Last Man Standing

50

It was around two o’clock in the morning. The only movements at East Winds were the horses in the pastures and the wildlife in the encroaching forest. Then came footsteps that crept along the path leading through the trees.

There was one light on in the house and a man’s silhouette was stark in the outline of the window. Nemo Strait held a cold beer can against his injured shoulder, grimacing as the frosty metal hit the damaged skin. He wore a T-shirt and boxer shorts; his thick, muscular legs had split the fabric at the thigh. He lay on his bed, picked up the semiautomatic pistol there and deftly loaded the gun’s magazine, but with only one hand he had trouble sliding the bolt back to chamber a round. Frustrated, he finally put the gun on the nightstand, lay back on the bed and sipped his beer.

Nemo Strait, by nature, was a worrier. And right now he had a lot to concern him. He was still thinking about the chopper that had come out of nowhere in the dark woods. Strait had watched the flight of the aircraft. It had not landed in the woods, and it did not appear to be the police. Strait had thought about going back to where they had shot Cove to make certain the guy was dead. Yet he had to be. They had fired five shots into him, no one could shake that, and even if the man somehow managed to live, he’d be a vegetable, incapable of telling anyone what had happened. Still, Strait didn’t like it and he had scanned every news program he could find in the hopes of learning that an FBI undercover agent had been found dead. And he also wanted to hear that there were no clues to the killers. He rubbed his shoulder. Strait’s blood was out there, of course, but they had to have something to match his DNA to, and his was not on file anywhere that he could remember. Except the Army! But after more than twenty-five years, would they still have it? Would the stuff be any good? He doubted it. Still, he could feel it was getting close to the time he would be moving on. He had accomplished everything he had set out to do, and last night’s transaction had left him with enough money to retire to just about anywhere he wanted. At first he had thought about buying a place up in the Ozarks and passing the rest of his life doing nothing more than fishing and spending his money in increments that would arouse no suspicions. Now he was rethinking that strategy. Now he was thinking that another country might be a far better retirement venue. Well, he had heard the fishing was terrific in Greece.

If Strait heard the back door open, he made no indication. It had been a long day and his painkiller was wearing off. He took another slug of it and wiped his lips.

The door to his bedroom slowly opened. Again, Strait seemed not to notice. The person moved into the room. Strait turned on some music on the radio next to his bed. The figure moved closer to the bed. Finally Strait stopped what he was doing and slowly looked around.

“I didn’t think you were going to come tonight,” he said. “Thinking with one arm I wasn’t good enough anymore.” He took a drink of his beer and then put it down.

Gwen stood looking down at him. She wore the red dress she had had on at the party, but her high heels had been replaced with flats; her gold anklet glittered a bit in the wash of light.

She moved closer to him, her gaze drifting to his shoulder. “Does it hurt much?”

“Just every time I breathe.”

“Which horse did it?”

“Bobby Lee.”

“He’s not known as a kicker.”

“Every horse can be a kicker.”

“I forgot, you’re the expert.” She smiled demurely, but there was something behind the look that was not nearly so playful.

“No, but I grew up with the damn things. I mean, you don’t learn this stuff in a year or even in ten years. Look at Billy, he’s a fast learner, but he still basically knows shit about running a horse farm.”

“You’re right. That’s why we hired you and your good old boys.” She paused. “You’re our white knight, Nemo.”

Strait lit up a cigarette. “Yeah, that’s a good one.” She surprised him by reaching over and taking a drink of his beer.

“Don’t you have anything stronger than this?” she asked. “Bourbon.”

“Get it.”

While he pulled out the bottle and glasses, she perched on the bed and rubbed her calf. She touched the anklet, a gift from Billy. It had both their names engraved on it. Strait handed her a full glass and she downed it in one pass and handed it back to him for a refill.

“Take it easy on that stuff, Gwen. It’s not candy.”

“It is to me. Besides, I didn’t drink at the party. I was a good girl.” Strait’s gaze ran down her long body, took in her bare legs, her ample bosom. “Every man in the place wanted to jump your bones.”

Gwen did not smile at this compliment. “Not every man.”

“Hey, Billy’s getting up there, can’t do it on demand anymore. Hell, I’m getting to that point myself faster than I’d like.”

“It has nothing to do with age.” She reached over and took a puff of the cigarette and then handed it back. “And when your husband hasn’t touched you in years, it tends to drive a woman to other sources.” She glanced at him. “I hope you recognize your limited role here.”

He shrugged. “A man has to take what he can get. But it ain’t right that he still blames you for what happened to your son.”

“He has every right. I was the reason David was at that school.” “You didn’t order them crazy Frees in there to shoot up the place, now, did you?”

“No, and I didn’t ask the FBI to send down a bunch of men who were too cowardly or incompetent to save my son either.”

“Kind of strange, having the FBI right here on the farm.”

“We knew that was a very real possibility.”

Strait smiled. “Come here to protect you.”

Gwen said dryly, “From ourselves.”

“Well, the little bomb in Billy’s phone that I detonated when Web tossed it out the car, that threw them off the scent for good. They’re not looking in our direction.”

“Web London is a lot smarter than you probably think.”

“Oh, I know he’s real smart. I ain’t going around underestimating anybody on this one.”

Gwen took a sip of her second bourbon, slipped off her flats and slid back on the bed.

He caressed her hair. “I been missing you, lady.”

“Billy could care less, but it’s a little difficult to move around with the FBI patrolling your property.”

“Well,” said Strait, “now it’s just Web and Romano. He’s another one to watch. Ex-SWAT and Delta, that dude can be bad news. See it in his eyes.”

Gwen rolled over on her stomach, propped up on her elbows and stared at him. His eyes were locked on her cleavage, which was now spilling out of her dress. She noted his gaze, but apparently his attention did not interest her.

“I wanted to ask you about the horse trailers.”

Gwen’s question caused his gaze to lift from her breasts to her face.

“What about ’em?”

“I grew up on a horse farm too, Nemo. You had some of those rigs customized in a very special way, and I want you to tell me why.”

He grinned. “Can’t a man have any secrets?”

She got up on her knees and slid closer to him. She started kissing his neck, and his hand went first to her chest and then moved to her bottom. He hiked her dress up to her waist and discovered she had on no underwear.

“Good thinking. With me as horny as I am, you would’ve just gotten those panties ripped off anyway.”

She moaned into his ear as his fingers moved over her. One of her hands went to his face and then down to the neckline of his T-shirt. And then with a flash she had ripped the shirt down the front and sat back.

Her movement surprised Strait so much that he almost fell off the bed.

He followed her gaze to the bloodstained bandage on his shoulder.

“Mighty odd bruise from a horse kick,” said Gwen.

The two stared at each other. And before he could stop her, Gwen picked up Strait’s pistol, chambered a round and drew aims at various points in the room. She looked at the gun.

“The balance on this is off. And you really should get some lithium sights, Nemo. They do make a difference with night fire.”

A bead of sweat appeared on Strait’s forehead. “You handle that thing real good.”

“Horses weren’t the only thing I grew up with in Kentucky. My father and brothers were very active members of the NRA. I would’ve joined too, only it wasn’t deemed ladylike by my parents.”

“Hey, that’s real good to know. I’m a member too.” He breathed a sigh of relief when she set the safety, yet she still didn’t put the gun down.

“So what is it?” she asked. “Drugs?”

“Look, baby, why don’t we just have a drink and get to—”

The pistol came up and the safety went off. “I came here to screw you, Nemo, not to be screwed with. It’s late and I’m starting to get tired. If you want any candy tonight, you better cut the bullshit.”

“Okay, okay. Damn, you are something.” He took a quick belt of his drink and wiped his mouth with his hand. “It’s drugs, but not the kind you think. Prescription stuff with a kick twice that of morphine. No lab, no border problem. Just steal ’em or work a deal with a pharmacy assistant making eight bills an hour. This Oxycontin stuff started rural. But I’m taking it to the big cities. About damn time us country folks got a piece of the pie. It’s sweet.”

“And you’re using East Winds as your base and our trailers to move your product.”

“Well, we’ve been distributing the drugs, mostly in pickup trucks, prearranged drop spots and even through the mail. Then I got the idea to use the horse trailers. We move horses across state lines all the time. And if the cops stop us for permits and papers on the trailers or the horses, the smell’s gonna keep them away from where the stuff is, and I don’t know of many dogs trained to sniff out prescription drugs. I’ve been shuffling men and trailers around so you and Billy wouldn’t notice. The run we made to Kentucky was our biggest yet.”

He raised his beer in salute, apparently to himself.

Gwen eyed his wound. “But not a complete success.”

“Well, you do something illegal, you got to be prepared to face some risk.”

“Did this risk come from your demand chain or maybe the cops?” “Come on, now, honey, what does it matter?”

“You’re right. I guess either way it means you’ve put us at risk. You were supposed to be working for us, Nemo, full-time.”

“Well, a person’s got to look out for himself. And it was too good a deal to pass up. And I ain’t breaking my back on horse farms the rest of my life, okay?”

“I hired you for a specific purpose, because of your unique qualities and experience.”

“Right, the fact that I got a damn good head on my shoulders, know folks who don’t mind killing people and I can put together some pretty slick explosives. Well, I done that, baby.” He ticked the points off his fingers. “A federal judge, a U.S. attorney, a defense counsel.”

“Leadbetter, Watkins and Wingo. A judge with no backbone, a prosecutor with no guts and a defense counsel who would gladly defend his own mother’s killer if the guy had enough money. I consider that we did society a service by ending their pathetic lives.”

“Right, and we took out HRT and then suckered them into wiping out the damn Frees. Man, we tricked a veteran undercover into thinking that he’d come upon the drug operation to end all drug operations. We set that place up like something straight out of the movie The Sting.” He looked at her and his features grew grim. “So I delivered for you, lady. So what I do on my time is my business. I ain’t your damn slave, Gwen.”

She kept the pistol pointed at him. “Web London is still standing.” “Well, hell, you said to keep him that way. Make him look like a coward. We got lucky when I found out the shrink he was seeing was an old acquaintance of mine from Vietnam. So everybody thinks Web’s rotten to the core. This whole thing took a lot of planning, had a lot of risk, and let me tell you we executed it to damn near perfection, and you got it for pennies on the dollar ’cause I think what happened to your son stinks.” He looked at her with a hurt expression. “And I don’t even remember you saying thank you.”

Her tone was businesslike, her expression unreadable. “Thank you. How much money have you made off the drugs?”

Surprised, he lowered his drink. “Why?”

“After what I’ve paid you and what we’ve sunk into this place, Billy and I are in the hole. They’ll be coming to take his antique car collection pretty soon because we borrowed against that too. We could use some free cash flow, because we’re going to be selling out and moving on too, especially since however you got that injury tells me that one day somebody’s going to come knocking on our door with questions I don’t have answers for. And frankly, I’ve had enough of Virginia hunt country. I’m thinking our next stop is a small island where it never gets cold and there are no damn phones.”

“You want me to give you a share of my drug money?” he asked incredulously.

“Actually, demand would be more accurate.”

Nemo spread his hands. “Well, I wasn’t kidding, darlin’, we got some good prices for those fine yearlings,” he said in a very sincere tone.

She laughed at him. “This place never made any money before we bought it and it’s not going to make any money now. Fine year-lings or not.”

“Well, what do you want from me?”

“It’s very simple. I want you to tell me how much you have made from the drugs.”

He hesitated for a moment before answering. “Not that much, actually.”

She raised the pistol and pointed it in his direction. “How much?”

“Okay, ’bout a million. There, you satisfied?”

She gripped the pistol with both hands and took very careful aim at his head. “Last chance. How much, Nemo?”

“Okay, okay, don’t get your panties all twisted.” He let out a deep breath. “Tens of millions.”

“Then I want twenty percent. And then we go our separate ways.” “Twenty damn percent!”

“Wired to an offshore account. I’m assuming that a great businessman like yourself has set up some secret accounts somewhere to hide your millions. Excuse me, tens of millions.”

“But look, I got expenses.”

“Right, you probably paid your help off in pills, since most of them are too stupid to know better. And since running prescription drugs means low cost, lower risk, I imagine your profit margins are pretty nice, and I don’t think you’ve been paying taxes on the income. And on top of that, you use our equipment that we paid for to move your product and also the manpower we’re paying to work the farm to do it for you. So there was very little capital out of your pocket, and that makes for an even greater return on investment. And so, yes, I want my share. We’ll call it rental fees for equipment and labor. And you’re lucky it’s only twenty percent.” She slid a hand enticingly down her front. “In fact, you’re fortunate that I’m in a generous mood right now.”

Strait just shook his head. “What, was your dad a damn MBA too?”

“Billy and I have gotten the wrong end of the deal for long enough. At least we’re still alive. My son only had ten years. Does that sound fair to you?”

“And if I say no?”

“I’ll shoot you.”

“In cold blood. A religious woman like yourself?”

“I pray for my son every day, but I can’t say that my faith in God is absolute anymore. And I can always call the cops.”

Nemo smiled and shook his head. “And tell them what? I’m dealing drugs? And oh, yeah, I killed a bunch of people for you? What’s your leverage?”

“My leverage, Nemo, is that I don’t give a damn anymore what happens to me. That’s the best leverage of all. I have nothing more to lose because I’ve already lost everything.”

“What about Billy?”

“He knows nothing about this. And now it’s twenty-five percent.”

“Well, hell.”

Keeping the gun trained on him, she stood, unzipped her dress and let it fall to the floor, then stepped out of it completely naked.

“And here’s the sweetener,” she said. “Going once, going twice . . .” “Deal!” said Nemo Strait as he held his arms out for her.

The sex was hard and left them both breathless. Strait collapsed on his back nursing his aching arm, while Gwen let her legs down and stretched them out. Strait had almost driven her right through the box springs and twisted her legs back into positions they were never meant to go. She would be hurting for a couple days, but it was a wonderful pain, something her husband had withheld from her for so long. And not just the sex, but also the love, which was far worse. In public he made a pretense of affection; in private he bothered not at all. He had never been abusive to her—on the contrary it was extreme diffidence coupled with irreversible melancholy; being ignored had never been so painful.

Gwen sat back against the headboard, lit a cigarette and blew fat rings to the ceiling. She lay there for about an hour and then reached over and put a hand on Strait’s hairy chest, slowly rousing him.

“That was wonderful, Nemo.”

“Uh-huh,” he grunted back.

“Think you can do it again before sunrise?”

He opened one eye. “Damn it, woman, I ain’t nineteen, and I got a bad wing. You get me some of that Viagra crap, maybe I can.”

“In your line of work I’d think you’d be tired of pills.”

He raised his head slightly and looked at her. “Hey, you wouldn’t entertain the notion of moving to Greece with me, would you? It’d be a hell of a lot of fun. Guaranteed.”

“I have no doubt, but my place is with my husband whether he knows it or not.”

He slumped back down. “Yeah, I thought you’d say that.”

“And you’re really just looking to cut me out of my twenty-five percent.”

“Okay, I give up.”

“Nemo?”

“Yeah?”

“What do you think happened to Ernest B. Free?”

He sat up, used her cigarette to light his, then sat back next to her and put an arm around her.

“Hell if I know. That one’s really got me stumped. I thought he’d be at the compound HRT hit, but he wasn’t. Unless the Feds are lying, but why would they? They bag him, they’d be screaming that to the world. And the guy I used to set up the Frees also planted the drugs and other stuff down there, including some made-up files on the judge and two lawyers. He actually knows old Ernie, so he would’ve seen and recognized him if he was down there. Even if they had him real well hidden.”

She ran her fingers through his hair. “Web and Romano are leaving soon.”

“Yeah, I know. Good riddance. They’re cramping my style, although it was pretty sweet driving fifty thousand stolen pills right out under the Feds’ noses. But to tell you the truth, I kind of like those guys. If they found out what we’ve done, they’d try and put us on death row, but except for that, I wouldn’t mind popping back a few brews with them from time to time.”

Strait glanced over at Gwen, and the look on her face startled him. “I loathe Web London,” she said.

“Look, Gwen, I know what happened with your son and all—” She exploded and beat the mattress with her fists. “It makes me sick to see his face. They’re worse than the Frees. They come rushing in to save the world and innocent people start dying. Those people swore to me that once HRT was called in, no one else would die. And then they paraded around Web London as this big hero while my son lies dead in his grave. I’d love to shoot them all down myself.”

Strait swallowed nervously at her wild tone and words as she knelt there on the bed, her hair in her face. Her lean, naked body, every muscle tensed, made her look like a panther about to spring. He eyed the gun where she’d put it on the nightstand and was ready to make a lunge for it, but she was quicker. She pointed the gun all around the room as Strait looked on nervously. Finally the barrel ended up pointed at Gwen herself. She looked down at it, as though she wasn’t sure what it was. Her finger eased closer to the trigger.

“Then why don’t you do it yourself?” he said, eyeing the gun. “Kill Web, I mean. Like you said, accidents happen. Especially on horse farms.”

Gwen thought about this and finally dropped her angry look and smiled at him, putting down the gun.

“Maybe I will.”

“Just don’t blow it, though, ’cause we’re in the home stretch.” She got under the covers, snuggled against him, kissed his cheek and put her hand under the sheet, rubbed him down there. “Just one more time,” she said in a low, throaty voice, her gaze holding his. She slid the sheet off them both and looked down and smiled.

“My goodness, who needs Viagra, Nemo?”

“Woman, you are playing me like Charlie Daniels plays the fiddle.”

Even without the potency drug, Strait managed to satisfy her one more time though it about killed him.

Later, as Gwen dressed, he watched her.

“Damn, you are a hellcat.”

She zipped up her dress and held her shoes in one hand. Strait got up and started gingerly pulling his shirt over his bad arm. She looked at him. “Early morning plans?”

“Aw, you know how the life on a horse farm is, there’s always something to do.”

She turned to leave.

“You know, nothing personal or anything, Gwen, but it ain’t good for a person to carry that much hate around. You just got to let it go at some point or else it’ll ruin you. I was like that when my ex took the kids. At some point you just got to let it go.”

She slowly turned and looked at him. “When you’ve seen your only child lying dead right in front of you with a bloody hole in his chest, Nemo, and then you lose the only other person you love because of it; when you’ve reached the lowest point of despair a person can reach and then watch yourself drop even lower—then you can come and talk to me about letting go of the hate.”