Payne noticed a couple stable hands watching them. Two Hispanic men, each with a foot on the bottom rail of the corral fence.
'I made a promise to a boy, and I'm not gonna let him down. Not this time.'
Rutledge's laugh was as sharp as barbed wire. 'Got a news flash for you, Payne. Every day, kids in Africa starve to death. Women in Tecate are raped and murdered. A little boy riding with his father gets broadsided by a drunk. Grow the fuck up!'
'Not growing up. Not giving up. Just give me Marisol Perez, and I'll go away. Whatever's happened, we'll let it go. No authorities. No investigations.'
'You got no idea what's at stake here. Or what I'll do to protect it.' Rutledge leaned forward, both hands on the saddle horn. A look crossed his face like quick, scudding clouds covering the sun before a storm. 'Don't you get it, Payne? You're the one endangering the woman's life. You fuck with me, her blood's on your hands. Not mine.'
Rutledge reached into a holster fitted alongside his saddle.
Payne heard the cr-ack before he felt the pain.
The tip of the bullwhip had struck his shoulder like a rattle snake.
'I could take out your eye before you could blink,' Rutledge taunted him.
A second cr-ack, and the leather flicked at Payne's neck, drawing blood. The sting of a hundred bees.
The two Hispanic men leaning against the rail didn't move. They could have been watching their boss shoe a horse.
Payne raised an arm and blocked the third throw. But the popper wrapped itself around his forearm like a snake. Rutledge tugged at the reins and turned the horse, yanking Payne off his feet. A nudge in the ribs, and the horse cantered around the perimeter of the corral, dragging Payne through the red dirt. His face scraped the ground, a blowtorch to the skin. He tried to get his feet under him but could not. A knee twisted and buckled. Pain shot through his metal-plated leg, a dagger deep to the bone. He pulled with his trapped arm, tried to rip the whip out of Rutledge's hand, could not get the leverage.
The horse picked up speed, and Payne dug his sneakers into the dirt, trying to slow down. One sneaker came off, then the other. He felt his shoulder pop out of its socket. His right arm was aflame, and he spat blood.
He heard himself scream. Hated the sound, a shameful shriek of pain and fear.
Rutledge gave slack to the whip and wrestled it free from Payne's arm. He slung himself off his horse. Payne writhed on the ground, face pasted with dirt and blood. His stomach heaved. He thought he would puke. He struggled to his knees, just as a shadow moved over him, blocking out the sun. The shadow kicked him. A cowboy boot straight to the gut. Another kick, this one to the side of the head, and his vision blurred.
'Damn you!' Rutledge brayed. 'Damn you to hell! A smart man would have taken the money. A real man would have killed Garcia.'
Rutledge kicked him again, aiming for his balls, but catching the inner thigh. Payne curled into the fetal position, yet another humiliation. Rutledge towered above him. Face reddened, saliva oozing into his mustache.
'Turns out you're stupid and a coward. Ain't that right, Payne? Estupido y cobarde. '
Payne remembered Tino calling him a valiente. But he was neither brave nor cowardly. He was just a flawed man trying to fix one thing in a broken world.
'You just gonna lay there like a whipped dog?'
Payne got to one knee, and collapsed, blood spraying from his blistered lips.
Rutledge spat into the dirt near Payne's head. 'My daddy always told me if I was to stomp a man, I should squash him like a cockroach. Leave nothing but a tobacco stain on the ground.'
The heel of a boot appeared above Payne's head. Rutledge grunted as he put all his weight into it. A lightning bolt shot through Payne's brain. Sparklers burned, and he saw the capillaries, like twining streams, behind his eyelids. The pain took a detour, paused like a pedestrian at a traffic light, then crow-barred him between the eyes. A second later, he was aware of nothing at all.
SEVENTY-SIX
Kneeling in the moist earth of the brothel's garden, clipping at the rosebushes with pruning shears, Marisol planned her escape. She had been docile ever since Mr. Zaga asked whether she could read and speak English. He would not expect her to run today.
Where would she go? She didn't know. She would search for Tino, but where? Had he crossed over or was he still in Mexico? How would she ever find him?
When the enormity of the task made her tremble, she focused on the first step of the journey. From her bedroom window, she could see that the brothel was an island in a sea of farmland. Almond trees. Cow pastures. Strawberry fields stretching to the horizon. Everything owned by el jefe. Mr. Rutledge. The man who had come to her room and taken what he wanted. As if he owned her.
Through a stand of oak trees, she had seen a building perhaps three hundred feet away. One story, made of concrete blocks, with a flat roof. Seemingly abandoned. A small parking lot and a yard full of weeds. A flagpole with no flag. Just beyond the building was a road. If she could make it there, she could flag down a driver. But not those white trucks with the sign Rutledge Ranch and Farms, Inc.
She gripped the stem of a brilliant red rose, avoiding the thorns. Snipped with the shears. Soon, she would carry two armloads inside to the parlor. White roses as fluffy as a bride's gown. Pink roses, delicate as a blush. Purples, as dark and rich as wine. All far too beautiful for such a place.
Mr. Zaga had put her on yard and kitchen duty. She sensed that it was temporary, that they had other plans for her. The women working there, the putas, whispered about her. Strangely, many of them-Mexicans, Guatemalans, Hondurans-did not seem to mind their despoliation. This morning, in an adjacent bedroom, three women from Chihuahua, dumber than cows, were fixing one another's hair, giggling and babbling. Marisol thought of them as putas parlanchinas.
Chatterbox whores.
Giggling, they described their customers' genitals in disgusting terms and boasted about providing extras in return for bigger tips. One of the women slapped her rump, shouting, '?Metemela por el culo, vaquero!'
Demanding it in her back door. How vulgar. How crude.
The other women laughed. They claimed to be sending home enormous sums of money. Marisol could stand it no longer. 'Do you tell your families how you make this money?'
'?Chingate!' the ass-slapper hissed.
'She'd better,' another one brayed. 'No one else will.'
More laughter.
'You are free to leave,' Marisol told them. 'Why don't you just walk away?'
'To where? The fields?'
'I have no man to protect me,' the third one said. 'I'd be raped every night.'
'Better to be paid for it,' the ass-slapper said. 'And have good food, too.'
'If you don't like it here,' the second one said, 'go back to whatever shithole you came from.'
Marisol would have gone in an instant. But there were different rules for her. These women, the trusted ones, could go into town to shop. They could use the telephone.
Just now, the daytime guard stood on the rear porch watching her. An Asian face. Said to be from Vietnam. Not young and not appearing physically strong, but Marisol had heard whispers that he was a trained killer from a long-ago war, that he enjoyed hurting women with his knife. There were many such rumors here.
The guard kept his eyes on Marisol. Had Mr. Rutledge ordered it? She tried to suppress the memory of his trips to her room but could not. She had struggled at first, then realized he enjoyed it more when she fought back. She had gone limp. Motionless. Silent. Eyes squeezed shut. Imagining she was far away, floating on a cloud, oblivious to his violation of her. Hoping his interest would wane.
Instead, he slapped her across the face and pulled her hair.
'Move your ass, chica!'
