Moving someone in Lydia’s condition wasn’t a simple deal. She was worth the effort. Without her, he didn’t have much to look forward to—more odd jobs, hanging around the edges of the underworld. He wanted respect, never found in the real world, where he’d made a mess of the nice jobs, or with criminals because he wasn’t connected well enough and they thought he was a disgusting sweaty pig anyway. Lydia saw him differently, demanded more of him, made him feel wanted, and that had caused others see him with more respect, too.
Norm fucked it all up. They should’ve taken care of him much earlier. Then again, he wasn’t the one who stumbled across Tompkins and Alan in the woods, either. Stumbled? No, Terry and Lancaster were in on this from the beginning. Norm was in on it with them, had to be.
So Alan knocked out this cop and everything was going fine when the shots exploded and scared Alan silly. He dropped to his knees behind the counter, one knee landing on the cop’s chest, sounded like he cracked a rib. More shots, some yelling, Alan crazy wanting to know if Lydia was all right. He crawled around the counter, under the table, finally getting a decent angle to see into the living room. The detective rolled behind the couch, helped by the last uniform. No telling how many were outside or around the block already on their way.
Shit, shit, you little fuck, Norm. Not an emergency at all. Probably a tough question. What, he didn’t think Lydia could handle tough questions from men? It was like a sixth sense for her now.
Alan guessed he had a couple of choices and not much time to consider either one. Commando his way into the living room guns blazing and make a beeline for the closest car, or take off out the back and run for his life, leaving Lydia to the cops and never looking back.
There was a third option that wasn’t an option. Stay put, get caught, and plead for mercy. Alan wouldn’t make it half a day in prison. Norm might last longer, only as a punk.
Before Ronnie and Cap and Lydia, the idea of anything but running was absurd. Alan Crabtree, brave? You kidding? He remembered the shock on Lancaster’s face when he pulled the trigger on the woods. Relived the moment he yanked the ambulance driver out and tossed him like a kitten to the pavement. More than that, felt those moments all over again. The difference before Lydia and after was one thing—less fear.
He checked the pistols he had lifted from the cops, clicked the safeties off, made sure a round was chambered in each, and took a deep breath. He didn’t want to fire until the last possible second, never giving the cops much of a target. He eased out from beneath the table and worked himself up like a bull aiming for the red cape.
*
Norm didn’t want to hang out at the window anymore. He’d been hit in the hand by the cop’s bullet and was going into shock. He lay on the grass outside for what felt like hours sucking in breaths and unable to cry. Not hours, though. More like minutes. Seconds? He sat up and lifted the bloody hand, a finger gone and another barely there, all of it purple and slick. It only hurt when he looked at it, nausea coming in waves.
He wrapped the hand in his shirt so it rested high on his stomach. He used the other hand to pull himself up, just in time to catch Alan exploding into the room, bullets from one pistol pounding away at the sofa. This was slow motion to Norm. Ten bullets super fast into the couch as Alan grabbed Lydia from her chair and hefted her over his shoulder. One of her legs went flying and her arms dangled mannequin-style. Alan dropped the empty pistol and grabbed another from his belt. More shots into the couch as he made a run for the front door, Megan crouching behind with her hands on her ears. When Alan was shield enough for her, she opened the door and yelled at him to hurry up. Alan and Lydia moved into the foyer. Then the door slammed.
All the noise shook Norm out of his stupor enough for him to stumble towards the front of the house. He made it in time to see Alan opening the garage door, Lydia still over his shoulder, now with only one arm, the other limbs on the porch. Norm felt drunk as he walked, barely able to keep his balance. The cop cars were empty, doors open and radios buzzing. His last few steps were strong, making it to the back passenger’s door of the Monte Carlo while Alan placed Lydia in the front and strapped her in. She was bawling, not making words. Alan was gentle.
He noticed Norm trying to open the car door. He stood and aimed the pistol over the top of the car at Norm.
“Get away from us,” Alan said.
“Your clip’s empty.”
“You counted all the bullets? You know for sure?”
“Empty.” Norm looked down, made his free hand work the door handle. It clicked and he nudged it open, slipping into the car while the door banged his side. His clothes hung up. He didn’t care because the bad hand was still bleeding and he wanted to sleep.
Lydia saw him in the rearview mirror. “Oh God, Norm. What’s that?”
“My hand.” The words slurred like a tape getting eaten. He pointed to his shirt balled tight around his hand. Megan kept far away, pressing against the opposite door.
Alan walked around and leaned into Norm’s face.
“I said emergencies only. You don’t know what the fuck that means, or you just like playing with guns. I ought to kill you.” Alan looked at the hand. “Looks like you’ll be dying slowly anyway.”
He shut the door hard, ran around to shut Lydia’s. She was staring at the lone arm on her lap.
“Get it off me,” she told Alan.
“You don’t want it? Better than nothing.”
“Get it off, get it off! Off!” She bawled like a kid, and Alan fumbled with the straps until it was free and he tossed it to the side. Lydia calmed down.
“It was mocking me, only having one. Thought I was back in the crash,” she said.
“It’s fine. See? Gone.”
“It’s not fair,” she whispered.
Alan closed her door gently.
Once on the road, they had nowhere to go. Norm fell asleep. No one tried to wake him. They listened to be sure he was still breathing.
“We can’t keep driving,” Megan said.
Alan shook his head.
“So?”
He raised his shoulders and held them up a long time before he drooped and sighed enough to fog his side of the windshield. “I don’t know.”
TWENTY-ONE
Terry and Lancaster sat on the beach in Biloxi drinking beer while they talked about how to find and kill Alan Crabtree. They were in the tern nest areas, supposed to be off-limits—tall grass shielded them from the passers-by on the highway that ran along the beach. The sun was setting, the orange glow purpling up the clouds, Terry listening to a terrible plan about offering to hire Crabtree, getting word out through the underground, and then killing him when he comes to see about the job.
“It won’t work. He’s probably done with killing,” Terry said.
“We’ve guessed wrong about him plenty the last few days.”
Terry cupped sand in his palm and let fall between his fingers.
Lancaster was strengthening faster than Terry imagined, almost as if he didn’t have major surgery only hours before, and his revenge plan was all he talked about. When Terry didn’t agree or at least nod or something, Lancaster would bark or punch him on the arm. Strange how a man with his main arm in a sling could be such a good punch with the other. Boxing training, had to be. Terry had always assumed it was natural.
Lancaster finished the bottle of Busch and stuck it deep in the sand, bottom end up. It was his third. Terry sipped along on his first, ignored how warm and lifeless it was.
“You have a better plan? Maybe some complicated shit I’d need to have a degree to get right?” Lancaster said.
“It’s not that. He’ll be careful next time is what I’m saying. You need to surprise him.”
“What’s not a surprise about this? He shows up expecting a client, and it’s us. Bammo, he’s dead. Surprise, fucking surprise, fuck you. I don’t get you anymore.” Lancaster rolled his eyes and shook his head. He reached behind him for the shopping bag full of beer and
pulled out his fourth. He twisted the cap with his teeth easily, then spit it in the sand. Terry saw dots of blood surrounding Lancaster’s pile of caps. He was on revenge overdrive, no pain or shit. Scared Terry silly.
“He doesn’t have a lot of friends. You need to find his friends and that’s how you can get him.” Terry was careful to say you instead of we, hoping the guy would catch on. Lancaster was too wrapped up to really listen. “Did you hear me?”
“Sure, yeah. Find his friends. I’m not after the friends.”
Terry wanted to shake his head and yell, You never listen, you dumb ass muscle boy. Instead, he cupped more sand. The deeper he dug, the more wet the sand. The white dusty stuff kept falling back into the hole. Terry didn’t like being outside. The gnats buzzed around his ears and nose, biting his arms and face.
“I want one of those girls,” Lancaster said.
Terry looked up. “Show me.”
Lancaster pointed at a group of high-schoolers—they looked sixteen, seventeen, three girls and a couple of guys hanging out in a pickup truck by the seawall, all in swimsuits and shirts, the girls squeaking and laughing like it was the best day of their lives.
“Jesus, man, they’re kids.”
“They’re not kids. Look at their hair, and they leave those cut off shorts unzipped. Shit, they want it.”
“We can find girls at the bar.”
“I don’t want bar girls. I want one of those.” He pushed himself off the sand. “Come on, we can act like we’ll buy them beer or something, then get rid of the guys, then take us a couple girls.”
Terry felt weak all over. He liked the short girl who looked latina, but he didn’t like where this was going at all. These were kids. You scammed them, sometimes fucked them if they wanted it. You never just took them.
“Man,” Terry said.
“Shut the fuck up and look cool. I need you to help anyway. I can’t hold her down with only one arm.”
*
In the hotel room later, the door slammed and Terry and Lancaster were left alone. Terry held a pillow to his chest and shivered while Lancaster wiped blood off his dick with a towel.
“Goddamn virgin,” he mumbled.
What happened was they had talked to these kids and offered them beer. The teens were suspicious at first, a heavyset girl saying something about being from a Methodist youth group. The guys were quiet, waiting for an excuse to make threats, their arms crossed and muscles tensed. Frat guys, Terry knew without a doubt, like he once was, and they were hanging with underage girls. Typical. A couple of years of that frat lifestyle, barely passing school, too much beer and not enough upkeep, all of the sudden Terry was twenty-nine and flabby, running cons instead of practicing law like his dad hoped he would.
Lancaster shrugged at the kids, the supposed holy rollers, and said, “That hip hop stuff you’re listening to, that’s not some Christian band, is it? Sounds like Nelly to me.”
“It’s only music.”
“Music about fucking, that’s what it is. Take a beer.” He held the bag out to the guys, who stayed rock still. The latina girl stepped between the bag and the tough boy. She reached in and took a bottle, held it out to Lancaster.
“Open it for me?”
Lancaster grinned and did the thing with his teeth. The girl smiled.
Another girl, taller and skinnier with punk blonde hair, the one Lancaster really wanted, took another bottle and said, “We’re just partying, letting off steam.”
The guys calmed down and took beer, still quiet, more because they knew Lancaster overtook Alpha Male status. Terry gave up on the latina, who ignored him, but the heavyset girl wanted to talk. She wasn’t awful, had a very pretty face, and acted older, like a college girl. Probably a senior in high school, though, or a dropout.
Lancaster asked if they could borrow the truck to get more beer. The skinny girl asked for Zima. He left the latina girl and the guys, told Terry to drive. The heavy girl climbed into the truck bed. The skinny girl sat on Lancaster’s lap.
The girls were obviously afraid when Terry pulled into the hotel parking lot after getting the booze. They tried playing it tough.
“Shit, you better buy me dinner first,” the heavyset girl said.
Terry grinned, helped her out of the truck. “We’re picking up something. Only be a few minutes.” The lie sounded too bright coming out of his mouth.
In the room, the heavyset girl said she had to pee and headed for the bathroom. The skinny girl sat on the edge of the bed and crossed her legs. A big mistake, Terry thought. Run, please, run, don’t do this, please.
Lancaster sat beside her and they started making out. Terry tried not to watch, turning the TV on and clicking to VH1. The smacking was loud and it was a small room. The girl didn’t know how to kiss and Lancaster didn’t care. His free hand was all over her, and she didn’t mind—fingers on her back, her ass, her breasts, all with a breathy “Oh yeah.” When Lancaster tried to get the cutoff shorts out of the way, she fought back.
“No, slow down, man. Come on, we’re just having fun,” she said. The voice was young.
The toilet flushed and the heavyset girl came out of the bathroom shaking her hair and giggling at Lancaster and her friend until she saw the struggle.
“That’s not cool,” she said.
Terry said, “It’s nothing.”
The skinny girl saw her friend and started to say, “Help—”
Lancaster covered her mouth with his lips, the weight of his cast pinning her stomach and one arm. The shorts were down to her knees, then slipped to her ankles.
“See, she’s into it,” Terry said.
The heavy girl grabbed Terry’s arm and said, “You need to stop him. This is wrong now. You’re not like him, so you can stop him.”
VH1 blared one of those shows that talked about videos instead of playing them, so Terry kept hearing clips of Quiet Riot in the background between interviews.
“Let them go, okay? You and me, wanna take a shower?” Terry said.
The girl looked repulsed. It was pure, unexpected, no-doubt repulsion.
Lancaster was having trouble with the bikini bottoms. “Hey, a little help, my man.”
Terry took a step forward, glanced back at the larger girl, then shrugged at her. He turned to Lancaster. “What do you need?”
“Whatever you can do. Slip a finger in and yank them off, man. Then get her arms.”
The big girl grabbed Terry from behind and pulled him away. He got free, but her fingernails had cut him. “Shit, leave me alone, okay? Go sit down or join in.”
“Get off her,” the big girl yelled.
“Shit, do something with her,” Lancaster said. “Then help me.”
Terry shoved the big girl over the empty bed. She tumbled and came back up ready to fight. Terry opened the drawer with the Bible and picked up the steak knife he stashed there. They didn’t have guns, but he needed something, especially for his own protection against Lancaster. He held it towards the big girl, who slumped into the tight corner between the bed and the wall.
“Terry, now,” Lancaster said.
Why the fuck give them a name? Even the fake one?
Terry pulled the skinny girl’s bikini bottom and sliced it with the knife. They came off one leg, and he pulled it down. The girl had some hair down there, though not much, and Terry almost cut Lancaster. He could do it—the neck, the chest, the stomach. He could do it.
He didn’t do it.
Lancaster worked his own shorts down, throbbing dick looking for a place to find relief. Terry grabbed the girl’s flailing arms by the wrists and pinned them. Her face was tear-streaked and she looked Terry in the eye and said, “Please don’t. Please. I’m only sixteen.”
Lancaster grunted. “Most girls start when they’re sixteen.”
“Not like this, please. No.”
Lancaster pressed her thighs open and found what he was looking for. The girl’s eyes went wide and she sucked in air, let it out in small hurtf
ul sounds. Terry turned his head. The other girl was crying, too. She seemed paralyzed on the other side of the bed. Terry watched the heavyset girl watching her friend being raped.
Then they left fast without a word and took off in the truck. Lancaster wiped the girl’s blood from his dick and pulled off the stained sheets. The blood soaked through to the mattress.
Lancaster grinned. “Fuck. I didn’t think I lasted long enough for it to soak through.”
Terry rocked back and forth. “They’ll tell the cops. We need to get the hell out of here.”
“Yeah, I know. Still got a few minutes. Let me get my clothes on. Pack your shit. Man, we’ve got DNA all over this room. Too bad we’re not done in town.”
“Not done? We’re done. We can’t stay here now, are you nuts? Trying to lay low, want to find Crabtree, and you fucking rape a girl? What’s wrong with you?”
Lancaster dropped the sheets to the floor and frowned at Terry. What an evil goddamn expression. “You calling it rape now?”
“Don’t start with me.”
“No, answer the question, dear. Rape? You say that was rape?”
Terry nodded but turned his eyes away. “Yeah, I guess.”
Lancaster bolted towards Terry and grabbed the pillow, tossed it across the room. Terry held his palms out keeping Lancaster away. The guy slapped them down and banged Terry upside the head with his cast. Lancaster balled his good hand and punched Terry’s face. Terry felt things crack and burn. Only a few punches, but Terry wanted to pass out. He covered his face, felt wetness. He looked down into blood and salt water. Cuts over his eye, on his cheek, maybe a cracked bone.
Lancaster backed off, reached down for the sheets. He said, “Whatever you call it, you helped me, bitch.”
TWENTY-TWO
The drive from Biloxi to New Orleans took just over an hour. Alan thought it was a good place to start “getting lost.” It wasn’t a really big city as much as it was crowded, usually packed with tourists. He found a packed hotel near the airport and took a room. Hopefully the four of them could slip in without being noticed since it was one of those hotels where the rooms were all accessible from the parking lot. A nice ground floor room in the back, a place to count blessings and decide where to go from there.
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