Thrilling Thirteen

by Ponzo, Gary

  Steele saw Silk playing at a pool table next to them. He was gliding around the table, on the prowl for a good shot. When their eyes met, he winked at her.

  Another ball slammed into a pocket and the man continued lining up his shots as if she weren’t there. She noticed he was wearing a silver belt buckle with the Confederate flag flying in the center of it.

  Steele began to lose her patience. “Is your name Rocky?”

  The man ignored her.

  Steele looked at her watch. She suddenly felt like Cinderella at the stroke of midnight.

  “Are you Rocky?” she repeated, a little louder.

  He made no attempt to respond. It was obvious she had found the right man.

  Steele reached into her purse and flipped open her credentials. She grabbed the man’s pool stick and shoved her creds in his face. “I’m an FBI agent. Tell me your damn name.”

  The Indian stopped smiling.

  Rocky yanked the stick free. “I don’t give a shit who you are, lady. This is a free country and I don’t have to talk to nobody I don’t want to.”

  Steele stood with her hands on her hips. Randy Travis was now pining about missing an old flame. The music was loud enough to cover up most of the commotion, but the few patrons who were watching made Steele nervous. Or maybe it was the fact that she suddenly felt extremely vulnerable. She wasn’t dressed for an altercation.

  Silk was lining up a shot at the table next to them. He drew his stick back with a short jerky motion and jabbed Rocky in the ribcage with the back of his pool cue. Silk turned and brushed off the man’s shirt.

  “Sorry about that,” Silk said. “Hey, you’re kinda cute.”

  Rocky squared up on him and his shoulders seemed to swell. Silk was a couple of inches shorter, but he looked up at the man with the practiced stare of a professional assassin. Rocky tried to keep up, but the best he could do was look menacing. Nobody spoke as the two men stared each other down.

  Finally, Silk glimpsed down at the man’s belt buckle. “The fuck is that?” he said, pointing at the Confederate flag.

  Rocky maintained his stare. He was trying out his best scowl, but Silk seemed immune.

  “Didn’t anyone tell you?” Silk asked. “The South lost. What happened, you drop your subscription to the Redneck Daily News?”

  Rocky’s eyes flared with fury. He gripped his pool stick with both hands and roundhoused a swing at Silk.

  Silk ducked.

  When Rocky came back with it, Silk deflected the shot with his right arm and grabbed the stick with his left. He pulled down with both hands, snapped the stick over his raised thigh and came up with two splintered pieces. Rocky stood startled at Silk’s agility. Silk wheeled and clocked the Indian who was now reaching for Silk from behind.

  The Indian went to his knees. Blood trickled down the side of his face. Silk barked, “Stay down, Chief, I got no gripe with you.”

  Rocky had grabbed another pool stick and was about to swing when Steele fumbled her gun out of her purse and pointed it at him. “Stop, or I’ll shoot.”

  Silk looked at Steele as if she’d ruined his birthday party. “Aw, leave him be,” Silk said, with open palms. “He ain’t gonna hurt nothing.”

  Steele held the gun steady and wondered what else could go wrong that night.

  “Put it down, lady,” a man’s voice boomed from behind her. When Steele turned, she saw a large man with a dirty, white apron tied around his bowling-ball gut. He was holding a shotgun and leveling it at Steele. “Get out of my bar . . . now.”

  Steele held up her credentials. “I’m an FBI agent here on official business.”

  “I don’t’ give a shit who you are.”

  “You don’t understand—”

  The shot reverberated throughout the spacious room, followed by screams and a frantic rush for the exit. People nearby lunged to the floor and began scrambling for the door on their hands and knees.

  Steele flinched for a moment, but when she regained her focus, she saw the bar owner on the floor clutching his leg. Silk holstered his revolver, kicked aside the shotgun that lay next to the bar owner, and crouched over the fallen man. “Sorry, pal. You just don’t know how serious all this stuff is.”

  Silk unfastened the bar owner’s apron and tied it snug around his upper thigh as a tourniquet. He motioned to the Indian, who was getting to his feet, holding his hand up against his bloody ear. “Hey, Chief, get him to the hospital. Pronto. It looks like you could use a stitch or two yourself.”

  The Indian stood expressionless.

  Silk casually steered his revolver in the Indian’s direction. “What? I gotta shoot you too?”

  The Indian moved toward the injured man.

  The bar owner’s face was screwed up into a knot. He appeared to be fighting off the effects of shock.

  “You didn’t have to do that,” Steele said, still breathing heavy from relief.

  “You’re welcome,” Silk said, helping the bar owner to his feet and placing the man’s arm around the large Indian’s shoulder. The two of them shuffled off and Rocky started to follow them. Silk grabbed the back of Rocky’s shirt and pulled. “Where do you think you’re going, Sport?”

  Rocky unleashed an elbow into Silk’s ribs and caught him by surprise. Silk took a step back, then regrouped and kicked Rocky in the crotch, like he was punting a football. Rocky curled over in pain.

  Silk scowled. “What’s the matter with you, you don’t see me shoot that fat fuck with the apron? You think I’m like one of your cowfolk friends that carry around a six-shooter just to impress his girlfriend?”

  The room was empty, but for the three of them now. Johnny Cash was singing about shooting a man in Reno just to watch him die; his voice resonated throughout the rafters of the elevated ceiling.

  Silk lifted his foot and shoved Rocky to the ground. He landed on his back in between two pool tables and looked up at Silk. “Are you the law?” he asked in a breathy voice.

  Silk opened the chamber of his revolver and dropped all five bullets into the palm of his hand. “More like an outlaw,” he grinned.

  “What are you doing?” Steele asked.

  “I’m not sure,” Silk said. “I think I’m trying to save the free world.”

  Rocky squinted incredulously at what he was watching.

  Silk slipped all but one of the bullets into his pants pocket. He waved the single bullet in front of the man, gently holding it between the index finger and thumb of his right hand. He eased the bullet into one of the six chambers, then flicked it shut with his wrist. He spun the cylinder. It clicked around like a roulette wheel. Rocky’s mouth opened.

  “What are you doing?” Steele asked. Louder this time.

  Silk spun the chamber again. He knelt next to Rocky and cocked the hammer. “You know what I’m doing, don’t you? I might have to put you to sleep, if ya know what I mean.”

  Rocky sat frozen. He looked at Steele. His eyes pleaded for help, but his mouth only quivered.

  “Silk, you’re not doing this,” Steele ordered.

  “You see,” Silk said to the man, “I need to know something.” He stopped, then looked back at Steele. “He does know where this Angel guy lives, doesn’t he?”

  Steele didn’t want it like this. Not her first big assignment. Not in the town she lived in. When everyone else had packed and gone home, she would still be there representing the Bureau. “This is not how we do things,” she said.

  “Uh huh,” Silk said. “I’ll take that for a yes.”

  He returned his attention to Rocky. He pressed the gun to the man’s temple and said, “I need to know where Angel lives. Can you tell me? Or do we start gambling with your life?”

  “I don’t—”

  Click.

  Rocky screamed.

  Steele aimed her pistol at Silk. “Stop it!”

  Rocky’s face was drained white. He screamed incoherent words.

  Silk cocked the hammer again and cupped his ear. “What did you say, I
can’t hear you?”

  Click. Silk pulled the trigger for the second time.

  Rocky was convulsing. His eyes were saturated with tears.

  Steele fired a shot over Silk’s head. The blast startled Rocky. It startled her. Silk didn’t flinch. “Stop it, or I’m going take you down,” she ordered.

  Silk kept his hand cupped around his ear. “What?’ he said in Rocky’s face. “I can’t hear with all this racket.”

  Click.

  Steele blasted a second shot, closer this time. Wood splintered off of the side of a pool table and splashed Silk on his cheek.

  Silk brushed his hand down the side of his face and glared at Steele. “You’re starting to piss me off here.”

  “I’ll tell you!” Rocky screamed. “I’ll tell you!”

  “See,” Silk said. “His memory came back to him.”

  “He lives over on Sycamore,” the words rushed out of the man’s mouth. “Take 260 east toward Heber. About two miles past the Ranger Station on the right hand side is Sycamore. That’s the road he lives on. Second house on the left.”

  Silk patted the Rocky’s face. “Good boy.” Then Silk’s face turned dark. “You wouldn’t lie to me, would you?”

  Rocky shook his head furiously, his eyes fixed on Silk’s revolver. “N-n-n-o.”

  Silk reached into the man’s back pocket and yanked out his wallet. He opened the billfold and pulled out some plastic cards. His forehead wrinkled. “Your name is Arthur? I thought she was asking you if your name was Rocky.”

  The man was still trembling. “That’s what my friends call me.”

  “Oh. You wanna know what my friends call me?”

  The man’s eyes rose in anticipation, like he was extremely eager to hear something so important.

  “Well, the ones that don’t lie to me call me Silk. Wanna hear what the ones who lie to me call me?”

  Rocky’s tremble segued into a nod.

  Silk smiled. “Well, let’s just say, graveyards don’t have any telephone booths. So they don’t get to call me so much.” Silk stood and held up the man’s wallet. “And I know where you live.”

  Steele wiped her forehead with the back of her gun hand. “You’re crazy,” she muttered.

  Silk dismissed Rocky. “Go home, Arthur,” he said. “And change those pants, will ya?”

  Rocky got to his feet and shuffled backward toward the door, dubiously staring at Silk, never showing him his back.

  Silk walked up to Steele, opened his cell phone and began pushing buttons.

  “What are you doing?” Steele said.

  “I’m calling Nick with the info. That’s why we came, right?”

  “We need to discuss what just happened.”

  “What is it with you broads, always gotta talk?”

  Steele ignored the comment. “There’s been a shooting. I have to write a report. You almost killed an innocent man.”

  “What, the bartender?” Silk asked. “I shot him in the leg on purpose. If I wanted, I’d of nailed him between the eyes.”

  “I’m not talking about him, I’m talking about your other victim.”

  “What, Arthur?” Silk looked bewildered.

  “Yes, Arthur. You could have killed him playing your little game of Russian roulette.”

  Silk let a breath out and shook his head. “Listen,” he glanced over his shoulder at the empty bar. “I’ll tell you something that I never told nobody. Ever. You understand what I’m saying?”

  Steele nodded, without a clue as to what he was talking about.

  “I make my living through intimidation and fear. I make both of these things do a lot of my work for me. Capisce?”

  Silk raised his revolver and slid open the cylinder. He rotated the cylinder exposing six empty chambers. Like a smooth magician, he opened the palm of his left hand and showed Steele the missing bullet. “You know how much I practice that move? Maybe two, three hours a month. Every month.” He pointed a finger at her. “But if word ever got out that I use this move, I might as well open up a deli in Topeka, Kansas. Sensitive guy like me would get eaten alive.”

  Steele pursed her lips. “Why didn’t you tell me ahead of time? I could have shot you.”

  Silk stifled a laugh. “What, and ruin a perfectly good performance? Besides, when we left the Sheriff’s office, Nick said to let me do whatever I needed to do. I know you didn’t forget that.”

  Silk continued to push the buttons on his cell phone, hovered his index finger over the send button and looked up at Steele. “Are we done talking here? Or do you wanna know about my feelings?”

  Steele shook her head. The KSF could learn a lot about terrorism from a guy like Silk.

  Chapter 35

  Angel Herrera sat hunched over a grilled cheese sandwich with his hand on a cool longneck bottle of beer when he heard the noise. He picked up the remote control from his TV tray and lowered the volume on Jeopardy. Alex Trebek mouthed the question to an answer that Angel didn’t know. Angel hadn’t known the question to any of the answers Alex was giving. He was on his fifth longneck, but probably wouldn’t have known any of the questions even if he’d been sober. Ever since he found Fred Wilson decapitated, Angel couldn’t get enough alcohol in his system. The foreign bastards were sneaking into America and killing innocent citizens—including a harmless businessman like Fred.

  Angel had heard the rumors about terrorists hiding out in the Payson area and it spooked him. His name was in the paper as the person who found Fred and he wondered if the terrorists knew that he had seen the killer. In fact, he knew exactly where the killer lived. It was the reason why he never said anything to the Sheriff. What kind of protection would he get? A patrol car might drive by a couple of times a day, but what good would that do him? He figured he had a better chance of staying alive by keeping his mouth shut and letting it go.

  It seemed like a good plan until now. He heard the noise outside of his cabin sounding like something moving. Angel’s wife, Mabel, was in the basement doing laundry, so he knew it wasn’t her. He waited to hear more. Nothing. Maybe a branch scraping up against the siding, like it always did whenever the wind picked up. He glanced out of his living room window and saw there was no wind. Not a breath.

  He turned back toward the TV and saw, “Breaking News,” at the bottom of the screen. He raised the volume and took a pull on his bottle of beer. The screen went blank for a moment, then a local newswoman was standing in front of a familiar landmark.

  “Theresa Sanchez reporting for Channel 3 News. I’m live at the Winchester Bar and Grill, where a shooting took place just minutes ago.”

  Angel almost choked on his half-swallowed beer. He’d planned to head down to the Winchester after dinner. The woman held her hand to her ear as if someone was talking to her through an earphone, maybe even telling her what to say. “Eyewitnesses have told Channel 3 News that Max Gordon, owner of the Winchester, was shot and rushed to the hospital. We also have reports that a dark-haired man in a white tee-shirt was seen running from the scene shortly after the shots. It is yet to be confirmed whether this event is related to the terrorist organization reportedly hiding somewhere in the Payson vicinity. We will keep you informed with any breaking news as it happens. Theresa Sanchez, Channel 3 News.”

  Another sound, this time from the backyard. Angel shut off the TV. He crept to the kitchen and turned off the overhead lights. He peeked past the curtain hanging over the sink. It was dead still. Angel squinted into the tree line behind his cabin. He thought he saw something. He squinted harder and his peripheral vision became hyperactive with movement. If he stared straight at something it wouldn’t budge, but everything around it seemed to come alive with motion. Someone was out there.

  He pulled open a kitchen drawer and grabbed a long carving knife. His senses swirled with suspicion. He thought he heard a man’s voice. He picked up the telephone hanging on the wall. The line was dead.

  Shit. His gun was in the glove box of his truck out front like always. Just g
reat.

  He thought about hiding down in the basement. Maybe buy himself some time. But he couldn’t get rid of the vision of Fred Wilson’s headless body, spurting blood like a dropped bottle of red wine. He wasn’t dealing with any local punks, that was for sure. These guys were the real deal. Hiding would only delay the inevitable. Better to face them head on.

  The doorbell rang. Angel felt his legs tense with fear. He struggled to the basement door and saw his wife’s feet at the bottom of the stairs, sorting laundry, her purple robe almost dragging the floor. “Mabel,” he said in a forced hush. “Stay down there until I tell you to come up.”

  “Why?” Mabel asked over the hum of the dryer.

  “Just do as I say,” Angel said.

  The doorbell rang again, only this time it was followed by a couple of urgent thumps on the front door.

  “Damn,” Angel said. He crept to the door. He placed his hand on the doorknob and became paralyzed with fear. A pounding fist shook the door. He thought the frame was going to give out. He tightened his grip on the knife, tucked it behind his thigh and threw open the door as quickly as possible, trying to startle whoever was on the other side.

  He froze.

  A bright spotlight engulfed his entire doorway. Angel squinted and held up his arm to shade his eyes. Two men in navy windbreakers stood on his porch. Behind them, he could see the silhouettes of men wearing military fatigues crouched into an attack mode. A couple of dozen. Maybe more. Each had a machine gun pointed at him. He heard a helicopter approaching, then glanced up, blinded by another spotlight shining down on him. When his vision adjusted, he saw two military men leaned over the open door of the chopper with their eyes tucked behind the scopes of a couple of powerful looking rifles.

  He was overwhelmed with the scene and was trying to make sense of it when the dark-haired man on his porch said, “Are you Angel?”

  They had to be from the government, he thought, or he’d be dead already. There was no advantage to lying. They wouldn’t be the gullible type like those Angel swindled out of a couple of hundred bucks every weekend at the Winchester. They wouldn’t send this much force just to be deterred by some creative storytelling. He suddenly became aware of the knife he was still gripping tightly by his side. “That’s what my friends call me,” he said, in a voice too scared to speak slowly.