by Matt Kincade
“Nuh-uh,” said Alex. “It ain’t gonna work like that.”
“To hell with that. I’m coming with you.”
“Look, you don’t know what you’re getting into. I’m gonna be up to my ass in alligators down there. Gonna be dangerous enough without me havin’ to babysit no civilian.”
“I think I just got a pretty damned good crash course on the world of vampires.” She gestured to the wound on her neck. “I know what I’m getting into. And I’m not a civilian, I’m a cop, remember? I’m not some delicate flower.”
“I don’t care if you’re fuckin’ Wonder Woman, if you ain’t a vampire hunter, you’re a civilian in my book.”
Carmen planted her fists on her hips. “I have a right, damn it! She’s my sister.”
He studied her for a moment, considering, then sighed. “This might get real ugly real fast. Think you’re ready for that?”
“I can handle it.”
Alex sighed again, and rubbed the bridge of his nose. “Okay. Let’s be real clear. I’m callin’ the shots. I say frog, you jump. I don’t want no whining, no backtalk, and I ain’t gonna have no time to go holdin’ your hand if you get upset when things get rough.”
Carmen crossed her arms. In a voice dripping with sarcasm, she said, “I’m a big girl.”
Alex paused for another few heartbeats. He shrugged. “All right then. Let’s get packed.”
***
He filled a duffel bag with supplies and set it on the front step. While Carmen waited, he entered the garage by the side door. A few minutes later, he drove a white SUV out the big garage door. He pulled around in front of the house and parked, leaving the engine running. Carmen got in the passenger seat. As Alex tossed the duffel bag into the back, he said, “Oh, one other thing.”
“What’s that?”
“Well, this here’s my hideout. You seem like a good person and all, but fact is, I just met you. So if y’all don’t mind…” he held out a bandanna.
Carmen rolled her eyes. “Whatever.” She tied on the blindfold.
***
Jacob saw the column of smoke rising lazily into the baby-blue sky long before he got to the house’s smoldering remains. His black Dodge Ram pickup jerked its way up the dirt driveway.
The man’s bulldog face was impassive, but beneath the sunglasses, his eyes glanced shrewdly left and right at the low-scrub desert all around. The pile of charred timbers that used to be the vampire’s house came into view as the truck rounded the last bend. Next to the smoking mess was Rafael’s black Mercedes and a rusted-out Ford Bronco.
The truck groaned to a stop. Jacob put a cowboy boot onto the chrome step rail and eased himself down from the cab. He wore a black leather jacket and blue jeans, a crisp black felt cowboy hat on his head. He took the hat off and ran a hand through thinning, gray-streaked hair, before replacing it on his head.
He looked around as his blunt fingers automatically pulled a cigarette from a pack of Marlboro Reds. He lit the smoke and held it in his mouth while he pulled a shotgun from behind the seat of his truck. Leaning the gun on his shoulder, he sauntered toward the smoldering house.
He slowly circled the remains of the house, occasionally poking at the ashes with the toe of his boot.
When he got to where the front door used to be, he knelt. Gingerly he pulled a spent shotgun casing out of the dust. He blew it off and put it in his jacket pocket. He found an empty wrapper for a piece of surgical gauze and noticed drops of dried blood on the concrete front steps. He pulled out his cell phone and took a picture of the mess of footprints all around the steps. He examined the prints then looked at his own sole for comparison. Definitely cowboy boots.
Jacob walked in a wider circle, methodically searching the ground. Three-quarters of the way around the wider circle, he ran across a set of tracks. He knelt again, bringing his face closer to the earth. The Bronco hadn’t come from the driveway. It had driven out of the desert and come to a hard stop. He looked up and saw the tracks receding into the low desert hills, saw the flattened, mangled bushes left in their wake. He eased himself standing again and whistled a low tune as he walked into the desert.
He found the hideout. With the shotgun’s barrel, he picked up the camouflage netting. He saw the sandy trough where the hunter had waited. A banana peel. A Snickers wrapper. He took more pictures. Walking back to the Bronco, he found the door unlocked. He rummaged through the trunk, the glove box, under the seats. The name on the registration was ‘James Burton’. He tucked the papers into his pocket.
At last he returned to his truck. He dialed a number on his cell. “Hey, it’s me,” he said. “I think I know why Rafael isn’t answering his phone. His house burned down. I don’t see a body here, but I got a feeling. Yeah. No, it doesn’t look like an accident. Looks like a hunter was here. I’m not exactly sure what went down. There’s a truck out here, but if it actually turns out to be registered to the guy we’re looking for, then I’m Buddy Holly. Yeah, you think? I’m working on it.”
He slipped the phone into his pocket. The last things he noticed were the divots from where a third car had peeled out in the dirt driveway. After one final look around, he stowed the shotgun and hauled himself up into the cab of his truck.
Chapter Five
Alex cranked the wheel over hard and hit the gas. The tires chirped as the SUV swerved onto the on-ramp of I-19 southbound. “All right, you can take off the blindfold.”
Carmen removed the bandanna and looked over. Alex was driving one handed while the other fiddled with his iPod.
She cringed. “Jesus, watch the road!”
“Huh? Oh.” Alex glanced up and swerved out of the way of an oncoming semi. He looked back down at the iPod. “You like Jerry Lee Lewis?”
“What?” Carmen clutched the passenger handle, the other hand braced against the seat.
“Jerry Lee! Damn, woman, you live in a cave or something? I mean, he ain’t Elvis or nothin’, but you musta heard of him!”
Carmen nodded, still nervously watching the road. “Uh, yeah, they made a movie about him. The piano player, right?”
Alex leaned back in his seat, his tattered white cowboy hat down low over his eyes. “Honey, the man was a piano god. I mean, The Killer had fire, you know?” He hit the “play” button. The cab filled with the sound of Jerry Lee pounding out the frenetic opening riff of “Mean Woman Blues.” Alex nearly bounced out of his seat, shaking to the music and drumming his fingers on the hard plastic steering wheel.
Carmen looked over at him. His face twisted into an ecstatic grimace as he shook his head from side to side in time with the four-by-four beat.
“Goddamn the man can play!” He let out a cowboy whoop. “This is some driving music here!” He looked over at her. “How can you just sit there like that? Don’t this make you wanna move?”
Carmen shrugged, watching the low sandy hills and desert scrub pass beneath a cloudless blue sky. “Not in the mood for dancing.”
“Aw, c’mon on. Tell me this don’t make your feet wanna move.”
She smiled a little. “It’s got a beat. I’ll admit that.”
Jerry Lee Lewis wrapped up, and the vocal harmony of “Little Bitty Pretty One” started up.
“Nineteen fifty-seven, Aladdin records,” said Alex. “Maybe a dozen different bands did this song, but Thurston Harris was always my favorite. ’Course, the Clyde McPhatter version ain’t half bad neither. Good Lord,” Alex grinned, tapping his fingers in time, “that’s music.”
Watching him, Carmen smiled again despite herself.
“Rock ‘n’ roll, that was real music. I tell you what,” Alex said, all the while drumming on the steering wheel and the dashboard. “Started when Truman dropped the bomb and ended when the Beatles dropped acid. Best music ever made.”
Leaning against the doorframe, her long, dark hair tossed by the hot breeze, Carmen sat with her knees up on the dash and watched Alex. He glanced over and flashed her his lopsided smile.
“
Why do you do this?” she asked.
He met her smoky eyes for a moment, then looked back at the road. “I don’t follow.”
“This. You know. Kill…kill vampires.”
Alex laughed. “So now you believe in vampires?”
Carmen shrugged. “I don’t know. I guess I need to see a little more proof.” She picked at the sun-crumbled dashboard with her pinkie nail. “And you didn’t answer my question.”
He thought about it for a minute. “Same reason everybody else does, I guess,” he said. His expression darkened slightly. “They hurt me. I hurt them back.”
“Care to be a little more specific?”
“No. No, I do not.” He looked away from her then, out the driver’s-side window. The desert rushed by outside.
“What did you do before this?”
“Little of this, little of that.”
“Like what?”
“What are you, writin’ a book?”
She gave him a crooked smile. “I’m just curious.”
Alex was silent for a half mile or more. The iPod switched to Johnny Cash’s “The Mercy Seat.”
“I hurt people,” he said, finally. “I worked for bad people and did bad things.”
“What kind of bad things?”
He sighed, and was silent for another half-minute. “You know, like when you owe money to the wrong folks, and you don’t wanna be found, so then they send some fella out to find you and make sure that you pay up, or else they make you real sorry that you didn’t?”
“Okay,”
“Well, I was that fella.”
“Oh.” Carmen studied him for a quiet moment. He glanced out the driver’s side window again. “So,” she said, “what changed?”
In response, Alex turned up the radio and put his sunglasses on. The rest of their trip to the border passed in silence.
***
Other than the usual traffic, the border crossing went smoothly. A disinterested border guard looked at their passports, asked them a few questions, and waved them on through.
They cruised down the narrow streets of Ciudad Juárez, past signs advertising farmacias and gifts and food, buildings painted in bright pastel pinks and greens, as if to compensate for their shabby states.
Alex paid five dollars to park in a garage next to a Banamex. He and Carmen got out and locked the doors. “Let’s just wander a bit,” Alex said. “Play tourist. See what we can see.”
Carmen rolled her eyes. “I didn’t come down here to eat carnitas and go shopping.”
“Let’s just get the lay of the land first. We’ll ease into it a bit. Let’s get some food. Then we can go visit this El Ojo Negro and see what there is to see. We’ll just take it easy like. Besides, I’m about hungry enough to eat the north end of a southbound skunk.”
Carmen sighed. “Okay. Last time I was here, there was a great little place just down the street. Best tacos ever.”
“All right, now you’re talkin’.”
They wandered down the paved sidewalk, past tiny bodegas and racks packed with gaudy sombreros and piñatas. Young boys swarmed around, trying to sell them trinkets. Vendors hawked tacos and churros from brightly painted carts. Mariachi music filtered out to the sidewalk from within a restaurant. A man standing next to a food cart smiled and tipped his hat toward Carmen. Despite it all, there was a pallor, a feeling of apprehension that they both felt. It could be seen in people’s eyes, in their reactions to loud noises. The streets were emptier than they should have been; Carmen and Alex didn’t see any other tourists. As they walked by a line of bullet holes stitched into a wall and a suspicious-looking stain on the sidewalk, Alex commented, “Murder capitol of the world. Wonder why they don’t put that on the tourist brochures?”
“They probably murdered the guy who makes the brochures,” said Carmen.
An incredulous smile spread across Alex’s face. “Did I just hear a joke? Did miss Serious Sally just make a joke?”
Carmen shrugged. “I’ve had a bad week. I’m not a zombie.”
“Just needlin’ you a bit.” Alex looked around. “It’s a shame. This was a jumpin’ little town once.”
To their left, on the other side of a broad concrete trough that used to be the Rio Bravo, ran The Wall. Ten feet of corrugated steel topped with barbed wire, blocked off with concrete bollards, and covered in graffiti and lights and cameras.
Carmen looked over at the wall. “I hate that thing,” she said. “Why can’t people just go where they want? Why did Mia have to pay someone thousands of dollars to get from this side to that side, just to get a hundred feet north…”
Alex said nothing.
“A hundred feet,” she said. “All this trouble to get a hundred feet.”
Alex put a hand on her shoulder. She scowled and pulled away. “Goddamn it,” she said.
“I know,” he answered. “I’m sorry. C’mon. Let’s get some food.”
***
The restaurant was dark and cool, all white stucco and rounded doorways, with exposed wooden ceiling beams above. Mariachi music played in the background.
Alex tucked twenty American dollars under his empty plate and picked his hat up off the extra chair. “You weren’t joking. Those were some damn good tacos.” He ran a hand over his dirty-blonde hair and placed his hat on his head, then adjusted the brim to the correct angle. “Okay, let’s get to work.”
“How do you want to play this?” asked Carmen, as they left the restaurant and headed toward El Ojo Negro.
“You got Mia’s picture?” he asked. She fished the photo out of her wallet and handed it to him. “Well, let’s just go on in and order some cervezas. Maybe a little cash will jog the bartender’s memory. Besides, I could use a beer. Past that, we’ll just play it by ear.”
The bar had an ugly, scarred green door with a metal push plate. Alex pushed it open and stepped inside, with Carmen on his heels.
Neon signs glowed in the darkness, advertising Tecate, Corona, Budweiser. Beneath them were rows of shabby booths and equally shabby people. The floor was bare concrete. Through the haze of smoke, men and women watched the two newcomers enter their domain. The place smelled like sweat and cigarettes and stale beer. Next to the pool table, a grizzled old hombre in a leather vest glared while he ground a blue cube of chalk on his cue. The men in the room tracked Carmen’s every move as she followed Alex to the bar. Alex plopped down on a wooden bar stool, and Carmen took the stool next to him. Somebody whistled, but Carmen didn’t respond. The bartender nodded in their direction.
“Dos Modelos,” said Alex.
The bartender slid two bottles in front of them. Alex took a long pull from his beer and engaged the bartender in idle chat. Finally he slid the photo of Carmen’s sister out of his shirt pocket. He laid it on the bar.
“La has visto?”
The bartender looked at the picture for a moment then shook his head. “No se.”
Alex slid a wad of bills across the counter. “Estas seguro?”
The man at the pool table with the ponytail and the leather vest noticed the money and sidled up to the bar.
“Sí,” said the bartender. He took the money. “Seguro. No la he visto.”
Alex nodded. “Conoces a Lupe?”
The bartender flinched. For just a second, Alex saw fear in his eyes. “No. No lo conozco.” The bartender slipped the cash into the pocket of his worn khakis. He abruptly turned away and busied himself wiping down the other end of the bar.
The man in the leather vest leaned against the bar next to Alex. He grinned. “Hey, rich gringo, you giving out money?”
Alex grinned back and lifted his beer. “Que tal, amigo?” he said with a terrible accent.
“Buy me a beer, rich gringo.”
Alex laughed. “Well, sure, por qué no?” He turned on his stool. “Why don’t I get one for everyone!” He waved the bartender over with another bill. “Cervezas para todos!”
The vague threat permeating the room vanished like a magician’
s coin. A cheer went up. Alex instantly made twenty new friends.
Graciously dealing with his newfound fame, Alex noticed the bartender typing something into a cell phone. He leaned over to Carmen. “Darlin’, I think things might get a mite ugly here real soon. Would you be a doll and go get the car?” She started to protest, but he cut her off. “Remember what I said? I’m callin’ the shots. This ain’t nothin’ I can’t handle on my own, so don’t you worry. But we might want to leave in a real hurry. So go on now, git.” Carmen almost said something else, but then she slid off her seat and out the door.
The party continued unabated. Someone dropped some coins in the jukebox. Norte music blared, all guitars and accordions and brass. Alex amused himself with his new friends, leaning on the bar and sipping his beer.
As quickly as it had started, the party stopped. The door banged open. Every head in the room turned to look. As one, the patrons of El Ojo Negro froze, the merriment draining from their faces. At the same moment, the jukebox ran out of money. Silence descended. Alex twisted around on his barstool to see what everyone was looking at.
The man in the doorway wore jeans and a sharp-collared button-up shirt with a bolo tie. Mirrored sunglasses and a broad black mustache obscured his face. Deep pockmarks scarred his cheeks. Behind him stood three muscled young toughs in T-shirts.
Alex grinned and raised his beer glass, the picture of the dumb gringo. “Hola, amigos!”
The man in the doorway wasn’t amused. He glanced around the bar as the other patrons did their best to melt into the walls.
“Is this the gringo that was asking about Lupe?” he said to the bartender.
“Yeah…sí, that was me,” said Alex, with a drunken slur. He slipped a bit and almost fell off his stool. “You know him?”
“I am him.” Lupe walked into the bar, each step punctuated by the click of cowboy boots on the bare floor.
As he approached Alex, his thugs circled around. Alex leaned against the bar, grinning idiotically. “Well, thass fantastic! I wanna ask you a question’r two.” He waved his finger around. “Lemme boy you buys…buy you boys a drink.”