John watched me approach. “You gonna need us at the station, you figure?”
I shook my head. “Wes’ll be enough. He can drop you at home first, though.”
John nodded in agreement and obvious relief. “All right, then.”
I gave Wes an upward nod. “See you at the station after, all right?”
His eyes darted to John and then back to me. “Sure,” he said with false camaraderie.
I opened the driver’s door to my Explorer and stepped up into the seat. Jack’s verbal harangue washed over me immediately, but I ignored it and dropped the camera on the passenger seat. I turned the ignition, lowered the gear lever into Drive and headed toward the station.
Jack became strangely silent once we reached the station. His stream of threats and insults for the entire ride dried up. It’s a phenomenon I’d seen before. When the previously ambiguous concept of jail suddenly looms as a very concrete reality for the prisoner, it can be a sobering moment for some. I was surprised it affected Jack in that way, though.
I removed his handcuffs, took his belt and his watch away. The thick band was gold and heavy. I put him in a holding cell at the end of the hall. He rubbed his wrists and glared at me, but didn’t say a word. I decided that booking photographs and fingerprints could wait. I needed to get the paperwork done before morning came. Besides, I figured he needed to spend a little time sweating.
Molly was waiting for me at my desk when I closed the door to the hallway of jail cells.
“You really arrested him?” She shook her head in wonder. “I thought I’d never see the day that happened.”
“Why?”
She looked at me like I’d asked the most foolish question of the decade. “Because he’s Jack Talbott, that’s why. This is his town.”
“I keep hearing that. And you know what? I don’t get it. I never have. So he’s got some money. He’s just a big fish in a small pond.”
Molly shook her head. “No, Carl, you’re wrong. It’s not just that he’s richer than anyone else in town. Hell, he’s richer than everyone else in town put together. But it’s more than that.”
“Power?”
“Yeah, that, too. But not the kind you’re thinking of. He’s got plenty of that, but that’s not what makes this his town.”
“Then what?”
She eyed me for a moment. Then she said, “I’m surprised you haven’t figured it out. You’re a cop. You’ve been here four years. You’ve seen how he is.”
I turned up my palms and spread my arms. “Enlighten me.”
“He has something on everyone in this town. Something on them or something that they want.”
“Everyone? Come on.”
“Everyone,” she insisted.
I thought about it for a moment, remembering his tirade toward Wes when I opened the back of the Explorer.
“He said something to Wes about his cousins.”
She nodded. “Three of Wes’s cousins are illegals. They work on Jack’s cattle ranch.”
“And he holds sending them back to Mexico over Wes’s head,” I finished.
“Exactly,” she said. “That’s the way he works. If he doesn’t have something on you, he finds out what it is you want and strings you along until he does. And if he can’t get anything on you, he just plain runs you out of town.”
“That’s pathetic. It’s loco.”
“It’s Jack,” she said. “And it’s La Sombra.”
“Jack’s town,” I muttered, shaking my head.
“Now you’re starting to understand what you’re up against.”
I took a deep breath and let it out. “Well, he’s not above the law as far as I’m concerned. And he doesn’t own me.”
Molly considered me for a moment. Then she said, “That’s when he’s the most dangerous, Carl.”
I looked into her eyes. I wondered how she knew these things. I wondered what Jack had on her.
“Don’t ask,” she said, reading my gaze. “Just leave it alone.”
I nodded slowly. “All right. I need you to make a copy of that 911 call for me, though.”
“Why?”
“It’s evidence.”
She didn’t answer. Without another word, I headed upstairs to write my report.
Wes walked in when I was about halfway through the face sheet of the report. I looked up. He stood across the room from me, his thumbs looped in his belt while he chewed on his lip.
He glanced over at the closed door. “You got him in holding?”
“In number three.”
He nodded, then looked back at me. “You figure your charges will stick?”
“I reckon they should.”
“Should?” Wes barked out an exasperated laugh. “Maybe in El Paso, they’d stick. Hell, probably not even there. You might not even be able to make these stick in Dallas, Carl. But this isn’t Dallas and it ain’t El Paso.”
“I know.”
“It’s La Sombra. And La Sombra is-”
“Jack’s town.”
We stared at each other across the room. Wes ran his hands through his thick black hair and sighed. “I…I don’t think I can be with you on this one,” he muttered.
I nodded in understanding. “Do what you gotta do.”
He drew another deep, wavering breath and let it out in a rush. “I’m sorry. Really. But my cousins — ”
“Go,” I said. I kept any accusation out of my tone.
Wes pressed his lips together and left the room.
I resumed typing, waiting for the storm.
“What in the goddamn hell do you think you’re doing?” the Chief roared at me.
“My job, sir.”
“Your job? Your job is to arrest criminals around this town.”
“That’s what I — ”
“You arrested Jack Talbott!” the Chief screamed. “What the mercy fuck were you thinking?”
I looked into the Chief’s contorted, red face. His hair was tousled with sleep. Even his vain, handlebar mustache was tweaked. His mouth hung open slightly. I could see the permanent blackness of his gums, but he must’ve scrambled out of bed so fast he didn’t even stop to stuff a wad into his lip. The sourness of his breath and unbathed body drifted into my nostrils.
When I searched his eyes, though, I found no trace of the rage or anger I expected. He was afraid.
“What’s he got on you, Chief?” I whispered. “Just holding your job over your head, or is it something more?”
“What?” he sputtered. The red drained from his face and he became pale. “What did you say to me?”
“He’s just a man,” I said. “He’s not the devil.”
The Chief held out his hand, his fingers shaking. “Give me your badge, Carl. You’re done.”
I shook my head. “No.”
His eyebrows flew up. “No? You little outsider son of a bit-”
“I wonder what the newspaper would think of a cop getting fired for making a domestic violence arrest,” I said.
The Chief’s jaw clenched.
“Or even the TV station over in El Paso. They’re always looking for corruption cases.” I smiled without humor. “Those news boys would like nothing more than climb up some small town police chief’s ass and point out all the things he’s doing wrong.”
He dropped his hand to his side. “Go home,” he growled hrough clenched teeth.
“I’m not finished with my report yet.”
“You’re finished for tonight,” he said, leaning forward. His eyes flickered with rage. “Now go home or I’ll fire your Yankee ass for insubordination. Try’n get someone to give a shit about that, boy.”
Days passed. Jack’s arrest was the talk of the town and yet it wasn’t. The newspaper didn’t report it. No one mentioned it in polite circles. But in the undercurrent of conversation, when people were sure that no one else would hear, I knew they were talking about it. People eyed me with a curious mix of dread and admiration. By arresting him, I’d only accentuated my own status as an outsider, despite being a part of La Sombra for four years.
The Chief had released Jack later that same night.
Since then no one at the station spoke to me, except Molly and even she waited until we were alone. We kept our conversations to bare minimum.