“Who the fuck is you?” Echo’s voice blasted through the phone. “Not a word in two years and now you yelling demands?”
The Judge took a deep breath. You need a favor, a big one. Ease up. “I know, Echo, and I have no excuses other than being selfish. But right now, I’m deep and I—” He hesitated. Was going to toss him some line about needing the best of the best. But Echo wasn’t stupid, not even close. That was what had attracted the Judge to him. “I’ve got nowhere else to turn.”
“That’s killing you, ain’t it?”
“Echo, that was me. At Johnny’s.”
“Yeah, huh?”
“At Johnny’s...yeah. Now open the doors, you fucking smokehound.”
Echo chuckled. “That’s the Judge I know. Scanner said a truck was on fire.”
“Goddamnit, that’s my truck. It’s on fire. And I’m coming so you better have an open bay.”
Echo breathed angry. “Son of a bitch. Bean’s coming. He’s bringing us a shitmess, too. Open the doors.”
Just in time, too. The Judge fought the truck through a last turn, felt the thing slide across the gravel. The pavement was old and broken, cracked with years’ worth of forgotten potholes. The truck bounced and jumped and on the far edge of the road, the right side of the truck caught the shoulder and grabbed.
The truck teetered on the edge of the roadway and a hot wire of fear stabbed the Judge as the truck rocked back and forth.
You fall over now, you bastard, and you’re going straight to Texas Department of Criminal Justice.
Where he’d be met by how many mopes who’d stood before his bench over the years, who’d listened to him lecture them before sentencing them to five or ten or twenty years DOC? A shitpile lot of them, that’s how damned many, and it’d be ugly. They’d slice him up just to watch him bleed, then bandage him all up just to slice him again the next week.
So best keep your ass out of TDCJ.
The sirens, getting as loud as a bad country band, were like a shitty reminder to stay the hell outta prison.
Swallowing hard, the Judge eased the truck gently back to the faded center line. The trailer tipped, swayed, but came back down wheels against the road.
Ahead of him, the doors began to open. Slowly.
“Son of a bitch.”
He’d never get through, he was moving too fast. He’d tear at least one door off, maybe both. Echo’s giant doors, still the originals from the first trucking business in that location decades ago, seemed to be frozen in the west Texas heat.
“Open, damnit, open,” the Judge said, his voice a whisper.
Thump-thump-thump
But the doors mocked him.
“Come on...come on, you bastards.”
At four hundred, maybe five hundred, feet out, his balls began to shrivel. He yelled into the phone, still glued to his ear. “Echo...the doors.”
“They’re opening. Shut up, will ya?”
“They’re not.”
“They are!”
“They’re—”
“Shut the fuck up, you gassy old bastard!”
The Judge tossed the phone aside and jumped off the gas. Choked of fuel, the semi shuddered and the sudden deceleration banged Bean against the steering wheel.
“Open...open openopen.”
The truck barreled through the electrified chain link fence and stumbled over the cracked asphalt parking lot. One of Echo’s men dove out of the way, a red bandanna tied over his skull and flapping in the blast of air from the Judge’s truck.
When the truck was past, he ran back and banged the chain-link gates closed.
A pothole pulled the truck left, threw it back right. Bean hung on to the wheel, fighting to keep it straight and lined up with the doors. From across the passenger foot well, Echo’s voice split the air from the Judge’s phone.
The building loomed. In the shadows, a skinny Mexican kid had managed to get both doors mostly open. The truck hammered through them as it dove into the garage, knocking one backward until it bounced against the wall, came back, and bashed into the side of the trailer.
The Judge stood on the brakes, felt the tires leave behind lines of rubber like black coke.
Echo yelled. “Are you stupid? Don’t lock it up.”
The Mexican kid, goggle-eyed, crossed himself.
The tires screamed on the garage’s concrete floor. The Judge pounded the brakes, willing them to stop the thing before they crashed through the back wall. That wall, grimy bricks stained with grease and soot, towered over the truck.
“Shit shit shit,” Echo said.
The Mexican kid took off, his hat forgotten on the floor. He dashed through a door and disappeared as the trailer began to jack-knife. Still burning, the trailer slammed into empty oil barrels and sent them flying. Smoke, as black as Echo, filled the garage quickly, slashed the sunlight down to ragged shafts of smoke-hazed white.
Thump-thump-thump
Echo waved his arms, directing the Judge to park the damned thing.
Left, right. No, left again. No, no, right.
“The fuck is your problem?” Bean yelled out the cab’s window. “Stop this fucking truck.”
“This ain’t my fault, you grizzled son of a bitch. Don’t you wreck my garage.”
“That boat already sailed.”
Thump-thump-thump
The truck careened toward the back wall, slowing but still too fast. The Judge threw himself into the sleeper cab—
—Thump-thump-thump—
—And waited for a violent shower of bricks that would come down on his head like God’s own thunder.
Echo’s howl rose above everything.
“NooooooOOOOOOOO!”
8
Somehow, the hulking monster, tens of thousands of pounds of steel and plastic and lead and fluids and coffins and dope and rubber, that screamed and howled and fought against everything Bean tried to do—and on fucking fire, too!—stopped.
Suddenly, as though the hand of Mariana’s God came right the hell down and simply froze the thing.
The engine shuddered, died.
Inches from the wall.
Bean breathed slowly, vaguely surprised to still be alive.
No one moved, as though no one could quite believe it. Echo, eyes as wide as pie plates, stared at Bean. His men, black, brown, white, and all dirty, stood dead still.
The trailer kept burning, filling the garage with a thick smoke and the sweet stench of cannabis.
“Know that smell,” Echo said. “Judge? Toking a little? Druggin’ and drivin’ a bad way to go.” He inhaled hard. “So...yeah...my garage burns down? I’m killing everybody.”
Echo’s men jumped into business. Hoses appeared from nowhere, blasting water and foam. Two men slammed the garage doors closed. The summer sun snapped off as though someone had turned off a giant, plasma-screen TV.
“Get out, dumbshit,” Echo said.
“What?” Bean said. “Why?”
“’Cause the truck is on fire?”
Jumping down, Bean ran to the trailer. “Don’t worry about the fucking fire. Get that dope.”
“Your wagon’s full’a dope?”
“It’s in the trailer. What the hell’d you think?”
Echo laughed. “Thought that was just you sucking a big ol’ spliff.” He pointed to the trailer. “Says coffins, yo.”
“Echo...the dope?”
Most of Echo’s guys swarmed the burning trailer while a couple others continued to hose the fire. They tore through the smoldering coffins and bag after bag flew out. With every bag that plopped to the stained concrete floor, Echo’s eyes got brighter.
“Down, boy,” the Judge said.
“That a comment on my heritage?”
“On your heritage? I’m commenting on your big, black, weed-inspired boner.”
Echo snorted. “Fair enough.”
When the weed had been saved, all the men went back to the fire and had it out in just a few minutes. Heavy black smoke h
ung over everything and through the darkness, the Judge could hear men coughing violently, but still they worked. Near the far windows, a man went to a huge electric box on the far wall and cranked the handle down. Above them, four huge fan blades began swirling.
After a bit, the smoke began to clear, slowly disappearing into the roof.
“Just a thought, Echo,” Bean said. “But maybe blowing all that black smoke through that giant hole in the roof might tell law enforcement exactly where I am?”
Echo frowned. “Man gets hisself a black robe, thinks ever’body else is stupid.” He looked through the smoke. “Julio.” Echo pronounced it with a hard J. “Tell him.”
The skinny Mexican kid stepped up. “Fan’s set slow, don’t dump too much smoke too fast. We all good.”
The Judge frowned. “Other than having to breathe it because we can’t vent too quickly.”
“Motherfucker, you needed a place and you got a place.” Echo’s voice hardened. “I can just open the damned doors and let you drive on outta here.”
“I’m sorry, Echo.”
“Doing the damn best we can. Which not ever’body always does.”
Bean let that sit for a few seconds. “Need to dump smoke often, do you? And what happens when the fire marshal comes around, checking on exits and extinguishers, and smells a garage full of cannabis?”
Julio laughed. “Grease the wheels, no problem.”
“Damned system, corrupt as a three-dollar bill,” Bean said.
Echo laughed. “Corrupt system? Dude, you are the system, yo. Corrupt as they come. Drugs, guns, whores, murd—”
The Judge swiveled his gaze on Echo. “I don’t run prostitutes.”
Julio snickered. “Ain’t worried about no murder, but don’t wanna be down with whores.”
The Judge’s voice took on the texture of hot steel. “Every prostitute was someone’s daughter.” He stepped up to Julio, his six-three frame towering over a less-than-six Julio. “Do you hear me? Every prostitute had a mother or a father or a brother or sister. Do you understand?”
Julio’s eyes darted between Echo and the Judge.
“Do. You. Under. Stand?”
“Uh...yes...uh, yes, sir. I didn’t mean no offense.”
For a long moment, maybe forever, the Judge held Julio’s watery, baby-shit brown eyes. The man’s breath hesitated. Bean took another step, let his hand play subtly over his empty holster. He reveled in the little man’s quiver, and then hated himself for the cheap intimidation.
You treat him this way, Jeremiah? After he’s helped you?
Bean strode to where other men gathered the bags of weed. They collected every bag and packed them carefully into cardboard boxes. On the truck, men were emptying the coffins that hadn’t burned. After a few more minutes, the trailer was empty.
“Where are they taking my dope?”
“All yo smoke going on another set of wheels. Done and gone inside’a half hour.”
“Less what burned.” Bean rubbed his temple. Of two hundred and fifty coffins, maybe seventy-five had had burned completely or been tossed out the back during the drive.
“Not even two hundred. Son of a bitch.”
Echo shrugged. “Well...one hundred sixty, anyway.”
“What?”
“Twenty points.”
“Are you kidding me?”
“Wouldn’t kid a man about his dope. Damn sure wouldn’t kid a man about nearly burning down my garage and forcing me to get another truck ready to finish his delivery. You’ll get a bill for that truck, too. Time, mileage, wear and tear.”
“You listen to me, you—”
“All respect...you listen to me, you empty-holster wearing dumbass. I ain’t one of your clients. You see me standing up’a front of you pleading for help? I’m a businessman, yo.” He thumped his chest. “You dumped a shitload of crap onto my dinner plate. Cops are everywhere. You hear that?”
Echo jerked a thumb toward the office. Even in the crackle of the cooling metal and wood, and the bang and grunt of men moving coffins, the Judge heard it clearly. The scanner was still ablaze. Every one of those voices, the Judge knew, was looking for him. Not by name, though that was probably bound to come up eventually. They were looking for a burning truck and everyone who might have been involved in a shoot-out at Johnny’s.
“That truck is hot as a sick whore. I gotta figure a way to burn that thing and—”
“Burn my truck?”
“It rolls outta here and we all go down. Trailer’s burned, cab’s shot to shit. You think Barefield five-oh ain’t gonna notice?” Echo breathed deeply, stood tall. “So yeah, I’m gonna take me a little piece of whatever action you got left. I’m sorry that fucks you with whoever you shipping to—”
“Little Lenny.”
Echo’s eyes widened. His Adam’s Apple bobbed a few times. Eventually, he nodded. “Yo...Little Lenny, huh? Ever’body’s gotta be in bed with somebody, I guess.”
Bean nodded. “But it’s not personal, right? Just business.”
Echo cut his eyes toward the judge. “It’s exactly what you doing to those idiots down south. More to the point, it exactly what you taught me a’fore you left.”
Eventually, the Judge offered his hand. Hesitantly, Echo shook it.
“We good, yo?”
“We good, yo,” Bean said.
Echo blinked, surprised. “Uh...okay. Nothing quite like an old white boy slinging lingo.” The black man’s eyes lingered over the burned truck. “Wanna tell me?”
Bean sighed. “Well, there was an all-night poker game. Thought I might find it. You hear anything?”
“Come on, Judge, it’s me...Echo. I heard about it, I’d’a told you. Hell, I’d’a bought it and sent it to you gift-wrapped.”
Bean nodded.
“So a poker game...?”
“Yes. And then a package with a finger in it and a note that said—”
Echo cocked his head. “A finger? Yo, you into some weird shit, man.”
And over it all, Johnny’s death. The man had been a friend forever, longer even than Digger or Echo. The three of them had spent many a night at the honky-tonks and blues clubs up and down west Texas’ chitlin circuit.
I already miss you, Johnny. I’m so sorry for the mess I brought down on you.
Breathing steadily, trying to hold himself together, Bean stood as tall as he could and looked Echo straight in the eye. “Johnny’s dead.”
Echo’s jaw tightened.
Near the end, as Bean got the truck around a corner, Johnny had fallen. The barbeque man caught a bullet, who the hell knew from which gun, and there had been nothing but blood after that. Bean had no idea what happened to the detective or the customers. For all he knew, everyone had made it out alive.
Or no one had.
Have I killed again, Mariana? Are there more bodies at my feet?
You are a wise and terrible man, Jeremiah, and there will always be bodies at your feet. But not those.
I love you, Mariana.
Echo stared at Bean for a long while, then spit and walked into his office. He slammed the door, and through the window, Bean saw him sit heavily behind the desk, his head in his hands.
Julio came to the Judge. “Wa’ss the problem?” Julio was maybe twenty-one with a wisp of a mustache across his upper lip like a dirt stain. His eyes were washed-out and his skin was almost translucent it was so pale.
“Johnny was his cousin.”
The kid frowned. “Yeah? And Cousin Johnny’s dead?”
“Yes.”
The kid crossed himself. “Tough day. He die good?”
Bean licked his lips. “Not sure there is a good death.”
“Damn sure is. Good death...bad death. Makes all the difference.”
“To who?”
The kid nodded upward. “Big gangsta upstairs, man.” The kid shook his head as though clearing it of death and religion. “Soooo...we good? Price all worked?”
“Got something to write on?”
Julio stuck out a hand. The Judge quickly scribbled an address on the boy’s skin. “Five large if you get all of it there. One hundred and sixty coffins, twenty pounds per coffin. Thirty-two hundred pounds.”
Julio whistled. “Worth a helluva lot more than five G’s.”
“How much that bullet worth?” Bean asked.
“The one you’ll put in my head?”
“The one Little Lenny’ll put in your balls...and then work from there. It’ll take you a week to die.”
“Uh-huh.” Julio cocked a head toward Bean’s empty holster, then grinned. A gold-covered tooth winked. “Pay up, baby. ’S good as there.”
Bean shook his head. “Good as still sitting in the lot. You’ll get it through Echo.”
Julio frowned. “Echo take twenty.”
“If you’re the one, I’ll cover Echo’s points. One of Echo’s other mopes, I won’t.”
Without another word, Julio hopped in the truck, fired it up, and left the yard.
Bean stepped outside, looking for a lungful of fresh air. Though he still hear some sirens, most were silent now, as though Barefield PD had realized whoever they’d been chasing was already gone. It had been a major firefight, though, and a burning truck was missing and by now the cops knew it was a drug deal, courtesy of the weed strewn along the roads. Plus a beloved local businessman was dead. So now way was BPD going to give up just yet. Citizens would probably hear sirens well into the evening hours.
Beloved businessman. Dead. Johnny was gone and Bean thought maybe there would be one less star in the night sky tonight, maybe one less ray of sunshine tomorrow morning. Yeah, Johnny had a taste and ran stolens through his joint more than once, but he was still a favored son. Barefield’s power elite loved his food and as long as he served it hot and greasy, they’d let a moderate amount of bullshit pass.
“’Cause they’re hypocrites,” Bean said to no one. “Fucking Barefield elite, as shitty and low-life as the mopes who came through my court room.”
Be careful, Jeremiah. Everyone fails at one time or another. Everyone fails to live up to their own standards at least once...sometimes lots of times.
Death is Not Forever (Barefield Book Book 3) Page 4