Like Lions

by Brian Panowich

  “I am talking to the man who took two high-powered rifle hits to the chest and lived to talk about it, right?”

  “Yeah, you are, but how many times can someone do that before it catches up to him?”

  “So you’re saying you’re turning into an old fart like me. Mortality is knocking and all that shit, right?”

  “No, Charles, I’m saying the first time I need to chase some peckerwood down into the woods for shoplifting from Pollard’s, I’m going to fall on my face and not be able to get up. That doesn’t really instill confidence in the people of McFalls County. You know what I mean?”

  “I suppose, but what if you didn’t have to chase down peckerwoods for shoplifting anymore?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean, what if you were working from an office instead?”

  “What are you getting at, Charles?”

  “I’m offering you a job, you dumb hillbilly.”

  “With the GBI?”

  “No, Clayton, at Walmart as a greeter. Yes, the GBI. We are hemorrhaging good men. Everyone we train up that’s worth his salt moves up the chain to a federal level. So a seasoned detective without the inclination to move anywhere could be seen as a real asset.”

  “You mean a detective who also happens to be a cripple.”

  “I mean a detective I could rely on who knows those mountains better than anyone else.”

  “I don’t know, Charles. Kate and I are just starting to sort things out, and you’re talking about relocation, and we have the baby, and—”

  “Say no more, buddy. I didn’t call to pressure you. I’m just putting it out there. You think on it. Maybe talk to Kate. Maybe down the road, if you want to hang up the sheriff’s hat and you need something else to focus on, you take me up on it.”

  “Thanks, Charles, but right now the only thing I need to be focused on is getting these flowers home to the wife.”

  “That’s a smart man. Only proves my point. So anyway, put a black BMW on your radar, tell your boy scouts to be looking out, and give me a shout if anything pops up.”

  “Will do, Charles.”

  “Okay. Take care of yourself, Clayton.”

  “You, too, Charles.”

  Clayton ended the call, and looked at the phone for a long while. Deddy would really be proud to know his baby boy was a G-man. He’d almost walked back to the Bronco with his hands tucked in his coat, almost forgetting to do what he’d come there to do. He scooped up the few bunches of firewheels he’d tossed back into the grass and slung them onto the seat of his truck. Tomorrow was another day, but today was a day for atonement. He held a hand over his eyes and looked up. The sun was at five o’clock. It was the perfect time to stop by Lucky’s for a drink. He knew when he got home he’d need to talk to Kate about her whereabouts the other night, and he was dreading it. A fight with the wife wasn’t what he wanted at all. He was hoping the flowers were a step in the right direction. He knew stopping down at Lucky’s Diner for a drink would be a definite step in the wrong direction. There was no way he was going to do that, no matter how good it sounded.

  19

  LUCKY’S DINER

  WAYMORE VALLEY TOWNSHIP

  Clayton stared at the red-and-white sign hanging above Lucky’s across the street from his office. The sign said, “Come on in...” and Clayton reckoned he would.

  He walked into the diner and crossed the dining room to the bar. Lucky’s was as he thought it might be at that time of day. The place served as a diner and Main Street’s largest eatery during the day, stationary bar stools, laminated menus, and plastic salt-and-pepper shakers on the tables, but it doubled as the town saloon after six p.m. every day of the week except Sunday. Nicole, the bartender, a beautiful little thing in her early twenties that most of the women in Waymore hated for being a beautiful little thing in her early twenties, was behind the bar making the transition. The lights were still bright and the shades were still up, but the tablecloths were already folded and put away. The menus were stuffed under the counter and cases of Bud Light and Yuengling were stacked on the bar about to be iced for the night. Two hunters sat at one of the tables eating an early dinner, a slim blonde woman drinking a glass of white wine sat at the bar, and another young man in a dirty orange T-shirt sat a few stools over chatting up Nicole as she cut up lemons and limes for cocktails she’d be making during the next few hours. She smiled and flirted with the boy with roofing tar under his nails as she tossed the wedges of fruit into small plastic containers she had lined up on the bar. Nicole sat the knife down on the cutting board when she saw Clayton plop down at the bar.

  “Hey, Sheriff, we eating or drinking our lunch today?”

  Clayton tried to smile, but his mood wouldn’t allow it.

  “Drinking it is.” Nicole poured a double bourbon neat and set it down in front of him. He looked at his reflection in the amber and hated his own face. That boy shouldn’t be dead. He could’ve stopped it. He could’ve stopped it a few days ago at Pollard’s instead of roughing him up like he did. “I’ll just take the one, Nicole.” He reached into his pocket for his wallet, but Nicole waved her hand.

  “Already started a tab, Sheriff. Your friend said she had it covered.”

  “What friend?”

  Nicole looked confused. “Um, her?” She pointed at the slender blonde with the glass of wine. “She said she was waiting to meet with you.”

  Clayton looked at the woman with bright blue eyes sitting a few stools over. She offered a polite wave.

  “I don’t know her.”

  “But I know you, Sheriff Burroughs,” the woman said. She picked up her glass and moved over to the stool next to Clayton.

  “Well, I doubt that.”

  “It’s true. I know all about you.”

  Clayton sipped his bourbon. “Then you know I’m married, right?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then what do you want?”

  Vanessa wiggled her glass in the air like a dinner bell, and Nicole brought her a fresh full one to replace it. “My name is Vanessa Viner.”

  “And?” Clayton hadn’t looked up from his drink since the first time he looked at her.

  “A few days ago, my nephew was killed up on Bull Mountain.”

  “And?” Clayton took another hard swallow. He did know the name Viner. Vanessa turned in her stool to face him.

  “And I believe you were the one who killed him.”

  20

  CRIPPLE CREEK ROAD

  Having guns pointed at him was something Clayton had grown used to in his past line of work, but having guns pointed at him by two men on his own front porch was something entirely different. Clayton instinctively swerved the Bronco to the left, placing as much U.S. steel between himself and the guns on his porch as possible and snatched his own rifle off the mount in between the seats. He was out and crouched behind the front quarter panel and ready to return fire before his brain had even caught up with what he was doing. A third man appeared in the doorway, a scarred man with a bushy beard that only covered the one half of his face. Clayton dropped his forehead to the warm metal of the fender well and exhaled. He felt relief wash over him, but he kept the rifle in place anyway. Scabby Mike swatted one of the men aiming at Clayton across the back of his head, knocking off his ratty baseball cap. Both men lowered their guns and sulked back to their assigned positions at the sides of the front door like scolded children.

  “Clayton,” Mike hollered. “My bad. They should’a been told about your truck.”

  Clayton stayed crouched and trained. “What the fuck is going on here? Where’s Kate?” Before Mike could answer, Kate appeared at the threshold. She held the hickory walking stick he kept by the front door, and used it to push past Mike and the men on the steps. Finally, with his wife in sight, and clearly safe, Clayton lowered his gun and stood. The furious pain in his hip shot down his leg like a length of rebar being shoved through his thigh all the way down to his kneecap. It brought a tear to his eye. He’d push
ed his physical limits too far today. When Kate made it out to him, she mistook his watery eye as a tear of worry for her. It softened her, and he let it. She smelled the whiskey stink on him from Lucky’s immediately, but she held back the lecture and hugged his neck regardless.

  “What the hell, Kate?” The rush of adrenaline in his blood allowed him to stand on his own, but he took the stick from her anyway.

  “Everything is okay, baby.”

  “Is it? Is that why Mike and two assholes with guns are on my front porch?”

  Kate wiped at the wetness on Clayton’s cheek, stroked his beard and kissed him, sweet and light, over and over. That softened him, but only a little.

  “He’ll explain everything,” she said. “Just come inside.”

  “Where’s Eben?”

  “He’s fine. He’s in his playpen waiting to see his deddy. Now come on.” Kate took Clayton’s hand and he slung his rifle across his back by the strap.

  “Hold on,” he said, and pushed the still-open door of the Bronco shut with the end of the hickory cane. He forgot all about the bunch of wild flowers that were now scattered all over the floorboards. He let Kate lead him inside, passing the two men on the porch. They were too embarrassed to hold Clayton’s eyes as he walked by. Scabby Mike followed the couple inside and stood in the foyer, his hat in hand. “Good to see you, Clayton.”

  “No offense, Mike, but maybe you want to start this conversation with something other than bullshit. Why didn’t you tell me about the kid you brought to the pond the other day? That he—that I—”

  “It’s not important, right now.”

  “Not important? Are you kidding? Mike, I—”

  “Did what you had to do to protect your family.”

  “I didn’t mean to kill him.”

  “C’mon, Clayton. What did you think was gonna happen?”

  “I’m not a murderer, Mike.”

  Mike didn’t argue any further. He knew it wasn’t him Clayton was trying to convince. Clayton turned to Kate to back him up, but he could see in her eyes that she wasn’t going to. He felt sick and stared at the floor.

  “Clayton, it’s okay.”

  He lifted his head back up to look at his wife. He expected to see disgust or fear in her eyes over what he’d done, but he didn’t. He just saw concern. Clayton could feel real tears swelling in his eyes now. “He was eighteen years old.”

  “How do you know that?” Mike said.

  “It doesn’t matter right now. What matters is another child is dead, and it’s my fault.”

  “He wasn’t no child, Clayton.”

  “Then what the hell was he?”

  “A threat.”

  Clayton just stood there. He stared at this man with the scars on his face who he’d come to know as his brother and didn’t recognize him at all. “Jesus Christ, Mike. Who are you? You knew that kid was dead, and you let me go through with that sit-down the other night anyway.”

  “He threatened your son.”

  “He was a kid.”

  “Stop saying that,” Kate said.

  “Why? He was. He was a kid, and I killed him. I took somebody’s life, and to top it off, I took a meeting with known criminals like I’m not the sheriff of this county.”

  “You’re a father first.”

  “Kate, he was just an innocent kid.”

  Kate came off the counter. “No, he wasn’t. He was a killer from a family of killers. That boy in there”—Kate pointed down the hall toward Eben’s room—“he’s an innocent kid, and you need to sit down and listen to what Mike has to say before he grows up to die in his underwear and a gas mask.”

  Clayton was slack jawed. He looked at Mike as if every cat had been let of the bag, but by the look in Mike’s eyes he knew there was more to come. He sucked up his guilt and tried to focus on why these men were at his house in the first place. Something must’ve happened. He slid his weight into one of the dining room chairs and relieved the pain in his leg. “Well, okay, then, what is going on?”

  Mike took a seat at the table and Kate followed suit. Mike took off his hat and tried to figure out where to start. “Okay, the boy at the pond. The robbery over at The Chute.”

  Kate winced. “The name of that place is disgusting.”

  Mike ignored her and kept going. “We believe it wasn’t just a random robbery. We think they were looking for something. Something a lot bigger than what they found.”

  “And what is that?” Clayton said, and scratched at his beard.

  “We think they were looking to find your brother’s money.”

  “What money?”

  Mike leaned back. “All right, let me back up. For the last few years, before the raids, long before you got shot, or before Halford put you in the position he did.”

  “To kill him, you mean? To kill my own brother.”

  “Yeah, I guess that’s what I mean. However you want to word it, before what happened, happened. Halford was, I don’t know, not handling things very well. He’d always been paranoid, a gift from your father, but toward the end there, with Hal, it was something more than that. He was acting bizarre. Sometimes I couldn’t understand the point behind some of the things he did.”

  “Well, no shit.”

  “Clayton, please, just hear me out.”

  “Fine. What do you mean bizarre?”

  “He—he just got weird on us sometimes.”

  “Weird how?”

  Mike conjured up an example. “Like a couple times he called us all out to the compound—to the table—in the middle of the night, or early morning sometimes, before sun up, just to count rounds of ammunition, or go over financials that everyone seemed to understand but him. He was talking to himself a lot. Sometimes right in front of us. It started right after your father died, and over time it just got worse. It got some folks doubting his ability to lead, and if he caught the smell of that doubt on any of ’em...”

  “He’d kill them. He’d kill his own people. You’re not telling me anything new here.”

  Mike suddenly looked tired and a bit ashamed as he spoke. “On that day, the day he attacked that girl in your office, the day you shot him, he killed a boy right in front of us, not even an hour earlier, right on his front porch. He shot the kid in the belly point blank with a shotgun. He told me to clean it up. I knew that kid. His name was Rabbit. He was a sketchy little shit, but he was loyal—stupid, but loyal. More importantly, that boy was born and raised not twenty minutes up the road from where we’re sitting right now.”

  “Jesus,” Kate said. “You and this boy were close?”

  Mike looked confused. “Well, no. Not really, but that ain’t the point. The point is, he was a good kid. Born on Bull Mountain. We being square or not don’t matter. He was one of ours, and Hal cut him in half, and then told me to clean up the mess like he was just a spilt beer or a turned-over shit-bucket. That’s when I knew it was all going to end. I just didn’t know at the time how badly.”

  Kate leaned back and crossed her arms. “And you wonder why in God’s name I question why you followed that psychopath?”

  “Because I loved that psychopath.” Mike’s voice hardened to match Kate’s. “He was my brother. Just like Buckley was. Just like Clayton is. You fight for your family. You don’t turn your back on them even when they get lost. You know that as well as I do. Halford was lost. It was my job to help him find his way back.” Mike picked up his hat and slapped it back on his head, pulling it down low over his brow. “But I failed. I failed him, and I’m living with that. I don’t want to fail you now, Clayton. I know you did what you had to do with Hal, and it’s over and done, but now we’re here.”

  “And where is that? And what does any of this have to do with that kid at the pond?”

  “Hal kept us liquid. We did everything with cash, but he never kept it in the same place. Something else he learned from his father. He had stashes all over this mountain, a lot of them, and I knew them all. At least I thought so. Back then, I was the o
nly one other than Hal himself who knew exactly where and how much money we actually had. When the raids started I figured the Feds would turn up most of it, but I was wrong. They only found what Hal left lying around. After the dust settled, the Feds stopped looking, and I was finally cleared of everything. So I checked all the stashes and they were all cleaned out—every one of them.”

  “How much?” Clayton asked.

  “A little over three and a half million, by my records.”

  “Jesus Christ. You’re here about money. I should’ve known.”

  “Just listen. Even the emergency cash that hadn’t been touched since your deddy’s day in the chair was gone. I just assumed Hal brokered something with Bracken and his boys, or had stepped up to using offshore banks because he didn’t even trust me anymore, but the Feds would have found something by now, and they haven’t. I think they just stopped looking. The million or so that they did find was a big win for them, so I think they’ve cashed out.”

  “Halford could’ve been burning it the last few years he was alive, if his mind was slipping like you say it was.”

  “I thought about that for a while, too, and the truth is, I wouldn’t have put it past him.”

  “But now you don’t believe that?”

  “Now I have new information.”

  “Tell me.”

  “Mark came to me shortly after he got here with something his grandfather, Ernest, told him.”

  “So he was already here?” Kate shot a confused look at Mike, and Clayton shot a confused look at her. He thought about the lie she told him about where she was the other night, but opted to stay silent.

  “You didn’t bring him here to help you find the money?”

  “No, Kate. He was already here, but I did bring him in on it after the fact. That’s the truth, ma’am.”

  Clayton moved them past the awkwardness of the moment. “So what did Ernest say?”

  “He said about three months before he died, Halford reached out to Ernest in the middle of the night—I told you he did that a lot—and had him clear out every stash on the mountain. Every dime. Asked him to bring it all to the compound. He told him it had to be done that night, and before sun up.”