The Sinners

by Ace Atkins

  In the grow rooms, they had all kind of shit planted in irrigated buckets: FLUID, SUPER SILVER, STAR KILLER, ALIEN RIP, COCO, HALF GOOEY, GRIZZ, and their special, STAND ON IT. He and Cody could handle most of it. Sometimes they brought in some trusted buddies to help them out, folks they knew would absolutely never say a word about how they’d outwitted the damn DEA, with all their flyovers of the Pritchard property not being worth jack shit. Most of the time Tyler ran the grow side of things, pruning, checking on the new plants, testing the water quality. Cody was the harvest man, taking the buds to the drying room, racking ’em up on plastic coat hangers and drying them out for a few weeks. Once that was done, they knew a couple girls from down in Starkville, Ag students and party chicks, who’d ride up and help them package. That was the fun times when they’d put on the music and watch all that money just pile up in baggies on the table.

  Cody walked into the grow room and called out to him.

  Tyler was sitting on an overturned Home Depot bucket while he worked. He waved with the shears in his hand and told him to come on.

  “Uncle Heath never came home,” Cody said. Tyler looked down at his feet to make sure he’d put on those booties to keep the work space clean. “I wouldn’t give a good goddamn except for he took my truck and stole fifty dollars from my wallet. Said he was horny and thirsty and not to wait up.”

  “Did he tell you he was taking your truck?”

  “Figured he was gonna take that old Ford,” Cody said. “Not the damn Black Widow. I’m about getting sick and tired of that son of a bitch thinking that he owns everything on the property. He even sits on our damn commode like he’s king of the land, reading Juggs magazine and laughing at the jokes they put in back. Don’t have an ounce of shame in that man.”

  Tyler nodded, careful as he reached into a bushy plant to snip off some wasted branches, a few dead leaves. It was cool and comfortable down here, the gurgling of the water tanks, the woosh of the fan. Not a bad place to spend your time. Lots of times he’d smoke it up before he opened up the hatch, put in some earbuds and listen to some Jamey Johnson or Chris Stapleton. Just chill out, do the work without even thinking on it.

  “We could use an extra hand down here,” Tyler said. “If we’re gonna keep up production and keep racing.”

  “Sure would be great if Uncle Heath worked,” he said. “But prison did something to that man. All he wants to do is lay around and sleep and watch TV, talking about how good the colors are now, trying to find MMA fights and titties on the satellite.”

  “He’s an old man,” Tyler said. “Twenty-three years is a long time being gone. Got to be a real mindfuck coming back to cell phones, flat-screen televisions, and grow houses like we done built. You know?”

  “C’mon,” Cody said, scratching at his cheek, walking down the long line of plants, fingering the branches, inspecting the work Tyler had already done. “You want that son of a bitch gone same as I do. Only your problem is, you didn’t fall asleep in church when Momma used to take us. You think kicking that man to the fucking curb is some kind of dang sin.”

  “He ain’t gonna go,” Tyler said. “Not easy.”

  “Have you forgotten what it was like building all this shit down here?” he said. “Working that backhoe in July, driving them Conex containers down from Memphis. Welding all that shit together like a motherfuckin’ Erector Set. Shit, yeah. This is all our house. Every damn seed down here. And I don’t need our worthless momma’s worthless brother stinking up our goddamn universe.”

  Tyler set down the shears next to the bucket. He stood up, looking down on his shorter, yet older, brother, and nodded. He pulled at his beard a little bit, finding a little bit of ash stuck in it from smoking a blunt after breakfast. Standing there, he could see it all, from the first churn of the soil to dropping them Conex containers down in the holes, linking it all up with sheet metal, running pipes, water from the well. All the damn expense of filtration systems, cattle tanks, grow lights, buying seed from all the way in goddamn Napa Valley, California. Yes, sir. There was something particular and shitty as hell about Uncle Heath showing up one night and expecting to be Mr. Hot Shit 1993 like he’d stepped from a fucking frozen time capsule.

  Tyler stood there, thinking, mind swirling on things as he played with the beard. “OK,” Tyler said. “I’m not doubting you. I’m just asking what the fuck do we do about it?”

  “He works for us,” Cody said. “Not the other way around. If he tries to make some trouble, we get rid of his ass.”

  “That’s some hard-ass Old Testament thinking there, Cody Pritchard,” Tyler said, picking up the shears, feeling the handles and springs working in his hand. Clip, clip, clip.

  “Tell me you ain’t been thinking the same goddamn thing,” Cody said. “Goddamn Doc McStuffins and his fucking box of pills? Shit, man. What’s wrong with that son of a bitch? If we don’t get someone to cover our ass quick, we’re fucked five ways from Sunday.”

  “I’ll talk to Sledge,” Tyler said. “Maybe he’ll let that shit ride for a while?”

  “Ain’t a damn chance in hell.”

  * * *

  • • •

  Those turds out of Tupelo would come over tomorrow, put their feet up on her fucking furniture, and take over everything Fannie had worked nearly twenty years to build. She’d done her goddamn part, everything Ray and Buster White had asked. From taking over the shit show at the Rez, making it into a first-class cooze parade until the chief wanted his cut, to driving on up the highway to Tibbehah to clean up Johnny Stagg’s mess in this godforsaken county. Fannie had rebuilt a goddamn lean-to barn called The Booby Trap into one of the finest T&A beer joints in the Deep South. She never as so much got a thank you from White or any of the boys, just damn grunts on the phone questioning her on the night’s take or the cash exchange with the blacks up in Memphis. But this thing? The deal with Wes Taggart and his ponytailed fuckwad buddy, J. B. Hood, hit her right where she fucking lived.

  “Want another, Miss Fannie?” Midnight Man asked.

  It was nearly nine, Fannie sitting at the edge of that old weathered bar, waiting for the house to really open up for the night. Why the hell not? She motioned for another half gin, half grenadine special with extra ice, plenty of cherries, and a slice of orange. It was sweet and burned and hit the damn spot, making her feel steady and confident, that long brown cigarillo in her fingers burning down to her immaculate nails. Thinking how to out-fuck a man who did twenty years in Angola with a smile on his face, working his scams and business from behind bars, getting the guards to smuggle in TVs and cell phones, goddamn Oysters Rockefeller from Antoine’s and whores from the Mississippi coast. She’d heard Buster White didn’t give a goddamn whether it was male or female, switching to either side depending on his mood. He spent most of his teenage years over in reform schools in Alabama, learning to survive with his fists and his mouth, working for nickels and dimes and chocolate bars until people got real comfortable with him and he’d put a knife right in their gut. She’d known that swamp creature for most of her adult life and knew he didn’t have any more loyalty to her than some of the cats she fed out by the dumpster.

  “How’s that?” Midnight Man said, motioning to her drink.

  “It’s fine.”

  “Need more cherries?”

  “I said it’s fine.”

  Fannie had always done for Fannie, but when it came to the good ole boys, she figured doing her business, being professional, would get her a seat the table. Instead, it got her a tap on the ass and more bullshit until Buster White decided to take away her keys and turn her into some kind of glorified greeter. She didn’t have much. Not so much of the cut or the overall action, but the deal had been for Vienna’s. There was no end for the need of tits and pussy and there was no damn reason it had to be skanky and dirty. She did good for those girls. Kept them neat and clean, bought them clothes, made sure they got
what they deserved. Every other week she got them tested with a gyno brought in from Grenada. These boys, Taggart and Hood, would turn Vienna’s into a Wild West clap trap within weeks.

  Fannie sucked down the drink, kept an eye on the time, and watched the door, just waiting for those sonsabitches to come in, smiling and happy, loving they just got the damn front door keys to all the pussy they could stand.

  She drained the glass. Motioned again to Midnight Man. Bring it on.

  “You sure, ma’am?”

  “Did I stutter?”

  Yes, sir. Fannie did for Fannie. Vienna’s was fucking hers. It was her grandmother’s, built on basic Southern principles of hospitality, hot women, and full-tilt liquor. This fucking business had already taken two of her boys down with it and if she showed a damn bit of weakness, they’d take her along, too. Either way, she might be fucked. But if she rolled over on her back for these boys, she knew Buster White wouldn’t have a goddamn lick of respect for her.

  She needed to find the way to flush the toilet on these two turds and show that north Mississippi and that little cut-through to Memphis was all fucking hers. She drank some more, tapped the ash off the cigarillo, and thought about how she’d been outsmarted by a couple of kids with dirty fingernails and a truckload of body odor. She had the cooze. They had the weed.

  “Midnight Man?” Fannie asked.

  “Yes, Miss Fannie?”

  “You know anyone who can get in touch with the Pritchard boys?”

  Midnight Man looked down at the empty drinks in front her, passing a little judgment. But Fannie looked up at him, clear-eyed as hell and thinking of a few things.

  “Sure,” he said. “I do.”

  “I want you to set something up,” Fannie said. “Soon as you can.”

  “Just what you thinking, Miss Fannie?”

  * * *

  • • •

  Don’t worry,” J. B. Hood said, sitting up in the cab with Boom Kimbrough as Boom made a midnight run down to Biloxi for an unknown pickup, deadheading it down to the Coast. “I’m not going to ask you about your fucking arm. I’m sure you get enough of that shit already.”

  Boom nodded, following that long white line on Highway 45 deep into the night, down through Waynesboro and on through Buckatunna, skirting the Alabama state line. L. Q. Smith had told him he’d have an adviser on the next run, not real specific about what was being observed or why. But when Boom got to the Sutpen office to pick up the truck, he saw the same old gray-ponytailed motherfucker who’d eyed him after he’d asked about the shit they’d put on his truck. The guy didn’t say a word, even when introduced by Smith, just hopped up in the passenger cab and lit up a smoke. Talking about Boom’s arm was the first damn thing he’d said since leaving Tupelo.

  “I was in ’Nam,” Hood said. “Just a kid at Khe Sanh, where we had the damn shit shelled out of us for five months. I saw up close and personal the meat grinder of that war and still don’t know what the fuck we were trying to do. The only thing that kept me going was a pinup of Nancy Sinatra sitting on a big pile of combat boots in her bikini. Many a night I took the dog for a walk just thinking about her long, bare feet. That woman had such great-looking toes.”

  Boom nodded. His left hand steady on the wheel, downshifting with his hook as they ran through the flashing yellow light, passing a Chevron, an Exxon, the First Baptist Church of Buckatunna. A big sign at the church said GIVE THE DEVIL AN INCH AND HE’LL BECOME YOUR RULER.

  “I don’t know why a woman’s feet just always did it for me,” Hood said, keeping on. Boom not asking for more. “I don’t mean that I’m some kind of pervert. I don’t want to lick them clean or nothing. Or have her stick her toes up my ass. I just think feet are sexy, is all. The first thing I look at when seeing a woman? Toes. Don’t care a thing for short, stubby little ones. I like them long, lean toes, nice little painted nails. I used to date a woman from Shreveport who had toes as long as a monkey’s. She could pick up a cigarette with them and pluck the damn thing in her mouth.”

  “Where we headed?” Boom said, his own voice sounding strange to him as he hadn’t spoken for a long while. He just wanted to get down to business and get this creepy-looking motherfucker out of his cab. His truck reeked of cheap aftershave and cigarettes.

  “Just drive,” Hood said. “When we hit I-10 at Mobile, I’ll tell you which way to go.”

  Boom kept on rolling. He didn’t mind the talking but would prefer the radio. Most of the time, his music kept his mind right and sharp, focused as the miles clicked away. He and Quinn liked that old-school country music, but he also kept Enter the Wu-Tang. Something told him that J. B. Hood’s old, countrified ass wouldn’t be into “Shame on a nigga who try to run game on a nigga.” Boom glanced over at Hood as he drove, knowing he had a loaded .357 Magnum down in the space between the seat and door. He wasn’t sure exactly what Smith and the boys were trying to run on his ass, get passed through him, but the old guy riding shotgun was making him nervous as hell.

  “Whatever you see down here,” Hood said, leaning forward in his seat toward the glass, clearing off a smudge with his fist, “don’t be asking me about it. Just like I’m not asking you about your fucking arm and how it all went down. What we got to do down here, the run, don’t mean nothing in this big ole world. All you got to do is go where I say, stay in the cab while we load up, and drive this rig on back to Tupelo. I heard you had some ethical issues driving back from Houston last time? I don’t need none of that.”

  “Then why am I driving?”

  “Call it baptism by fire,” Hood said. “If you were so goddamn offended by what you were doing, you would’ve quit. But you and me are the same. We don’t give a good goddamn about the job, long as it pays. And, for the record, I don’t care how black you are or how many limbs you got. I learned that over in The Shit. We’re all headed down into the ground and you might as well have a hell of a ride on the way.”

  “You really believe that?”

  “What’s that?”

  “That there ain’t nothing else in this world?”

  “I can’t see no farther than the headlights,” Hood said. He laughed, lighting up another cigarette, the cab filling with smoke. “Beyond that, it’s dark as hell.”

  “Light cuts through all that mess.”

  “Goddamn,” Hood said. “Please don’t tell me you’re gonna witness. Better men and women have tried, and, to be real honest, man, I just don’t give a fuck.”

  “Hard thinking.”

  “Just keep your eyes on that blacktop and your mouth shut,” Hood said. “And we’ll get along just fine.”

  Hood pulled a pistol from his pocket and checked the magazine. The gun looked like a toy to Boom, but he knew it could kill a man just the same. “When the racket starts,” he said, “all the wailing and crying, knocking on the walls, just keep driving. When you hear screaming and yelling, just drive.”

  “What the hell are we driving?” Boom said. “Cattle?”

  Hood let down the side window, hot wind blowing through the cab. He spit and looked over at Boom with those sleepy, dead eyes. “Of a kind.”

  15

  “I’m happy for you, Quinn,” Lillie Virgil said. “I really am. About time you got married or folks might start to whisper. A grown man, pushing forty, living way the hell out in the country in a big ole house with no one but a cattle dog to talk to. You need a woman, or a person, to civilize you, make you not seem like some kind of Boo Radley with a buzz cut and a badge.”

  “You know, people have been talking for a while,” Quinn said. “They say they always figured you and I were going to get hitched.”

  “Christ Almighty,” Lillie said. “Can’t a man and a woman be fucking friends without people thinking they want to bump uglies together? I love you like a brother. But, like a brother, the thought of getting nekkid with you makes my flesh crawl a little.”
>
  “Appreciate that, Lil,” Quinn said. “That’s awfully nice of you.”

  “You’re welcome,” Lillie said. “Now we got that out of the way, just what the fuck do you want?”

  They stood outside the Clifford Davis/Odell Horton Federal Building in downtown Memphis, where Lillie had been assigned as a U.S. Marshal soon after leaving Tibbehah County.

  She was a tall woman, about Quinn’s height, but maybe taller today in some fancy black shoes that went with a fitted black blazer over a gray top. She had on jeans and wore her MARSHALS SERVICE badge around her neck. Her unruly brown hair pinned down in a bun and a brand-new Sig Sauer on her hip.

  “Nice-looking gun,” Quinn said.

  “Little present to myself,” Lillie said, patting her hip. “The judges didn’t like me carrying a rifle around the courthouse. I think it’s because they have small dicks and I intimidated them.”

  When Lillie left Jericho, she’d originally planned to go back to the Memphis PD, where she’d started her career out of Ole Miss. But the Marshals had offered more money and better hours for her to spend with her daughter, Rose. Also, Quinn was pretty sure she liked saying she was a U.S. Marshal. Kicking in doors and chasing fugitives was pretty much Lillie’s speed.

  “Did you get the warrant I sent?” Quinn said.

  “We already had Wrong Way on file,” she said. “Fucking Lyle Masters. I thought we’d run his ass far away from Jericho.”

  “Not far enough,” Quinn said. “He came back and got into a throwdown at the Walmart.”

  “Now, that’s class,” Lillie said. “That’s the goddamn Olympic pinnacle of shitbirdism. Who was he fighting?”

  “The Pritchard boys and their uncle,” Quinn said.