Clete brought the little Steyr AUG A3 to his shoulder and turned on the main optic. “You ranged out yet?” he asked, trembling a little with the cold.
“A little. I got four sixty-three to the front of the porch.”
“I show four sixty-six,” Clete said, peering through the scope “Close enough at this range. Wait a minute. We got activity.”
Crockett was back on the M107 in an instant. Two blond women, one clutching her side, wobbled out the door and stood, peering rather numbly into the valley. The one holding her side staggered and fell to the floor. Her companion helped her to her feet. She leaned heavily on the rail for a moment, then vomited over the edge of the porch. Shortly, they were joined by four other young women. They huddled together like quail, three of them smoking, looking disheveled and tired, definitely not dressed for morning in the wilderness. Puma was easy to spot. She was the only non-blond in the group.
After just a couple of minutes yet another blond arrived, this one tall, thin, and male. His hair was boot camp high and tight, his attitude abrupt, and he began to herd the women off the porch and onto a gravel path that led around the right end of the building to the parking area. The young women, all in short skirts and towering heels, struggled with the hike, but managed to reach the black Lincoln and clamber awkwardly inside. The one who had been ill was assisted rather roughly by their male escort. He pushed her through the door, causing the woman to fall to the vehicle’s floor. It was obvious by his demeanor that, while he may have found some value in the ladies the night before, they were little more than an inconvenience now.
“Boy’s a asshole,” Clete said, hugging himself to manage body heat. “Wasn’t no reason for him to push that girl around like that. Lord, I despise men that mistreat women. Don’t make no difference if they’re slappin’ ‘em around, or just bein’ a shithead like that dumbass. It’s still fuckin’ abuse an’ it pisses me off.”
Crockett grinned. “How do you really feel?”
“Well, it’s like this whole bunch out here. Rent a mess a women so everbody can git their jollies, treat ‘em like shit, push ‘em around, sexually abuse ‘em, and then, when it’s all over, just get rid of ‘em as fast as you can. Like they’re disposable, ya know.”
“These girls know they’re not going to the prom,” Crockett said.
“Huh?”
“They get paid,” Crockett went on, his voice turning a little nasty.
“What?”
“They’re not passing out blow jobs for free, Texican. Nobody’s got a gun to their head. It’s a service for payment. Just like a fucking plumber or anybody else.”
Clete’s eyebrows shot up. “What!”
“They don’t have to hook, Texican. Hell, most of ‘em are control freaks anyway, or got father issues, or are so fucking needy they sell it just to get it. You bleeding heart idiots need to wake up. Christ, Marshal, they’re only whores.”
Clete exploded. “Jesus Christ. What the hell is the matter with you? Goddammit, Crockett, I ain’t never heard you talk like this before. These are people! These women are just as…” Clete’s tirade faded away as he noticed Crockett’s grin.
“Still cold, honey?” Crockett asked.
Clete paused for a moment, then shook his head. “You asshole.”
“That’s mister Asshole to you,” Crockett said. “Watch the place. Wake me up if things start to happen.”
With that, he rolled to his side and turned his back to Cletus.
Clete grinned and began to pat his pockets in search of the second Snickers.
Crockett’s ringing satellite phone woke him up. He fumbled in the fanny pack that lay beside him for a moment, then answered.
“Hi. It’s Puma. I mean, Terri.”
“Hello, Terri,” Crockett said. “Cute red skirt. Looks good on ya.”
“Thanks. I got it at…what?”
“I’m psychic. You have a number for me?”
“Sure,” she said, and read off a phone number that Crockett wrote on the notepad strapped to his left arm.
“Got it, kid. What else?”
“What else you want, baby?” Terri said. Crockett could hear the grin in her voice.
“A pacemaker if I ever tangled with you.”
Her soft chuckled sounded warm. “Everybody’s there. The usual guys, plus Cooper, Hammer, and Slick. Full house. Ice got serious with Cherry. Punched her when she wouldn’t lick his…’cause she wouldn’t do everything he wanted her to. I don’t blame her. Hell, he hadn’t even taken a shower. Kicked her ass big time. She got some chipped teeth and maybe a broken rib. Motherfucker.”
“He’ll be dealt with,” Crockett said.
There was a pause before Terri spoke again. “Sometimes you sound kinda scary,” she said. “I bet you could get real scary, too.”
“Only to assholes. This Ice, is he the blond one that drove you girls back to town?”
“No. That was Shaz. He’s blond, too. He’s kinda in to strangling and shit like that but, as far as I know, he’s never really hurt anybody. Just likes to play games. How’d you know Ice is a blond?”
“Magic. I do it all with mirrors.”
“Now you’re spreadin’ bullshit. You do that a lot, huh?”
Crockett laughed. “Occasionally. Thanks for all the help, champ. You’ve got my number if you need anything. You getting out of Dodge?”
“I’m at my friend Carly’s apartment. She’s changing clothes and is gonna drive me to the airport. Then it’s off to Tahoe.”
“Wonderful. Have a nice vacation. It’s been good getting to know you a little bit, Terri.”
“You’re gonna do something aren’t ya?”
“Who me?”
“Yeah, you. You’re getting ready to do something serious. I know you are.”
“Have fun in Tahoe,” Crockett said.
“You’re a good person, Dan. You’ve been nice to me. Be careful.”
“You, too, sweetheart,” Crockett said, and disconnected.
Clete peered at him. “Sweetheart?”
“She called me Dan,” Crockett said. “I think maybe she likes me. Must be my winning personality and good looks.”
“Or the six grand,” Clete said.
“That doesn’t mean I can’t send her a note in study hall.”
“Nobody sends notes anymore, ya old fart,” Clete said. “You don’t write, you text.”
“Terri and I have a traditional relationship. Kinda like Andy and Thelma Lou.”
Clete grinned. “If they were in a Turkish prison,” he said.
The black Lincoln Navigator arrived back at the lodge midafternoon, loaded with groceries and supplies that a couple of other inhabitants helped offload and carry inside. There was no sign of Metzger, Boster, or the two worthies that accosted Crockett while he was in the hot tub. Clete and Crockett spent some of the time swapping stories, got various points of interest ranged and sighted, munched survival rations, and watched an elk or two go about their business on the surrounding slopes.
By evening they were uncomfortable, tired, and bored. After working out shifts to make sure somebody watched the place all night, they kicked back under the stars, rolled in the space blankets, and gave it up for the day.
“I’m gonna sack out,” Clete said.
“Okay,” Crockett said. I’ll give ya three hours, then wake you up. I want us ready to rock and roll by first light.”
“Then what?”
Crockett’s voice was cold. “Then we take care of business.”
The Texican’s accent vanished. “For those who have to ask,” he said, “no further answer could suffice.”
When time finally came to wake Cletus up, the need to sleep was clawing so heavily at Crockett that he was dizzy with the effort of resisting it. Nearly sick at his stomach, he shook Clete awake.
“Already?”
Crockett was almost panting with exertion. “Gimme three hours,” he said, “then wake me up. That way you can get a short nap in
before daybreak. Right now, I gotta sleep.”
“You okay, son?”
“I don’t know,” Crockett said, flopping down in his spider hole. “Gotta sleep.”
“Get some rest. Anything goin’ on over at the place?”
The answer to Clete’s question came as a quiet snore.
“Jesus,” he muttered. “I ain’t never seen nobody fall out that fast.”
Crockett did not hear the comment. He was asleep, and more than just asleep. That quickly, that needfully, he had fallen into the darkness where sleep can be more than rest.
Crockett dived deeply into the realm of Morpheus, that nearly liquid world of boundless possibility and endless malleability that shows us brief snatches of its surface in the melodramas we call dreams. It was there, in those somnambulistic depths where time means nothing and physics less; where reality is fantasy and fantasy is fact; where our hearts and spirits sometimes go to heal, that Ruby found him.
She found him soaking in the tub and sat on the edge, her feet in the water below his knee. She found him on the couch and fed him chocolate chip cookies and hot chocolate sweetened with Bailey’s. She found him alone and frightened and soothed his fear. She found him fixing pancakes, and kissed the back of his neck as he bitched about needing a new griddle. She found him on her terrace and brought him single malt and a cigar. She found him as she had so many times and, perhaps more importantly, Crockett found her, and their time together scrolled across whatever he had become.
Her wise mouth and brilliant mind, her wonderful face and marvelous body, her humor, her warmth, her caring, her amazing strength and surprising vulnerability, her dynamic energy and her gentle synergy were all there with him. Crockett became immersed in her, engulfed in her. Ruby swirled around and through him and he knew her as he had never known anyone, least of all himself. In his sleep, he cried with sadness at what had been lost and with joy at what had been found. And when he opened his eyes he felt better than he had in a long time.
Crockett sat up and turned to Cletus. “Everything okay?” he asked.
“Yeah. Thought you were gonna sleep.”
“I did.”
“Yer ass is itchy, Pard. You flopped over like you’d been shot, snored for about ten minutes, an’ now yer settin’ up an’ lookin’ around like a pond pig.”
“A what?”
“A pond pig, gawddammit. A groundhog. Lay back down an’ git some rest.”
“I’m fine,” Crockett said. “Go ahead. Sack out. I got it.”
Clete’s whisper elevated an octave. “Sack out? I just fuckin’ woke up!”
“Me, too,” Crockett said.
“Yeah, after ten minutes.”
“Honest, Clete, I’m good. I couldn’t sleep right now if I wanted to.”
“What the hell is goin’ on?”
“Cletus,” Crockett said, “since you asked, I just spent twenty years or so with Ruby, and I understand a lot more than I did about her, and she and I, and myself.”
“There ya go!” Clete said. It ain’t a gawddammed ‘nuff that Ruby came to the fuckin’ house to tell Carson where that ring was, oh no! Now she’s out here runnin’ around in the wilds a fuckin’ South Dakota. That’s all I need, a Italian haint flappin’ through the Black Hills. Ruby the friendly ghost, for chrissakes.”
Crockett fell back and muffled his laughter.
Clete was all eyes, peering into the darkness. “I’m damn glad I can bring a little humor into your pathetic life, ya old bastard.”
“Take it easy, Texican. No ghosts or spirits hidin’ in the weeds. It was just a dream. Only a dream.”
Clete was skeptical. “Only a dream, huh?”
“That’s all. I’m awake, I’m gonna stay awake. Turn in.”
“You sure?”
“Yeah.”
In five minutes Clete was displaying sinus problems, and Crockett was arranging clips of ammunition beside the M107, preparing for the morning ahead. In the face of what was to come, he found himself smiling. He resisted thinking about what had occurred while he briefly slept. No point in over analyzing.
It was, after all, only a dream.
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
Ba-Da-Bing
“Yum,” Clete said, munching the last bite of his nutritionally balanced, high protein-low fat breakfast bar. “Just like my dear ol’ mamma used to make. Breakfast is the most important meal of the day, ya know.”
“Nothing like a hearty meal of sticks and twigs to get the morning off to a great start,” Crockett said.
It was less than an hour before daybreak, a three-quarter moon providing glowing illumination that was just starting to fade. Crockett dragged some dead foliage from under a Blackjack Pine a few yards to his left, and arranged a low breastwork of cover in front of their position, making sure they would be impossible to locate from the lodge.
“Guess ol’ Stitch’ll be taking off in a little bit,” Clete went on, removing his ranging binoculars from a leg pack lying on the ground beside him.
“Yeah. With three hours loiter time, he’ll be orbiting south of here when we need him.”
Clete peered through the binoculars. “Not enough light yet. You figure on flushing them boys out of the lodge?”
“Yeah. If we can get ‘em panicked enough, they’ll come outside to try to get away. The way they graded the slope behind the place and around the buildings, there’s not a lot of cover.”
“Return fire shouldn’t be much of a problem. If all them fellers got are assault weapons an’ stuff, we’re out of effective range.”
“But not ineffective range,” Crockett said. “They can still reach us if they get lucky.”
“They come outa the place, the last hit is the center of the clock.”
“What?”
“Okay,” Clete said. “Suppose two a them boys run out the back a the place and head up the hill toward the crest, an’ you dust one of ‘em. I got a much better field of view than you do with the ‘nocs. You hear me say something like ‘twenty yards at three o’clock,’ that is your next target’s position relative to the last shot you made. See?”
“Gotcha.”
The two of them became silent then, each absorbed in his thoughts.
Crockett extracted the big 107 out of the drag bag and set it up, the muzzle reaching through a Black Jack bough for cover. He deployed the bipod, checked the angle of sight, and extracted the monopod at the rear of the stock to seat the rifle so that, when the weapon was totally at rest, the line of fire would be directed at the top of the slope behind the lodge. By simply raising the rear of the rifle an inch, he had vertical range over the entire target area. He readjusted the positioning of the magazines for best convenience, slapped a load of eight rounds of the standard fifty caliber ammunition into the receiver, slid a round into the chamber, snicked on the safety, and backed away from the weapon. The sky was just beginning to lighten in the east.
Next, he scrounged through the ground litter for twigs and weeds, and began to dress his Ghillie cape with the appropriate foliage to make himself blend with the terrain. Clete followed suit, and soon they were just two more small piles of brush on the littered slope. Crockett spit in his makeup case to soften the paints, and spread various shades of brown and green over his face and hands. Clete grinned at him.
“You’ve never been lovelier.”
“Don’t get any ideas, Texican. This is a business trip, not a pleasure cruise.”
Chuckling, Clete took his turn with the makeup, then unlimbered the little AUG A3 and scanned the target area. The building was closed up, drapes drawn tight.
“I got movement in the lodge,” he said.
“So soon?” Crockett said.
“Yeah. One guy. I get his heat signature on infrared as he moves past the drapes.”
“Probably our early bird from yesterday morning,” Crockett said, folding his space blanket. “Making coffee or something.”
“Now that sounds good. I’m sick a this plastic flav
ored water. Son, why don’t you run over there an’ see if you can git me a cup. Make my mornin’ a lot nicer.”
“Cream and sugar with that?”
“Black’ll be fine. Don’t wanna push our luck. He’s in the area near the left corner behind where that little window is. Must be the kitchen. First up makes the mud.”
Crockett’s satellite phone rang. “That’ll be Stitch,” he said, retrieving the instrument from under his cape.
“Ah, like, you dudes awake and shit, man?”
“Hey, Stitch. You sound chipper this morning.”
“Yeah. I just had two over easy, hash browns with gravy, a side of bacon, a short stack, three cups of coffee and a glass of orange juice. Am I a asshole or what?”
Crockett grinned. “There’s never been any doubt about that.”
“Just wanted to make sure you dudes didn’t forget. I’ll be airborne in about ten minutes. In position in about a half hour. Air-Cav, Motherfucker.”
“Great. Next communication will be via the radios that Goody gave us. Keep your headset on when you’re in range.”
“Roger. Dust off in ten, orbit in thirty. God, I love the smell of Willie Pete in the mornin’. Them zipperheads’ll be fixin’ breakfast in a minute. Have some kimche on me, motherfucker. Blackbird out.”
“How’s Stitch?” Clete asked.
“Off his medication.”
Cletus smiled. “I wouldn’t have it any other way,” he said.
Fifteen minutes later, Crockett and Clete had used the last of the darkness as cover to police the area and attach all their bags and such back on their body webbing so nothing would be left behind. They then Ghillied up for real, and assumed their mission positions.
“Little cool this morning,” Crockett said, looking at the lodge through the scope of his rifle.
“Cool air is a little denser,” Clete said, also studying the target. “That gonna make a difference?”
“Only a small one at this altitude,” Crockett answered, fiddling with the scope. “If we were trying to do this at twice the distance, it’d be a major variation. Goody was right in wanting us to work in this close. Much simpler. You still see the guy?”
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