“That’s Leo’s Jeep.”
The headlights picked up a bulk of dark green on the side of the rutted road and Rusty pulled his truck in behind
it. Louis couldn’t see anyone in the Jeep or in the heavy brush.
“Where’d they go?”
Louis asked.
Rusty pointed into the darkness. “There’s a path there. It leads out to a clearing.”
“What’s out there?”
“A cabin. Leo used to bring his buddies out here when he was hunting hogs. He
ain’t used it in a long time though.”
Louis looked at the blackness, then down at the CB radio on
Rusty’s dash. “Does that work?”
“Yeah. Who do you want to get a message to?”
“Lee County sheriff’s office. Just get them out here.”
Louis started to open the truck door but Rusty grabbed his arm. He reached
in the back and pulled out something dark. “Wear this. There’s a cap in the pocket.”
Louis took the camouflage rain jacket
. He got out of the truck and put on the jacket and the ball cap. The rain was starting to pick up again.
Rusty came around the front of the truck. He was training a flashlight into the brush, his head hunched down
in his collar.
“I
ain't been out here in years,” he said.
Louis pulled Susan
’s revolver from the waistband of his jeans and put it in the right jacket pocket. Zipping the jacket, he slipped the Glock from his holster.
“Okay, let’s go,” he said.
Louis could barely make out Rusty’s back as he followed him into the dark brush, so he watched the jerk of his flashlight against the trees. The rain splattering on his jacket sounded deafening in the silence.
“How far?” Louis asked.
“About three-quarters of a mile.”
If there was a path, Louis couldn’t see it
. But Rusty was moving easily through the heavy brush.
“The news said Adam kidnapped that boy,” Rusty said. “That true?”
“Yes,” Louis said.
“And killed all those people?”
“Yes.”
“I’m not sure Adam would do all that on his own. Someone else had to have been behind it
.”
“Someone was,” Louis said. “Leo.”
“Leo? Why would Leo want all those people dead?”
“He wanted one person dead,
” Louis said. “Vargas let it all get out of control.”
Rusty was quiet
.
“That’s why I think he wanted you to bring Vargas here tonight so he could protect him. Hide him from the cops.”
“No,” Rusty said. “Maybe he would have once, but not anymore.”
“Then why would Leo bring him out here?”
Rusty stopped and turned. “To kill him. To solve the problem for good.”
“Problem? He took Vargas in when he was a kid.”
“Yeah, but he didn’t really want him around. He told me once Adam was nothing but white trash.”
Louis could see just enough of
Rusty’s face to know Leo probably had included him in that category even if he had never said it.
“Adam got in trouble a lot,” Rusty said, moving on. “Nothing real bad, just normal kid shit
. But Leo got sick of it and worked up a really good punishment.”
Rusty swung the flashlight beam slowly over the black trees. “Every time Adam acted out Leo
would bring him out here and put him in a shack out on Starvation Prairie. He’d leave him here for days.”
Louis stared at him. “Locked in a shack?”
“No lock. Didn’t need it. Leo just told him if he left the shack the hogs would get him.” Rusty was quiet for a second. “No lights, no food. No one to hear you cry.”
“How long did this go on?” Louis asked.
“About two years. The last time, Leo left him out here a month. When we came back to get him --” Rusty took a breath. “I don’t know, it was like the boy was just broken. He crawled out crying stuff like I’ll be a good boy.”
“So Leo took him back to Naples?”
Rusty shook his head. “No, he moved him to the cabin in the clearing. He was alone but at least it was a real place to live. I used to come out once a month and bring him food and stuff.” Rusty paused. “He seemed okay, I guess.”
They came to a wide clearing. It was dark but Louis could make out the ou
tline of a cabin set back against the trees.
“That was Adam’s cabin,” Rusty said, pointing. “He lived there till he was eighteen and went off to prison. No one’s used it since.”
Louis went to the door of the cabin. The rain made it impossible to hear if anyone was inside. He crept up to a window and stole a look. Dark. One room and it looked empty. He slid to the door, Glock ready. The door gave with one hard kick and he swung the gun in.
Nothing. No movement or sound. He ventured in, his eyes sweeping the dark room. He saw a lamp and then the wall switch. He slapped it on and the room came to life.
Rough wood walls and floor. A small bed with a wad of sheets and blanket. A table with some soda cans and potato chip bags. A TV near the fireplace. A cassette player and a scattering of tapes on the floor.
Louis went to the tiny bathroom and switched on the bare bulb light. The white sink was stained bl
ack. There were broken Bic pens in the basin and wads of toilet paper stained black and red.
Switching off the lights, Louis left the cabin and went back to Rusty waiting in the middle of the clearing.
“Where’s the shack?” Louis asked.
“There’s three of ’
em spread out over the hunting grounds,” Rusty said. “One is about a half-mile from here, the second is a couple of miles northwest of that one, and the third is way out on Starvation Prairie. That’s the one where Leo used to leave Adam when he was a kid.”
“That
’s where they’ll be,” Louis said.
“I’m not sure I could even find that one anymore, especially in this weather. We need to wait till daylight.”
Louis looked at his watch. Five-twenty. The sun wouldn’t be up for another two hours. And the rain was not letting up.
“I’ll try the closest one,” Louis said.
Rusty pulled something out of his jacket and held it out.
“
Take my compass,” he said. “The path is probably long gone. Head due west and you’ll come to the shack.”
Louis took the compass
and turned up the collar of the camouflage jacket against the rain.
“Be careful,” Rusty said. “Leo took his crossbow.”
Louis kept the flashlight down, trained on the muddy ground. He was probably a quarter-mile from the cabin when he saw slits of light.
The shack was a blur against the darkness, but as he got closer he saw that the light seemed to be coming from gaps in the boards. Louis flicked off the flashlight and moved closer, easing up against the right side of the door.
The rain made it impossible to hear. And there were no shadows moving across the light inside. He waited. Seconds. Maybe a minute. Nothing.
He grabbed the door and flung it open, staying well outside but swinging himself to where he could see into the shack. Gun leveled at the doorway, he waited for a response.
N
othing. Except...
In the white glow of
the lantern he saw something hanging on a large metal hook on the back wall.
A body.
Red. Limp. Dripping.
The head tilted to the shoulder. The shirt cut away, small pieces of cloth still clinging to the body.
Ribbons of skin hung from raw red muscle, from the chest and arms.
It was Leo Ryker.
Louis fought to keep the Glock level. He forced his eyes away from the body. On the floor, a black poncho and the lantern in a pool of blood. On the walls, two more hooks —- empty —- on each side of Ryker’s head.
That was all Louis could see from his position outside the door. He couldn’t see the inside walls, couldn’t see if someone was hiding inside. He had to go in.
But he waited, frozen in place, only his eyes moving, moving over the exterior of the shack and the thin lines of light in the wood planks.
One
of the cracks near the door went dark and a second later lit up again. Someone inside had moved.
Louis
slid to the doorway then quickly stepped inside, swinging his gun to the right.
The knife came down at him. He caught Vargas
’s arm and spun him around, slamming him against the wall. Louis braced Vargas behind the neck with his forearm, beating Vargas’s hand against the wall until he dropped the knife.
Louis pushed Vargas’s shoulders harder against the wall and searched him. Then he spun Vargas around to face him, the
Glock pressed against his jaw.
“You
sonofabitch,” Louis hissed.
He belted him with the butt of the gun. Vargas stumbled, but didn’t fall, didn’t even look up.
Louis pulled him up and flung him out the door. Vargas fell backward, sprawling in the mud. Louis dropped a knee to Vargas’s chest and jammed the gun against his forehead.
“Where’s the boy?”
Vargas just stared at him, blinking against the rain.
“What happened to him?” Louis yelled.
Nothing.
“Talk to me, you bastard!”
Nothing.
“Where’s the boy?”
“He died a long time ago,” Vargas whispered.
Louis stared down at the
fleshy blur beneath him, pushing the gun harder against Vargas’s skull.
He wanted to kill him.
He squeezed down on the trigger, the gun shaking in his hand.
No. Don’t.
Louis pulled in a hard breath and jerked the gun away from Vargas’s head. He straightened slowly, walked a small circle, staring out into the darkness. Finally, he looked back at Vargas.
“Get up.”
Vargas managed a sitting position.
“Get all the way up. Show me where his body is.”
“I can’t.”
Louis put the
Glock back to Vargas’s head. “Get up or I will blow your fucking head off.”
Vargas didn’t move.
Louis spun away from him. He couldn’t leave him here. He hadn’t brought his cuffs and there was no rope to tie him up with. He knew he couldn’t drag him very far. And he knew he needed him. Ellis was dead. There was no one else to tell him where Ben’s body was.
Rusty. He’d signal Rusty. He lifted the
Glock to fire a shot. But then he heard something. Soft at first, then louder.
H
umming. The bastard was humming.
“Shut up.”
Words now. A western song.
Vargas had crawled to the side of the shack and was sitting against it, his head down, legs crossed, his voice cracking as he sang.
Louis pulled in a slow breath, trying to calm himself. Joe shot through his mind, the way she could talk to Susan, the way she had of questioning people, getting what she needed out of them, things even they didn’t know they had inside. He drew in another deep breath.
All right...he’d get this
sonofabitch talking.
“Some cowboy you are,” Louis said.
Vargas stopped singing.
“That’s what you want to be, right?”
Vargas shrugged.
“You don’t have a horse or a gun,” Louis said. “What kind of cowboy uses a knife? What kind of cowboy kills women? And kids?”
Vargas looked away from him.
“You’re a bad cowboy,” Louis said, hitting him in the shoulder with
the tip of the gun.
Vargas didn’t seem to care. He drew his knees up and started rocking, like Ben did when Susan got on him about something.
“Cowboys have rules, don’t they?” Louis said tightly.
No response.
“Rules! Cowboys have fucking rules, don’t they?”
Vargas picked at his jeans. “Yeah.”
“You know those rules?”
He nodded.
“Say them for me.”
Vargas looked up at him, then away.
“You know them. Say them!”
Va
rgas hesitated, then slowly started repeating Gene Autry’s rules. When he got to the one about being kind to children, he stopped.
“Nobody obeys that one,” he said quietly.
“Where did you leave him?” Louis demanded.
Vargas ran a hand across his face, looking out into the darkness. “I buried him behind the trailer.”
Louis closed his eyes. He had known it was coming. Vargas had said only minutes ago he had killed Benjamin, but there had still been hope that maybe it had been another lie. But there was a hard finality in Vargas’s voice that told Louis it wasn’t a lie. Not this time.
“Get up. Let’s go,” Louis said.
Vargas shook his head. “I can’t.”
“Don’t start this shit,” Louis said, walking to him. Vargas leaned away from him, bringing his hand above his head.
“I can’t,” Vargas whimpered. “I can’t...tell. I can’t tell. I can’t tell.”
Louis leaned down
into his face. “Tell what?”
“It’s a secret,” Vargas whispered, looking up.
Vargas fighting hard not to cry. He drew his knees to his chest, wrapped his arms around them, and put his head down. His shoulders shook with small sobs.
Louis stared down at him.
Yancy Rowen’s words came back to him.
It was like the guy never got past thirteen or something.
“Vargas, look at me.”
No response.
Louis lowered himself to a squat
in front of Vargas. He took another deep breath and forced himself to soften his voice.
“Adam, look at me.”
Vargas looked at him quickly.
“
Tell me the secret,” Louis said.
“I can’t
.”
“Why not?”
“The hooks.”
Louis glanced at the shack. “Those hooks
in there?”
“I don’t want to hang on a hook.”
“No one’s going to hang you on a hook.”
“He will,” Vargas said quickly. “He told me he would. That
’s why I killed him.” Vargas lowered his forehead back to his knees.
“
Uncle Leo’s dead,” Louis said.
“That’s why I did it
,” Vargas said. “I had to do it before he did. That’s why I killed him and buried him.”
“Who?”
No answer.
“Who
did you bury?”
Vargas whispered something Louis could barely hear.
“Your stepfather? Is that who you killed? Is that who you buried behind the trailer?”
“Yes.”
Louis stood up slowly. He looked at Vargas, huddled against the shack, arms over his head.
“Adam.”
Vargas didn’t answer him.
“Where’s the boy you and Ellis took from
the park?”
“Who?” Vargas asked, looking up.
“The little boy in the park. Benjamin.”
Vargas hesitated, like he was trying to remember. “
He’s with the women.”
“The women?” Louis asked. “The three women you got from Austin Outlaw?”
“Two. There’s only two now.”
“They’re alive?”
Vargas nodded.
“Take me there, Adam.”
“Uncle Leo will be mad.”
“Uncle Leo won’t know.”
“But I won’t get my money,” Vargas said, wiping his face, smudging the black teardrop tattoo under his eye.
“Adam,” Louis said. “What would Byron want you to do?”
“I don’t know.”
“He’d want you to save the boy, wouldn’t he?”
Vargas thought about it for a minute. Then he nodded slowly.
“Take me there now, Adam,” Louis said.
Vargas wiped his face then struggled to his feet, bracing himself against the shack. Louis went quickly back into the shack, not looking at the body hanging on the hook as he grabbed the lantern.
He came back out
and held out the lantern. Vargas stared at it for a moment, like he didn’t realize what it was, then took it. He looked up at Louis.
In the white glow of the lantern light, Louis could see
Vargas’s face clearly. It was a mask of dirt and blood, lined with tears. And in it, he saw Adam, the boy died a long time ago and Adam the man, but pieces now so fractured that no one could ever fit them back together.
Va
rgas turned and started toward the trees. With a final look back at the open door of the shack, Louis followed him into the darkness.