Authors: Brad Smith
When the woman went inside the man walked back to the Mercedes and a few seconds later the lights in the office went out, then the lights in the adjoining house. When the man shut the roadster off, Virgil turned and headed back toward the cabin, keeping to the row of trees along the narrow lane. Stopping there in the shadows, he waited.
The moonlight was so bright that he could clearly see the man making his way toward Virgil's truck, parked in front of the cabin. Virgil decided not to go back inside, but instead retreated beyond the corner of the building. Again in shadow, he waited for the man, who approached cautiously, stopping to take a look in the big front window before continuing around to the rear of the cabin. Virgil retreated once more, finally concealing himself behind a stand of rough cedar shrubs that marked the property's rear boundary.
The man moved quietly along the side wall of the building, and when he emerged from the shadow into the moonlight Virgil could see his features, his pumped-up arms, the gold jewelry around his neck. He stepped up onto the deck and approached the French doors that opened to the bedroom where Virgil had slept. The bedroom where Dusty was sleeping yet. From where he crouched Virgil could clearly see Dusty's form inside, curled on the bed beneath the wool blanket. When the man was a few feet away he stopped and
looked through the glass doors for a long moment, as if trying to make out who it was on the bed. He was no more than a dozen feet from Dusty.
He pulled a long-barreled gun from his coat.
Virgil was lucky for the wind. If it wasn't for the waves slapping the shore and the leaves whipping in the trees, he never would have reached the cabin without the man hearing him. He leapt from his hiding spot and sprinted barefoot across the rough lawn, his heart pumping wildly. The man was drawing a bead on Dusty when Virgil jumped onto the deck behind him. The man half turned at the sound, and Virgil stepped in close to him, turning his shoulders to the right, like a hitter in the batter's box, and then taking a home-run swing with the cast on his left arm, striding into it with all his weight. The hard plaster took the man flush across the face; Virgil could both hear and feel the nose cartilage being crushed beneath the blow. The man grunted loudly; he was unconscious before he hit the wooden deck.
 * * *
Virgil sat on the couch, looking at the man called Cherry, now sprawled on the living room floor where Virgil had dragged him after knocking him out. The man called Cherry was still unconscious. In fact, Virgil had never seen anybody
that
unconscious, and he was beginning to wonder if he was going to wake up.
Cherry's nose was a mess, spread across his face like a toad mashed on the highway. Blood was congealing around it, and down both sides of his mouth. Virgil's cast was broken where it had hit the man, but he felt no pain in his arm and he was reasonably sure he hadn't done further damage to the bone. He sat on the couch, with the bottle of Jameson and a cup on the table beside him. He held Cherry's semiautomatic in
his hand, a Browning .45, fitted with a silencer, which is why the barrel had looked so long when Virgil first saw it in the moonlight. If there was any question that Cherry had come to kill Dusty, the silencer answered it.
Virgil took a drink and waited for Dusty to return. He thought back a couple of weeks, to the day he'd taken the two steers to the abattoir, and his decision afterward to stop at Slim's for a beer and some wings. That was the day Mudcat McCluskey had come in with the stripers in the cooler, and that was the day that Virgil had decided to go fishing off Kimball's Point, resulting in his hooking the cylinder.
The next time he took steers to the abattoir, he'd head straight for home afterward.
Dusty came back, carrying the keys to Cherry's Mercedes in her hand. She nodded to Virgil, saying it was done, crossed over, and put the keys back in Cherry's pants pocket where she had found them. Virgil stood up and handed her the Browning, then filled the plastic cup with Irish and, kneeling down beside Cherry, tossed half the contents in the man's face. Cherry made a slight noise and Virgil splashed the rest of the whisky down the front of his shirt, soaking him. Then he slapped Cherry several times until finally he began to come around.
Still, it took the better part of five minutes for the man's head to clear and when he finally realized his predicament, he was noticeably surly. He got unsteadily to his feet, the back of his hand against his battered and bleeding nose, and once he had his wits about him, he began to utter dark threats to both of them. They allowed him to go on for a bit, then Virgil grabbed him by the scruff of the neck, propelled him to the door, and shoved him outside, where Cherry tripped on the steps and went sprawling to the ground.
“You're a dead man,” he told Virgil as he got to his feet again.
“You'd be a lot more convincing if you weren't so stupid and beat up,” Virgil said.
Dusty had walked out onto the small porch and now she stood beside Virgil, the .45 at her side. Cherry eyed them both and then, realizing he was finished for the night, turned and walked toward his car. He was still wobbly on his feet; anybody who encountered him would have no trouble believing he was blind drunk.
They waited until he got into the Mercedes and drove off. Back inside the cabin, Virgil watched as Dusty picked up the phone and dialed 911.
“I've just been sideswiped by a drunk driver,” she said when a dispatcher answered. “A Mercedes convertible.” She listened as the dispatcher questioned her. “U.S. 3, about two miles south of Obertville.” Glancing over at Virgil, she smiled. “As a matter of fact, I did get the license number.”
The cabin cruiser called
Down Along Coast
had an open back deck, where there were canvas-backed chairs and a table made of teak. Parson was sitting on the deck, drinking coffee and staring out at the river. It was shortly past eleven o'clock and he looked as if he'd been up for hours. His eyes were red, his cheeks unshaven.
Virgil and Dusty stood on the lawn maybe fifty feet away, watching him. They had pulled up to the mammoth garage housing Parson's vintage cars a few minutes earlier, out of Parson's sight and, with the sound of the river, out of earshot too. When they didn't see him inside, they'd walked around the building, to the expanse of lawn leading to the boat slip.
Dusty put her hand out to stop Virgil from advancing farther, walked another ten or twelve feet, raised the Uzi in both hands, and without a word of warning strafed the side of the boat, emptying the clip, ripping the cedar planking to shreds, clanging bullets off hardware, breaking windows.
Parson practically burst out of his skin, leaping to his feet and diving below the railing, where he scrambled on his hands and knees for the cabin. Only when the shooting stopped did he dare to have a look. His eyes widened when he saw Dusty.
“What the hell is this?”
“You sent Cherry to kill me!” she screamed.
“Hell I did.”
“You're a liar.”
They heard shouting from the house next door, a large white Victorian a couple of hundred yards away. “What the hell's going on over there?”
Parson was fast on his feet. “Just scaring these damn Canada geese off,” he shouted back. “They're shitting all over my dock.” He stood up, his hands in front of him, as if they would deflect any further gunfire. “Put the gun down, Dusty.”
“It's empty anyway,” she said and tossed it carelessly on the lawn.
Parson climbed out and walked over to pick the gun up before turning to survey the damage it had inflicted. “Look what you did to my boat.”
“You sent him to kill me,” Dusty said.
When Parson turned to look at her, it seemed to Virgil that he was genuinely puzzled at the accusation. After a moment his eyes went past Dusty to Virgil.
“I heard about you,” he said darkly. He glanced toward his neighbor's house. “Let's go in the shop.”
They followed Parson inside, where he walked over and slumped into a chair behind a desk. He now seemed more weary than scared or pissed off. Virgil glanced around the huge building, at the dozen or so cars parked there. His eyes went past the Corvettes and Mustangs and Jags, to an old coupe in the far corner, partly covered with clear plastic.
“I've been up all goddamn night,” Parson said. “What did you do to Cherry?”
“Not what I should have,” Dusty replied.
Parson put both palms to his temples and sat like that for a moment, as if trying to arrange his thoughts. “I got a phone call a couple hours ago,” he said. “Cherry's been arrested up north. Suspicion of drunk driving. The cops found about
a hundred pounds of cocaine in the trunk of his car.” He paused for effect. “Cherry wasn't aware there was cocaine in the trunk of his car.”
“What a drag for Cherry,” Dusty said. “Him being such a stand-up guy and all.”
“I told him not to hurt you, Dusty. He wouldn't go against me.”
“He was going to kill her,” Virgil said. “I was there.”
“Who the fuck are you again?” Parson demanded.
“I'm the guy who cold-cocked your buddy Cherry before he could shoot Dusty. That's who I am.”
Parson stared at Virgil a moment but turned back to Dusty. “Cherry wouldn't go against me.”
“He might,” Dusty said. “If he found out I knew it was him who set you up seven years ago.”
Parson opened his mouth but nothing came out. He sat back in the chair, blinking. “Cherry?” he asked.
“Yeah, Cherry,” Dusty said. “Think about it. How many people even knew you were bringing the coke up from the islands? It was Cherry. The cops busted him for kiddie porn, and Cherry gave them
you.
”
“Cherry,” Parson repeated, confused.
Virgil left them to their conversation, went walking along the row of cars toward the coupe in the corner. Parson saw him, but his mind was too wrapped up in what he was hearing to care.
“And so,” Parson said to Dusty, “you planted the coke in Cherry's car.”
“I don't know what you're talking about,” Dusty said.
“You're full of shit.” Parson shook his head, and the businessman slowly returned. “Why didn't you just shoot him and bring me the coke?”
“You are unbelievable,” Dusty told him.
When Virgil reached the coupe in the corner, he pulled back the plastic for a better look. A few inches behind the passenger-side window there was a bullet hole. Virgil put his finger in the hole, as he'd done roughly a year earlier. It looked as if the car hadn't been touched since he'd seen it then. He left the plastic pulled back and walked back to the front of the shop.
“If the cops have the coke, then I guess that's the end of it,” Dusty said. “I'm going to have to believe you when you say you didn't send Cherry to kill me. But now we're finished, Parson. You and I are square. I need to hear you say that.”
“I'm not so sure we're finished, Dusty,” he said. He watched Virgil returning before turning his eyes on her. “Tell me about your son.”
She was ready for him. “What about him?”
“You do have a son?”
“Yeah.”
“Tell me about him.”
Virgil stopped a few feet away now, watching her. She had to be a jangle of nerves inside, but she was cool as could be where it mattered.
“I don't know what to tell you,” Dusty said. “He's a kid. He likes Superman and Iron Man. And baseball. If I let him, he'd brush his teeth once a month.” She paused before dropping the lie. “He turns four next Saturday. I'm taking him to Six Flags.”
“He's four?” Parson asked.
“Almost.”
Parson nodded slowly, shifting his gaze to Virgil. “You're his father?”
“That's right,” Virgil said. “I don't know what business that is of yours.”
“You want to get on my bad side, asshole?” Parson asked.
“I couldn't care less what side of you I'm on,” Virgil said, seeing the chance to shift the topic from the boy. “Look at you. I've got one arm and you still won't get out of that chair. A minute ago you were asking Dusty why she didn't kill your pal Cherry for you. You always need somebody else to do your dirty work for you.”
“For you, I might make an exception,” Parson said, glaring at Virgil, the veins in his neck bulging.
“Fine,” Virgil said. “Right this minute works for me. When we're done, you're going to pay that old farmer the money you owe him for that coupe over there.”
“I got no idea what you're babbling about,” Parson said.
“No?” Virgil said. “The old boy he told me that it was a big colored guy who stole his car. That might not be politically correct, but a thief is a thief. The only reason you were able to steal the car is that he took you for a straight shooter, same as him. So you're either going to pay him his ten grand or give him the car back. I'm going to make sure you do. I've never called the cops on anybody in my life.” Virgil smiled. “But for you, I might make an exception.”
Now Parson's mouth was open, but he seemed unable to make a sound. He glanced from Virgil to Dusty, and finally looked away from both, choosing instead to focus on his row of beloved cars. “Get the fuck out of here, both of you,” he said. “I never want to see either of you again. Just ⦠go.”
Virgil drove Dusty across town, back to her apartment. When he pulled up out front he reached under his seat and brought up the rotor from her truck.
“You asshole,” she said.
“Yup.”
She took the rotor and put it in her pocket, then sat quietly
for a time, looking out the windshield. “I have no idea what to say, Virgil.”
“Go get your son.”
“I will.”
“Is it really his birthday next week?”
“Yes.”
“And you're going to Six Flags?”