The Fallen

by Ace Atkins

Fannie touched the red lace along the V-neck, her silver pendant hanging deep between her titties, and smiled. She reached her long fingers around the cheap china mug and leaned into the table, well out of earshot of the hash slingers and broke-ass waitresses, maybe ten years gone from being able to work the pole. “You don’t need to sweet-talk me, baby,” she said. “I know I’m sitting on the best pussy in north Mississippi. Just tell me where you boys stand.”

  Cord looked around the Huddle House and then back to Fannie, all Marine seriousness. He flared his nostrils and nodded. “Yes, ma’am.”

  “Good.”

  “But we’ll need some time to prep,” Cord said. “Do some recon on those Twins. Any chance you know what it looks like inside the counting room?”

  Fannie reached into her purse and pulled out the little diagram Ordeen had drawn for her. She’d added a few of her own thoughts and placed it on the center of the orange table. Cord caught it and spun it around, checking all the angles and details. If anything, Fannie knew Cord was a man for details. He fingered the edges, moving his mouth, but not speaking any words, studying each bit.

  “This is good,” he said. “You trust it?”

  “I know it.”

  “Five inside?”

  “And maybe three in the restaurant,” Fannie said. “The Twins keep a couple shooters in cars around the back. If you go bust in that way, you’ll have to take them out.”

  Cord nodded, lifting his eyes from the paper and staring at her.

  “Will that be a problem?” she said.

  “A bunch of black guys with popguns?”

  “My man says it may be more than popguns,” Fannie said. “They may have some assault rifles. One guy, this one they call Armani, keeps a damn gold-plated Glock.”

  “Gold-plated?” he said. “You shitting me?”

  Fannie shrugged and put the thin little coffee mug up to her lips. The waitress had left them alone after checking on them twice, Fannie giving a cold-ass stare that sent her away with her muff tucked between her legs.

  “I promise, we’ve met lots worse.”

  “One fights for money,” Fannie said. “One for God. In the end, who wants it more?”

  Cord didn’t answer, the waitress walking back and slapping down some steak and eggs in front of him. She smiled at Cord, gave Fannie a nasty look, and switched her narrow bony ass on back to the cash register. Some old boy by the jukebox punching up one of her daddy’s favorites by Kenny Rogers, “Ruby.” She recalled him hitting that one on his eight-track, liquor and cigarettes on his breath, a dark shadow looming in the room she shared with her sister.

  “When do they make the pickups?” Cord said.

  “They pick up every night,” Fannie said. “But the best night is Sunday. The Twins come in after a four-hour church service and do the count in their best suits.”

  “What time?”

  “Most deliveries come in before four,” Fannie said. “They’re elbow-deep in the cash by five. My man says they get real into it, everyone wanting to know the count, some of the boys on the outside getting lazy, coming in for free beer and chicken wings, maybe smoke a blunt and talk some shit.”

  “Taliban didn’t smoke blunts.”

  “And didn’t care about money?”

  “Oh, they cared about money,” Cord said. “Money means power and control.”

  “But it’s all about religion.”

  “Seventy-two virgins,” Cord said. “Paradise.”

  “So they’re fighting for pussy?”

  Cord cut into the steak and eggs, taking a bite of both. He reached down for a napkin and wiped his mouth. He nodded and said, “Yeah.”

  “You boys,” Fannie said. “So damn predictable. Peckers always pointing you right to the fucking grave.”

  Cord grinned and kept eating. The waitress left them alone until Fannie snapped her fingers.

  • • •

  “Guess you heard about Potts Camp?” Jon Holliday said. “Two men in Donald J. Trump masks hitting the cash drawers and threatening to shoot folks in the pussy. Taking off in a stolen vehicle that they dumped a few miles away and rode off on motorbikes.”

  “Our boys,” Quinn said.

  “Only got thirty grand this time,” Holliday said. “But they’re getting national press on account of their style. The Trump masks, hitting the banks in under ninety seconds. People are calling them heroes. Some say the robberies are politically motivated.”

  “Bullshit.”

  “I agree,” Holliday said. “But there’s so much bullshit going on these days that you don’t know where to separate facts from reality. How’d you like to be a goddamn Fed right now? We’re swimming in a sea of bullshit.”

  Quinn sat with Holliday on a green bench outside the county courthouse in Oxford. Holliday looked strange in a navy blue suit with crisp white shirt and red tie. Quinn had on his uniform: starched jeans, Tibbehah County SO shirt, cowboy boots, and Beretta clipped to the belt. They drank coffee from paper cups and watched the cars and trucks around the town square. It still wasn’t spring, but the sun had come out, and college students were out jogging and women with lots of makeup and styled hair shopped the local boutiques. Daffodils had started to bloom, adding some green and light yellow to the roads leading downtown, even if the trees were still bare and cold.

  “My wife grew up here,” Holliday said. “There used to be a hardware store, pharmacy, and a diner called Smitty’s on the Square. Now it’s all ladies’ boutiques and college puke bars. Got some good restaurants, a nice little bookstore, but it’s all changed so damn much. Folks from the Delta who can’t cut it up in Memphis.”

  “No worries about that down in Jericho,” Quinn said. “Unless you count a western-wear shop or the Dollar Store as a boutique.”

  “Oh, it’s coming, brother,” Holliday said. “Pretty soon, you’ll have a pretty little Starbucks next to the Sonic.”

  “I’ve prayed on it,” Quinn said. “It hasn’t happened yet.”

  Three men walked past, two of them in matching red sweater-vests and visors, the other in a fuzzy Sherpa vest and khakis, talking about how Ole Miss needed to fire their football coach. The talker’s belly swelled over his belt, toothpick swiveling in his mouth, as he ran down a few things he’d heard on sports talk radio. Holliday lifted his eyes to the three, let the noise pass, and turned back to Quinn.

  “How’s it coming along with that van?”

  “MBI towed it to Batesville,” Quinn said. “They gave it a good look but didn’t find anything except a couple cigarette butts. Unless one of our boys has donated some DNA to Big Brother, we don’t have shit.”

  “Boot prints?”

  “A partial,” Quinn said. “The van was stolen up at the Oak Court Mall in Memphis. The plate on it was taken off another van at a Target in Olive Branch. We checked the surveillance at Target, but the guy had parked too far away. Didn’t want his van scratched by the carts. We haven’t been able to get any security video from the mall folks yet. Only thing we do have is those tire tracks off the dirt bikes. All seem to be the same make. We’re checking out Kawasaki dealers to see who might have purchased three at the same time.”

  “Smart,” Holliday said. “I have a few contacts at the VA. Officially, I can’t bust in and make inquiries for vets who might have criminal tendencies. But they’re checking. We’ve also been looking for vets in Tennessee, Mississippi, and Alabama who’ve committed felonies. You talk about a mountain of shit. Just because you put on a uniform doesn’t make you goddamn Sergeant York.”

  “You and I didn’t have much experience with regular Army,” Quinn said. “But we had enough to make us sick. Young fuckups who had a choice of the recruiter or jail. We put a gun in their hand, teach ’em how to use it, then expect them to be choirboys when they get back home.”

  “Aren’t all who serve American hero
es?”

  “Hardest part of my job was getting my boys not to kill,” Quinn said. “And I worked with the very best the Army had to offer.”

  “You think these guys might’ve been Rangers?”

  “No way,” Quinn said. “Every Ranger has a set of brass balls and a heart of gold.”

  “You know what I think?” Holliday said. “I think these boys are having the goddamn time of their lives. I don’t think it’s about money at all. They hit these little towns, make a little dough, and move on to a new target. Some men like to hunt, fish, play golf. These guys can’t play golf. They can’t relax. Their heads are fried by the danger of combat. Their asses are wound up and this is the only thing that levels them.”

  “Like coming home and carrying a badge?”

  “How’d you like to be a fucking salesman?” Holliday said, leaning back into the bench, watching a crew of young women in tight pants and sports bras. “Or one of those turds who just walked past talking college ball?”

  “No, sir.”

  “These assholes will get bored soon,” Holliday said. “I think all these little banks—excuse me, chickenshit targets—are a warm-up. They’re going to get bored again and hit something bigger, like a nice, fat First Tennessee in downtown Memphis. Can you imagine that? Assault rifles flying loose on city streets, trying to make a getaway down fucking Poplar Avenue.”

  “Little more crowded than Jericho.”

  “Lots of folks will get killed,” Holliday said. “And with the attention these fuckers are getting on the cable news . . . Whew. Some real shit.”

  “Well,” Quinn said. “We don’t have solid descriptions, leads, prints, or any workable evidence other than these boys liking Kawasakis. Damn, we got this all figured out.”

  Holliday leaned forward, placing his elbows on his knees, and turned to Quinn. “You got any job openings down in Tibbehah County?”

  “Are you sure you’re qualified?” Quinn said. “You, sir, have perhaps less of a tolerance for bullshit than I do.”

  “Is it thick?”

  “Hell.” Quinn nodded, no expression on his face. “You can smell it all the way to Tupelo.”

  14

  “The toughest question I got asked by the judges was ‘Crissley, what makes you happy?’” Crissley said, twirling her hair. “It’s tough because so many things make me happy, Rick. Sunshine, seeing live music. Hanging out with my family and watching cheesy horror movies. Shopping with Daddy, even if Daddy can sometimes be a real horse’s butt about the way I dress.”

  “What’s wrong with the way you dress?” Wilcox asked, driving down Elvis Presley Boulevard behind the wheel of Crissley’s white BMW. The car smelled like leather and baby powder. She had a bubbly Taylor Swift CD playing on the stereo.

  “Daddy doesn’t like me to show too much leg,” she said. “Or when my boobies are all pushed up. He said it makes me look trashy.”

  “Daddy sure didn’t mind you strutting across that stage in a pink string bikini,” Wilcox said. “I’ve seen the pictures. What were you, sixteen? He was smiling and clapping in the front row.”

  “You don’t understand that world,” Crissley said. “The swimwear competition is a celebration of physical fitness. I hadn’t eaten anything but rice cakes for a week before I jumped in that bikini. When it was all over, I ate an entire pepperoni pizza from Domino’s.”

  Crissley had on yoga pants and a sports bra, her bleached-blonde hair in a ponytail, since they’d just left the gym. That’s where he’d met her, chatting her up at the squat rack, telling her that she had the best form he’d ever seen on a girl. And that’s when she told him about her platform at Miss Teen Mississippi, physical fitness. Now she says she would have won outright if she’d picked a sexier topic, like working with old folks or hunter safety.

  Wilcox passed Graceland on the left and all the construction for the welcome center and new hotel, no more riding the short bus across the street from that crappy strip mall. He looked at his watch, noting the time, keeping the speed limit, and headed two miles down the road for the Wing Machine.

  “Even though I didn’t win,” she said, “I won’t change what I said. I told the judges the most important thing for me was living by the Golden Rule, to treat others as you would like to be treated. My mom has always told me to go out in the world and let your light shine. Because if you radiate kindness and positive energy, you have the power to turn someone’s day around, and, in turn, it’ll come back to you. I really feel that way, Rick. You know me, I’m always so happy. Sometimes it’s hard for me to keep smiling. I smile so much sometimes it hurts.”

  “I like the Golden Rule,” Wilcox said, idling at a stoplight, checking the watch, timing the light, and punching it at the green. “I always do unto others before they do that shit unto me.”

  “That’s not exactly what I’m talking about, silly.”

  “I guess we’ve had different experiences,” Wilcox said, slowing down, knowing that the address would be coming up quick on the right. “I had a whole lot of folks want to exterminate me over the years. Bullets flying over your head will wipe a smile right off your face.”

  “I don’t know how you did it,” Crissley said. “Honest to God, I believe I’d pee myself.”

  “Sometimes you do,” Wilcox said. “At first. And then you stop caring.”

  “You stop caring about people trying to kill you?”

  “You stop caring about yourself,” he said.

  He glanced over at Crissley. She looked confused. But Crissley often looked confused, with that big, beautiful smile on her face. Wilcox grinned at her and winked.

  “Didn’t you care if you lived or died?”

  “I cared if my men lived or died,” he said. “That’s pretty much it. But if you care too much for yourself, your own safety, it’s all over.”

  Crissley didn’t answer. Wilcox saw the strip mall coming up on the right, the wing shop out front and a detail shop behind. A bunch of cars were being waxed and detailed in the parking lot, vintage sedans painted metallic blues and greens, one a flashy orange. Big silver rims, lots of bass shaking the windows, as he turned and moved toward the restaurant.

  “How’d you get through it?”

  “You just have to make your mind up that you’re already dead,” Wilcox said. “You think you’re going to die, but you keep moving ahead. You react from your training, try to think about the mission. Probably the worst of it for me was before you got into the shit. That would tear out your guts, but once you heard those AKs chattering away, you knew you were home.”

  Wilcox parked in front of the strip mall but let the motor keep on running. He checked the time and then his chiseled profile in the rearview mirror, still handsome as ever. When he turned to Crissley, he saw she was crying. Big tears running down her cheeks, black from all the mascara.

  “Don’t cry, baby,” he said. “You know what? I see things clearer now than ever before.”

  Crissley looked up, just now noticing where they’d stopped and parked. “What are we doing here?”

  “I want you to go inside,” he said, “and get a dozen wings to go.”

  “Since when do you eat chicken wings?”

  “I love chicken wings,” he said. “Good protein, after we lift. The spicier, the better. And, baby?”

  Crissley wiped her face and looked to him.

  “Look around and tell me if that joint has a back door. If you can, take a couple pics with your phone. Just be real cool about it. Tell them you’re a tourist coming to see Elvis’s pink Cadillac.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “You don’t need to,” Wilcox said, patting her leg. He leaned back in the driver’s seat, hitting the RECLINE button and shutting his eyes. “Just do it and wake me when you’re done.”

  • • •

  “How’s my sweet baby doing up there
in big, bad north Mississippi?” Buster White said in his unmistakable gravelly drawl.

  “Oh, you know,” Fannie said. Feet up on her desk, speaking into her toss-away cell. “Slinging cold Coors Light and warm cooze for lonely truckers. Raking it in and dishing it out.”

  “Fine, fine,” Mr. White said—always “Mr. White” since he stepped out of Angola running the show. “You know, you’ve always been a favorite of mine, Fannie. I look at you like I look on my own daughters.”

  “I do,” Fannie said, but thinking that she hoped he’d never asked his daughters to let him grab their titties. Which Mr. White had done one lonely night in his suite at the casino in Biloxi. “Just one,” the old man had said. “Let me just feel it, baby. Whoa! I could wear them things like a damn crazy hat.” Fannie just said, “I appreciate that.”

  “Ray tells me you’ve been helping him out with some real ass ache up in Memphis.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Buster White wouldn’t be Buster White if he ever spoke direct about a damn thing on the telephone. When you did a stretch as long as he did in the joint, you got a sly, casual way of talking in code, making sure what you said wouldn’t hold up in court even if a Fed was sitting right there in your office.

  “Well, we appreciate you, Fannie,” he said. “Ray’s filled me in some business up there in the piney woods. Sounds like you got some real Bible-thumpers crawling up your ass.”

  “They want to shut down Vienna’s,” Fannie said, seeing no reason to hide that fact. “The truck stop is still in play, although I’ve been asked to add Johnny Stagg’s famous chicken-fried steak back to the menu.”

  “Turning the screws to us.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Ray told me they didn’t want nothing in return.”

  “Far as I can tell, they want to shut down the girls and bulldoze the bar,” she said. “They’re going to stop drinking right off. That’ll cut me off at the damn knees.”

  “Mmm-hmm,” Mr. White said, voice sounding like he’d been gargling with rocks. “Clean up Tibbehah County. Damn, that’s a first. I knew some boys that used to bootleg up there in the sixties, right before things got wild up in McNairy County.”