El Gavilan (36 page)

Able tasted blood and realized he’d bitten through his lip. “How’d you get onto it?”

Brusquely—annoyed to be knocked off his agenda—Walt said, “You were fucking sloppy, Hawk.” Walt then described a circumstance almost identical to Tell Lyon’s uncovering of Able’s scheme. Walt had arrested two Mexican teens. The duo had handed up Trent Paris. Just as he had with Tell Lyon, goddamn Trent had rolled over on Amos.

Able should have known to threaten Trent out of town after handing over the business to those two Italian thugs. He should have severed the only loose end that might lead back to himself.

“So what’s the fucking upshot, Pierce?”

Walt smiled. “I’ve got me a copy of that fucking baseball film I hear Lyon is trying to use to take down my deputy, Luke Strider. I’ve watched that film several times with my key men. Like me, they see a fuckin’ red Isuzu in that film. A red Isuzu like them spic gangbangers who beat up that reporter drove. Them spics you’ve already got in custody. You’re going to close ranks with me, Hawk. We’re going to close this case
together
. We’re going to hang the murders of Thalia Ruiz and them three others on them that did it—those vicious spic gang members who you’re holding. Them that ain’t owed due process. God evidently don’t care what happens to them, so why should we, eh?”

“But they didn’t
do
it.” Able licked his bloodied lip. “That’s Luke Strider and his truck on that piece of film. We both know that.” Able looked at Walt’s hands and something clicked. He was suddenly cold all over. Able said, “And looking now at your hands and all those damned rings, I’ll be a sorry son of a bitch if I don’t think you’re the other man on that tape. I think you’re the fat main man in that film—the one who beat my Thalia to death. It’s you, isn’t it? It’s
always
been you. I’ll be a sorry son of a bitch if I’m not right.”

Spraying spittle, Walt snarled obscenities and went for his gun, struggling in his seated position to draw clear, his arm bumping up against the car seat—fouling his draw. Able grabbed Walt’s head with both hands and slammed his face into the steering wheel. The cruiser’s horn blared and Walt screamed, tasting blood in his mouth.

Walt raised his right hand and waved it in Able’s face. Able saw the can of mace in Walt’s hand, but too late to try to take it from him. Able screamed as the mace hit him in the eyes and nose and sprayed into his open mouth.

Screaming himself—his own eyes burning from the mace he’d released in the tight confines of his cruiser—Walt emptied the can in Able’s face.

“Jesus fuck!” Able bellowed. He got his hand on the door release and fell out of the Vale County sheriff’s cruiser onto the damp pavement. It was raining steadily now and Able scooped rainwater from a chuckhole and washed his burning eyes, clearing them just enough to see Walt lumbering around the back of the cruiser, one hand working at his own eyes and the other reaching again for his gun.

Able pulled his back-up gun from his ankle holster. Waving their guns, blinking back tears and rain, the sheriffs stared one another down. “What I guess you’d call a fucking Mexican standoff,” Able said, his voice raw from the mace.

“You fucking take back what you said, Able!”

“I can’t do that, Walt, not thinking as I do. And I’m thinking it more with each damned second.”

“You goddamn take it back, Able! Then we go before the cameras together and declare them gang members guilty.”

Able sneered. “And
then
what? As you point out, they ain’t legal, none of them. So we can’t try them here, Walt. And hell, if we could, they’d fast slip out of your lame fucking frame and you and Luke’d end up indicted anyway.”

Walt slowly lowered his gun and holstered it. “That’s why you’ll hand them over to
me
, Hawk. Let me carry the weight of cleaning up that end. I’ll do the
right
thing.”

“The ‘right thing’?” Able spat blood. “You mean kill ’em, like all the others you’ve killed in your custody.”

“You fucking bend to my will, Hawk,” Pierce said.

“No.”

“Then you kiss your ass goodbye. And your grandson’s ass too. Before you take me down, I’ll see you two up on them federal charges. Can you imagine what’ll happen to
you
in prison for twenty, maybe thirty years if some old collar of your department’s doesn’t shank you first? Least you won’t last long enough to see what it does to that bookworm grandson of yours.”

Blinking, Able raised his gun and pointed it at Walt’s head. “I shoot you now, I only kiss
my
ass goodbye.”

Pierce held up his fat hands. His rings glittered in the parking lot lights. It was raining harder. “For old times, I’ll give you a third option, Able,” Walt Pierce said. “Stand down. Step aside.”

Able blinked.
“What?”

“You heard me,” Walt said. “You stand down and I won’t burn you and that boy you dote over.”

FIFTY ONE

“Mr. O’Hara?”

She was in her midtwenties. Pale blond hair, Nordic good looks. Very poised. Shawn thought the stranger standing in his hospital room’s doorway might constitute his new physical ideal for women. No more fucking black-haired, black-eyed Mexican cunts for him.

The woman wore a tailored cream skirt and matching jacket over a white blouse. She had her hair pulled back and was slender and tall. She clutched a leather briefcase in both hands in front of her. Shawn could imagine her nude—busty (probably implants), wasp waist and a good ass. Probably porn-star smooth down there. Shawn wondered if he was getting hard. With all the Vicodin, it was tough to tell much of anything going on with his body lately.

She said, “I’m Tracey Blair. I’m a human resources specialist for Buxton Publishing. I understand you can’t talk so I’ll do that and try to keep it brief, Mr. O’Hara.” She scowled, taking in his condition. She was the first pretty woman to see him since his beating. The look in her eyes wasn’t a good omen for the future, Shawn thought.

Tracey Blair said, “The reporter who is filling in for you is under instruction to vet all copy for the week’s coming edition through an editor back at corporate. So when you sent your account of your own beating and your proposed editorial over last night, they both were passed along by her to the executive editor.”

She smiled sadly, looking earnestly into Shawn’s eyes. “I’m afraid that the content and statements contained in both items were of such a charged quality—and of what the executive editor regarded as extremely poor taste and poor judgment—as to cast doubt on your news judgment and continued suitability as an information gatherer for Buxton Publishing. We’ve therefore elected to end your term of employment, Mr. O’Hara. I’m sorry. Understanding your unfortunate situation, we’ll keep you on payroll through the end of the month. We’ll also extend you six weeks’ severance. Your insurance will lapse ninety days after that date. So you might want to inform your doctors of that so they can push ahead with any procedures or surgeries while you still retain coverage. I should mention there were some recent revisions to our corporate dental plan. Those changes hadn’t yet been announced prior to your attack. I mention this because it is possible that the dental implants I’ve seen ordered for you may not be covered under the new plan. We’re still checking into that. We’ll inform your physicians of the outcome there so you can make a decision about whether to go ahead if it’s to come out of your own pocket. They’re quite expensive.”

Tracey placed a packet on the tray table next to Shawn’s bed. “Everything is explained in there,” she said. “You’ll need to sign those and return them within fourteen business days if you accept terms. My e-mail address is also in there, as you can’t yet speak. We’ll try to rectify any concerns or details via e-mail.” She took a step closer. “I’m sure everyone at Buxton joins me in wishing you a fast and full recovery, Mr. O’Hara. These things are never easy for anybody. I appreciate you taking it so well.”

Shawn shrugged. What the fuck could he
say
to that? What would he say to that if he were even
capable
of
speaking
?

The human resources specialist smiled and fidgeted with the handle of her leather briefcase. “This is my first time handling a termination. I was nauseous all last night. My boyfriend cooked dinner and I wrecked it with my sour stomach. But this wasn’t so bad. I just want to personally thank you for making this so professional, Shawn. I really appreciate that.”

Dumbfounded, Shawn waved her out with his right hand, confused by her sudden frown back at him. He looked at his right hand. Splinted and bandaged as it was, it looked like Shawn was perpetually flipping the bird.
Sorry, Tracey
. Well, fuck that haughty cunt sideways, anyway. He listened to her heel taps fade down the hallway.

Fuck
.
Unemployed
. A gimp with maybe no prospect for new teeth.

Shawn was beginning to see this horrible future for himself. He’d end up living with his mother in Chicago. He’d limp on and off el-trains because his fucked-up knee would never allow him to drive again. He’d end up taking low-tier freelance assignments while looking for some other shitty weekly newspaper gig. Only fat or plain chicks would take him to their beds and those maybe in pity.

Fuck
. The doctor had told Shawn that Tuesday morning they’d maybe let him spend a few hours in a motorized wheelchair. The chair would allow Shawn to operate it with his left hand. Shawn looked over at Troy Marshall’s empty bed. Troy was in his own rehab session—trying to build back up some muscle in his punctured leg.

If Shawn went mobile, he could wait for Troy to sleep or go to rehab. Then Shawn could lay hands on the deputy’s gun. Shawn could blow a hole out of the shitty life those fucking Mexicans had dealt him. He felt a sudden kinship with his father. Saw now how easily a man could be driven in that direction. Shawn thought about all that some more. The more he mulled suicide, the more he leaned toward the option.

But Troy was scheduled to remain hospitalized a few more days. Shawn had time to think about it some more.

Time to weigh options; time to maybe settle some scores before.

* * *

Tell’s phone was ringing. He struggled out of sleep and checked the clock: nine
A.M.

God, he should have been up and at work hours ago. He lifted the receiver, said, “Lyon.”

“Boss? We were worried.” Billy Davis.

Tell said, “I just overslept. Too much heat and walking at that damned festival yesterday.”
Too much of everything, for too long,
he might have added.

Billy said bitterly, “He goddamn quit, boss. He fucking kicked it in. Effective immediately.”

Tell rubbed sleep from his eyes and sat up in bed. “Who? Who quit?”

“Able Hawk resigned as Horton County sheriff this morning. Left us with our dicks in the wind.”

FIFTY TWO

Able looked sourly at his cell phone’s missed calls menu. Many, many of the calls that had gone unreturned or unanswered were from his various deputies. DeeDee had called seven times. The girl reporter who had replaced Shawn O’Hara had called several times too; he recognized her name from her by-lines in the
Recorder
.

And there had been many, many calls from Tell Lyon.

By agreement with Walt Pierce, Able couldn’t contact any of them—none of his ex-deputies or sheriff’s office flunkies. And particularly not Tell Lyon. His agreed-upon silence bought Able Walt Pierce’s silence and suppression of the evidence he held against Amos and Able for their felonious identification scam. Combined fines would likely reach two hundred grand. Both would be hung out to dry, because of the intent to obscure the recipients’ illegal statuses. Hell, that latter could be treated as a crime of aiding terrorism in the hands of the right wrong-headed legal types, just as Tell and Walt had warned. Able would die in prison, no question.

But Lyon: that betrayal ate at Able’s conscience the worst. He’d let Lyon set himself up as a target and now he wouldn’t have Lyon’s back as he’d promised to. He couldn’t even extend to Lyon his promised surveillance.

Surveillance.

That sparked Able’s anger afresh. Walt, making it clear that Able was now his bitch, had informed him that the Vale County Sheriff’s Office was running an indefinite tap on Hawk’s home phone. Able figured that probably extended to his cell phone.

An unmarked car had, until the last hour or so, been parked out front. Able suspected the one in the car, another of Walt’s flunkies, was probably equipped with a “big ear”—one of those portable eavesdropping gizmos that allow cops to listen through walls.

The only upside to Able’s morning was that Amos was in school. Amos wouldn’t have heard yet that his grandfather had stepped down as Horton County sheriff. It would be a few more hours until Able had to field all of Amos’s impossible-to-answer questions as to why he’d resigned his post. And there was that other dark prospect: Amos had already revealed himself ready to sacrifice himself when he thought Tell Lyon would press the case against them for the false IDs. He might try to do the same in the face of Walt’s threats.

Absent Amos and any hard questions, Sofia was more than taking up the slack.

“I can’t talk about it,” Able told her again. He felt like he was saying that to her over and over.

He couldn’t talk about it without violating his pledge of silence to Walt Pierce. But Able was looking for loopholes—to at least find some way to get even a one-way dialogue going with Tell in order to warn Lyon of his precarious position and what he knew about Walt.

Sofia pressed while he listened, half-distracted. She said, “Does this all have something to do with Thalia? Is that what it is, Able?”

“I can’t talk about that,” he said. He was standing at the fireplace mantel. There was a framed picture of Thalia there now, alongside those of his daughter and his dead wife.

“Then it must be so,” Sofia said. “You would have simply said ‘no,’ otherwise.”

“Sofia …”

“Talk to me, Able. Let me help you,
por favor
.”