13
WATERTON
Royce Hawthorne felt like a ten-ton weight had been at least partially lifted from his shoulders. A weight in keys, actually, but it could have gone ten tons worth of bad.
The special unit would have been proud. It was so typical of their ways. As he drove in search of Happy, the memories of the two nightmare years he'd spent “away from home” played in his head like bad dreams.
Mary wondered if he'd been doing “detective work of some kind.” Sam telling her he'd joined the CIA. How could he tell anybody about what he'd been through? A world as far removed from the covert ops planners and need-to-know poli-sci majors of Langley as one could get. Yet, oddly, such a similar world, where case officers and informants and blackmail and twisted motives were a way of life.
He shrugged off the thoughts. Nothing would spoil his mood. The “Package” was now wrapped. In the care of the United States postal system and—presumably—safe and sound. His sinuses were aching and he pulled over and did some snort. So good. Good for me. Good for you. Umm good. Feel good. Real good.
Royce pulled off Quarry Road, northbound, and followed a dirt-bike trail for about half a mile. The roadhouse had been built to resemble a saloon in an old B-western: hitching posts, covered step-up porch, extended front wall, swinging doors—now permanently nailed open against the outer wall—and more bullet holes than a county road sign.
Called “2 Daze 3 Knights,” this place had begun life as a gay bar for rough trade, drawing patrons from as far away as Memphis. But the isolated location and access made it the perfect biker bar, and the guys on the two-wheelers promptly took it away from the gays. Now it was where the people of color hung. Jamaicans, Cubans, Colombians—mostly Latinos frequented the roadhouse now, with an occasional black of two in their company. The original cutesy name had long since been deep-sixed, and the only name now was a large painted CANTINA over the entranceway.
Royce made sure that Mary's dough was well hidden in the stash and he locked his ride, feeling very pale as he entered the bar with all those greenbacks in his pocket.
Happy and Luis were at a table in the corner with two other men, in a heated discussion. Royce went to the end of the bar and nursed a tequila until Happy made eye contact. Royce nodded. The man got up, Luis beside him, and sauntered over to the bar, leaving the other two at the table.
Happy, a.k.a. Fabio Ruiz, was twenty-something going on a hundred. Five feet one, but on a good day, Cuban heels with lifts brought him up to maybe five four. Long hair in a choppy, little-boy haircut that covered his forehead and most of his ears. Sulky mouth and cokey nose. A real hard-on.
“Yo, homes. Ju a long way from Wallyworld.” They all laughed.
“I hear ya."
“So. Ju wanna cold one?” Happy's accent had thickened perceptibly.
“I'm good. I brought something. You want it in here?"
“Less see—whatchew brought me.” Luis Londoño was on the other side, and real close—Royce realized. If he came out with something in his hand they didn't like...
“Here ya go.” He slid a thick package out of his pocket and into Happy's hand. Royce was surprised to see him casually open it right there. The guy behind the bar was making a show out of not looking anywhere near them.
“Nnn-hm.” The man made a little two-note humming sound of satisfaction.
“Happy?” Royce said in a quiet, hoarse voice, lowering it more and whispering, “I got a dude—really moving for me, mano."
“Uh-huh."
“You know I'm for real now, huh?” He felt like everybody in the bar was looking at his back.
“What's not to love?” it sounded like he said.
“I can move serious weight, if you can set me up."
“Whatchew call serious, amigo?"
Royce whispered a number in the crow's wing of oily hair over his left ear. He could see the kilos tumble into place like cherries on a one-armed bandit.
Happy made a little whistling sound. “Thass—"
“Same quality."
“—no prob-lemo."
“How much you nail me for?"
Happy did some mental math and whispered a figure in his ear. They haggled a little. Happy redid his math. Royce nodded, watching himself sell it in the mirror of the back-bar.
“Let's do it, then,” he said.
“Whatever makes everybody happy."
“How soon?"
“Whatever, bro. I set it up ASAP. Whatever it takes. All right?"
“Hey, Happy,” he said, pushing it a little behind the cocaine, “I ain't no ounce-pouncer now, am I, señor?"
“Chit no, jefe,” Happy laughed. “Ju drivin’ the heavy Chevy."
They said their good-byes, slap-dapped, and Royce patted Luis on the back and left. It was like patting a large tombstone.
“Hi, Royce. Come on in,” Mary told him, turning away when she saw who was at the door.
“Thanks, hon. I owe you big,” he told her, handing her the envelope of cash.
“Oh, sure,” she said, absentmindedly, but pleased to have her five thousand back. She glanced inside the envelope but didn't check it. “Any time.” She appeared to have no further curiosity about his bizarre loan.
“I put a couple hundred in—you know—for interest or whatever. If you're penalized more than that, let me know."
“No. Take that back. It wasn't hardly anything."
“That's yours. I came out great. It's for the inconvenience. Don't give it back—I'll only waste it."
She didn't even hassle him about taking the two hundred back, so he knew she wasn't with it.
They sat at the kitchen table and he asked the usual question. She shook her head, telling him that Marty Kerns had called. Telling him the details of their conversation. As she did so, her pretty face registered worry, great anxiety, doubt, and suspicion—an assortment of quick despairs that blew across her attractive features like a chilling breeze.
Marty Kerns. There were three salient features about the good chief of public safety, or chief of police, as everybody in the town still called the office. He was tough, corrupt, and stupid. Royce decided he'd start trying to really help this woman—whom he'd just taken advantage of without a thought to any possible consequences.
“Marty Kerns isn't doing anything, Mary. Whatever gets done from here on, we're going to have to do—or some other law enforcement agency like the county or the Feds will have to do. Kerns couldn't find his fat ass without help."
There was a moment like the old times that flashed between them in that heartbeat of candor, and he read an unspoken question in her eyes. He imagined that she was asking him—you think something bad has happened to Sam, don't you? And he tried to answer her on the same wavelength.
“Listen,” he began, “let's start with what we know. Take it from the top. What was the biggest thing in Sam's life besides you? It was the land deal. Since the first time you told me about it, the thing has bugged me. Something doesn't play. Something wrong. I think that if we follow what Sam did in putting the land sale together, we might get some clue as to what happened."
“I ... uh ... don't have any better ideas,” she said, shrugging. Telling him that she thought it was useless.
“Go back to the beginning. When was the first time he mentioned the deal to you? Who was this guy—this Sinclair whatshisname? How did he get in touch? Let's start by calling the phone number in Virginia that Sam called."
She took him through the whole thing, step by step. The walk-in who called out of the blue one day about wanting to purchase rural properties, not sounding like he was anybody who would actually follow through. Then showing up a week later and meeting her husband at a restaurant in Maysburg. Describing Christopher Sinclair later to Mary as having “pink skin the color of a baby's tush.” The big cash offers that whoever he represented intended to make to ten local landowners. Whoever he was fronting for had done their homework. They knew how to make offers that would be extremely tough to decline out of hand. Something that no outsider should have been able to do without spending a lot of time in research, Sam emphasized.