Kill 'Em With Kindness, page 17
“Weed deal. High grade shit, and a bunch of it. Listen for yourself.” Perez pressed play on the recorder and Kirkpatrick immediately recognized Elroy Watts’s voice, but not the other.
“Sanch?” said the unfamiliar voice, which also carried a Texas accent.
“Well I’ll be goddamned,” Watts said. “Wussup, Coop?” Kirkpatrick scribbled that name down, still listening intently, trying not to miss anything over the banging sound in the background, some sort of drum maybe.
“Hell, not much, man. Where you been?”
“Been down in Costa Rica the last six months macking on shorty senoritas and getting some serious beach time.”
“Six months, huh? That’s a whole truckload of beach time.”
“Yeah, I’m over it now. Anyhow, to what do I owe the pleasure? Y’all been seeing some shows while I been gone?”
“Some. We hit Oak Mountain and a couple others earlier this summer, did most of the southern leg of the tour. Red Rocks last weekend was about the best damn run of shows I’ve seen in four or five years. Still recovering from it.”
“I heard that, actually. What else is going on?”
“I…maybe I ought to call you back on your cell so we can speak freely? I don’t have your new number, why I called the house.”
“Haven’t had one in a while. Just got back two days ago, been dealing with the jet lag, maybe a little culture shock. Costa Rica and Texas is about as opposite as two places can be.”
“No doubt,” Coop said. “I don’t understand why you still live down there when the laws are easing up so much everywhere else.”
“It’s home. Besides, I don’t see how cheaper prices are good for me.”
“See there, I never wanted it to be home, got the hell out soon as I could.”
“I get it. But why don’t we get down to it, Coop. We can talk on this line just fine. I been dead to the world for six months, ain’t nobody checking up on me.”
“It can wait until later today if you want to go pick up a Cricket or something.”
“No can do. I got a couple ladies stopping out for a little pool party, don’t plan to step foot off the ranch today or tomorrow, if I can help it. Got an old buddy stopping up to play a little. Just got the pool back in working order, and I intend to make the most of it. I could call you back in a couple days when I make it into town though, if you’re really worried about it?”
There was a long pause, as if this “Coop” were thinking it over, deciding whether to wait on whatever news he had. Kirkpatrick figured no way they’d keep talking after that, was surprised when the voice said, “I guess we can talk around it now, and see what you think.”
“Attaboy. Shoot.”
“I don’t know if you heard, but Nelson got rolled up in Chi Town a couple days ago.”
“I didn’t, but that’s fucked up. What they get him with?”
“Enough is all I heard. Would’ve gotten him with a truckload more if they’d waited a few days, though.”
“I see. So what’s that got to do with me?”
“Well, they didn’t get him with a truckload more. Which means I’m sitting here stuck with a truckload, nowhere to send it. Know what I mean?”
“I do. But again, how does it concern me? After Dumas you told me you were done with The Great State of Texas as far as business was concerned.”
Kirkpatrick scribbled Dumas down and made a note to check the records up there.
“And I meant it.” Coop continued, “But just now I’m in a bit of a financial bind, and it would surely help me to get this thing off my chest.”
“What we talking?”
Kirkpatrick took his foot off the desk and leaned toward the recorder, thinking no way this kid spills the beans over the phone. The voice on the other end of the line hesitated, too, maybe sensing he wasn’t alone on the line, but needing to get it out anyway. Finally he answered.
“Thirty elbows of Bruce Banner. Fantastic quality, too, one of the best crops I’ve done in a long time.”
Sancho whistled. “Sounds a lot better than the schwiggity they had down in Costa. I might can help you out. Timing’s pretty good, actually, with my boy coming up, think he’s angling for some business. It won’t be here in Austin, though.”
“Why’s that?”
“You kidding? Town’s already full of Colorado’s finest. You boys got yourselves one hell of a saturated market up there.”
“Tell me about it. All right then, where could you use it?”
“I think my boy is starting to do some work out in Teller. Why he’s coming up tomorrow to catch up, or that’s the impression I get. He didn’t exactly say. I’ll try to set something up with him when he gets here. Probably about sixteen a pop, I’m guessing. Will that work?”
“It’ll have to, I guess. There was a time that was inconceivably bad, even if you came up here for it.”
“Still wonder why I live down here?” Sancho said. “I’ll hit you up once I get back out into the wild day after tomorrow. Let me see what I can put together.”
“All right, do that.”
“Good to hear from you, Coop.”
“You too, Sanch. Try not to get so drunk that you drown in the pool, you hear?”
“Loud and clear,” Sancho said.
Perez hit stop on the recorder. He and Kirkpatrick looked at each other.
“I see what you meant,” Kirkpatrick said. “He was never careful, really, but that beats all. How does a guy like that make it this far without getting his ass locked up?”
“You know exactly how. Boy’s daddy is a hell of a defense attorney.”
“You mean was. I heard Pops might have run down to Costa Rica with him after they disbarred his ass over that mess down along the border. Luck must run in that family. I don’t know how in the hell he avoided prosecution on money laundering and a whole host of other charges. Last I heard, they were still trying to make the case.”
“Sure you do. The Good Ol’ Boys’ club wouldn’t be so good if they didn’t have some perks. Some folks think every county official up to the governor himself is corrupt around here.” Perez grinned. “Probably some truth to it, too. No telling who that guy might have implicated if they’d let him burn. You snag this little shit now and maybe Daddy will come running out of the bushes and you can get him, too, make a whole new set of headaches for everyone involved.”
Kirkpatrick frowned. “That your way of telling me I’m on my own on this?”
“You heard the tape. It doesn’t sound like the dope is coming within two hundred miles of Travis County. That puts it out of our jurisdiction. I’ve done all I’m allowed by passing this on, and really more than I was told to do. A lot of folks around here don’t seem to want to see this thing go any further.” Perez looked around to be sure no one was within earshot. “If the department thought for two seconds this could bring even an inch of work back on us, you’d have never heard about this tape in the first place. The sheriff’s had it up to his intestines with Weldon Robb.”
“I figured as much. Thanks for the head’s up, Javi. I’m assuming I can take the recording with me?”
“It’s all yours my man,” Perez said.
Kirkpatrick left the last two tacos sitting on Javi’s desk and walked out of the building to his department-issued, four-door white Dodge Ram 1500, already dialing Senator Weldon Robb’s personal cellphone number as he climbed inside.
Click here to learn more about Texas Two-Step by Michael Pool.
Back to TOC
Here is a preview of the second book in the Cargo Series, Precious Cargo by Linda Sands…
Chapter 1
Someone once told me, if you do what you love, you’ll never work a day in your life. As a long-haul trucker who spends three hundred and fifty days a year exploring the contiguous states of America, I’d say I was on permanent vacation.
Last month, I shared this wisdom with my co-driver and boyfriend, Gator Natoli.
He said, “It’s not the same, you’re still working.”
“But it doesn’t feel like work,” I said stretching and cracking my back. “That’s the beauty of it.”
“Wait,” he said. “Let me get this straight. You have to go where someone tells you to go, be there when they tell you to be there, wait for as long as they tell you to wait, submit their paperwork in their designated manner, deal with their rules and regulations, even telling you how many hours you can work, when and where to sleep and then, maybe then, you’ll get paid—after the government takes their share, of course—and that’s a vacation to you?”
“Well, when you put it that way…”
I flipped my long, brown hair over my shoulder and stared out the window. We’d stopped Sabrina, our custom Kenworth T-800, at a truck stop diner outside of Austin, en route to Los Angeles. I’d been craving hash browns, and not for the reasons some women crave things, I just liked potatoes. The crispier the better. Add cheese and I might kiss you.
The waitress had been sweet, one of those bless her heart sorts who talked about her grandkids so much I figured she was probably raising them, wondered if that was why she was still working at her age, and with that bum knee. I wanted to give her a much bigger tip, but Gator said it might insult her.
I was sitting at the kitchenette thinking about that, one’s pride verses a pair of orthotic shoes when Gator opened the rear door of the sleeper.
“You okay?” he asked.
“Yeah, sure. Why?”
“Looking a little spacey,” he said, bending down to kiss my cheek, whiskers tickling, hand cool on the nape of my neck. Before I got the wrong idea, he slid the fuel receipt across the table, patted me on the back, then headed to the driver’s seat.
Not that there wasn’t time for the wrong idea. I leaned forward to catch Gator’s face in the small mirror we’d installed on the dash. He smiled back at me and winked. Yep, there was always time for the wrong idea.
I blew my man a kiss, then waved him off and scooted down the bench seat to my portable office, where I scanned the receipt and added it to our books. As the truck began rolling, I opened the laptop to check out the day’s news from trucker pals and less reliable sources.
I’d barely updated my Facebook status when the truck pulled hard to the right, lurching to an abrupt stop, knocking my bottle of water off the table and sending it rolling across the floor.
“Hey!” I yelled over the hissing brakes.
“Sorry. Some crazy girl ran in front of the truck!”
Closing the laptop, I went up front where Gator was motioning for the girl to get out of the way. We were hardly out of the truck stop lot, half on the shoulder, the road empty in both directions.
The girl kept waving her arms like she was flagging down a rescue plane.
Gator’s grip tightened on the wheel as she ran to the driver’s side.
“Can you help me?” she called. “Please?”
Even if I hadn’t been able to hear her, the look on her face was enough. I tapped Gator’s arm. “Pull over.”
Gator maneuvered us off the road, set the brakes and gave me his best I hope you know what you’re doing look.
I motioned for the girl to go to the back door of the sleeper, then rushed to unlock it. She barreled in, headed straight for the window over the sink and pulled aside the small curtain.
I could smell fear on her and something else. It reminded me of my grandmother’s cellar on rainy days.
She was pretty with dark shiny hair and almond eyes. Her face was heart-shaped, with perfectly proportioned childlike features, the kind of face a camera would love. Sporting a modern canvas messenger bag over her navy miniskirt and white top, she might have stepped off the pages of a teen magazine’s “Back to School” ad. The only thing that threw me was the cork platform wedgie sandals and purple-painted toenails.
“It’s my boyfriend,” she said. “My ex-boyfriend. He….”
She looked at me, then at Gator in the driver’s seat, then back again.
“It’s okay,” I said. “He’s okay.”
The girl nodded, like we had an unwritten agreement, something only people with estrogen understood.
“What happened?” I asked, looking at her closer. “Did he hit you?” I was ready to beat the shit out of a guy I’d never seen, ready to right centuries of wrongs.
She shook her head and turned from the window, apparently satisfied that the boyfriend hadn’t followed her. Her shoulders dropped an inch. “No. It’s not that, it’s…well, he wanted me to do something I didn’t want to do.”
I looked over the girl’s shoulder at Gator and mouthed, See?
“How can we help?” I asked. “Do you need to call someone or should we report—”
She grabbed my arm. “No. I mean, no thanks.” She met my eyes and drilled into me. I squirmed. She ran her fingers down my sleeve and leaned in, my conspirator. “Could you, maybe, have him drive me somewhere? It’s not far. I’d be…really grateful.”
Oh. She was good.
My eyes never left hers as I called, “Gator? Start driving.”
“Where to?” he asked.
The girl mouthed Thank you, then called out to Gator, “Just go straight until you hit Primrose.”
Gator reached back and drew the curtain between the cab and our living quarters, before he pulled the truck back onto the road.
“Have a seat,” I said, moving to the kitchenette, as the truck picked up speed.
She slid in, put her bag on the bench beside her, tucking it in close.
“Skipping school?” I said, tipping my chin toward her bag.
She shrugged, pulling a lock of hair over her shoulder and twirling it.
“What’s your name?” I asked.
“Candy,” she said, in the way you give the answer you’ve been supplied.
I’d seen enough shit in Bunkie and other small towns of Louisiana to know when someone was living deep in a lie. Question was, did this involve me? And, did I want it to? I looked toward the drawn curtain, thought about Gator, the handsome, gentle man I’d fallen in love with, and then was quickly reminded of Boone, the first man I’d driven with. The man I’d thought I’d be with forever. So, no. That was the short, clean answer. This was not my deal. We’d drop the girl off and that was that.
Candy stared at our flat screen TV, the decked-out kitchen, the polished wood floors. “This is nice,” she said. “Real nice. You fix it up yourself?”
“Not really,” I said. “It pretty much came like this.”
“Wow. Most trucks don’t even have—I mean, I thought most trucks just had cubbies and a small bunk.”
I smiled. “You’d be surprised what you can buy these days.”
She looked away. ‘“Yeah, I guess.”
Before I could ask her about the boyfriend or school or why she seemed so fucking sad—I mean seriously, she was young and beautiful with her whole life ahead of her—Gator pulled the drape and said, “Coming up on Primrose.”
Candy stood, slinging her bag across her chest. “Take a right and you can stop anywhere after the tennis courts.” She bent to see out the windshield, confirming the location, then went to the back door where I’d let her in.
Gator hit the brakes and we glided to a shushing stop. I expected this was the first time a semi like ours had traveled these streets.
Candy grabbed the doorknob. “Tell him he should be able to turn around in the cul-de-sac at the end of the street. It’s wide enough and pretty slow this time of day. When you come back out, take a right and in two miles you’ll see signs to get back on the highway.”
“Okay,” I said, wondering why I suddenly felt like the student.
“Hey,” she called, stepping out onto the platform. “Thanks.”
And she was gone, jogging off to an upscale suburban neighborhood, The Estates of Something or Other. Her ponytail swinging shoulder to shoulder as her messenger bag—a bit too light for a serious schoolgirl—smacked her thigh.
“We good?” Gator asked, as I came up front, tucked the curtains back, letting in the light.
“Yeah,” I said, pausing to kiss his cheek. “We’re good.”
I went back to my laptop and tried to not think about Candy and her little life glitch that we’d been a part of. Because maybe that was all it was—a fight with a boyfriend, a moment that would be forgotten soon enough—written off as a bump in the road for a good student from a decent enough family, with a dad that played golf on the weekends and a mother who took banana bread to sick people. Just a glitch.
My father, Manny Boudreaux, taught me that people come into your life and you can choose to make it matter—for them or for you—but never both at the same time. In other words, somebody’s gonna be on the giving side and somebody’s gonna be on the taking side. I don’t know a soul in this world who would disagree with that statement, and if they do, they’re either big fucking liars or rich-ass preachers. Which may be the same thing.
I replied to a few emails, checked the weather for our route, then read for a while, catching up on other truck drivers via blog posts and comments on the trucking forums. Every so often I’d read something funny and repeat it for Gator. He was beginning to understand who was who—the rookie who used to be a rodeo cowboy, the lesbian couple with the truck cat, and the old timer who collected donations at every truck show so he could get dental implants—though I think his wife might be behind that movement.
The world of trucking is more than shifting gears and delivering loads. It’s about the people, the community. We’re the subculture that keeps the world going. Without truckers on the road, life would cease to exist as you know it in less than three weeks.
That’s some serious fucking power right there. You’d think we’d get paid better or at least get thanked daily by a total stranger. Yeah, not so much.
I logged off and went up front.
“How are you doing?” I asked, buckling into the passenger seat.
Gator lowered the radio. He’d recently begun listening to strange public radio stations that featured true stories and quirky scientific finds and other nerdy stuff. It was better than the country stations he used to tune in, so I wasn’t complaining—not out loud anyway.
