by Chuck Dixon
“You don’t know what it’s like, Goose.”
“So tell me.”
Dale stopped and turned back to Levon. His eyes were red. His mouth a twisted wound.
“Everything’s changed. Used to be the county left us alone,” Dale said. He was fighting to keep his voice even. “Let the hills be the hills, you know? ’Cause the deputies and alla them used to be us, you know. Our neighbors. They understood.”
"I remember. It was the state police gave our daddy and Uncle Fern a hard time. They did what they wanted in the county. Especially Daddy," Levon said.
“All over with now, Goose. By the by. The sheriff’s over from Tolliver County. Held chicken dinners and hung signs every damned where. The deputies are all like college boys up from Birmingham and Huntsville. They’re not us. They don’t give a shit about us.”
Levon said nothing.
“They sent me for training down to Bush Hills. Like boot camp for pussies. I took classes in law enforcement. They had an instructor there teaching about the ‘special challenges’ of working in rural areas. He talked about how hard it was to build a case up in here. Said the biggest obstacle a cop faced was ‘mountain pride.’ You believe it? Told us we had to break that pride to make everyone behave right.”
“They’re only enforcing the law.”
“Look at who’s talking!” Dale said. “Mister FBI most wanted!”
“Not the same thing.”
“No? Hell, boy, they got you on terror lists with fuckers like the ones blew me up in Iraq.”
“Way I see it, the sheriff used to cover for our daddy. Looked the other way when he beat my mom and yours. A little law, a little time in the county pen would have done him good. Would have done us good, for sure.”
Dale’s eyes narrowed to slits. His mouth turned to a lipless line. His knuckles turned white on the shotgun.
“Fuck you,” Dale said. He turned to walk down the hill. Levon let him have some distance, waiting to follow.
He came up on Dale standing at the barrier of the downed poplar. Levon trotted up to join him.
The county truck sat on its rims, tires slashed flat. In the ferns along the road a pair of ATVs squatted, the riders nowhere to be seen.
Gunny Leffertz said:
“Know your enemy. Know yourself. Know the ground. But most of all, know the goddamned ground.”
15
“Hold up and listen.” Levon’s voice was low. He put a hand on Dale’s arm.
They ducked low behind the felled tree bole.
“You got a round chambered?” Levon said.
Dale worked the action lever back a bit to reveal a fat round in place. Levon nodded.
Footfalls in the underbrush to their left. The brittle squawk of a radio voice to their right.
“We wait till they’re back together,” Levon said. His voice wasn’t above a hiss.
A voice responded to the radio call. The same voice called out to another.
“El nos dice que vaya a la colina.”
“Mierde.” A second man to the left.
Levon leaned on the bole listening to the footfalls converge on the trail. He held a hand up to Dale. Dale’s eyes were wide, his teeth clenched in a snarl. His face ran with fresh sweat.
The engines of the ATVs whined to life. The tires spun, spitting gravel. The noise closed on Levon and Dale. The riders were approaching to pass around the fallen bole in the woods to either side.
Levon slapped Dale’s shoulder and stood to move to his right. As he moved he cleared the 1911 from its place at the small of his back. It slid easy from the oiled pancake holster in his waistband. An ATV was banking around the tree stump. The rider looked like the cowboy he saw in Colby the week before. The man stared in stunned surprise at the bearded white man rising up before him.
The boom of the shotgun joined the triple tap of the .45. The hollow points struck the cowboy square in the chest, then neck, then face. Levon allowed the big auto to climb as he fired. The rider went backward off the saddle. A sneaker flipped high in the air. The ATV trundled on to a stop in the ferns.
Levon was turning before his target struck the ground. Dale was firing a second and third charge toward the second ATV. The driver’s head split like a melon. He slid from the vehicle to tumble back down the slope. A second man, riding behind, pitched himself to the ground. His white t-shirt was stained crimson with blood.
The second ATV rolled to a halt against the fallen tree. The engine died. Levon leaped over the bole to run for the third man crawling through the ferns on his belly.
Two rounds in the back brought the man to a halt. A third opened his skull in a spray. Dale finished the second driver with a round of buck to the head.
Levon rushed up to the bitch rider. Inches from the dead man's fingers lay a tricked-out AR-15. It went flying when the pair were first struck by loads of buck from Dale's Beretta.
Dale stood breathing heavy over his target. Levon swung his arm in a stirring motion for his half-brother to keep an eye out.
The bitch rider wore a Glock in a tooled holster against his spine. Levon stripped off the action, released the mag and threw the three parts deep into the woods before picking up the custom rifle. His first observation was wrong. The rifle was an M4, capable of full auto fire. It had all the toys mounted on its rail system. 10x scope. Maglite. Forward grip. The barrel was chromed as were the magazine, trigger guard and front half-ring sight.
He trotted to the cowboy and took a .357 Colt from a belly holster. There was a second M4, a stripped down military issue model, strapped across the handlebars. He removed it and slung it over his shoulder with the first one. In the small cargo compartment he found three full mags. He stuck them in the back pockets of his jeans.
Levon moved to the second ATV sitting where it crashed into the fallen tree. He found a Tech-9 in the boot. He stripped it to four parts and tossed them as far as he could in four different directions. Deeper in the boot were four more M4 mags. All chromed. He trotted to join Dale and handed him the four mags and the pimped out rifle. He stooped to pat down the headless man at Dale’s feet.
“You told me you weren’t armed,” Dale said.
“You told me there was pigs out here,” Levon said.
“Shouldn’t we be moving on?”
“On four flat tires?”
“Someone might have heard those shots.”
“Gunfire’s nothing unusual in these woods. I wouldn’t carry far over the ridge anyway.”
“What’re we doing here, Goose?” Dale said. He slung the shotgun over his shoulder and stood cradling the rifle and magazines in his arms.
“I could ask you the same damned thing,” Levon said. He turned up a Czech nine millimeter under the dead man’s t-shirt. He shoved it in his waistband.
“Meaning what?” Dale said. The color was returning to his face.
“You brought me up here to stalk pigs only you knew they weren’t here. You wanted me to know about those meth kitchens. Maybe you can tell me why.”
“Can’t you see why? We go for a walk in the woods and nearly wind up dead. We ran these woods day and night when we were kids. You can’t see what’s going on?”
“I see what I see.”
“I told you Ty Pettit was run off. He wasn’t. These son-bitches killed him. Cut his head off. His wife too. His brother packed up and left the county the next day.”
“There’s police to handle that.”
“You think so? Well, they’ve done jack shit about it,” Dale said. “Handed it onto the state. The case is just a folder in a file now.”
Levon stood waiting for more.
“Nobody in these hills will help the law. Not even with a bunch of outsiders running around cutting throats and setting fire to houses. Ain’t nobody going to do a damned thing.”
“Mountain pride.”
“So proud they’ll choke on it.”
Levon turned to the headless man at Dale’s feet and pulled up his t-shirt. The fi
rst load of buck had taken him in the gut exposing pink meat and white bone. The unwounded flesh was covered in a skein of black tattoos unreadable under a coat of drying blood. He pulled up the sleeve on one arm. At the shoulder was a grinning skull with a smoking joint clamped in its teeth. An ornate letter ‘Z’ was at the center of the skull’s forehead. In a scroll beneath it was ‘Tamaulipas.’ A gulf coast state in Mexico.
“That doesn’t stand for Zorro,” Levon said.
“Zetas cartel. Shit.”
“What was your plan here, Dale?”
“To scare them off.” Dale’s voice was small.
“They’re in the scaring business.”
Dale looked away. Levon turned at a sound from nearby.
The click and squawk of a radio.
“Rudy? Dónde estás , prima?”
Gunny Leffertz said:
“Maybe you didn’t ask for trouble but trouble asked for you. Man up, wire your shit tight and take a run at that trouble double time.”
16
Levon plucked a two-way radio from the cowboy’s belt.
He held it away from him, listening to a voice calling for an answer.
He pressed the send button home.
“Cállate! Que no es nada!” Levon said. He barked the words in Mexican-accented Spanish.
“Okay, Rudy. Cuando vas a volver aquí?” the radio said after a pause.
“No puedo escucharte,” Levon said. He clicked the radio off and hooked it to his own belt.
“Damn, brother,” Dale said. “You fucking sound like a fucking wetback.”
“No one should come looking for them for a while. Buys us some time.” Levon stood up and checked his rifle to make sure it was charged and combat ready. He adjusted the nylon sling so the M4 hung rigged across his torso.
“Time to do what?”
"You wanted to scare them? Let's go scare them." Levon moved past the fallen poplar to trot back toward the ridgeline.
“Start at the neck and pull the comb back along the flank,” Jessie said.
Montana was cross-tied in the stable. Merry used a hooped steel curry to comb the dust from his hair. The pony stamped a hoof and huffed through its nostrils.
“Not his belly. He’s ticklish,” Jessie said.
“Do you ever give them baths?” Merry said. She caressed the animal with a gentle hand as she combed.
“We hose them off. But only earlier in the day. The nights are still cool. Can’t be putting them up wet.”
“Do they like this? Like us fussing over them?”
“They love it. They’re all divas, horses. They eat up the attention worse than dogs.”
Jessie unhooked the reins and let Merry lead the pony back to his stall. She helped the little girl unhook the bridle. They closed the stall door and Montana trotted over for one last pat on the muzzle, lips slapping over champing teeth.
“So, you like riding?” Jessie said.
“I want to do it every day,” Merry said. There was such a plain earnestness to the statement that Jessie let out a whoop of laughter.
“I’ll bet you’re hurting.”
“My butt’s sore, I guess.”
“You’ll feel it in your legs and back come morning. Riding is real exercise. They’re carrying us but they’re not doing all the work.”
“Can you talk my daddy into buying me my own pony?” Merry said. There was a gleam in her eye.
“Hold on now. I want your father to still think of me as a friend,” Jessie said. “You’re the one who should ask him. And maybe wait till you have had a few lessons first. Make sure you want to do this.”
An insistent buzzing came from the pocket of Jessie’s barn coat slung on a stall post. She pulled her cell phone free. The number on the display looked odd to her.
It was Levon.
“Jessie, I hate to ask. Something’s come up and I won’t be by to pick up Merry when I said. Can you run her back to my Uncle Fern’s?”
“Well, if you’re going to be a few hours she could just stay here and have dinner with us.”
“Can I speak to her?”
Jessie handed the phone to Merry who listened, a smile widening on her face.
“Sure, Daddy. That would be awesome. Love you too.” Merry ended the call and handed the phone back to Jessie.
“He said it’s okay with him if it’s okay with you,” Merry said.
“I promised Sandy pizza tonight. Maybe we’ll all run into Haley after we’ve fed and watered.”
“Can I help? Can I?” Merry said.
“Sandy was right. You do have it bad, Merry Cade,” Jessie said.
“We coulda took those Yamahas,” Dale said. He was blown and panting, his back to a tree at the peak of the ridge.
“They’d be looking for their friends then,” Levon said. He was on a knee to wait for Dale to catch his breath. He replaced the sat phone in his jacket pocket.
“Going to be dark soon.” Dale lipped the filter of a Pall Mall and slid it from the crumpled pack.
Levon yanked the cigarette from his mouth, crushed it, and tossed the flakes aside before making his way down the hill into the cover of the trees.
“Shit,” Dale said. He trotted after his half-brother.
He caught up. Levon moved sure over a spill of gray rocks scattered down the slope. Dale watched his footing, hopping from surface to surface.
“What do we do when we get down there?” Dale said.
“We clean this up,” Levon said.
“You saying what I think you’re saying?”
“The guy with the comms might have called in your plate number. No more talking from here on. Maintain noise discipline.”
Dale stopped to wipe his forehead dry on a shirt sleeve. He rechecked his rifle’s load. He watched Levon drop off a shelf of rock into a copse of birches.
“Goddamn,” he said. It was a curse and a prayer.
Gunny Leffertz said:
“Surprise is a bitch. Make sure she’s on your side.”
17
The sun dropped behind the hills leaving the valley in green shadow under a still blue sky.
Levon found a brush of scrub pines on a piece of level ground. He dropped to his belly to scan the buildings below through the 10x scope mounted on the M4. Dale scrambled up on knees and elbows to lie beside him, breathing hard.
Three buildings sat in a cleft at the end of a road of packed dirt leading away through the brush toward the north-south fire road. They were simple structures of stacked block. Metal rooftops. Steel casement windows. The kind of shacks migrant workers lived in during picking season. Except this compound was miles from any commercial farm.
The other difference was an untidy heap of plastic barrels and jugs lying in a growth of sumac. The chemical ingredients of a recipe for crystal meth. And the smell. It was stronger here, trapped on the floor of the holler by the surrounding slopes. The sharp sting of paint spirits and the musk of animal urine. It coated the back of the throat and created a sting in the nostrils.
Nothing moved below. There were signs the shacks weren’t abandoned. A Kia sport vehicle parked between two buildings. Vapor rose from a stove pipe set in the roof of the largest building. Music played somewhere. A Mexican pop song. A corrido about some brave drug kingpin battling the police to protect his hacienda. It came from one of the two smaller structures. A bunkhouse maybe.
Levon nudged closer to his half-brother to place his face close to Dale’s ear.
“We wait till it gets darker. Try to get a census.”
Dale nodded.
“I need you to cover the SUV. No one drives out of here.”
Dale swallowed hard. He nodded again.
“Rest if you need it. I’ll keep watch till it’s time.” Levon moved back to his first position.
A sudden wave of exhaustion washed over Dale. It was like Levon’s words gave him permission to surrender to the aches in his legs and arms and back. That wasn’t it. Dale was a soldier too. Three deployments
to Iraq, he knew it was adrenaline leeching from his body at the first moment of quiet since they opened up on those three guys. He set the rifle and shotgun aside and rested his head on his arm.
Scratchy squawks came from the walkie in Levon’s hand. The volume down, Levon was keying the radio to make the guys down in the shacks think their dead amigos were still trying to send. A muted voice bleated from the radio a few times between clacks and clicks. Even at low volume Dale could hear the irritation in the tinny voice though he could not hear the words. Wouldn’t understand them if he did.
He drifted off to the rhythm of radio hiss and whispered gibberish. In a dream Dale was riding in an '83 T-bird with the roof off. Rick Mueller, his best buddy in high school, was driving. It was the car they both always talked about owning. One badass ride. The road was straight and flat with desert stretched out to the horizon in all directions. Dale put his head back on the headrest, squinting through his Oakleys at the sun glinting off the hood.
“When we gonna get to Vegas, Ricky?” he said.
“We’re not going to Vegas,” Rick Mueller said.
He was in crisp new BDUs. Digi-desert pattern. Bucket on his head all strapped down.
Dale looked down the highway. The signs coming toward them were in Arabic.
“So where we going?” Dale said.
“You know where,” Rick Mueller said. He punched the accelerator. The big eight roared higher.
“Can I get out now? Can you pull over?”
“No way. We got to go,” Rick Mueller said. He was laughing when he said it.
Dale sat up in the dark. His head brushed low branches. It was full dark. A hand gripped his arm. Another clapped over his mouth. Levon’s voice low, close to his ear.
“I count five. Five I could see. Nod if you understand.”
Dale nodded. The hand came away from his mouth. Levon’s voice continued.
“I’m moving down to the left. You move right. Get close to the car.”
“Uh huh.”