“How long’s it going to take?”
“Soon as we’re back, I’m thinking a month? A month sound okay? And since he’ll be in on that part, it’ll be pretty smooth.”
Her hands on his skin were warm, a little sweaty, stung his “Baby Raper”. Girl’s got a worried mind, like in those blues songs. Maybe Led Zep. Breath on his ear was fingernails on a chalkboard. Lafitte rotated his head, felt his neck grind, then the cracking sound, gave him some relief.
He told her, “Okay. Okay. I think it’s best for the whole crew. But we can’t just out and out betray him, make it obvious. I’m not going to do that.”
“God, no, I’m with you.” Lips touched his ear. “It’s not about power or anything, but more, uh, what is it?”
“Security.”
“Yeah, sure. Security.”
“A little security sounds sweet to me right about now.”
She squeezed him to her. He didn’t cry out when the wounds she pressed bit into his nerves. It was okay. He was a thousand miles away already.
“Hey,” she whispered. “I wasn’t going to show you until later, but…” Kristal hopped off the bed, giggling. She bent across her bed and grabbed her package. Looked like the underwear all the college girls wore, with cartoons and colors and shit. She headed for the bathroom. “I’ll model for you. Be right back.”
Sure, that was okay. He was tired, hurt, and not at all feeling up to much, but she was a pretty little thing. And those toenails, painted a rusty red, goddamn, she knew what he liked.
*
Wasn’t more than fifteen minutes later that Lafitte found Steel God lounging poolside. It was indoors, heated. A peek outside the window showed gray shading everything. Might even have seen a snowflake or two. Across the pool, a couple of kids splashed around while their grandparents reclined, the woman reading a magazine and the husband napping.
Lafitte started to sit down beside Steel God, had to hold the waistband of his jeans to keep them from sliding off. Kristal had bought the baggy kind. Thought it would make him look cooler. Couldn’t wear his belt because of a bad bruise near his kidneys. Sucked in air as his muscles tightened in bad places.
Steel God said, “I dropped by a while ago, but heard some fine moaning from Kristal. Thought I’d better leave you to it. Something not working?”
“No, working fine. Just can’t go for too long. My body can only take so much. Overran the cup pretty quickly.”
Steel God laughed. Made the grandma look up. “Poor Kristal.”
“There’s always tomorrow night.” Not that she’d complained. Was sweet like those hookers you see in movies, helping a guy through his first time.
They sat listening to the splashing water, the sharp echo of the kids play-screaming, running around the pool with water guns, slipping a couple times, then up and on the run again.
Lafitte was thinking of telling Steel God all about Kristal’s real plan. Sad, really. To sic him on her would be brutal, but it would distract the big man enough so that Lafitte could get himself far enough down the road to quit worrying. If God had to choose between one guy and his whole empire, well, that was an easy one, right?
It was tough to imagine what Steel God would do to Kristal. She’d have to be taught a lesson. Did that mean handing her over to the boys in the MC? Brand her skin? Slice her face? Take off an arm? Or just kill her flat out? The leftover cop in Lafitte was hoping to think of a better option he could offer, but nothing came. It had been too long. The cop candle was close to burning itself out. Let Kristal take care of herself.
Lafitte cleared his throat, ready to throw the girl to the wolves, but Steel God spoke first.
“She tell you her grand plan?”
“Yeah. Mm-hm.”
“That one, I’m telling you, too smart for her own good. She would’ve been good on Survivor.”
“I’ve seen it a few times.”
“Good stuff. Between Trump and that one, I learned a lot about all the political shit.”
“Too smart for her own good, you say?”
Steel God shrugged. “She could have anything she wants, so what does she want? To lead my club. I don’t get it. Maybe just thirsty for attention. Can you imagine her in law school? She’d make partner like that.” He snapped his fingers. It echoed loud enough to shut up the kids for a few seconds.
Lafitte waited. Looked away. Then, “I told her she should try college.”
“Nah, she won’t. Girl’s scared she won’t be the best in the room. Scared of competition. That’s a damn shame, because she doesn’t understand that competition makes you sharper. Here, she knows she’s three steps ahead of the other women, five steps ahead of the guys, and about a step ahead of you and me.”
Lafitte grinned, turned back to God. “A whole step?”
The big man raised his eyebrows. “If it’s any more, then you’re in trouble.”
The grandmother kept peeking at Steel God from the corner of her eye. The big man was on it, too. Threw her a wink. The woman turned away, reached over and woke her husband.
He’d known all along. Lafitte should’ve expected it. That’s why he would suck as a leader. Kristal would rock, though. She’d learned from the best.
Steel God said, “It’ll be your club, you know. Your real family. I can teach you some, but the rest is your call. And when the time is right for me to pretend to make a comeback, I won’t give you any slack, but I will make it look good.”
“Wait, what do you mean?”
That big Steel God grin. “Kristal’s not going to want me back. Soon as she said ‘temporary’ and ‘for my health’ and all that bullshit, I got the message. Figured I might as well play along. What’s the point of coming to get you otherwise? Fuck, it’s time. If someone’s going to take over, it needs to be the one who doesn’t want to. That’s the only one who’ll do it right.”
“Oh, Jesus.” Lafitte spread his knees and bent over, tried to keep it all down.
“What’s that they say, ‘Only Nixon could go to China’? Or Reagan taking it to the Soviets? Or Kirk to the Klingons.”
“You knew and you’re going to let—”
“Goddamn, man, get yourself together.” Steel God smacked Lafitte’s shoulder, nearly sent him out of the chair, but that same hand gripped his shirt, held him up. “I either do it her way or I have to manufacture some other way to die. What, a bike wreck? No, man. You’re it. You’re the one going to kill me, and you’re going to take care of my people.”
Lafitte gripped the armrests of his chair, felt dizzy like he was in freefall.
Steel God kept going. “And if that little girl of yours thinks her plan worked the way she wanted, fine. I’d rather do this than, you know…”
If he had known about Kristal’s deal all along, did he also know Lafitte still wanted to run? How long do you have to live before you can read minds? Maybe that’s it. He’s really a fucking psychic masquerading as a biker.
Lafitte said, “I don’t want it. I was going to let you in on what Kristal was thinking. Then I was going to take off.”
He watched as Steel God turned his face towards the pool and slumped deep down in his chair. “Ungrateful little ass.”
“It’s my wife, man.”
“Your ex. Fucking ex. What do you expect, everything to go back to normal? You don’t get normal any more.”
Lafitte shrugged. “Then stop me. I’m calling your bluff.”
They sat quietly for another few minutes as the grandfather gathered the boys out of the pool, tossed towels on their backs, and ordered them back to the room. Big guy for an old man, like a former football player or something. Reminded Lafitte of his high school coach. The grandkids whined the whole way to the door until she said they were going for pizza.
“See,” Lafitte said. “It’s like…I know it’s a trap. Like, a bad one, too. But I can’t help it. You’ve seen the fish swim upstream to spawn and die? There it is. You’ve got your blaze of glory all planned out, and I’ve got
mine.”
“Why? Why like that? Call it a second life or something. I’m offering you a full-blown resurrection.”
“Aw, fuck no.” Lafitte stood. Had to work at standing steady. One sway and he was in the pool. “That ain’t nothing except being wanted twice as much for two different reasons. And, and, don’t forget the whole gang gunning for me, like some ‘King of the Mountain’ shit. Look at me right now! That’s what I get for even thinking about…”
He let that one go. Steel God didn’t even have to finish the thought: For even thinking about going back.
Under his breath: “Fuck it.”
Steel God grunted and pushed himself out of the chair. Slid behind Lafitte on his way to the door, said, “You want to run, I’ll be the one who calls the Feds on you. And I’ll find another guy to take over. Don’t think you’re special. You’re just the best I know so far.”
Left him standing there wobbly. Heavy bootsteps echoing on the tile. Each one like another brick laid on his tomb.
*
He waited. Waited until Kristal had gone to pick up dinner at a nearby taco joint. Until Steel God said, “Got to drop one” and locked himself in the bathroom.
Lafitte picked up the phone, tried to decipher the instructions for an outside line. He punched the right button and then had to remember the number. Or had it been changed? But why? They were the ones who had called Tordsen in the first place. They wanted to be reached, right? Even if the FBI put them up to it.
The number floated back. They always do. Along with it came his old home number in Gulfport, the name of his kids’ preschool, Ginny’s favorite perfume, her dress size, Ham’s favorite toys (the water guns, of course), Savannah’s giggle while she watched Sesame Street.
Fuck.
Almost didn’t dial the final two digits.
But how could he decide if he wanted to keep going or not unless he really knew?
He pressed the final two and listened to the ring. Maybe they wouldn’t be home. Then it was easy. Keep motoring south. Keep going. Consequences be damned. Keep on.
“Hello?”
Lafitte cleared his throat. “Mrs. Hoeck?”
Took her an extra breath to say, “Yes, it is.” Like he was a telemarketer or something.
“How is she? How are the kids?”
“Oh god.” Yeah, she recognized the voice now. “Billy.”
“How are they?”
He’d kept in touch with his ex-mother-in-law more than anyone else down there. Mrs. Hoeck was the only one willing to tell him the truth. She was Christian to the core, believed in forgiveness and all that. Even if it made her sick to do it, that’s who she was. She always told him, “You’re forgiven” like it chilled her blood and she had to let the Holy Ghost itself say those words for her because she damn well couldn’t on her own.
The woman said, “We have your son and daughter. They are both well, but they miss their mother. Children shouldn’t have to live like this.”
“Like what?”
“Ginny sliced her wrists. She’s alive, but maybe past the point…” She choked up. Took in a long breath. “She’ll need psychiatric care for a long time.”
“She’s stronger than that.”
Under her breath, “Help me, Jesus.” Then, “It’s you. They want you, so they wanted to use her. They sent that, that, agent. He wants to put her away.”
“That’s not on me,” Lafitte said, his voice upping a notch in volume. “He started it. I was clean.”
“You’ve never been clean, son. Turn yourself in so Ginny and your children will know where you are at night.”
“Doesn’t matter. I want to see them. I want to tell them everything’s going to be fine.”
“It’s not!” She had never raised her voice like that before. “You didn’t even listen. You can’t see Ginny. She’s being hospitalized. She won’t respond to anyone. She’s staring off, babbling, that’s what’s left of her. All because the…the damned government wanted to use her as bait.”
“But I can help—”
“And now I have to raise your children. Ham’s own mother has disowned him, and it’s a miracle she didn’t hurt Savannah. Tried to kill herself with the child in the next room.”
“No, wait.”
“You can’t help any more. You should have done that a long time ago, Billy. You can repent. Take your punishment, whatever it may be, but your spirit will be clean. For once, you’ll be clean.”
Trying to thump her Bible on him? After what he’d seen? That trip with Graham, that was his shot at redemption. Tried to take the high road with some wannabe terrorists only to find out they had neither high nor low roads, just one straight and narrow path to Allah. Mrs. Hoeck could take her Jesus Saves crap and…
“Just…listen. The kids. I can’t see…? No, you’re right.”
“If you turned yourself in, I would. I would bring your children to see you in jail, and you could explain to them how it’s right for you to be there because you’ve done something wrong. You’ve done wrong and realized it. I would make sure they were in your life then, absolutely.”
Lafitte felt goosebumps rise. “For real?”
“I give my word.”
He sat on the bed. The softest bed he’d been on in a long time. A cheap chain hotel, and he was thinking this mattress was a luxury. Jail bed wouldn’t be so soft. But he’d be someone’s dad again. Sleeping bag out on the highway, wherever you happen to land, something romantic about that. Getting colder up here, and they’d either retreat to Steel God’s cabins outside of Aberdeen, the three he’d built with his Dad’s help a handful of years back, or they’d go way down to Mexico, live cheap on the beach until it was time to migrate back, following the birds.
Lafitte said, “Would I get to see Ginny? You’d bring her?”
“Listen to me, son.”
“It would be nice to, you know. I’m trying here.”
“No, Billy, listen. It’s all well and good. We’re not going to make a deal. Do the smart thing here. The FBI tapped my phone because I told them I’m the one you would call. I’ve kept you on the line long enough for them to trace where you are.”
He closed his eyes. “That’s not fair.”
“You called me, remember.” Cold. The bitch never wavered—praying for you or cursing you, the bitch was ice.
“Shit.” He hung up. Sat there. Said it again. “Shit.”
The toilet flushed. The bathroom door opened almost simultaneously. Steel God’s stink flooded the room. Lafitte coughed.
Steel God said, “Who you talking to?”
A grin. “My mother-in-law.”
The big man’s eyes went wide. “Shit.”
“Yeah, shit.”
“Ain’t it weird how I put so much faith into such a stupid little prick like you?”
Couldn’t say anything to that. Something Lafitte had wondered on and off himself.
He said, “So?”
“Gotta get. If Kristal’s not here by the time we hit the parking lot, adios.”
Lafitte inhaled too much stink, coughed again and pulled his shirt collar over his nose. “What the hell, man?”
Steel God cupped his hands, tried to waft the current directly towards Lafitte. “You smelled ten times worse before I prettied you up in the bath.”
“We have to wait for Kristal. We leave her, she’ll spill everything she knows. That girl’s not taking one for the team.”
“Hot damn, that’s officer thinking.” Steel God turned to the wall-mounted mirror behind him, took a look. Got his face close, pulled down his bottom eyelids. “You going to be ready for this?”
“Ready for?”
“We have to get serious distance between us and here. You can handle it?”
Maybe not. Thought about seeing his kids again. Been so fucking long. Won’t get to teach his son to hunt, but he could tell the kid about girls. About staying in school. Make some serious money and avoid law enforcement at all costs. Tell Savannah all her f
uture dates needed to know her dad was, like, in the pen. Uh huh. Pull that one, some little teenage pecker will shrivel up. Or later, she might bring him a grandchild to look at one day.
And then see what happens if the Feds catch him and lock him up and waterboard him or whatever the hell they do any more, and that self-righteous bitch Hoeck reneges on her promise. She wouldn’t though.
But are you willing to risk it?
Lafitte figured he had less than ten minutes to choose.
THIRTY-FIVE
Muted TV, half-strength lights, too cold, a local uniformed cop at the door. Rome sat waiting for word on McKeown. Wheeled directly into surgery, one of the doctors telling Rome he couldn’t be optimistic beyond “We’ll do our best.” So they’d taken over a waiting room and were waiting, Wyatt out in the hall on the phone, Desiree off buying them both coffee, and Deputy Colleen huddled in a chair on the other side of the room, a magazine in her lap. But she hadn’t turned the page in a half hour.
Rome checked his watch. Yeah, a half hour. Like an eye blink in doctor time, he guessed. When you’re waiting, so much longer. He stood, paced a few steps, hands in his pockets. All coming to an end, it seemed. The whole chase, his whole reason for existing any more. Every non-Lafitte thought followed by one that brought him back onto center stage. What a shitty way to live. Dee had every goddamned right to be pissed enough to follow him across the country. And telling Colleen not to go all vigilante. That was it. The moment he could actually laugh at himself. Leave Lafitte to the pros. He had to take care of his wounded colleague first.
Walked across the floor to Colleen. She didn’t look up. Breathing kind of funny because of the bandage across her nose Rome had insisted she get once they got to the ER. Not ready to have her hand looked at yet, not until McKeown was out of danger.
“I was a little hard on you back there.”
“Mm.”
“And I am sorry about Nate. He was a good man.”
She shrugged. “Good cop.”
“He was that.”
Colleen plunked the magazine onto the empty seat next to her, leaned back, fingers fidgety on the armrests. “Thank you. I don’t feel like talking.”
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