An Incidental Reckoning (10 page)

He reached the window and parted the curtain the smallest fraction, just enough to see a tall, thin man struggle with a massive rock, wrestle it into position and drop it onto the hood of his Mustang. Brody’s finger twitched on the trigger, his instinct telling him to shoot the man. Ten years ago, that man would not have left intact, if he had left at all. But prison had changed him, made him more cautious; he knew that he had enemies and that rushing outside could be an expected reaction by others lying in wait, looking to put holes in
him
.

The man suddenly stopped and looked all around, and Brody believed that they had made eye contact, sure he had been seen. But he paid no particular attention to the window, and soon fled into the corn.

Brody waited for something else, heard a car start and drive away, finally went out the back door, inched down the side of the house away from the cornfield, sliding along the grimy siding in need of a power wash, and waited at the corner, his gun ready. He listened for a muffled cough, the scraping of the corn leaves without any breeze to stir them, the smell of tobacco smoke, anything to betray an ambush. Torn between this need for caution and his natural aggression, Brody finally stepped out into the yard. No one shot at him. He relaxed and moved towards the damaged vehicle, furious at the shattered glass and buckled metal, but intrigued despite all that.

He pictured the man: his awkward and furtive movements, the utter lack of awareness to his surroundings; someone new at this type of thing, like a kid dared by some older boys, a rite of initiation. But the guy had to be pushing forty, and he doubted he was looking to join the mob as a fix to a mid-life crisis. This attack had the hallmarks of something personal, and he thought of the boyfriends and the occasional husband of women he had seduced, tried to place the man in that line-up but failed. Not that he had a file on each one and still maintained it as a possibility.

He waited to see if the man would come back. He and Crush repaired the Mustang in the garage that his friend owned and at which he worked - not wanting to re-enter the drug trade, but not reformed in any accepted sense of the word - keeping his eyes open for that one big score that would make the day to day risks unnecessary. He didn’t want to admit it, even to himself, but the ten year vacation courtesy of the state had shaken him. He never wanted to go back there, would rather go out via suicide-by-cop than caught and caged again. He wasn’t like those others. He had reasons for being what he was, and they only had excuses.

He had dutifully visited his parole officer, a man that reminded him of Mr. Giles from high school, had maintained a humble, yes-sir-I-be-reformed-now attitude, the man pleased that he had found employment and seemed to be staying out of trouble. And he truly intended to do that, for now, except for the possession of firearms. In the wake of the next time he made trouble, Brody either would have vanished with enough cash to finish out his life in style, or be lying on a slab in the morgue full of holes and tagged for an unmarked grave.

The days turned to weeks, summer into winter, and no one came, nor any indication of who destroyed his car or why. Although still angry about the damage, the event faded from his list of priorities, and whatever revenge the act fulfilled seemed to have sated the man.

In the spring he had gone to the mailbox and found the plain envelope among the solicitations for credit cards and the water bill, read the two lines typed on an unremarkable piece of paper tucked inside. He felt a thrill of fear and a ripple of excitement. Both emotions surprised him; the whole thing so bizarre, coming from some unknown and indecipherable quarter, nothing that fit any pattern or behavior he understood. The people he knew, if they believed his release meant a desire to take back the turf yielded on his incarceration, would not have left a calling card as subtle as rocks through his windows. If a small army didn't just open fire on his house, he would have had a gun pressed to his head or pushed into his mouth while forced to listen to a sermon of dire warning; an undeniable show of force to convince him that his time had passed.

He went inside and looked at a map, found Ravensburg. Checked the date. He rode out there alone the weekend before, scoped out the campground, watched the Amish drive back in forth in their buggies on the highway. Looked for the places he would set up an ambush if he had arranged the meeting, still tried to make sense of it. He asked Chris, a former employee that had run drugs for him on his motorcycle, to join him on the camping trip, specifically because he had a Harley and another for Brody to ride. And because Chris liked to hurt people.

He had recognized the tall man as soon as they had ridden in, felt his eyes while passing by, but didn't acknowledge him. The second man looked harmless and miscast for any scene requiring violence, even more than the first. But as the evening wore on, he began to doubt the quick identification. He hadn’t gotten a good look at his face while peering out of his window and the grime that had accumulated over the past decade. There were plenty of tall men around.

He decided to poke them and see if they poked back. And when that failed to rouse any telling reaction, to poke them again. He considered that they could be FBI or DEA, even off the clock looking to avenge some grudge for holes drilled into a fellow agent, but their haplessness seemed too genuine to be cover. By the time he had hijacked the Amish kid as a last ditch effort to create a situation to draw them out, even leaving Chris alone with them to stack the odds in their favor - never once considering that Chris would end up floating face-down in the creek - he was convinced that the guy had lost his nerve and hadn’t shown up, that he had picked on some garden variety soccer dads here to enjoy some camping and fishing.

He didn’t mind the lack of resolution, exactly. He would get this guy eventually, if he kept throwing rocks into the hornets' nest, maybe even find out who had set him up for the bust and prison if it were somehow related. The ride out here had been relaxing, and hey, he had always wanted to drive an Amish buggy. And it provided a distraction to keep from brooding on his future, so unclear since being freed from his cage.

Now, Chris was dead, and he struggled between exacting retribution for that act, controlling his laughter at the identity of the two men before him and processing the surprising swell of affection, even nostalgia, for them both and the memories they evoked. He could barely see through his tears, couldn’t remember the last time he had laughed this hard, when Jon threw the rock at Will.

Chapter 8

Jon saw Brody react and raise the pistol at him in his periphery, but he didn’t think he even cared if Brody shot him. The rock sailed through the short space and struck Will in the shoulder.

“Ow! Jon, what are you doing?”

“Hey, cut it out. We need to…”

Jon didn’t care what Brody needed. The anger took precedence. He stood up, and the other two followed suit, shared lines of tension binding them together.

“Shut up, Brody.”

“What? No, I don’t think you…”

He might have said more, but Jon tuned him out, his hands now clenched into fists. He stepped forward towards Will, pulling his right hand back and swinging at the same time he planted his left foot. He swung without restraint, for the first time ever in his life, against the only person he had every fought. He wanted to hurt Will, had no other agenda than that, deal out what he deserved for setting up this nightmare scenario and placing him in it. He had never known rage of this degree, a betrayal worse than anything felt in high school. At least then he had Will, could always count on Will, and now Will had dragged him into his obsession and Jon could not let that go without comment.

His fist connected with Will’s cheek, but at the last moment Jon balked and pulled the punch, so that it struck but not as hard as he had intended. He waited for Will to hit back, breathing hard, his legs tingling as the numbness wore off.

Will rubbed his cheek, kept his eyes on the ground, said, “I’m sorry, Jon. I’m so sorry.”

The fight ebbed from his body, replaced with exhaustion. He still burned with anger at Will, but he understood. Didn’t condone his actions, but understood. He reached out his hand to place on his shoulder when a blow from Stape caught the back of his head and he stumbled forward, realizing through a haze that it marked the first time Brody had actually struck him.

“What’s the matter with you? If you hadn’t noticed, I have all the guns. If you’d like a demonstration of my capabilities, just keep it up.”

Jon turned to look at him, the fight building in him again, knowing that without the gun, he would throw himself at Brody Stape. The fear that had made him so impotent as a kid no longer existed. At least right now. He knew Brody would probably beat him to a pulp and didn’t care. He would at least leave the hospital with his dignity intact. But he didn’t want to die.

“So what now, Brody?”

Brody smiled at him, and he did see the kid from high school then. The smile matched the one in his memory, right before he and Will began their stint as indentured pugilists. The crazy smile gone crazier.

“First thing we need is the tarp we slept on. It’s in the bag on my bike. Which one are you again?”

“Jon Albridge.”

“All right Jon Albridge. You stay here with me. And you…Phil…”

“Will.”

“Whatever. You get the tarp and bring it here. You try anything, I will shoot Jon Albridge where he stands. Are we clear? I don’t like repeating myself and you should always assume I am telling the truth.”

“We’re clear.”

Will strode off, his face blank, his stiff movements those of a man resigned to the consequence of what his actions had wrought. Jon struggled to clear his head, knew one of them had to stay alert and look for a way out.

“Did you know anything about this?” Brody asked him.

Jon shook his head.

“Great friend you got. You understand that I would not be here but for him?”

Jon gritted his teeth, and said, “Yeah, I get it. Except none of what he did would have been necessary except for what you did to us. So you aren’t exactly innocent.”

“It was what? Over twenty years ago, man. Time to move on.”

Jon looked at him, saw the amusement rising in his eyes again and turned his head, not wanting to speak with him any more than necessary.

“Whatever.”

He could feel Brody’s smile on him.

“I can tell you want to fight. I think you would if I put down this gun. And if my buddy wasn't lying dead down there, I might oblige you. Hell, we could bring back the Amish kid and I'll take you both on. But right now we need to do this."

"Why don't you just call the police? That kid isn't going tell them what happened."

"I don't deal with police. And anyway, this is a personal matter…between old friends."

Brody chuckled, and Jon frowned and asked the question weighing heavily on his mind and turning his gut to cement.

"Are you going to kill us?"

"I don't know what I'm going to do with you. First we're going to bury Chris, and you two are going to dig the hole. Then we can think about the future. I’m hoping I can be more creative than just shooting you, as long as you cooperate."

Will came back with the tarp. He was shivering again, and Jon felt the chill as well, his wet clothing drawing the heat from his body. He wondered how long it would take for hypothermia to set in.

“We need to change our clothes. It’s getting cold.”

“Not yet. Gonna get wet again. You guys put him in there, now you’re going to pull him out. Bring him up here.”

Jon groaned, could already feel the weight of the body fighting against his overly taxed muscles. But there was nothing to do but obey. Will had already started towards the creek.

They climbed back down the slope. This time Jon slid most of the way, not caring about a graceful entry.

“We should bring him over there a little ways. It doesn’t look as steep and we’ll never get up with all of that mud,” Will said, and then whispered, “What should we do, Jon? Make a run for it?”

Jon’s anger had subsided at Will’s indiscretion, but hadn’t vanished.

“You tell me, Will. This is your plan, remember?” He felt sorry for saying it, knew it wasn’t the time for recriminations. Maybe later, when they were back home. If they made it home.

“I’m sorry, Jon. I can’t say anything else. I shouldn’t have done this, or at least should have told you.”