by Glenn Trust
“Don’t.”
Startled, Budroe turned towards the voice he knew so well. George Mackey stood by the airplane’s tail, the Glock held loosely in his hand, pointed in Budroe’s general direction. He was battered and bruised. Bone showed through a deep gash on his right arm, forcing him to hold the pistol with his left hand. Budroe noted that although Mackey was bleeding, torn and injured, the Glock looked to be in good working order.
‘Son of a bitch. You made it, Mackey.” Budroe shook his head. “I shoulda checked you first. Just not real familiar with these things.” He motioned at the Cessna. “Upside down and all I forgot which side the pilot would be on.” He shook his head again. “Dumb mistake.”
“Drop the gun Budroe. You’re under arrest.” The gash in his arm burned, the salt water in his eyes burned, his bruised body ached, but Roy Budroe was in his sights and he was not going to get away. Not this time.
“Reckon you’re gonna have to prove it, George...that I’m under arrest. No one ever been able to prove it before.” Budroe smiled as he turned. “Besides, lookin’ at your condition, I think I have the advantage.”
George shook his head “Don’t count on it, Roy.”
Budroe smiled and kept talking. “Man’s got to have an advantage, George. This ain’t Hollywood, the two of us walking down the street at each other, drawing, fair fight and all. Nope, this is life. Fuck the fair fight. A man’s got to have an advantage, and I been makin’ advantages for myself all my life…looks like I got one now.”
Peering through bleary, burning eyes George shook his head to clear them. Drops of water flung from his hair sparkled in the sunlight.
The moment had come. The big Colt in Budroe’s hand rose. The smile on his face widened. The beginnings of one of his deep, sneering laughs rumbled down in his gut.
Three sharp, cracking explosions filled the sultry Atlantic air.
Terns foraging in the wet sand skittered away. Two brown pelicans floating in the waves offshore lifted ponderously into the sky. Roy Budroe crumpled into the surf.
There was no drama to it, no flinging backwards to splash noisily in the shallows, no hand clutched at his chest in theatrical death throes. He was right, this wasn’t Hollywood.
Roy Budroe dropped suddenly and silently into the shallow water, a dead two hundred and fifty pound sack of meat. There was no word or a sound, just three nine-millimeter holes punched through his chest and a small, rippling splash moving in concentric circles away from the body face down in the knee-deep surf.
Slogging painfully through the wet sand and low receding breakers, George made his way to Rince, unconscious, upside down in his seat. He pulled at the Cessna’s door. It didn’t budge. He pulled again and fell backwards into the water, his strength failing now from the trauma and loss of blood.
“Let me help.”
George rose to his knees in the water, breathless and spent, leaning against the plane. He nodded and managed a whisper. “Help him.”
Merle Turner reached down and pulled the deputy’s good arm until he had him out of the water, lying on the sand. George lifted himself and nodded weakly at the plane before falling back. “Rince…the pilot. Gotta get him out.”
“I know. I’ll get him. You stay here.”
He tried to watch as the helicopter pilot worked at the door, prying it open with a piece of metal from the wreckage. The effort to lift his head a few inches required more energy than his weakened body could muster. He fell back. The wet sand was cool and soothing. He stared at the sky, breathing deeply.
A gull flew overhead, across his field of vision. It was bright white against the deep blue sky. It squawked loudly, annoyed at the presence of the intruders on its deserted stretch of beach.
Just before everything went dark and the loud rushing sound filled his ears, George smiled through the fog in his brain. Calm down old gull. It’s over…ended.
103. Epilogue
"Nice landing."
Johnny Rincefield's blurry eyes fluttered open and roamed around the room trying to focus on the speaker. After a minute, they found George and Sharon sitting beside the bed in plastic hospital chairs. Heavy bandages covered George's right arm. Eyes wet and misty with concern, Sharon smiled.
"What happened?"
George nodded. "It's done."
Rince’s brow furrowed, confused for a second, then he returned the nod, understanding. After a moment, he smiled. "Good. I can't keep crashing planes like that." He closed his eyes. "Where am I?"
"Hospital. Savannah." George's leaned close. "Reckon you're not as hard-headed as we all thought. Bouncing around the inside of that plane like a pinball, you ended up with a concussion. Doctor said there's some swelling on the brain."
Sharon reached out and lay her fingers gently on his bare arm, waiting for him to open his eyes again. "Thank you."
Rince's brow puckered, concentrating on her words, trying to understand.
"For bringing George back to me. For keeping your promise."
He nodded and closed his eyes again. "Welcome."
*****
“What the fuck.” Stu Taggert cruised by the lot at Pete’s Place without stopping.
Yellow crime scene tape surrounded the building and parking lot. Plywood was nailed over the windows shattered in the exchange of gunfire with the Pickham County Sheriff’s Department. A single deputy parked in the lot looked up from a report he was writing eyeballing Taggert as he drove by.
He was about to keep going and make the turn towards the interstate when he saw biker girl, Brenda, come out of a room across the street at the StarLite Motel. He pulled into the lot and across the gravel to where she stood outside her room.
“What’s up Stuie?” Brenda smiled, sipped from the styrofoam cup of motel coffee and made a sour face. “Shitty coffee.”
“What the hell happened?” Taggert looked into his rearview mirror, watching the deputy across the road at Pete’s.
“They wanted a war.” Brenda shrugged. “They got their goddamned war.”
“How? When?”
“Two nights ago. Budroe hit the sheriff, blew him up in his car or something. Went after that big deputy, Mackey’s woman. Killed the old man they lived with. Plan was to draw the sheriff’s boys out here and finish them off.” She sipped her coffee. “Plan didn’t work.”
“You mean…”
“I mean that son of a bitch, Bono, or whatever his real name is, and that redneck that hit on me…they was cops all along…undercover or some shit…like Serpico. They took everyone by surprise. Stopped the war.”
“I’ll be a son of a bitch.” Taggert shook his head in disbelief. “You?”
“They questioned me. They don’t have nothin’ on me. No proof of anything. Besides, I was over here in my room when everything went down. Big Luke sent me away that night, said I didn’t need to be around.” She smiled. “That was nice of him.”
“The rest?”
“Coolin’ their asses in the Pickham County jail. Gonna be hard for them to make bail. Attempted murder of the cops…that don’t sit too good with the judge down here.”
“I’ll be damned.”
“Yeah.” She looked hard at him. “And you? You missed all the action. Where you been?”
“Florida, pickin’ up Budroe’s share from the dealers down in Campo.”
“Yeah, well, he won’t be needin’ his share.”
“What?”
“Budroe. There ain’t no Budroe anymore. That Mackey killed him.”
Son of a bitch. Budroe dead. Schulls, Luke, all of them in jail. Stu Taggert was suddenly a free man again.
“How much?”
“What?” He turned his head to look at Brenda.
“How much? The payoff you collected.”
“Little over ten thousand.”
Brenda opened the car door and sat down. “That’s a good start.” She smiled. “Let’s go, partner.”
“Huh?”
“Let’s go. Seems like we’re the
only ones left.” She nodded at the deputy working on his report across the road at Pete’s Place. “Unless you want to go over there and turn yourself and that ten thousand in…let’s go.”
She was wearing blue jeans and a tight tank top, reminding him of the morning he met her at the rest area on I-95. He’d looked at her ass and tits while he watched the sunrise. He smiled at the memory.
Yeah…and then she pulled a gun on him, threatened to shoot him. Yeah…but she didn’t. Stu Taggert shrugged and put the car in gear, pulling slowly from the StarLite, headed towards the interstate. Life is fucking weird, he thought, as they left Pete’s Place and Roydon behind. Fucking weird.
*****
The minivan hummed along I-10, the windows down and the radio turned up. Rich, wet earthy scents rose up from the Louisiana bayous, flooding the vehicle's interior and surrounding the two occupants. A cell phone on the console between the seats lit up and began chiming.
"Who's that?" Lonna MacIntyre looked down at the phone.
Vernon Taft gave it a quick glance. "My sister." He reached for the phone and tossed it from the window. "She wants her van back."
A semi-rig passing the old van gave a blow on its air horn as the big tires ground the plastic and circuitry to black dust on the concrete pavement. So much for the phone's indestructible hard case.
"What the hell you do that for?"
"Don't wanna talk to her." Vernon shrugged. "Besides, we don't need no one trying to track us through our cell phone. Cops do that all the time." He looked at Lonna. "So do some others."
"You mean..." Her face paled slightly and her hand nervously flipped a strand of hair away from her eyes. "He's dead...right?"
Looking straight ahead, Taft's head rose up and down in a single, firm nod of agreement. "Roy Budroe is deader'n shit." He turned toward Lonna. "He's got friends...them Mexicans or Cubans or whatever the hell they was."
"You think they'll come after us?"
"Don't know, but we ain't waitin' around to find out."
Lonna leaned her head against the window and stared at the passing greenery, bayous, swamps, woods, an occasional farm field. When they crossed into Texas, the landscape opened up some and she drifted off to sleep.
Lonna MacIntyre, former whore and right-hand woman to crime boss Roy Budroe, and Vernon Taft, former drug runner and full-time loser teamed up again, running the interstates, as they had in the eighties. Only now, they ran for their lives, or at least thought they might be, and they weren’t taking any chances.
They did not know that Ramon Guzman and Armando Soto had absolutely no interest in their whereabouts. Budroe's former associates from Pickham County were even less interested in them.
Rounded up at Pete's Place along with Henry Schulls, Big Luke McCrory and their small army of bikers, Lonna had been released after a night in jail. There was no evidence that she had participated in the attempted attack on the deputies. It also helped that George Mackey had put in a good word for her.
The others had problems of their own. Locked up in the county jail, they tried without much success to convince a judge that they were not flight risks so they could make bail while awaiting their own trials. The status of Vernon and Lonna did not even register as a minute blip of concern in their limited and preoccupied minds.
I-10 took them through Houston and San Antonio and then exited the great state of Texas after passing through El Paso. Lonna checked off their location on the gas station map unfolded on her lap. From El Paso, the interstate jogged up to Las Cruces, over to Tucson, up again to Phoenix and then crossed into California. They drove until there was nowhere else to drive.
After three days, making their way along I-10 from the Atlantic to the Pacific, Vernon parked the minivan on the curb in Santa Monica. They stepped out into the California sunshine with just over five hundred dollars between them, no jobs, no contacts, no prospects. For the first time since they were young, not much more than teenagers, Vernon reached out his hand. It almost surprised him when Lonna put hers in his with a smile.
Without speaking, they crossed Ocean Avenue, walking through the grassy park and then out to the Santa Monica Pier. At the end of the pier, behind the Bait and Tackle Shop they stood at the rail looking out over the Pacific Ocean. They had gone as far as they could go.
*****
"So, he is dead?"
"So say the American newspapers. I believe they are truthful. Roy Budroe is dead."
"Killed by the one he blamed for his troubles? The deputy?"
"Yes." Ramón Guzman watched Marques Peña closely. Armando Soto at his side remained silent.
They sat in the lobby bar of Soto's hotel looking out over the harbor and the Gulf of Paria beyond. A mere fifty kilometers or so across the water was the South American mainland, Venezuela. Trinidad's location and proximity to South America and Eduardo Rivera's expanded distribution network made the island the choice for their headquarters. From there, they could export women, girls, boys and drugs around the world, thanks to the blind eyes of the Venezuelans, willing to look the other way as long as they were compensated.
They sipped their drinks in silence, contemplating the water and the deepening color of the sunset. Just as the colors flashed orange and red rays through the tall cumulus clouds on the horizon, Peña spoke.
"You left without giving any warning as to your plans." For a moment, his eyes flashed. "I might have been arrested."
"Yes, I know. It was regrettable, but I was forced to act in that manner." Guzman nodded somberly. “By you.” He raised his eyes, studying the two men seated nearby.
Colonel Enrique Valdes and another of his soldiers sat watching Peña, Guzman and Soto, waiting for some signal from their genérale. Nearby at another table, two of Soto's men also watched the proceedings. They too waited for a signal or threatening action. The North Americans would have called the scene a 'Mexican standoff' in one of their westerns.
Guzman dropped his gaze to look into Peña’s eyes. "You told me yourself that you would honor your contract with Budroe, that you would do what you must to protect him. It seemed that any notice I gave you would force you to honor your contract and act on behalf of Budroe." Guzman lowered his head in a bow. "You have my apologies for any...difficulties...that events may have caused you. Such was not my intention." He raised his head again to look calmly into Peña’s icy face. "I trust that we may be able to put these things behind us and move forward...in everyone's best interests."
Seated to Guzman's right, Armando Soto watched the exchange. It was the moment of truth. There would be peace between them and a mutually beneficial business arrangement, or he would signal his men to eliminate the threat. Armando Soto was a man of action and the action would be immediate, if required. Peña and his men would disappear quietly into the waters of the Gulf. The sharks would leave no evidence.
A minute passed before Peña turned his eyes from the boats moving through the harbor and spoke. "I suppose there is truth in what you say. In your position, I would have acted in much the same fashion." The icy stare was back. "As long as we understand that there must not be a recurrence of such a failure to communicate. There will be trust between us...or war. It is your choice."
"Agreed." Guzman nodded and extended a hand. "There will be trust between us." He smiled. "And profit."
Peña lifted his arm and returned the handshake, sealing their agreement. Then turning his head slightly, he nodded to Valdes.
The Colonel and his man stood and walked from the lobby lounge followed by four others who had been stationed at the bar. Soto nodded appreciatively. Marques Peña was a man who came prepared for all eventualities. That was a good thing to know...now that they were partners.
*****
"So, where's the confidential informant?" Colton Swain stared at Richard Klineman.
"Uhmm...we're not sure...we..." Klineman looked steadfastly at the floor, terrified to raise his eyes and meet the attorney general's fiery gaze.
"We! Who
the hell is we?" Swain slammed a fist down on his desk. "You said you had an informant who would tie Mackey to Budroe! Where the fuck is he Dick?"
"Well...uh...the best I can ..."
"Stop your fucking stammering. Spit it out!"
"He left."
"Left? Left to go where?"
Klineman took a deep breath. "I don't know. When Budroe was killed, he disappeared...in fear for his life." Yeah, in fear for his life. That sounded good. It might work; take some of the heat off. He dared a glance into Swain's eyes and then jerked his eyes back down at the floor. It wasn't working.
"So Mackey takes out Budroe, a major crime boss and now he is a hero all over again, and the one thing that could have sealed this case up, the confidential informant testifying that Mackey was on Budroe's payroll, that informant has vanished."
It was a good summary of the situation. Klineman nodded.
"Jesus H. Christ, Dick! I don't know who's the bigger idiot, you, or me for letting you drag me into this." Swain threw his Mont Blanc pen onto his desk where it bounced on the mahogany and fell to the floor. "Get out."
Richard Klineman walked unsteadily through the door to the outer office where Swain's staff stifled their grins and laughter until he was in the hallway. He could hear the chatter and chuckles as he waited for the elevator.
Down on the street, he began walking. He wandered the streets of Atlanta until nightfall. He had nowhere to go.
*****
Hand in hand, Sharon and George walked through the field behind the barn. Fel Tobin was buried in a small family plot beside Colleen. Their graves sat at the far edge of the field under an oak. Deer came out every evening to graze the field and munch the acorns near the graves. Sharon said Fel would have liked that.
She clung to George's hand, and he to hers. It was their ritual. They would pay a visit to Fel and Colleen in the evenings as the sun lowered then return to the house and the porch, sitting in the old kitchen chairs beside the one that had been Fel's.