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  “I’m all for stepping on cockroaches,” I said. “But for me, it’s less noble than that. It’s about me and my family. That’s my mission.”

  Booger said, “Point me at who you want done, and it’s done, and I don’t give a shit about cockroaches or family.”

  “We’ll have to do a little more planning,” Cason said. “But basically, they’re coming for you, Tom. The cops, if someone there is in on it, we can’t count on them. But even if we were counting on them, they only have so many men and so many police hours to offer. We’ll start out just being your emergency backup and hope we don’t need more than that, though that’s highly unlikely. Booger here has a bodyguard agency, and he’ll be there to protect you in a semi-legal way, depending on what we end up doing and what they find out, which if we’re lucky, will be very little.”

  “Yep,” Booger said. “And I’m the only bodyguard in the agency.”

  “That’s right,” Cason said. “But you write him out a check. You’ve hired him. He has the right to be there to protect you as long as he doesn’t break any laws. That they know about.”

  “I got a fucking license and everything,” Booger said. “But I’ll tell you, it would be simpler just to hunt them down, bring a few party favors, and get it done, kill every man jack of them.”

  “I’d rather just try and be protected,” I said.

  “Oh, don’t misunderstand me,” Cason said. “That’s our pose if they find out Booger is there. In the long run protection itself won’t work.”

  “Then what are you talking about?” I said.

  “Long as either of the Anthonys can get to you, or can pay someone on the outside to get to you, you aren’t safe. I’m saying we’re going to make it look like a bodyguard job. In the end, I figure we’ll end up doing something like Booger has suggested, because that’s about the only alternative there really is.”

  “So we’re going to kill them?” I said.

  “You aren’t really that dull,” Booger said. “What do you think we’re talking about, giving them a hand job? Yeah, we’re going to kill them. So dead. So damn dead.”

  Sixteen

  Of course I knew that, and had been thinking it myself, and had even suggested as much to Kelly, but I needed to hear them say it, I guess. Still, I didn’t like the idea. Not even a little bit. You don’t forget dead bodies. It’s not like in the movies, like someone lying down to sleep. It’s nothing like that. There is something so strange and cold about it, and not like a dead person in a coffin either. Much more pathetic, and made all the worse by bloody wounds. And there’s the smell of blood and intestines, and finally, if the bodies have lain there for a while, the smell of decomposition. That smell you never forget. That stink stays in your nose forever. Sometimes in a dream I’ll see the bodies I saw in Afghanistan, sometimes Afghans, sometimes American soldiers, and I swear, I can smell that fresh bloody stench of death, and then I can smell that other stink, the one that comes from decay, and I’ll wake up, sit up in bed, and the stink is still with me. So strong I have to get up and go downstairs and wait until it passes, letting time act like a breeze that blows it away.

  I was thinking about all this as I drove to the police station that morning. I hadn’t slept much, a couple of hours, and then I was up making coffee. Booger was up too. He didn’t seem to have slept or needed it. I got out of there as soon as I could. Booger made me nervous.

  When I got to the station, I went past the bald cop again, who lifted his hand to wave this time. I easily found Lieutenant Ernest. He was in his office pushing some papers around on his desk top. The door was open and I went in and sat in the chair in front of his desk. He smiled at me.

  “You look a little haggard, Tom.”

  “You have an idea why, I presume.”

  “Yeah, I do. It would make anyone nervous.”

  “I want you to know that I’ve put my family someplace safe, so it’s just me you got worry about.”

  “Where did you put them?”

  “I’m going to keep that to myself. I figure if no one knows but me, then it’s a safer place.”

  “You can tell me.”

  “But I won’t.”

  “Tom, I’m the police. I should probably know.”

  “They’re safe,” I said. “That’s good enough.”

  “All right. Have it your way.”

  “There’s me, though. I could use some protection.”

  “We can do that. You’re still going to testify?”

  “You act like you think there might be a reason I wouldn’t.”

  “No more than what I told you before,” he said.

  “When’s the trial?” I asked.

  He leaned back in his chair. “That I can’t say. That’s up to the judge. Will Anthony already has a lawyer.”

  “So he knows I’m going to testify?” I said.

  “He has a lawyer on retainer when he needs her,” Ernest said. “He doesn’t know he needs her yet. No one’s told him. I’m just saying, he has a lawyer and he’ll go straight to her soon as he knows about you.”

  “Look here, I said, “I may hire a bodyguard.”

  “A bodyguard?”

  “It’s just a thought,” I said. “I haven’t put it in concrete.”

  “I can put someone on it, park near your house in an unmarked car.”

  “Near my house?” I said. “And what if they come in the back door, or for that matter through the front while your man is snoozing?”

  “He won’t be snoozing. That’s insulting.”

  “You can get over an insult; I might not get over a bullet,” I said.

  He didn’t like that, and I could see what he didn’t like moving around on his face, but after a while his features calmed. “I see your point. I can recommend someone if you want to go that route.”

  “I have an old army buddy that runs a service like that,” I said. “I’ll go to him, I figure.”

  “You won’t need it,’ he said. “We can do the job.”

  “What if Will’s not convicted,” I said. “You going to keep watching after me?”

  “I’ve warned you about the problems with testifying,” he said. “No. We won’t be able to do that after the trial. Those are things to think about for sure.”

  I stood up. “When does your policeman start?”

  “Since Will doesn’t know we have you, or what you know, you’re not in any danger at the moment, so when the trial is set would be good. When Will’s lawyer knows about you, for certain.”

  “All right, then.”

  I turned and started out the door.

  “Tom,” he said.

  I turned back to him. He said, “What you’re doing is brave. I want to tell you that. I thank you. The city thanks you. The state thanks you. But, it could be a foolish decision.”

  “You keep saying that,” I said, and left out of there.

  When I was down the road a bit, I took one of the two new burner phones Cason had given me that morning, and called him.

  “Yes,” he said.

  “Kind of like you and I figured,” I said. “Lieutenant Ernest. He’s in on it.”

  “You know that for a fact?” Cason asked.

  “No, but I think he’s in on it.”

  “That’s not quite the same thing,” he said.

  “Bottom line, I don’t trust him. I didn’t trust him to begin with, but now I really don’t trust him. I can’t say I know anything more than I knew before, but I’m going to play it like he’s in on it. That seems the safe way.”

  “I’m going to agree with you,” he said. “I thought he might slip up in such a way you’d know something solid, but even if you don’t, we got to assume he’s in with Anthony, for caution’s sake. What are you doing right now?”

  “Frankly, I don’t know.”

  “Come see me again.”

  Seventeen

  I drove over to Cason’s, and it was a pretty good drive, of course, all the way to Camp Rapture. When I was insi
de his place, he held out his hand. There was a .38 revolver in it. He said, “Here’s a nice and simple pistol Booger left you.”

  “How sweet of him,” I said.

  “It’s clean,” he said. “You have your own gun?”

  “I’m not a real fan of guns,” I said. “After the war I’m less of one, but yeah, I have a shotgun.”

  “Someone breaks in, use it, not this,” he said, referring to the revolver. “I mean, you got to, it’s what’s there, go ahead and we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it, but you’d have a hard time explaining killing an intruder with a clean gun. The shotgun, that’s yours. This one, it’s for work outside the home, so to speak.”

  “Where’s Booger?”

  I took the revolver.

  “He’s at your house. I dropped him off there awhile back. Or close enough.”

  “What if he was seen?” I said. “Someone may already be watching.”

  “He wasn’t seen. You can count on that. Not in any way anyone would understand it was him. He’s like a goddamn ghost when he wants to be. You should remember that from the old days.”

  “Yeah, I guess I should. I don’t like him.”

  “I don’t know if you should,” Cason said. “I worry about me because I do. Kind of. Truth is, I try to stay away from him normally. He’s a big accident waiting to happen.”

  “Hope this isn’t the accident,” I said.

  “He’s what I’ve got,” Cason said. “He’s what you’ve got. What you do is you go home. Be cautious, but know Booger is in the house. I doubt anyone that might have showed up got past him, and if they did, they didn’t get completely past him. You’ll find someone dead, even if he’s amongst them.”

  “Comforting.”

  “You go inside and wait until we make our next move, which is simple. We go after them.”

  “And when will that be?” I asked.

  “Maybe tonight, maybe tomorrow night. I’m going to come take Booger’s place, just a friend coming to visit. At that point Booger is going to slip out and do a bit of reconnaissance. We’ll wait to hear what he says before we have a war council. I also have a place in Laborde I’ve rented. A little pool house out back of a friend’s house. Now and again I go there to pretend I’m working on my book, or because I have a reporter story out of Laborde. So I’ll be close by.”

  I drove home then. Knowing Booger was supposed to be in the house didn’t curb my fears. I had the .38 revolver in my glove box, and as I pulled into the carport I took it out, held it by my side as I unlocked the door.

  Easing inside, the gun held before me, I said, “Booger?”

  There wasn’t any answer. I looked through the house. He was nowhere to be seen. I padded silently into the bedroom. A cold snake of fear slithered up by back. I turned and the pistol was snatched from my hand and the next thing I knew I was on the floor on my back and there was a gun stuck against my forehead.

  The gun went away, and a face, like a comet falling, dropped down close to mine. “You got to get your juice back, Tom, my man. And don’t call my name, even if you think I’m here. Someone else might be here, and I might be hiding to tag them.”

  Booger stood, held out a hand and helped me up. He was wearing a cap and gray work clothes that had the name of the local cable company stenciled on both.

  “Damn, Booger. You scared me to death.”

  “I know.”

  “Where the fuck were you?”

  “Right by you most of the time. I’m in your house, Tom, and you didn’t even notice me.”

  “You’re like some fucking ninja.”

  “Yes, I am. But I’m a hungry ninja. Can you fix something to eat?”

  I went in and whipped us up a couple of large omelets, got a pot of coffee going. We were in the kitchen, and at the back of the house is a double-wide glass door. The curtains were drawn over it. While I cooked Booger stood at the corner of the curtains, peeking out now and again. He said, “I figure they come, they’ll come through here or the carport. If they come through the front door, it’ll be under some ruse. The latches are easy to jimmy on all the doors, the carport especially. Cason dropped me off a block up. I walked over, stopping to look around like I was doing something important, carrying a clipboard. I got here, I walked into the carport like I owned it, and when I was sure no one was looking, I went through the gate into the backyard, jimmied this door, and I was in. Saw a photo of your wife in your office, by the way. She’s a hot piece of ass.”

  “I prefer you not call my wife a piece of ass,” I said.

  “That was a compliment,” he said.

  “I know, but it’s an uncomfortable one,” I said.

  He nodded. “All right. Whatever you say. You know, I was wondering. Are you part Asian?”

  “Of course I am. You’ve known me for this long, and you didn’t know that. My last name is Chan. That’s not Polish.”

  “All right, I knew. I just wanted to ask.”

  “Yeah. Asian. My dad was born in Hong Kong. He became an American citizen when he was a child. I’m also Irish. My mother is so Irish she spits shamrocks.”

  “Yeah, you look a little like a blue-eyed Chinaman. I just couldn’t decide if your eyes squinted enough. Mine don’t squint much, and I’ve got some chink in me, some nigger, some Jew, you name it. It’s all the same. All people, whatever they are, what mix they are, bleed, and I bleed. But mostly, if I’m involved, they bleed.”

  He grinned at me like I was supposed to have gotten some kind of joke.

  I put the food on plates and got out silverware, wondering if I was more frightened of Booger than I was of Pye and Will Anthony.

  We sat around like that for a while, Booger prattling on about this and that, telling me about all the women he’d had and how anal was the best if they were greased up right. I was a nervous wreck by the time it grew dark, and when the door buzzer rang I nearly jumped three feet.

  Booger said, “Wait here.”

  He made for the door, quiet as a mouse in moccasins. I had the thirty-eight in my hand by that time, forgetting what Cason had told me about the shotgun. Booger peeked out the spy hole, turned his head to me, said, “Cason.”

  He opened the door and let him in.

  Eighteen

  Booger had a bag in the closet, took it out and put on black clothes, stuck a black ski mask in his pants pocket. I realized Cason, except for the hood, was dressed the same way. Cason was wearing a cap, similar to the one Booger had been wearing, but without the logo. Not that anyone could see the logo at night.

  I got it then. Booger was going to walk out and drive away in Cason’s car. Just a friend who came to visit for a while, then left. Anyone was watching, they probably wouldn’t think much of it. Fact was they’d wait to get me alone if they could. Seeing Booger leave might excite them to action.

  Before Booger left, we all had a cup of coffee so it wouldn’t seem like too short a visit, then Booger said, “Now it’s time to go amongst them.”

  Booger adjusted his cap, pulling it down low, took a couple of handguns from the bag and stuck them under his shirt and went out without another word. I went to the spy hole and could see him get in the car at the curb and drive away.

  “He looks too big to be you,” I said.

  “I doubt they’ll notice that,” Cason said. “They saw me come in, and they expect to see me go out, and that’s what they’ll see. It’s kind of like a magic trick. The magician makes you see what he wants you to see, not what you’re really looking for. That’s of course if there’s anyone out there to see anything.”

  We sat around for a while, and though Cason was pretty solid, he was more nervous than Booger. Now and again, sitting there at the table, he’d smile at me to let me know he knew how I felt. We didn’t talk, or go into the living room to watch television. We didn’t play chess or cards. We didn’t do anything to distract us. I hid the .38, got the shotgun out of the bedroom closet and got the shells out of the shoebox up on the top shelf of t
he closet, and loaded it. I kept the shotgun and shells separated because of Sue. I had inherited the shotgun from my father, who was something of an East Texas-Chinese redneck, and I kept it for protection from a common burglar or a poisonous snake in the yard. I knew how to use it, but I still didn’t like it, not after my time in the war.

  As it got near ten o’clock, we cut off the light in the kitchen and moved to the hall. We sat down in the hallway, our backs against the wall, facing one another in the dark. We were at the edge where the kitchen began, and by leaning a little to the side, I could see the door to the carport. The hallway led to the front door and all we had to do was turn our heads to see it, maybe twenty feet from us. Look to the right and we could see the sliding back doors. We had all the doors covered, if not the windows. I, of course, worried about the windows. Hell, I worried about the doors. I worried about them coming through the ceiling. I worried.

  I said, “You’re not a bodyguard. What if they come and you’re here, and you have to shoot someone? How do we explain that?”

  “I’m your friend. I have a concealed-carry license. I carry it because I’ve written some articles that have made some bad people mad. I had my gun with me. We heard a noise. You got your shotgun. I drew my nine, and there we have it. That’s as good as it gets, and if we stick to that, we’re all right. I think.”

  “You think?”

  “Yep. I think.”

  We sat there for a long time, and finally I got up and made fresh coffee and we had a cup, sitting in the hallway with it, and when we finished I put the cups away and came back and sat down. The minutes went by like old, crippled convicts in chains.

  Coffee and adrenaline kept me wired and awake, and I guess that’s why my stomach was queasy as well. That and fear and confusion and wondering how the hell I had ever come to this, part of me thinking if I hadn’t looked around the corner of the house right when I did, had I been a bit slower, I wouldn’t be carrying all this concern and the fear. But I had. There was no way to reverse that. I could do like Kelly had wanted me to do and bail, but I would think about that every day of my life, and even then I wouldn’t be safe; my family wouldn’t be safe. There was no other course, good or bad, than the one I was on. It was like I was on a train and knew at the end of the tracks was a cliff and there was no other choice but to go over it, no way off that train.