The Other Side of Bad (The Tucker Novels) (23 page)

It looked like the big Mexican had been hit hard with a giant feather pillow. His shirt depressed into his stomach. His stomach was pushed back into his spine. His mouth formed an operatic expression, like reaching for a high note. His hands came out in front of him as his feet came off the floor, like he was trying to touch his toes in mid-air. Then he gently kissed the wall with his butt and sat down on the floor. His head was now trying to touch his knees. There wasn’t a lot of blood . . . at first.

No one moved. It was very still. The only movement was the light bulb hanging from the cord. It was gently swinging, moving the light it cast back and forth from the wall to the middle of the room, highlighting the smoke from the guns.

The smell of burnt cordite and dust was in my nose. But for the smell of marijuana and blood, I could have been at the gun range.

Teemo was still standing where he was when it all started, just a few seconds ago. To me, it seemed like at least five minutes.

Teemo was flat against the wall with his hands up around his shoulders. His eyes were mostly white, so was his face.

The three Mexicans on my side were down, one was dead for sure. Of the three on the other side of Teemo, two were standing with their hands high above their heads and one was lying on the floor. Because of the table, I couldn’t tell what kind of shape he was in. The two who were standing, now that I had time to look at them, appeared to be twins. They were very dark complexioned, black haired, clean shaven, handsome men, in their mid thirties.

Robby started moving towards the table and the money, so did I. I heard Phil reloading his shotgun and turned toward him.

“You killed that guy,” I said.

“No shit,” he said matter of factly, followed by, “and, Tucker . . . thanks, you saved my ass back there. I guess I didn’t practice enough.”

“Yeah.” Robby said, “And I’m going to kill this hijacking asshole.”

This wasn’t good.

“Keep me covered, Tucker,” Robby said, and walked around the table towards the now Caucasian Teemo.

With my left hand, I reached into my left back pocket, pulled out a full magazine, quickly dropped the magazine out of the .45 into the same hand, and slammed the fresh one home. I put the partially used one in the same back pocket. I was back to eight shots again.

The sound of the gun being reloaded was sobering and dangerous.

Robby had reached Teemo and was dragging him around to our side of the table. I kept my gun aimed in the general direction of the twins.

They didn’t seem as afraid as Teemo, or as afraid as I’d like them to be. Although they did keep their eyes on me. Looking at them a little harder, I saw they were well dressed, nice shirts and slacks. They didn’t appear to be any kind of muscle.

I leaned over the table and took a look at the downed Mexicans as Robby pushed Teemo against it.

The one on the left, long hair, was just rolling over onto his right side, leaning his back against the wall. His right hand was a gory mess, and there was blood on his right hip. It looked like I shot him in his hand and his hip, or through his hand into his hip.

That isn’t uncommon at the gun range, when they spin a target around and the picture is holding a gun. You often instinctively shoot the first thing you see . . . the gun.

Long hair was starting to moan. Middle man was still sitting on his butt, leaning against the bloodied wall. He was looking at me in shock, literally, he was in shock. His body had just taken two rounds from a .45 in the shoulder, and I would be surprised if his shoulder wasn’t shattered. His pistol was on the floor between his feet. It might as well have been a mile away.

I didn’t look at the big Mexican.

“Before I kill you, tell me why you killed my friends,” Robby said to Teemo.

I had no intentions of letting Robby kill Teemo, but at this time, I didn’t have any good ideas on how to stop him. I also knew about that paved road to hell.

“I no keel you amigos, I no keel!” Teemo screamed.

Robby had his .45 up under Teemo’s chin, pushing his head back with it. His finger was on the trigger; it was cocked with the safety off. In the rage he was in, he could easily accidentally shoot him.

Teemo was totally freaked.

“You’re a fuckin’ liar!” Robby screamed back. “Why’d you do it, you greedy bastard? Weren’t you making enough money?”

I had to do something. I remembered Robby saying this was a new contact for Teemo, and how earlier, they said the pot was different. Was that tonight? It seemed like days ago.

“Hold it, Robby. Don’t shoot him yet,” I said, trying to sound matter of factly. Like he could shoot him later and I wouldn’t care.

“What’s up?” he said, still holding the pistol hard under Teemo’s chin.

I couldn’t see Phil, but knew he was behind me.

I was covering the twins with my .45. It still bothered me how unafraid they were. They were just
too
cool. Then the hair on the back of my neck stood straight up.

“Phil, cover the front door with that shotgun!” I yelled over my shoulder. Then pointing my gun at the twins, I said, “You tell whoever is out there not to come in. Do it now.”

They looked at me like they didn’t understand. I knew they did. For one thing; I had seen their eyes tighten when Robby said he was going to kill Teemo. For another; Teemo didn’t try to translate what I had just said. I believed he was so afraid, he would have done anything to prolong his life.

The twins were standing so close together their shoulders were almost touching. I shot the wall between their heads, and the dried mud that exploded, showered them.

They both started yelling in Spanish. They said the same thing at the same time, sounding like a Mexican Doublemint commercial. They were definitely twins.

Robby, realizing there may still be some danger, backed off from Teemo, giving himself maneuverability space.

“I’ve got the front covered,” Phil said behind me.

“Robby,” I said, “keep ‘em covered.”

Putting my pistol down the front of my pants, I walked over to the closest pile of bricks and pulled one off the top. I went back to the table, set it down, took out my pocket knife, cut it open, broke out a fist full and dumped it on the table.

I stepped back and said, “Robby, check this out and tell me if it is about the same quality you’ve been getting.”

While he was doing that, I kept my eyes on the twins . . . and Teemo.

Teemo was leaning against the table with his back to the twins. When Robby picked up the pot and looked at it and smelled it, Teemo slowly turned his head around to look at the twins. They barely shook their heads. If only one had done it I might not have noticed. I saw that being twins had its disadvantages as well as its advantages.

Robby said, “This is much better grass than we’ve been getting.”

“Didn’t you tell me Teemo said he had a new connection?”

“Yeah, so?”

“Well, it looks like he was telling the truth about that. Maybe he’s telling the truth about not hijacking your buddies.”

“Es verdad, Tucker,” Teemo said, trembling.

“How you figure?” Robby said.

“I tell you how I figure,” I said, turning and looking around at all the pot. I pulled my gun out and when I did, the twins looked like two Dobermans on alert.

I waved my gun at all the bricks and said, “This is a huge operation. Whoever owns all this,” I looked at the twins, “doesn’t need to hijack a couple of armed men and shoot them up to steal for money. That’s a risky business. On the other hand, luring some stupid gringos down to Mexico, getting them lost, making them think everything is cool and just taking their money, well, that sounds much easier and much less risky. Gringos so stupid, they send down other gringos who are so stupid they get hijacked, killed and lose their money.”

The twin on the right, couldn’t suppress a slight smile. The one on the left was expressionless. He would be the boss.

“There’s not much to respect…
respeto,
about that is there? No respect, no trust, not good business,” I said for the twins’ benefit.

“I don’t know, Tucker,” Robby said. “I don’t know if I buy that.”

“Let me ask you something,” I said to Robby.

“What?”

“You want to walk outside first?”

That got his attention.

“We can take Teemo as a hostage,” he said.

“I don’t know about you, but I have no idea how many guns are out there waiting for us. I also don’t know where they are, out there in the dark.”

Robby aimed his gun at Teemo’s head and said, “How many greasers out there? How many guns?”

Teemo’s first reaction was to look over his shoulder at the twins. He stopped himself, but the intention was there.

“Robby.” I said, “I think you’re talking to the wrong man.”

“Tucker!” Phil said loudly. “I think there’s someone outside the front door.”

“Shoot whoever comes through it, and I’ll shoot . . .” I aimed my .45 at the twin on the left and said, “como se llamas?”

“Armando,” he said in perfect English.

“And I’ll shoot Armando here,” I said.

Armando yelled something in rapid Spanish. I caught a few words… a lo sumo…something about the outside. The meaning was clear, stay outside.

Robby looked over at me and said, “What the fuck is going on?”

“I believe these handsome twins here, well, all this pot belongs to them, and Armando here, he’s the jefe, the boss.”

Armando looked at me and smiled, his teeth showing up white and even.

“Okay, so we use him as a hostage,” Robby said, moving around the table towards the twins.

“I may have a better idea,” I said.

Robby stopped and looked back at me, his eyebrows raised. We stood like that for a few seconds.

He said, “Let’s hear it.”

“First of all, let’s all just relax a little, back off and take a breath.”

In the silence that followed, long-hair began to moan.

Oh great.

I turned my head so I could see Phil. He was leaning easily against a wall of bricks, where he could see down the marijuana hallway to his left or into the makeshift room where we were.

For the first time, I saw a stool with a cowhide seat next to a short stack of bricks on my left. I put my gun in the back of my pants. I walked over, picked it up, brought it back to the table and sat it down across from the chair on the other side.

The light had stopped swinging, and the dust was starting to settle. The blood odor was stronger, like a dirty copper penny held close to my nose.

I remembered reading somewhere that Mexicans, most of all, admired and respected bravery, courage. So, I figured I had better get on with this façade before the shakes set in and I wet my pants.

I motioned to the chair and said, “Armando, would you like to sit?” I smiled and tried to sound polite, and unafraid. Then I motioned with my hand and said, “Of course, you can put your hands down. You and your brother, I’m sorry I don’t know your name.”

“Tom’as,” said the other twin, speaking for the first time.

“Thank you, Senor Tucker, I believe?” Armando said.

“That’s correct.” I said. I’ve read enough to know how to sound proper.

After Armando sat down, I sat down on the stool.

Armando smiled handsomely and said, “I believe your shirt is no longer good, Mister Tucker.” He nodded down to my right side.

I looked down and there was a hole about the size of a dime in the tail of my shirt, made by buckshot. I pulled the shirt out to get a better look and revealed two more identical holes. I remembered the odd picture of a child pulling on my shirt, trying to get my attention.

“You are very quick, Senor Tucker,” he said, “and very lucky.”

“Lucky?” I said. “Look at my shirt.”

His laughter was genuine. Then he looked over his right shoulder at the three men laying on the floor, then back at me, and said, “You are right, Mr. Tucker, I have no respect for someone who cannot protect themselves or their investment…or me.”

Losing his smile, he said, “We have made a costly mistake. We underestimated you and your friends. We thought you would be, like you said, stupid. You are not.”

“Where the fuck’s this going, Tucker?” Robby said impatiently.

Without taking my eyes from Armando’s, I said, “Give it a chance, Robby.”

Armando smiled like a gambler with an ace up his sleeve.

“We’re not lost,” I said.

His ‘ace in the hole’ smile slowly faded. He looked over at Teemo, who shrugged.

“Don‘t blame him, he did his best. Don’t misunderstand me, I’m not saying we could find our way back here, but we made sure we could find our way back to Texas.”

He looked at me for a moment, his eyes searching my face. He nodded. He believed me.

“What do you propose to do now, Senor Tucker?”

I looked around the room and said, “You’re in the marijuana business, right?”