All The Way Down

by DaveKearns

  "Your brother worked some of the same night shifts that Ray did," he said. "He was following Ray's truck onto the highway one night and saw Ray turn the wrong direction, towards Los Cruces. Brick kidded Ray about it later in the locker room, but Ray was a hothead and jumped Brick's shit. That was Ray's mistake. Brick got curious about what Ray was so pissed off about and started watching Ray's truck when they were on another night shift. I guess he followed Ray out here on the highway and he realized Ray was into some serious business."

  Bullard took another drag off his cigarette before exhaling hot smoke into the still air. "Well, apparently he found our little dumpsite here and staked it out. We move about a half ton of cocaine through here every two weeks, and when Brick told Ray that he had pictures of him picking up wetbacks in the desert, that was it. Even if Brick didn't know it was flake instead of Mexicans, we couldn't afford for him to blow the whistle on us.

  "Ray and Marty went by Brick's house and worked him over, but Brick wouldn't say where the pictures were. They brought him out to the quarry in his car, found an empty rig and put him inside. Then they rolled the thing over the edge. They thought that the wreck would hide the fact that they had tenderized him. You found those pictures, didn't you?" Bullard asked. "I want those, too."

  I didn’t say anything. He was halfway though his cigarette and seemed pleased with himself. He blew another cloud in my direction to remind me that he was in control.

  "When you showed up here the next day, Ray figured Brick had called you and told you what was going on before they got to him. Ray and Marty lost it and shot up your car that night. When Marty told me what he and Ray had done, and then the autopsy came back on your brother, I knew that those two had to go. I kept the heat off them for a while, but I knew that they were so careless eventually it would lead back to me, and there is no way in hell that I'm going to prison. Marty and Ray killed your brother all right," he said. "I squared that for you when I dropped the hammer on 'em. So we're all even if you think about it. Right?"

  He took another pull off his cigarette and continued. "The biggest fly left in the ointment is you. Every time I turn around you’re in the middle of the mess that Ray and Marty created. I thought your night in jail and the paint job I did on your house would have finally chased you back to Oklahoma City. But you just wouldn’t quit. I guess some people are too stupid to know when they’re in over their head. Come to think of it, when I’m done here I might go back up to Cloudcroft and finish what I started with the dog. Your girlfriend isn’t bad-looking, by the way."

  He took another pull off his cigarette and continued. "I've got to tell you though. You gave me a hell of a shock leaving Ray in my driveway. When you called and said you were Marty, I about messed my shorts."

  I saw something move in the darkness behind Bullard.

  "I wondered what the smell was," I said. Bullard ignored me. He was inside himself, spinning his tale like I was supposed to be impressed by what he had been involved in. I shifted my weight to the other foot. My left arm felt as if it were tearing itself free of the socket again.

  He took a final drag from the cigarette, exhaled, and flicked the butt in my direction. The butt hit the side of the van about a foot from my head and sparks flew. One of the embers popped against the side of my face and stayed there. I pressed my cheek against my shoulder to put it out, but the burn made my eyes water before I could get it stopped.

  "Now," Bullard said. "And for the last time, where did you put the money?"

  "Go to hell," I said. Sandy must have finally heard enough because she stepped out of the darkness soundlessly and took a position a dozen paces behind Bullard.

  "We had a deal," he said. "I told you what you wanted to know. Now you're going to talk. You're going to tell where you put the money and the pictures, and how you found this place. You don't tell me, you're dead. I'm through playing games."

  I saw Sandy coming in close while Bullard was talking, and at first I thought she was going to blow Bullard's head off. She was only a few paces behind him and had her gun aimed at his head. Then she aimed the pistol up in the air before pulling the trigger.

  Bullard jerked from the sound of the gunshot as if he had been slapped. She gave him a fast kick to the back of his right knee, and he went down with a yell. I caught a glimpse of his face when his knees hit the ground and the expression was pure amazement and fear, as if he'd discovered that the devil himself had come to take his soul.

  Sandy moved in and pressed her gun against the back of Bullard's neck. He was prone, with his arms out to the side and his face turned towards me. His expression was sour.

  "Don't move or I'll kill you," she yelled. "I mean it."

  "He's got my gun," I said. "He's laying on it." The pain in my wrists had been replaced with a tingling sensation in my hands and arms, like thousands of tiny pinpricks.

  "Here's the deal, Dwayne," Sandy said. "You're going to roll over slowly, and if you go for the gun, I'm going to end your life. Now, move!"

  Bullard rolled over while she kept the pistol about a foot away from his head. Once he was on his back, she reached out and took the pistol from him and stuck it in the waistband of her pants.

  "You smell bad, Dwayne," she said. "You lose your mud when the gun went off?"

  Bullard lay on his back with his arms at his side. "Sherlock Holmes and The Bearded Lady in one night," he said. "You two make quite a team."

  "You're not taking me seriously," Sandy said. "Empty your pockets. Now!"

  Bullard pulled his pants pockets inside out, and the car and handcuff keys, his money clip, wallet, and lighter fell to the ground. She moved around him with care, making sure her legs stayed out of reach of his hands. She used her feet to sweep the keys and money away from him while aiming the pistol at his head. The tingling sensation in my arms was intense and painful, and the pinpricks on my arms had become wasp stings. My hands were numb.

  "Now get up, God dammit!" she said.

  Bullard struggled to get to his feet, standing with rage in his eyes. He looked angry enough that I thought he was considering trying to rush her. She had the pistol pointed at his face, though. For a moment I imagined his head bursting like a ripe pumpkin from a gunshot. I was in enough pain that the thought didn't bother me much.

  "Take your clothes off," she said to him.

  "You want to see what you been missing?" he asked.

  She adjusted the aim of her pistol slightly and fired a round past his head. He jerked as if he had touched a live wire.

  When my ears stopped ringing, she said "Take it off," again. He pulled his shirt over his head and dropped it.

  He looked like a bear. His torso and arms were covered with thick red hair. His middle was thick and heavy, and he had fat pads on each hip the size of small bread loaves.

  "You aren’t exactly male stripper material," she said. "Now take the rest of it off."

  He took off his shoes and pants and stood there in a pair of bright red boxer shorts. I might have thought it was funny if the nerves in my arms weren’t telling me that I was on fire from the armpits up.

  "Throw your pants to me," she said. Bullard tossed them at her head, and she snatched them out of the air with her empty hand. Then she swung the pants into the darkness behind her.

  "Take the underwear off, Dwayne."

  He shook his head "NO." She fired another round past his head for emphasis. He jerked again and slapped the palm of one hand up against his left ear. When he pulled his hand down I could see a dark streak starting on the side of his head. She had clipped him in the ear with a bullet.

  "I'm not going to ask you again, Dwayne. I'm just going to kill you. It’s your choice. Your underwear or your life. Since they have equal value, I'll let you decide."

  Dwayne pulled the shorts off, looking unsure what to do with them. He finally decided to drop them on the ground. Then he covered his genitals with his hands and half-turned to the right, facing away from us. His butt looked a yard wide.
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  "Do you remember when you came into the woman’s shower when I was in there, and you told me I was more of a man than half the guys in the department?" I could hear her voice cracking, and she wiped her eyes with her forearm like tears were coming. "This is what it felt like. Fun, huh? Now get on the ground, face down," she said. Bullard lowered himself to the sand, naked except for a pair of athletic socks.

  "Sandy, you gotta get me down from here," I pleaded.

  She ignored me. "Put your arms behind your back," she said. When Bullard complied, she pulled a pair of handcuffs out of her back pocket. She kept the gun against the base of his head and used her free hand to handcuff his wrists together behind his back.

  She stood up and said, "You're under arrest. You've also got a big ass, Dwayne."

  "Up yours," he replied.

  She came over to the van with the handcuff keys she’d taken from Bullard and climbed the ladder at the back of the van to get up on top. I sensed some jiggling in my forearms as Sandy unlocked the handcuffs, and then my arms fell free. My left arm felt as if it tore itself loose from the socket when it came down. I screamed, but screaming didn't seem to help the pain.

  I stood with my back against the side of the van. I was sweating and felt sick at my stomach. "I need to go to the hospital," I said. "Soon. I really feel bad."

  "Just give me five minutes," she said. "I'm almost done."

  I was in no position to argue. She took the handcuffs that she had taken off of me and went over to where Bullard lay on the ground. She put the second pair of handcuffs on his ankles, and I heard Bullard yell "What the hell are you doing?"

  "Dwayne," she said "I can't help but notice that your van has a tow hitch on it. That’s convenient, because I'm going to hook you to the tow hitch, and then I'm going to tow your fat, naked ass up and down the desert until I get bored. I haven't decided what I'll do with you then," she said. "Maybe I'll drive the van back and forth over what's left of you."

  I felt nauseous and cold. My vision was blurred. I slid to the ground by the van as gently as possible.

  "I'm really sick," I said to no one in particular. The blue spotlight behind my left eye was back.

  Then I heard Bullard yelling again, and I looked up to see Sandy dragging him towards the back of the van by the chain on the handcuffs on his feet. He was wriggling and swearing and twisting his legs and body trying to get loose. It looked like she was towing a small red-haired whale behind her.

  He probably weighed 250 or more, but she didn't seem to be having much trouble pulling him. I was still lucid enough to realize that she was grinding his groin to pulp on the crusty, abrasive surface.

  I heard clinking noises and felt the van lurch as she got the handcuffs on his ankles hooked around the tow hitch. When she came around the side of the van I saw that she had taken her windbreaker off and wore a white tee shirt. Dwayne was making lots of noise now, but I didn't hear any more obscenities. His words seemed to be alternating between "Please" and "Sorry."

  Her shoulders looked nearly as big as if she were wearing shoulder pads. There were sweat rings in the fabric under her arms, and her muscles and breasts stretched at the fabric of the shirt.

  She squatted down to talk to me. I could see beads of sweat on her upper lip and forehead. "I’m taking Dwayne for a ride," she said loudly enough that I was sure Dwayne could hear. "You can wait here or come along."

  I was shivering from the cold and from the nausea I felt at the core of my body. "You've got a gun," I said. "Why don't you just kill him if that's what you want to do?"

  "It wouldn't last long enough," she said.

  I couldn't think of a response for that. Dwayne was yelling again, and she stood up and climbed into the driver's seat and started the engine. I wondered if I needed to move away from the van before she pulled out, but she climbed back down out of the van and walked past me to the back of the van. Bullard was still screaming hysterically.

  She stood at the back by the trailer hitch with her hands on her hips, watching him beg. He kept repeating "I’m sorry, I’m sorry," like a pathetic mantra, but he was sobbing more than yelling at that point. Then she walked past me towards the driver's door. The skin on her face looked hard and tight as she climbed up into the driver's seat. Then the van jerked a little, and I knew that she had decided to turn Bullard into hamburger.

  Then the engine stopped. She came back and squatted in front of me.

  "I'm going to get my car," she said. "This one smells really bad."

  "It's got Ray in it," I said dully. I was having trouble holding my head upright.

  She nodded absently at me. "You don’t look good," she said.

  Bullard had stopped yelling, and I could hear him sobbing like a beaten child.

  "I know."

  "I almost killed him," she said.

  "I know."

  Her eyes searched my face for a second, but she looked troubled and hurt. I wondered what she was thinking about. "You look like hell," she said.

  I nodded.

  She steadied herself by putting one hand against the side of the van, and she leaned over and kissed me on the lips for what felt like a long time. Her lips were so soft and warm against mine that I forgot about how bad I felt. Then she stood up and took off running. I watched her jog off into the darkness to get her car.

  Chapter Fifty

  When I awoke, I was in a hospital room. Michelle was holding a damp rag to my forehead, and the lights in the room seemed to shine. I tried to move my left arm but it was no-go. Michelle said something about calling a nurse, and a moment later a woman in a white uniform appeared by the side of the bed. She had red hair and a quick smile. She shined a penlight in my eyes and said something I didn't catch. Then she hurried away. Michelle leaned over and kissed me hard, then wrapped her arms around me. The sensation of her hair against my skin was so intense that it was almost too much. But not quite.

  "They've given you morphine to help the pain," she said. She was mouthing her words at me as if I were hard of hearing. My mouth felt parched.

  "You're going to be fine. The doctors said your brain scan is normal and your shoulder will be okay if you take it slow. You were in surgery most of the morning. Officer Burroughs called me and told me what happened. I’m so sorry."

  She leaned over and kissed me again. I felt her hot tears against my face.

  My right arm was working well enough that I could hold it against her back. I felt her breath coming in shuddering gasps then. I would have held her forever, but the morphine kicked in, and I was floating away.

  As I went unconscious I had this crazy fantasy about Michelle, Esto, and me. We opened a restaurant on the side of the mountain overlooking Alamogordo and the San Andres desert. One whole wall of the place was glass, and inside we had gorgeous furniture and giant aquariums full of tropical fish. Esto and Michelle ran the place, and they let me pretend to be the manager. The three of us were out on the restaurant balcony drinking margaritas at sunset. The lights of Alamogordo were sprinkled below us in the valley like stars.

  We paid cash for everything.