5

“Move back,” the gunman says. “Now, or I redecorate this shithole with your brains.”

“God knows that would be an improvement,” the Reverend chimes in, sounding not-at-all annoyed by this intrusion.

The woman is shuddering, and there’s that goddamn instinctual need to help, to touch her, make sure she’s okay, but that bullet blower keeps me in place.

“How come you don’t have a piece?” says the man.

“I do, just not on me.”

“Anyone else in there likely to act the hero?”

I consider Kyle. He’s got a gun, and the guy’s probably going to find that out sooner or later. But “No,” I tell him, because later’s better.

“You better not be lying to me.”

“I’m not.”

“Carla, you alive?”

On the floor, head bowed, dark wet hair almost touching the boards, the girl slowly shakes her head. She’s bleeding something fierce.

“She needs help.” It’s an obvious statement, but considering the guy is still standing in the doorway pointing a gun at me, I figure he could use the reminder.

“Yeah, no shit. Don’t suppose there’s a doctor in there?”

“No, but we can at least patch her up, stop the bleeding. Give her something for the pain. You’re not doing her any favors leaving her on the floor.”

It doesn’t take him long to realize I’m right. He waggles the gun in my face. “Back up. All the way to the bar, and keep your hands where I can see them.”

I set the whiskey bottle down on the floor and do as I’m told, walking backwards, hands in the air, until I’m just about level with the Reverend’s table. “You plan this?” I ask him, though somehow I know he didn’t, not unless he was suddenly stricken with guilt and decided to save me gas money.

“It would seem,” he replies, “that we’ll have to suffer an unscheduled interlude.”

“I find it hard to believe you don’t make allowances for this kind of thing.”

“Oh, but I do. Before this night is through, that man and his little trollop will be still be so many pounds of mashed up meat branded by the tires of your truck, Tom. Doesn’t matter what they do to piss away the meantime.”

“Shut your mouths,” the man with the gun says. He steps into the light and at last I’m able to see the face of my intended victim. He’s little more than a kid, it seems, not much older than Kyle, wearing a cream colored suit that was probably nice before the blood spoiled it, with a white shirt open at the collar. Shoulder-length blonde hair frames a face hardened by the many pit stops on the road to a Hell of his own design. He slams the door shut behind him and stands there, gun trained on me, then at everyone else in the room, before coming round to me again.

“This isn’t the way to do it, son,” Cadaver says, and the thief almost jumps out of his suit and the skin beneath. I wince, waiting for him to pump a few rounds into the shadow in the corner, but he manages to restrain himself. “Who the fuck is that?”

“Cadaver,” I tell him. “He’s just an old man. Leave him alone.”

“The fuck’s he doing hiding?”

“He’s not. That’s his table. Light just isn’t so good. It’s how he likes it.”

“Yeah?” The kid doesn’t sound convinced, and his fingers dance on the butt of the gun like he’s deciding whether or not to illuminate Cadaver’s corner with some muzzle flash. “Move out here with the others.”

Cadaver doesn’t make a sound, nor does he make a move.

The kid clicks back the hammer. It makes the same sound Cadaver does when he swallows.

“Look kid…” I take a step forward, and realize a split second after I’ve done it that it’s a mistake. The gun finds me again. Now I have two of them pointed at me. If Kyle and this guy fire at the same time, I may very well hit the ground with two shadows. I raise my hands palm out. “Just hang on a second, will ya? No one needs to get hurt here.” Which is a damned lie. Sooner or later, someone’s going to get hurt, and satin-pillow-in-a-pine-box kind of hurt. Right now though, the question is not who, but how many, and that’s not good enough.

The kid catches sight of Cobb. Frowns. “Why’s he naked?”

“Because I choose to be,” Cobb states boldly. “Ain’t got no use for clothes.”

The kid smiles, and for a moment I see the real kid, the one hiding deep down inside that suit, the kid who watched his manners when his aunt came to visit, said grace before meals, and shook in his shoes when he showed up at the door for his first date. An All-American kid run over on the road of life, relieved of his dreams, then fixed right up with some choice drugs, a gun and a whore and sent on his way. Only to end up here, with his would-be executioner trying to talk some sense into him.

“Some bunch of fuckin’ loons we got us here, Carla.”

The woman on the floor doesn’t respond, but I almost don’t notice because now I know her name, and it dances before my eyes in lurid neon, mocking me. I wasn’t supposed to know. I don’t want to know, but now that I do, their ghosts will have names too.

Wintry turns around in his seat, his huge head sheened with perspiration, and stands. The expression on his face is unreadable, but that big nose of his is flaring at the ends like a bull about to charge.

“Hey now.” The kid is visibly intimidated. “Sit right back down big man, or I’m going to have to cut you down.”

Wintry doesn’t move, but his eyes move to the fallen girl.

“What are you doin’?” Flo asks, and grabs his sleeve. “Sit down.”

But Wintry doesn’t. He glances at me and nods one time, as if it’s the cue to do something, as if he figures I’m clever enough to read those large brown eyes of his, or maybe he thinks he’s already shared his strategy via some telepathic link. Whatever it is, I don’t have time to figure it out because Wintry’s already moving, brushing past me, his jacket making a zipping sound as it grazes my outstretched fingers. It smells of pinesap and smoke.

“Wait…”

My objection is overruled by Flo’s panicked cry. “Wintry, don’t!”

Wintry keeps walking.

The kid stiffens. “Hey, I said sit down man.”

“Goddamn it,” Gracie pipes up. “Do as he says.”

The kid aims the gun at the big man’s chest, licks his lips.

Wintry keeps walking, but he’s not heading for the kid. He’s headed for the girl, and surely the kid sees this. Surely he’ll read the big black man’s intentions, understand what I didn’t, and–

There’s a bang as if thunder has slipped under the door, a burst of light, and Wintry finally stops walking.

***

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