She smiled. “Yeah, that’s what you say now. But he was dead when we got there, so he died during your little escapade, freeing Ronnie and Johnny.”
“No way. No, no, no,” he said. “You won’t pin a murder charge on me.”
“Well, it’s definitely a murder that happened while you were committing a crime,” she said. “And you know that the law really doesn’t care about what part you played in the murder, so you’ll be going down for that too.”
“Hell, no,” he snapped. “This ain’t got anything to do with me.”
“You’re a little late to be protesting,” she said. “So, where are the rest of them?” He just glared at her. “I asked,” she said, stepping forward, “where are the rest of them?”
Shoving his chin out at her, he said, “None of your fucking business.”
“All right, have it your way,” she said, eyeing him carefully. “So, will you come in and talk to me, or will you resist arrest?”
“I’m not talking to you,” he sneered, “and you ain’t making me either.”
“Well, I could,” she said, studying him, “but I don’t have to.”
“And why is that?” he asked, glaring at her.
“Because that guy, behind you, he won’t have a problem doing it for me.”
Floyd spun around, and there was Bonaparte, towering over him. Floyd gulped, went to grab something in his back pocket. Bonaparte clocked him one in the face, his jaw like butter, and he crumbled to the ground.
“Jesus, I hope you didn’t kill him,” she said.
“Not unless something’s wrong with that jaw of his.” Bending down to check him, Bonaparte then stood, shaking his head. “No, he’s got a strong pulse.”
“Good,” she said, “but I don’t have a good feeling about this.”
“Neither do I,” he said, studying the junkyard. “A lot of vehicles are here.”
“Not only that,” she replied, “he’s also got a crusher in the back.”
“We better start there,” Bonaparte said, and he loped in the direction she pointed. Leaving Floyd tied up on the ground, they headed into the back. Sounds of machinery started up. She pointed off to the side, and the two of them raced as fast as they could in that direction. When she got there, a black vehicle with heavily tinted windows—the same one they’d seen earlier, delivering the crooked guy in a suit from Denver—was up on the deck, being lifted by the crane for the crusher. She immediately ordered the guy operating the crane to stop, but he just kept on going. “Looks like Floyd’s brother, Roscoe.”
“We have to get up there,” Bonaparte said.
“Do you really think somebody’s in the vehicle?”
“We can’t take the chance,” Bonaparte yelled, and he was already climbing the crane. It looked like Roscoe caught sight of him and tried to shift the angle of the crane, but that wouldn’t stop Bonaparte, who was climbing fast. By the time he was at the top, the car had been sent over to the crusher. But with Bonaparte’s gun pointed at Roscoe, he stopped. Immediately Bonaparte took control of the crane and slowly lowered the vehicle to the ground. She raced over to the vehicle, opened up the trunk, and found the two men Levi had sent down with Stone. Robert was alive and awake, staring at her in shock.
“Well, damn,” she said, “that was a little too close.” She helped him out of the trunk; then she reached in and checked his partner. “He’s alive,” she said, with relief.
“Yeah, I don’t know about the two guys in the front seat though,” Robert said.
She walked around and checked inside the vehicle. Sure enough, the corrupt Denver guy, who had tried to take over her operation, lay here, a bullet in his head. Beside him was the dead deputy on loan, Harry. “Damn,” she said. “This just keeps getting better and better.”
“Well, at least the Denver guy talked a lot while they had us,” Robert said. “We just have to find the two behind it all.”
“You mean, Ronnie and Johnny?” she said. “Those two have become such a pain in my ass.”
“Yours and mine both,” Robert said.
“That’s all right,” said another man, joining them.
Hearing a rifle locking into position, she turned to see Ronnie and Johnny standing there, each holding a weapon. “Wow,” she said, “you guys have turned into quite a pain.”
“No, that’s you,” Ronnie said. “All you had to do was let these guys get crushed, and it would have been a piece of cake.”
“Nope,” she said, “you would have just kept on coming.”
“Absolutely,” he said. “That’s who we are.”
“This is all about money,” she said. Noticing Robert, now at her side, trying to stand up straight, she reached over and gave him a hand.
“This is a hell of a situation.” Robert stared at the two brothers. “I just don’t get it,” he said. “After all this, why do you still expect to get away with it? Ronnie, you do know that we got all your electronics from your house, right?”
Ronnie shrugged and Johnny cackled. “Why wouldn’t we get away with this?” Johnny said, the bandage on his shoulder visible. “We’ll take out you three, plus that mammoth you brought into this deal. I still owe that asshole for the bullet in my shoulder.”
“It was hardly a bullet,” she said calmly. “It was barely a flesh wound, as I recall.”
As she spoke, she wondered what the hell Bonaparte was doing. But she just had to trust that he was up there and knew firsthand what was going on. She didn’t see how the evil brothers behind this could not know Bonaparte was in the crane, but she saw no sign of their recognition. So far, everything had been going in a completely crazed way anyhow. “This is all about money, and now you’re here, ready to kill how many more people?”
“It doesn’t matter how many,” Ronnie said. “After the first one it’s easy. We’ve killed probably six so far, so what’s another four or five?”
She shook her head. “And, with the local authorities and now the FBI
