. Not dead. Yet.

  I stared a little longer, just long enough to see two more men standing about 50 yards away whipping their heads around looking for something. Or someone.

  “I just killed one of Strasser’s men, Chief. How many more are there, do you know?”

  Numbly, flatly, he responded, “All of them.”

  “What the hell does that mean? A number. I need a number. Five! Six! Seven?”

  He lit up a little at the mention of number seven. “Seven. Plus, three more.”

  “Let me guess: Junior, Jackson, and Tyler.”

  The Chief simply nodded. Great, nine more guys. I probably would not have to kill them all; I figured the fight should drain out of them pretty quickly if I managed to get three or four more. Still, that meant there were still a lot of people who could throw hot lead my direction.