Blanco County 04 - Guilt Trip (2 page)

BLANCO COUNTY GAME warden John Marlin was two miles from Lucas Burnette’s house when it exploded late Sunday afternoon.

Before that, he’d been sitting in one of his favorite stakeout spots, high on a hill above Ranch Road 1623, listening for the sound of shotguns, watching a massive wall of rain clouds lumbering in from the west. Turkey season was in progress, and he’d been eyeballing one nearby ranch in particular, owned by a man with a teenaged son who was a fledgling poacher.

Last fall, Marlin had caught the punk shooting deer at night on a stretch of county road that was always thick with whitetails. It had been about 3:00
A.M.
on a Saturday, a time when mostly drunks and poachers (and sometimes drunk poachers) were out, and Marlin heard a shot on Sandy Road. Sitting in his green Dodge truck on a nearby hillside, he could see headlights as the vehicle stopped; a door slammed, then the vehicle came roaring his way. Marlin came down the hill, lights off, and waited by the side of the road. When the Chevy truck made the curve, Marlin was waiting, red and blue strobes flashing.

Problem was, there was no passenger, no rifle, and no deer in the back of the truck. But Marlin knew from years of experience: Roadside poachers
never
hunt alone. It’s like a social activity for them—a big hunting party on wheels, often with alcohol involved, maybe a little pot. So Marlin pulled the skinny teenager out of the Chevy, took his driver’s license, and asked him where his partner was.

“Who?” the guy replied, his eyes as wild as a penned steer’s. “What’re you talking about?”

“Son, what exactly are you doing out here?”

“Just out driving.”

“Alone?”

“Yeah.”

“In the middle of the night.”

The kid shrugged.

Marlin didn’t bother to argue. It was a common poacher tactic: One guy would shoot the deer, then jump out and track it down. Meanwhile, the driver would take off—figuring it was smarter not to leave a vehicle idling at the scene of the crime—then return in ten minutes or so if the coast was clear.

So Marlin tried a favorite tactic of his own. He cuffed the kid and said, “Where are your keys?”

“My, uh…my
keys?”
The boy’s voice had a slight tremble to it.

“Yep.”

“In the ignition.”

“Hang loose. I’ll be back in a few minutes.”

Marlin climbed into the poacher’s truck and did a U-turn. He drove slowly, lowering it to a near crawl when he reached the vicinity where the shot had been fired. Sure enough, the other poacher—who by now had located the eight-point buck and dragged it closer to the road—saw his friend’s Chevy coming and emerged from the brush to wave him down. When Marlin pulled over, the kid swung the carcass into the bed of the truck and hopped in, failing to notice who was driving. He said, “My house, man!”

Marlin said, “You mind if we stop by the county jail first?”

The boy nearly pissed in his pants.

Back then, Marlin thought both boys had learned their lesson. Lately, though, he’d been hearing things about the kid who had done the shooting, and he suspected the delinquent-in-training was back at it again.

Moments earlier, sitting in his truck, Marlin had been thinking of making an unannounced visit to the ranch, just to let the boy know he was watching.

That’s when he heard it—a huge, quick boom, sounding like a cannon being fired in the Blanco town square. The resulting chatter over the radio told Marlin something big had just happened, but nobody seemed to know what.

Marlin cranked the engine, dropped it into gear, and bounced down onto the road. He cut the wheel to the right and floored it toward the small town of Blanco. As he headed east, it seemed every deputy in the county was on the air—but it was a full minute before anyone came through with an explanation. Deputy Ernie Turpin, his siren screaming in the background, said, “Dispatch, be advised we’ve got a house fire at the end of Heimer Lane. Flames out every window. This place is going up quick, y’all.”

Lucas Burnette was another local problem child, and had been since the age of fourteen. Now he was twenty years old and on a first-name basis with every cop in the county. The short version was, Lucas had a drug problem, and it dominated his life like a stack of overdue bills. His list of infractions was long. Breaking and entering. Possession of stolen goods. Possession of marijuana. Driving under the influence. Marlin had even busted him a couple of times for poaching.

Despite all of Lucas’s problems, most of the officers couldn’t help but like the kid. Not all that bright, but funny as hell, affable, easygoing. He’d make jokes at his own expense when you were arresting him, and then, riding in the cruiser, he’d ask, with sincerity, how your family was doing. He was respectful and courteous, and he never resisted. Lucas hadn’t seen state prison time yet, just county jail. Each time he was paroled, released to a halfway house in Austin, those who knew Lucas would hold their breath and cross their fingers.
Grow up, kid!
they’d think. Disappointment always followed. Lucas would do fine for a couple of months, working steadily, staying clean, keeping out of the system. Then one day he’d skip out—just walk away from his best chance at redemption. Invariably, he’d come back to Blanco County, an hour west of Austin, and lie low, enjoying his freedom until the deputies happened to cross his path and pick him up again.

This last time, though, it looked like he was finally shaping up. He’d been meeting the terms of his parole, including drug testing once a month. He’d been working full-time at the feed store, earning enough to move out of his parents’ place and make the rent on a small house on Heimer Lane.

The same house—Marlin realized as he arrived on the scene—that was currently on fire.

Ernie Turpin was right; the place was completely engulfed in flames, and the throng of emergency workers and curious onlookers was pushed back by the heat. Marlin knew there wouldn’t be any putting this inferno out, not until there was nothing left but the house’s charred skeleton. Regardless, Marlin spotted several firefighters in turnout gear dragging a hose from the only pumper truck on the scene. If nothing else, they could go defensive and knock down grass fires to protect the neighboring homes, the nearest of which was two hundred yards away.

Marlin parked behind a cluster of deputies’ cruisers, an ambulance, and a dozen volunteer firefighters’ vehicles. As he climbed from his truck, Marlin saw two deputies—Ernie Turpin and a new woman named Nicole Brooks—working traffic control, keeping a path clear for emergency vehicles. Ernie and Nicole working closely together—no surprise there. Marlin gave them a wave, signaling his intentions, and proceeded in a wide arc around the home. For fifteen minutes, he walked the perimeter of the property, five or six acres, working his flashlight, searching for victims—people who might have staggered from the house and then collapsed—or for evidence of what might have caused the explosion. He’d once seen a water heater with a faulty relief valve turn a garage into kindling. Gas leaks, too, were a major problem, so Marlin scanned the backyard to see if the house was fed by a propane tank. There wasn’t one, which was just as well. Now the only question was whether anybody had been trapped inside.

Coming around the front, Marlin spotted Senior Deputy Bill Tatum near the road, finishing a conversation with the fire chief. Marlin walked over.

“You bring the weenies?” Tatum asked, nodding toward the flames.

Marlin grinned. Somebody always broke down and used that corny line. “Any word on Lucas?”

“Nope. We called his friends, next of kin. Nobody knows where the hell he is.”

There wasn’t much to say to that. Now it was a waiting game, and the firefighters would give them their answer in a day or two when they sifted through the extinguished rubble.

“No cars,” Marlin said, noting the empty dirt driveway. There was no carport or garage. Lucas drove a crummy little import, and it was nowhere to be seen.

Marlin could barely stand the irony. It would be even more of a tragedy if Lucas had died right when he was getting his life straightened out.

Neither man spoke for several minutes, transfixed by the fire, listening to pine knots popping like fireworks, watching the firefighters do their job.

Tatum said, “I heard you took a trip up to Dallas last weekend.”

Sparks flew high as the west wall of the house buckled and collapsed inward.

“Just visiting an old friend,” Marlin said, as fat marbles of rain began to fall.

Senator Dylan Herzog was sitting in front of a rancher named Chuck Hamm, and he felt like a kid called to the principal’s office for shooting spitwads. Hamm was leaning back in a leather chair behind an obscenely large desk made from burnished walnut.

“You know it’s a goddamn impossibility, don’t you?” Hamm said.

Herzog nodded. He continued to stare at the calfskin rug on the floor. Sunday evening now, and his insides were still jelly. One phone call. Hard to believe that’s all it took to drop his life into a blender and hit
PUREE
. He’d been reluctant to take his troubles to Hamm, but Herzog hadn’t been able to think of any alternatives.

Hamm said, “Even if we did what he’s asking—and we damn sure ain’t—it wouldn’t make no difference anyhow. Didn’t this moron realize that?”

Herzog shook his head, noticing, of course, the rancher’s presumptuous use of “we” instead of “you.” “I tried to reason with him,” Herzog lied, “but he wouldn’t listen. You know how those guys are. Like rabid dogs.”

Hamm grunted, a sound that befitted his personality. “I mean even you—the all-powerful senator—you can’t do it all on your own. Didn’t you point that out?”

Herzog hated Hamm’s smug sarcasm. “I’m afraid this man couldn’t grasp the fundamentals of legislation.”

“And you got no idea who he is?”

“Unfortunately, no.”

“Someone you know, maybe? Someone you met already?”

“Could be, Chuck, I really don’t know. You have to understand, this fencing issue makes people angry as hell. I get letters, phone calls, e-mails.”

“You think it was one of them?”

“I guess it’s a possibility, but the point is, there are plenty of people it could be. That’s what makes this such a difficult problem.”

“You didn’t get a number off your caller ID?”

Herzog shook his head. “Came through as unavailable.”

Hamm eyed Herzog over the rim of a bourbon glass. It made the senator squirm. Hamm was tall, like Herzog, but older and heavier. Most of the extra weight was stored in a belly that strained the lower buttons on Hamm’s shirts, but underneath the flab one could still recognize the hardened musculature of a rural working man. He had a weathered face, eyebrows that looked as if they might crawl off his forehead at any moment, and a square jaw that was just getting jowly. His skin was the color and texture of a pancake left too long on the griddle. “What’s he got on you?” Hamm asked.

Herzog sighed. “I told you already. Photographs.”

“
Yeah
,
but of what? Snorting coke, pissing in public, what?”

Herzog desperately wanted to avoid this issue—but he knew he’d have to share the basic facts eventually. Otherwise, Hamm might not comprehend how dire the situation really was.

Hamm gave Herzog a skeptical look and said, “I’ve wondered about you, Herzog, to tell the truth. The way you dress, your aftershave, all that. Maybe you was chasing some tail in one a those special nightclubs in Austin?”

“I’m not sure I follow you.”

“I think you do.”

“No, Chuck, I really don’t.”

“Fine, then. Are you a fairy? That’s what I’m asking. Or maybe you swing both ways, like that governor up in New Jersey.”

Herzog rolled his eyes. It had been obvious to him for quite some time that Hamm had little, if any, respect for him. Just because Herzog didn’t get a little dirt under his fingernails now and then? Just because he didn’t have a farmer’s tan from repairing a fence on the back forty? Just because—
yeehaw!—
Herzog had never milked a cow? It was damned unfair. Herzog worked hard, too—hell, he exhausted himself—but he did it with brainpower, not mindless manual labor.

Herzog noticed that Hamm was waiting, indeed expecting an answer to the whole gay question. “Of course not,” he huffed.

“‘Cause that kinda scenario could fuck things up real bad,” Hamm said quietly, a grimace on his face, as if the room were suddenly swarming with prancing homosexuals. Hamm lifted one boot onto the desktop and stared at the ceiling, thinking. “Maybe it’s something you could, you know, just ride out. Hunker low in your saddle and see if it’ll pass. Hell, most folks aren’t even surprised by what you people do nowadays. Guy gets a bee-jay right in the Oval Office and what do we do? Elect his wife to the U.S. Senate, that’s what. Damn pitiful, if you ask me.”

Herzog wasn’t sure if he was supposed to comment or not, so he remained silent. He let his gaze roam upward to a Cape buffalo mounted high on the wall behind Hamm’s desk. Fierce-looking animal, with eyeballs that seemed to penetrate Herzog’s very soul. Underneath the ferocity, though, there appeared to be a touch of embarrassment on the animal’s part at finding itself displayed above a credenza that held a combination scanner/copier/fax machine.

Herzog realized Chuck Hamm had just said something. “Excuse me?”

“I said if I’m gonna help you out—and that’s an
if
at this point—you gotta give me some idea what we’re dealing with. The photos. It’s not like you robbed a liquor store or something, right?”

Herzog shook his head. If only it were something that respectable.

“Jeez, gimme a clue, here,” Hamm snorted, sitting up, losing his patience. “What ballpark we’re playing in, something like that.”

Herzog grasped for the right words. This was all so humiliating. Finally, he took a deep breath and just said it. “The photographs are of a sexual nature, but I’d rather not go into details.” He could feel his face flushing a deep red. But deep down, it felt good, unexpectedly good, to share his burden with someone. Even a troll like Hamm.