of six-inch spikes and pulled on a long red velvet cape, then slid the hood up over her head. For a moment I thought of Little Red Riding Hood and wondered if I was the wolf or the woodcutter? Then we were running down the hall. The cowboy went down the front stairs to try and slow the mob boys down. We went out the back. I knew we had thirty feet of open space between the house and the gate. I cursed myself for leaving my gun in the car. I hooked Cass’ arm around mine and told her to follow my lead. Moving out of the shadows, I let out a loud drunken laugh. I stumbled toward the gate. I could see the thug on the Cadillac watching us. Hitting the gate I pulled her into a kiss, or at least that’s what it would look like, past her I could see the house. No one was coming out the door. Pushing open the gate we swayed toward the Cadillac. I let go of Cass and rolled up on the thug.
“Hey buddy, I’m getting hitched! What do you think about that?” I slurred. Cass let her cape float casually open, suddenly his attention was on her creamy flesh. Swinging a powerful right cross I dropped him, sending his sunglasses skidding across the gravel. As he fell I kicked him in the head and he flopped over on his back, his eyes fluttered once and he was out. If the girl was sickened or scared by my sudden burst of violence she sure didn’t show it. Taking her arm I lead her to the Crown Vic.
“This is your car? What are you, a cop?” Cass asked.
“It runs. Now get in.”
From the trunk I pulled my guns, slipping the.45 automatic into my waistband and dropping the riot gun into the back seat. Cass looked from the shotgun up to me.
“Get your head down, this may get messy,” I said in the voice I reserve for drunks and new girls at the club. It did the job, she stared at me defiantly for a moment then ducked down. I fired up all eight cylinders of Detroit magic and jammed the Crown into reverse. Spinning around I heard a car horn. The punk had been playing possum. The Cadillac had been moved and now it sat between us and the exit. Hitting the emergency brake I spun the Crown Vic in a 180 sending up a fantail wake of gravel. We stopped facing the Cadillac. Out of the side window I spotted two cats in dark suits running from the house. Both had ugly little automatics in their hands. The thug at the Cadillac pulled a shotgun out of the driver’s side window, aiming it at my windshield. I pushed Cass down onto the floorboards and stomped on the gas. The blast tore a hole in my windshield and I felt a sharp pain in my neck as the buckshot and safety-glass sailed past my face. I watched in syrupy slow motion as bits and pieces floated around the car, the thug’s face distorted as his mind locked in on the fact that I wasn’t going to stop. He had given his best and it wasn’t enough. With a blur and a rush the thug rolled over the hood of my car as I careened into the side of the Cadillac. Sparks flew and my side view mirror went sailing into the air. Straightening out the Crown Vic, I leaned hard on the steering wheel, fishtailing out of the parking lot. I heard two small pops and the thud of lead hitting the trunk. Then, only the comforting purr of the beast.
I redlined the engine, slid around the curves. Cass clambered up into the seat, gripping the door to keep from landing in my lap. As we rounded the mountain I caught a brief glimpse of headlights behind us, coming on fast. The road was flattening out to a long sloping straightaway. Punching it up to a hundred and twenty, the scrub brush beside the road blurred by. The headlights rounded another bend behind us. Soon they would wind down onto the straightaway and then it would be an all out run for cover. No way we would make the highway in time to lose them. If we got pulled over by troopers, there would be way too much to explain. On the left a rutted ranch road intersected the pavement, locking the brakes I killed the headlights and spun the wheel. The car slid sideways down the road, the rear tires fighting for traction. When we hit the dirt road I was driving blind. A tall pine appeared in front of me, wrenching the wheel I fishtailed past it, the rear end smacking into the trunk. Next we hit a bump that sent Cass tumbling back onto the floor. I hit my skull on the roof hard enough to leave a dent, and my head ringing. I eased on the brakes, pulled to a stop and killed the engine.
“Now that was fun…” Cass said without a hint of a smile. I motioned for silence. In the distance I could hear the deep roar of the Cadillac coming on steady and strong. They were almost past us when I heard their brakes, they must have seen the dust trail.
“Hold on,” I told Cass, revving the Crown Vic to life. The road was a tore-up nasty piece of turf, full of dips and dives that would destroy the strongest suspension. Their headlights bounced wildly in my rearview mirror now. There was a pop as someone leaned out trying to fire, but with all the bumping and jostling I didn’t have much fear they would hit anything. We flew over a hill and suddenly the road fell away from below us, airborne we sailed for fifteen feet, landing with a splash in a wide riverbed. The rear tires spun but couldn’t gain purchase. We were stuck in the gravel. “Hit the brush!” I yelled at Cass as I rolled out of the door. Kneeling in the icy water, I leaned against my car, aiming the.45 back up the road. First headlights came over the hill then the grill of the Cadillac. I sighted in between the headlights and fired four quick shots into the engine block. As jacked rounds ripped metal it seized and the car lurched to a stop, steam jetting from its radiator. Staring into the headlights fucked my night vision for the moment, so I emptied the clip into the body of the car without much hope of hitting anything. Grabbing the Mossberg I ran for the bank of the river. Jacking a shell into the shotgun I crawled toward the Cadillac. Through the brush I saw the driver stepping out. I jumped up and pulled the trigger, the blast hit him in the middle of the chest with a load of double ought buck. He flopped back against the car and went down. From over the car the other two boys let fly. I dove and rolled away, the dirt around me exploded with their bullets. Crawling behind a pine tree I leaned out firing. They ducked and fired back, blowing chunks of bark out of my only protection. I was pinned down.
“Yo Bubba, why don’t you give us the girl and we all part friends?” one of them yelled.
“Why don’t you pencil dick grease-balls come get me?” Cass yelled from the brush behind them. As they turned I jumped out from behind the tree, zigzagging across the rough terrain. They spun and fired at me, sending powder burning into the night and shots whizzing past my head. The muzzle flash of a gun sparked behind them. Cass had joined the party and apparently she brought an automatic friend. Trapped, they ran from the cover of the car. I caught the first in the gut, he spun to fire but I hit him again in the chest. He was dead before he hit the ground. Leveling my shotgun at the last punk, I pulled the trigger only to hear a quiet click as the firing pin fell on an empty chamber. He leveled his automatic on me smiling, enjoying the turn of events. Without warning the side of his face erupted in a spray of blood. Cass stood like some comic book geek’s wet dream in her merry widow, cape flowing behind her. She held a 9 mm in a classic pistolero single-hand stance, her left hand outstretched behind her for balance. She emptied the clip into the last punk as he crumpled, twisted and rolled with the impacts. It was over as quickly as it had started and silence fell over us. My ears were ringing from the gunfire and the acrid burn of spent powder stung my lungs. Checking the thugs I confirmed what I already knew, they were all dead. Looking at their useless corpses I felt a sick pride. The fuck-heads had tried to take me down and I showed their asses.
Cass walked up to me, the shiny little pocket 9 mm still in her hand. Her face was alive, electric with the rush. “Did you see that punk?” Cass was running on a full tilt motor mouth adrenalin high “Bam! Our old man was a cop, taught us to shoot rats at the dump. He used to say you had to practice until it became automatic. That was the one true thing he told us. Bam! That’s one scuz who’ll never fuck with me again. Did you see that?” Was her pride real, or covering for fear?
I don’t know. Whichever way, it scared me. I had seen something like it in the Root, newbies first kill, all glory and pride. That soaring moment before the ghosts start knocking at your door. Then, there were those who never sweated the death they brought. Freaks who saw only a target, not the living flesh beyond it.
“What’s wrong?” She searched my face, seeking out my mood and how she should respond to it.
“Everything’s copacetic, baby girl.” I could feel her eyes on me as I walked away, rather than explain all I knew about life-taking. In the trunk of the Cadillac I found a shovel and a bag of lye, intended, no doubt, for Cass. The sweaty hard work of digging their grave made me feel good, human. I was built for hard work and had spent too many days on my ass. Dragging their bodies over it sunk in. This wasn’t a game. These men were dead, whatever else they were going to be wasn’t going to happen. No more Christmas dinner with their families. No more shooting the shit around a pool table. No more anything. Perhaps the sickest thing about battle is how good it feels when you’re in the middle of it. I had helped send three young men into the silky blackness from which they would never return. Then again, it’s not like these rat fucks were worth getting all misty over. Me or them, that’s the game. These young fucks came to put the old man down and were found wanting. I win — they lose. I am the king of this bend in the river. Thus it has been since the dawn of time thus it shall ever be, sooner or later the talking stops, the bullshit walks and the Viking puts the hammer down on these motherless bastards. Them or me.
Patting the earth smooth over them, I walked back to the Cadillac. Their pockets had produced two driver’s licenses, one from California with a SF address, and the other a Nevada with a North Vegas address. I had little hope that the addresses were much more than mail drops, these boys clearly weren’t living the straight life. I also
