I sat there a moment. The waitress grabbed the twenty and began clearing up the counter, avoiding looking at me. I got up. I was livid. I felt a clear bolt of energy move through me, and as it surged into my center, I felt invincible. I hurried after Suazo, caught up with him in the parking lot just as he was about to get in his truck. I tapped him on the shoulder from behind. He was only about five-nine, not much bigger than me, really, and certainly not in good shape, though possibly tough in a wiry sort of way. Suazo whirled on me and took a swipe with his better arm. I ducked. That swipe was all I needed. I threw my body into his solar plexus, and I heard the wind rush out of his lungs with a grunt as my shoulder lodged deep. I grabbed his scrotum with one hand and his windpipe with another, and I rammed him against the side of his truck, squeezing the lower hand hard. His arms didn’t have time to reach for me before his face contorted with pain. He raised both hands in the air in defeat. I loosened my grip a little, but held him there. “I want you to apologize for the insulting things you just said about my anatomy and my profession, Mr. Suazo.” The words barely escaped my gritted teeth. I was a reservoir of seething rage.
“Lo si-en-to, señ-or-i-ta.” His voice wheezed from the blow, but his voice was still bitter. He wouldn’t look at me. His eyes were slits, one lid lazy, almost closing on his fierce stare past my shoulder.
“Now, tell me. What were you doing up by Boscaje?”
“Nada.”
I squeezed hard, and he tried to double over, but I pressed against his windpipe.
“Just looking for fun, man.” He half choked. “Looking for a good time with la rubia-some gringa like you.”
“I’m in no mood, Suazo. You may like to beat on your poor little wife, but this is one woman you better not screw around with. I’d just as soon rip these little jewels right off you as stand here and smell your foul stench.”
“Sí, pero, you’re not going to do that,” he puffed. “You got no jurisdiction here. You got nothing on me, man! You can’t do a fucking thing to me!” His raspy voice attempted bravado, but his eyes protruded from fear and pain. He looked like a big lizard.
“You took a swing at me, Suazo. That’s all I need. I can have you arrested right now for attempted assault on a federal agent. Or you can talk to me about what you were doing up by Boscaje.” We stood there a moment, my forehead almost touching the side of his pitted face, both of us panting, neither one of us moving. I could taste the stink of his beer breath, his fear. His crotch felt damp in my hand. I heard a car door slam behind me and footsteps coming toward us, but I didn’t take my hands away or even dare to turn my head around and look.
“Can I be of any help?” a baritone voice asked. I knew that voice. Where did I know that voice from? I released Suazo, whose eyes were wide with fright. He scrambled into his truck as I turned around and saw Andy Vincent, and behind him Regan.
“Jamaica?” she said, her face full of worry. “Are you all right?”
Suazo’s truck roared to life, jumped the curb, and squealed away.
24
My blood still coursed with unspent adrenaline when I walked into the BLM office a few minutes later. I felt like sopapilla dough when it hits the hot grease. I knew I shouldn’t have let Suazo get to me like that-I should have called the sheriff when he took a swing at me instead of taking him on myself. But if I hadn’t pinned him against his truck, Suazo would have been long gone before a deputy could have gotten there, and it would turn out like all the rest of the times we’d tried to press charges and he’d gone free. Either way, nothing stuck to Suazo, so what had I accomplished?
Rosa Aragon was at the desk again, a telephone receiver pressed to one ear, her head bobbing up and down in agreement with the caller. Roy here? I mouthed. She nodded more emphatically and pointed a thumb toward the hall.
Roy was in his office, rubbing his head with consternation as he stared at a pile of papers in front of him. I tapped my knuckles against the door frame. “Having fun, Roy?”
“Hell, no, I’m not having fun. I hate this stuff. What are you doing in here now-come to give me an excuse to give up on this blasted paperwork for a while?”
“Actually, I brought you some more paperwork.” I put my targets on the desk. “But if you need a break I’ll buy you a cup of coffee.”
“No, no. Sorry, I can’t. But sit down a minute, I want to talk to you about something. I was just thinking about you this morning.”
“Uh-oh.” I sat in the gray-green metal and vinyl chair in front of his desk.
“No, no, it’s nothing bad. In fact, I talked with the wife a little about this, too. No, I was just thinking maybe we ought to look for a different assignment for you here when this team effort with the Forest Service is done.”
“What do you mean?” My chest tightened.
“I mean, something where you get around people a little more. Not so much of that remote-area stuff. I think you got too much talent to be a range rider.”
I stood up. “I don’t want a change of assignment, Roy.”
He got up, went around me, and closed his office door. “Sit down, Jamaica. This is just you and me here. Just relax, you’re not in any trouble.”
I sat, but right on the edge of the seat, ready to break with it, if need be.
Roy saw it. He sat back in his chair, picked up a pencil. He twirled the pencil like a baton-over his knuckles and under his hand, again, then again. “Will you just settle down? You’re like an unbroken filly!”
I released my grip on the arms of the chair, tried to find a place for my hands in my lap.
“Jamaica, you don’t have to make the switch today. I’m just saying I think it’s time we found something better for you, something where you got to be around civilization once in a while.”
I laughed. “You think I’m uncivilized, huh?”
He smirked. “I wasn’t saying that. I just want you to have a chance to be around people a little more. I had an idea maybe we’d put in for-”
I cut in, “I’m okay, Roy. Why are you doing this? Do you think I can’t handle my job?”
He threw the pencil down on the papers in front of him, but it rolled across the desk toward me, then fell onto the floor. Neither of us moved to get it.
He broke the silence. “I used to do your job. I did it for years. It’s hard, mean, low-paying, lonely-assed work. Nine out of ten resource protection agents don’t last three years at range riding. You been doing it six. I see all the signs in you: you’re burned out. If I don’t move you, I’m going to lose you. That’s all I know. Besides, I don’t know how much longer that will even be a job classification with the BLM. Things are changing.”
“You used to be a range rider?”
“Hell, yes, I was, for almost seven years. It damned near cost me my marriage. I got so used to being alone, out by myself, I got to be like you said-uncivilized. I couldn’t open up and talk anymore. I didn’t have any patience with people. But I was lonely, too, and down. I was real down. I just didn’t know how to reach out to anybody.”
“I never knew that about you.”
“Yeah, well, take it from me. You want a change of assignment. And I’m not talking about a desk job, either, so don’t worry about that.” He surveyed his piles of paperwork. “I wouldn’t wish this stuff on a dog I didn’t like! No, I’m talking about one of the other resource protection agent posts, maybe with the Rio Grande Use and Management Division, or liaison with the Ski Valley or the pueblo. Something where you aren’t out by yourself in the backcountry all the time.”