Thrilling Thirteen: 13 Mysteries/Thrillers

Author’s Note

This is a collection of two short stories, both set in La Sombra, a fictional small town outside of El Paso, Texas.

The inspiration for these two tales was a mish-mash of original thoughts and outside influences. I wanted to write something with a Texas flavor, as the Lone Star State has always been my second favorite state after my native Washington. I also felt the influence of the Marty Robbins song “El Paso” and Springsteen’s “The Line.” In fact, the name of the narrator is an homage to the latter.

This was also around the time where the border was in the news for a variety of reasons. All of this got me to thinking about human nature, the nature of politics and the nature of love. I got to wondering what it was really like along the border, at least on “our” side, where I at least had a frame of reference. I wondered how different people were and more to the point, how different they weren’t. I started wondering what would happen if a Yankee rolled into a small Texas town and joined the police force. What would he find out about the place? About the people? About himself?

In The Shadow Of El Paso

We all lived together, but separate, white and brown, in the strange border land north of the Rio Grande. It wasn’t Mexico and it wasn’t the United States, but rather pieces of both and some of neither. We lived in La Sombra, in the shadow of El Paso.

I never got too involved in the politics of it, anyway. I wasn’t supposed to ask whether a person was legal or not, unless I really had to know. I learned that shortly after coming to La Sombra. If they were legal, asking was an insult. If they weren’t, the question was met with distrust. So most times, I just didn’t ask. There was work here and people wanted to do it. They worked hard, they drank hard and they loved hard. I liked their food, their music and their rapid language.

But I loved her.

Living here was tough enough. Being a lawman was almost impossible. How could I enforce something as abstract as laws written by some rich, white men who lived two thousand miles away? How do those laws apply in a town that only recognizes the most basic and the most extreme of human laws?

Things can get a little blurred along the border.

Isabella served drinks at Tres Estrellas most nights. I made a point of doing a walkthrough there at least once a shift, sometimes twice. Part of it was professional. A little police presence went a long way towards deterring trouble. But I would have gone anyway, just to see her. I think dozens of men in town felt the same way.

Tres Estrellas was the only place in town where white and brown mixed with little trouble. Music played on the jukebox. The songs on the juke were an eclectic mix of classic rock, old and new country, Tex-Mex and full-on Mexican. The polished wood floor creaked a little when I walked across it in the dim light. A few customers were scattered in small groups throughout the main room. An old Mexican ballad twanged from the speakers.

“Morena de mi corazon,” the man’s voice sang sadly. And that was Isabella. Dark-haired woman of my heart.

She smiled at me from the corner of the bar, where she’d been chatting quietly with Pete Trower. When she flashed that smile, the world stopped and sound diminished. The light in her eyes sent an electricity through my chest and out to my limbs. It was that way every time. A twinge of regret fluttered in my chest along with the other emotions banging around in there. I wished, not for the first time, that I could sit at the bar for the next few hours and drink her in along with my tequila.

“Carlos,” she said playfully, using the Spanish equivalent of my name.

I touched the brim of my hat and grinned stupidly. “Everything okay tonight?”

She shrugged. “Oh, sí, everything is fine. Just slow, sabes?”

I did know. Tuesday was usually dead.

“You mind if I walk around?” I asked. I didn’t need permission. I had the authority to walk anywhere I wanted to in a drinking establishment. But it didn’t hurt to have manners.

“Por favor,” she said, and moved down the bar a bit. From there, she leaned forward, resting her elbows onto the bar. The position pushed up her breasts and accentuated her cleavage. She beckoned me with a head movement. My mouth went a little dry and I stepped closer to the bar. Her perfume hinted at oranges and spice. She reached out and tapped my badge with a tapered, red nail. Her voice lowered to a husky, conspiratorial whisper. “It is nice to have the law around to keep things from getting loco.”

My face grew warm. “Now you’re teasing me.”

A smile played on her full lips. I looked into her dark, smoky eyes and held her gaze.

“Tal vez,” she cooed.

“Perhaps,” I repeated back.

“But you’ll still look around, won’t you?” she said, and turned to leave.

I watched her go, gliding around the end of the bar and to a table in the corner. Two young Hispanic cowboys, whom I didn’t recognize, sat in the booth and followed her with their eyes, just like I did.

“I hate them,” muttered Pete from his barstool.

“Aw, they’re just having a couple of beers,” I told him.

He shook his head. “They look at her.” The word dripped off his tongue like poison.

“Everyone does.” I pulled a five dollar bill from my pocket and put in on the bar next to Pete’s beer.

He turned away from the cowboys and regarded me. “What’s that for?”

“Next one’s on me, that’s all.”

“Why?”

“I gotta have a reason?”

Pete’s expression remained hard and he didn’t answer.

“Who bought me my first beer in La Sombra?” I asked him.

“Dunno.”

“Hell you don’t. It was you, right here at the Tres. My hair hadn’t even grown out from the Army yet.”

Pete shrugged and flicked his eyes back at the cowboys as they bantered with Isabella. Her laughter tinkled through the air like tiny bells.

“Pete,” I said.

He shifted his gaze to me. “What?”

I smiled my best Texas grin. “Just enjoy your beer. All right?”

He stared at me for a few moments, then lowered his eyes to the beer in front of him and nodded. Tres Estrellas was famous for its potent Mexican tequila and weak American beer. I was glad Pete was drinking the latter. He spent too much time on that barstool, night after night, dreaming about what he could never have. I knew, because I sometimes dreamed the same foolish dream.

I left Pete and strolled toward the back rooms. One contained three pool tables and two dartboards. On a busy weekend night, I could barely jostle through and smoke would hang in the air like a thundercloud. Tonight, Jack Talbott shot a game of nine ball, alone except for his newest girlfriend, a platinum blonde. She might have been twenty-two and with an IQ to match. Instead of cigarette smoke, the air was full of her perfume.

“Carl,” he said, chalking the tip of his cue.

I gave Jack a neighborly nod and stepped into the back room.

At first, I thought it was empty, but then I saw two Mexicans in the nearest booth, hunkered over their drinks. Neither one made eye contact. One pulled the bill of his dirty ball cap low over his eyes. The other squeezed further into the corner.

“Buenas noches,” I said.

They muttered the words back to me with thick accents. One cast a quick, wary glance up at me before returning his eyes to his tequila.

I thought about it for a second, checking them over. Dirty clothes, rough hands. Hard workers, I figured, and not likely to be any trouble. I touched the brim of my hat, turned and headed back to the main bar.

“You check them two for green cards?” Jack asked me as I strode past. “’Cause my money says they’re wetbacks.”

Miss Twenty-two giggled at his witty word choice.

“They’re legal workers,” I said, and kept walking.

Jack wouldn’t let it lie. “Bullshit. You weren’t in there long enough to check.”

I turned back to face him. “What’s that?”

“You heard me, Carl. Ain’t no way you checked them boys for green cards or any other damn thing.” His jaw jutted out, challenging me.

“I suppose you’re an immigration expert,” I said.

He shook his head. “No, but I am an expert on spic lovers. And you, my friend, are one.”

Heat flushed my face. The roof of my mouth itched. People with Jack’s way of thinking were part of the reason things never changed down here. I thought of a dozen responses and not all of them involved words. Finally, my eyes settled on the blonde at his side. “Your wife meet your new secretary yet, Jack?”

His face blanched and his mouth hung open for a moment before snapping shut. “You—”

“Wife?” the blonde screeched. “You have a wife?”

I turned on my heels and headed back to the bar.

Isabella stood in the corner at the cowboys’ table. She rested her palms on the edge and leaned forward coquettishly. A smile played on her lips. Both men bore huge grins. A small flare of jealousy burned in my gut as the song on the jukebox trailed off.

Pete was halfway from his barstool to the corner table when I walked in. He pushed up the sleeves of his jacket as he strode purposefully.

“Pete!” I barked.

It was a mistake, raising my voice like that. All eyes turned to me. Now if I gave Pete an order, he’d never live it down.

“Can I talk to you for a second?” I asked him, softening my tone.

Pete stared at me for a moment, then back at the table. I used the time to cross the distance between us, took Pete by the arm and led him outside. He pulled against me once, but I jerked his arm close to my body and kept walking.

Once outside the bar, Pete pulled away again and this time I let him go. We stopped a few paces away from the door. The odor of gas fumes from the parking lot and manure from the stockyards across the street replaced the bar smell of cigarettes and beer. All four smells burned my nose and would likely hang on my uniform for the rest of my shift.

Pete stood with his shoulders slumped, all hang-dog and pushing gravel rocks around in the dust with the toe of his boot.

“Those boys don’t need any trouble,” I said.

“Don’t reckon so,” he mumbled.

“And she’s just being friendly with the customers.”

“Bit too friendly, way I see it.”

“Friendly folks spend friendly money,” I said. “Isabella knows that.”

“’Spose.”

I hitched my thumbs in the front of my belt and appraised him. “What were you figuring to do, Pete? Take on both of them?”

He shrugged. “Guess so.”

“Not really a fair fight.”

He shrugged again.

“Where them boys from, anyway?”

“Over New Mexico way,” he said. “Leastways, that’s what Isabella told me.”

“See, that’s my point.”

He looked up at me quizzically. “What point?”

“They’re from New Mexico. Any Texan can whup at least three New Mexico boys. Not even close to a fair fight.”

Pete grinned grudgingly. “I ’spose not.”

I reached out and clapped him on the shoulder. “You just let things lie, all right?”

He pressed his lips together, but nodded. “Sure, Carl. It’s just hard, that’s all. She’s so beautiful, and…,” he trailed off.

“I know,” I said, and I did.

Pete sighed heavily. I gave his shoulder a squeeze. He turned and went back inside Tres Estrellas and I went back on patrol.

“Sam-25.”

I jumped. Molly’s voice from the radio surprised me. I’d been parked near the edge of town with my door swung open, staring up at the desert sky. The huge expanse of stars let me dream a world of possibilities and the clean desert air washed away some of the bar stink.

“Sam-25, go ahead.”

“Carl, you need to head over to the Tres right away. We just got a call about some arguing going on.”

I keyed the ignition and started the engine. “Talbott’s wife come by looking for him?”

“No,” Molly transmitted. “It’s Pete Trower.”

I cursed and hit the lights.

I skidded into the parking lot in a cloud of dust, jumped out of the police Explorer and ran toward the door. As my fingers wrapped around the handle, I heard two loud bangs. Gunshots.

I cursed again, released the handle and drew my .45.

The screaming started as soon as I went through the door. The shrill sound came from Miss Twenty-two. I moved deliberately in that direction, my gun at the low ready. Two steps further in, I encountered Jack pulling Miss Twenty-two along. Her mouth hung open in a silent scream and she jabbed her finger wordlessly toward the main bar room.

“Son of a bitch shot him!” Jack yelled on his way past.

As soon as I cleared the entryway, I saw the mess. Right in the middle of the bar room, a cowboy lay flat on his back. Isabella and the cowboy’s New Mexico partner knelt beside him. The partner held the wounded man’s head in his hands. The cowboy’s jaw was slack and his partner bore a look of disbelief while he muttered comforting words.

I scanned the room. No Pete. The back door beside the bar stood half-open.

“What happened?”

Isabella turned toward me, her expression tight but without any tears. “Él lo mató,” she said simply. “Pete shot him.”

I didn’t need to ask why.

“That way?” I pointed to the open back door.

She nodded.

“Call an ambulance,” I told her and hurried to the back door.

I nudged it open carefully. I didn’t think Pete would shoot me, but I wasn’t so sure he’d recognize me in the doorway.

“Pete?”

I was answered by the sound of a dirt bike engine kicking to life about a hundred yards away. The sound came from the stockyards.

I ran around front just in time to see Pete’s blue denim jacket flash past me in the parking lot. I made a frantic grab for him, but he leaned away and gunned it, throwing a spray of gravel on my legs as he sped away.

I got in the Explorer, punched the lights and headed after him.

“Molly?” I said into the mike. “Get an ambulance over to the Tres.”

“Copy. What kind of injuries?”

“Gunshot wounds. I’m in pursuit of Pete. He’s on a dirt bike and wearing a blue denim jacket. We’re westbound from the bar.”

“Copy.”

Pete must have seen my lights and known that he couldn’t outrun the Explorer on the road, because he turned sharply north off the roadway and cross-country.

I slowed, and followed, keeping sight of the shadowy rider as he lanced through the night. I chased him with my spotlight. Unseen rocks and dips in the ground tossed the Explorer around and jostled me in the cab.

“This is bad,” I muttered.

For twenty minutes, I followed Pete, barely able to keep a visual on him. The spotlight bounced and jiggled as I drove over the terrain, and the red and blue rotators cast a surreal light onto the desert night. Pete used every obstacle that came along to his advantage, putting it in my way by going over it. As we neared the rocky foothills, I knew it was only a matter of time before he got away. My only hope was that he wiped out long enough for me to catch up to him and grab on.

It didn’t happen.

Molly called out the Chief and two other officers and kept feeding them my grid coordinates. When I finally lost sight of Pete, I stopped driving and waited for them.

The Chief arrived first. I filled him in while he stood rocking on his heels, hands resting on his precious silver-studded gun belt, and alternately spitting tobacco and wiping his drooping mustache. His .45 revolver hung low on his right side like an old-style gunslinger.

“I’ve been on the phone with Earl,” he said, when I was finished. “He’s at the Tres securing the scene. Apparently, Pete didn’t take too kindly to them New Mexico boys flirting it up with Isabella.” He gave me a hard look. “Says you were in there earlier tonight when a fight almost started.”

I swallowed. “Yes, sir, I was. I thought I handled it.”

The Chief spit and drew his sleeve across his mouth. “’Parently not.”

We stood in silence for a long while, staring out in the direction Pete had gone. The only sounds were the desert at night, the ticking and cooling of our vehicle engines, and his occasional spitting. As we waited, the first shimmer of pre-dawn light appeared in the eastern sky.

“Where the hell can he go?” the Chief finally muttered. “Nothin’ but desert and rocky steppes to the north, now. I ’spose he could cut east or west and backtrack, but does he even have enough gas in that thing to make it anywheres?”

I didn’t answer.

The Chief sighed and we waited some more.

Thirty minutes later, Wes Perez and John Calhoun rumbled up in the big Ford truck, hauling the horse trailer.

I blinked. “You’re kidding.”

The Chief glanced at me. “’Bout what?”

“We’re going after him on horseback?”

“Listen, rookie,” the Chief said, “you think you can follow his trail in the Explorer? He ain’t gonna git far on that dirt bike. When that craps out, he’ll be on foot. I want to get him before the sun does.”

I’d been a cop in our little town for three years, but the Chief still considered me a rookie. I figured that wouldn’t change until he hired someone new. Maybe never, seeing as how I wasn’t a son of La Sombra.

Wes climbed out of the truck and headed for the trailer. John exited the passenger side, moving gingerly. His iron gray hair was combed impeccably and even his jeans were sharply creased.

“Give Wes a hand,” the Chief ordered. “Unless you want to stay here with the trucks and I’ll take John along.”

I shook my head and walked away. Riding in the heat wouldn’t do old John any good. I didn’t dare suggest we give El Paso PD a call or the County Sheriff or even the Texas Rangers. The Chief didn’t believe in outside help.

John put on his hat and tucked it into place. “Carl,” he nodded.

“Mornin’, John.”

“Fine day for a posse.”

I gave him a weak smile and went to the back of the trailer.

Wes led the Chief’s white gelding down the ramp. He met my eyes and nodded his hello. His deep brown skin seemed almost black in the pre-dawn light.

Wes and I unloaded all three horses, saddled them and made sure the canteens were filled. The Chief’s saddlebag contained a GPS device and a cell phone. When we were finished, I led my red roan and Wes led his mount and the Chief’s to where the Chief and John stood, engaged in palaver.

The Chief took the reins from Wes without a thank you and looked around at all of us. “They took that cowboy to the hospital in El Paso. It don’t look like he’s gonna make it.” He had himself a spit while we mulled that over. Then he continued, “John will stay here with the vehicles. He has the other cell phone. We’ll follow Pete’s trail. Simple as that.”

Nothing was simple on the border, but I couldn’t tell the Chief that any more than I could tell him that four-wheelers would do the job better than horses.

We swung up into our saddles. The sun peeked over the eastern horizon. I figured Pete had a good two-hour head start on us.

The trail was easy enough to follow. The knobby tires of the dirt bike tore up the desert ground. Wes rode in front, appointed as scout. I don’t remember him ever saying anything about having special abilities in tracking, but he was at the front anyway. The Chief was in charge of this expedition, so he wasn’t going to do it. And I was the rookie, so that left Wes.

The morning sun crept over the horizon and within an hour, my shirt was soaked through with sweat. We fanned out instead of riding in a column so that we didn’t have to eat the dust kicked up by the horses’ hooves, but desert sand still lightly caked my face. Wes rode silently, his head tilted to the left and watching the ground.

The Chief followed, ignoring me. When his cell phone chirped, his gelding whinnied and started, so he had to bring the horse under control before he could flip open the phone.

“Yeah?” Silence. Then, “All right.” He turned off the phone and replaced it in his saddlebag. “That New Mexico cowboy didn’t make it,” he said, not looking at either one of us.

No one replied. I took a slug of water from the canteen. It was already warm and brackish.

We found the dirt bike an hour later, dumped unceremoniously in a shallow arroyo. By then, a light wind had kicked up and the footprints leading away from the Kawasaki were partially wiped away.

The Chief uttered a curse and looked at his watch.

Wes turned in his saddle and looked at me. “How tall is Pete?”

I shrugged. “Five-ten or so.”

He pointed at the footprints. “He’s got a powerful stride here. It’s controlled, too. He’s not panicking.”

“How the hell can you tell that?” the Chief asked. “Or are you part Apache, too?”

I winced a little. The Chief considered me a rookie, but I think he considered Wes a necessary evil, a concession to the Hispanics in town.

Wes ignored the jibe. “I can tell from the distance between his steps.”

The Chief glanced down at the sandy bottom of the arroyo. “Maybe he’s running. Maybe he’s frantic.”

Wes shook his head. “The footprints look different when someone runs. There’s a more powerful impact with the ground. The print is more ragged at the heel and the toe. And there’s more distance between the steps.”

The Chief eyed him and the footsteps a moment longer. Then he spit, wiped and shrugged. “Walking or running, won’t be long ’fore we catch him now.

“Unless the tracks disappear,” I muttered.

“What’s that?” the Chief asked me.

“I said, unless the tracks disappear.”

The Chief grunted and spurred his horse forward.

Twenty minutes later, we came across a small waterhole. Wes dismounted and walked around, eying the bank carefully. He spotted something and pointed. “Allá. Someone knelt in the mud next to the water.”

I walked my roan over. Two shallow impressions were in the mud, right where he pointed.

“How long ago?” the Chief asked.

Wes shrugged. “I don’t know. It’s not like I’m Apache or something.”

The Chief scowled. I hid my smile behind my horse’s broad neck.

Wes knelt and sniffed the water. “It’s good.”

We watered the horses and rested a few minutes. Wes and I wandered around the water hole until we found Pete’s tracks.

“Still north,” I muttered. “Where’s he going?”

Wes shrugged. “If we called El Paso, they might be able to get us a helicopter. Maybe from the Army or something. Then we’d find him quick.”

“Yeah,” I said, “and if manure were music, we’d have a mariachi band.”

Wes grinned beneath his mustache.

“Let’s mount up!” the Chief barked at us.

We rode for another hour, but the wind kicked up, erasing the footprints in front of us. The Chief spurred us to a trot, but we couldn’t outrun the wind.

Wes finally reined up to a stop. “No good,” he told the Chief, squinting.

The Chief grunted a curse and spit. “He’s been heading due north. We could just ride.”

Wes shrugged. “We could. But if he hooked to the east or west—”

“Yeah, yeah, I know,” the Chief waved his comment away, then cursed again.

I scanned the horizon. There was naught but desert and hills, arroyos and ravines. A man could go anywhere out here and get nowhere.

“We’ll need to be relieving Earl back at the Tres, anyway,” I said, trying to mitigate the turn of events. “The crime scene has to be processed.”

The Chief said nothing.

We waited until the Chief had stewed long enough to spit, wipe, and curse again, before wheeling his horse around and heading back to John and the trailers. Then we followed.

Some small towns are boring enough that stories about a barroom murder would be on page one of everyone’s mind for months or years. In La Sombra, miles from the Rio Grande and old Mexico, death was common enough to brush the news aside after a few weeks. Ranchers shot and killed illegals crossing their property pretty regularly. The DEA and Border Patrol put a violent end to drug runs. Coyotes packed their human luggage too tight in the heat and lost a few poor souls on almost every smuggling trip. Death was everywhere. So after a month or so, people stopped talking about Pete and the cowboy from New Mexico. But they didn’t forget.

Neither did the Chief. He and John sat at the station, boots kicked up on their respective desks, and chewed on the topic almost daily. Wes and I kept fairly quiet about it.

“Musta died out there,” John said, every chance he got.

“Maybe.”

“Not enough water, ’specially this time of year. And him on foot?” John shook his head. “Naw, he’s buzzard food.”

“He coulda found water. Or come across somebody,” the Chief said. “Coulda circled around and gone ’cross the Rio.”

“Never make it.”

“He coulda.”

Then they’d fall silent and think on it a while, both chewing and spitting.

Turned out the Chief was right.

I knew I’d be the one to get the call. Call it God’s way of giving me a second chance, or call it fate, but as soon as we turned our horses away from Pete’s disappeared trail, I knew in my gut that I’d see him again.

The night was clear and still. I’d parked out on the edge of town and swung my door open wide to take in the wide expanse of stars above. Isabella’s dark eyes were on my mind, when Molly’s voice erupted through the radio.

“Sam-25!”

I keyed the mike. “Go ahead.”

“Carl! Get over to the Tres! Pete Trower’s back, and he’s got a gun!”

I pulled the door shut and started the Explorer.

“Carl! You hear me?”

“On my way,” I told her.

“Copy. I’m calling the Chief.”

I made it to Tres Estrellas in less than a minute. Four Mexican men burst through the front door as I jumped out of the truck. Jack Talbott hurried behind them, hauling a strawberry-haired waitress by the arm.

“That sumbitch is crazy, Carl!” he hollered at me.

“Who else is in there?”

“Hell if I know! Everyone bolted as soon as he pulled the gun.”

I pushed past him and went inside.

Isabella stood behind the bar, stock-still and staring straight ahead. Her eyes were flat and her face impassive. Pete stood on the opposite side of the bar, a small revolver leveled at her.

I eased my .45 out of my holster and took up a position behind a four-by-four post. “Pete,” I called to him, keeping the sharpness out of my voice.

Pete didn’t turn away from Isabella, but I saw his eyes shift in the large mirror behind the bar.

“Ain’t your business, Carl,” he said in a flat tone.

“Maybe not mine,” I said, “but it’s police business.”

“Have it your way,” Pete replied, and turned his eyes back to Isabella. “I wish it could have been different between you and me.”

Isabella didn’t reply. Her eyes didn’t soften.

“Because I would have treated you right,” Pete said, his voice thick with emotion. “I would never have treated you like a whore. Not like those guys did. Not like all of them did.”

I raised my barrel slowly, drawing a bead on Pete’s upper back, aiming center mass.

“Could you have loved me?” he pleaded with her. “Ever?”

I didn’t want her to answer that. I didn’t want him to hear the truth if she said no, and I didn’t want to hear the truth if she said yes.

Isabella shook her head slightly. “Lo ciento, Pete. I’m sorry.”

Pete’s gun hand wavered. In the mirror, I saw tears spring to his eyes. Huge drops rolled down his cheeks.

“Pete…” I tried to get his attention.

“Gitana,” Pete croaked. “Gitana cara.”

The blast exploded from the barrel of his gun and Isabella disappeared behind the bar. I fired immediately after, double-tapping. The force of my rounds hurled him into the bar. His gun clattered to the floor. Pete slid down the side of a barstool.

The biting odor of cordite stung my nostrils. I approached Pete carefully. He lay motionless.

“Señorita? Are you okay?”

No answer.

“Isabella? It’s safe.”

“¿Seguro?”

“Yes. I’m sure.”

Isabella rose from behind the bar and her eyes scanned the room. “Pete?”

I didn’t answer.

Tears welled up and spilled down her cheeks. She ran around the end of the bar to where Pete had fallen. I started to stop her, but with Pete’s gun outside of his lunge area, I let her go. While she touched his face, I secured his weapon.

“I’m sorry,” I whispered to Isabella, wondering if she were really grieving for a man she just told she could never love. “I didn’t have a choice.”

She ran her hands across Pete’s forehead, smoothing a lock of his hair. I stood silently, listening to the slowing trickle of alcohol dripping from broken bottles behind the bar and the wail of sirens in the distance.

Isabella stood and pushed her own jet-black hair back. I waited for her to turn to me for a comforting embrace, to thank me for saving her life. Instead, she shot me a glance of pure venom, turned and stalked away.

Gitana, Pete had said. Gitana cara.

Enchantress. Dear, precious enchantress.

Yet, he couldn’t bring himself to shoot her and had fired into the booze rack instead.

At least, things were clear for him now. At least, the woman had loved him for a moment, even if it were his last. I stood in the empty bar, the odor of gunpowder in the air, watching blood seep from Pete’s dead body, and waited. For what, I don’t know.

Like I said, things are blurred along the border.

Jack’s Town

“Sam-25?” the radio crackled.

Molly’s voice cut through the still night air. I was parked out on the edge of town with my boot lodged against the wide open door of the police Explorer, staring up at the expanse of stars across the West Texas sky. I’d been thinking about Isabella’s dark eyes and her hair falling down.

I grabbed the mike. “-25, go ahead.”

“I have a call,” she said, then paused. When she spoke again, her voice held a tone of reluctance. “Can you Signal 8 Dispatch, please?”

My eyes narrowed. Why’d she want me to call her on the phone? Why couldn’t she just broadcast the call over the air?

I turned the ignition key and the Explorer’s engine rumbled to life. The cell phone mounted in the center console booted up and beeped its readiness. I punched in the number for Dispatch from memory. She answered on the second ring.

“Carl?”

“What’s going on, Molly?”

She sighed. “I just got a 911 call.”

I put the Explorer in gear. “Where?”

“It sounded like a domestic,” Molly said.

“Where?”

Molly hesitated. Finally, she said, “It came from the Talbott house.”

I cranked the wheel left, driving in that direction.

“Carl?”

“I heard you,” I said, and turned on my overhead lights. “John and Wes still on duty?”

“Wes is driving John home. But—”

“Send them to back me up.”

“Copy that,” Molly said. “Carl—”

“Who called it in?”

“Doris.”

“What’d she say?”

Molly hesitated again. “Not much. Just that Jack was worse than usual.”

“Was there anything physical?”

“I asked her that. She just told me to never mind and hung up.”

“Could you hear anything in the background?”

“Just music.”

“All right. I’ll be on scene in about forty seconds. Get Wes and John up here.”

“Copy. Be careful, Carl.”

I broke the connection. The night desert air rushed through the open driver’s window. The cool bite of Fall mixed with the smell of cottonwoods.

Jack Talbott. Richest man in La Sombra, probably in the whole county. He owned a ton of real estate, plus the cattle ranch and one of the car dealerships. I’m sure he had his fingers in a few other pies as well.

I smiled grimly at that last thought. It was probably true in more ways than one.

The city road near Jack’s place was untended gravel, but the quarter mile driveway that was labeled Talbott Lane was paved in smooth asphalt. I cut all my lights and pulled onto what looked like a black stream that led to the house.

I parked short of the house, killing the Explorer’s engine. I grabbed my flashlight and got out, closing the door gently. My boots clacked lightly on the asphalt as I approached the large French doors. A giant ‘T’ boldly adorned both in the center. I knew the artist who carved the letters into the wood. He told me Jack rejected the first two attempts and then docked him for the delay.

There was nowhere to hide on the wide expanse of the porch. I tried to peer through the thickly curtained window next to the door, but the tan curtains were drawn shut. Light seeped around the edges from inside of the house. I listened for movement, but could only hear the faint strain of music and the occasional yelp from Jack’s hunting dog in the kennel around back. I moved to the side of the door and lightly rapped on it.

There was a long silence, then I heard the light sound of approaching footsteps. The footsteps stopped near the door. I rapped again.

“Police,” I said.

No response.

“Mrs. Talbott, it’s Carl Riggins,” I said, this time a little louder. “Open the door, please.”

Another pause.

I was about to speak again when I heard a click and the door opened.

The first thing I saw was Doris Talbott’s small, slender fingers. Long, manicured nails, painted a deep red, caught my eye. The nails on the middle and ring finger were torn and ragged. When the door swung open further, I saw the same red on her lips. The lipstick on her bottom lip was smeared downward toward her chin. A brighter red flared around her left eye.

“Are you all right?” I asked, stepping forward.

Doris held up her hand to stop me. She swallowed. “I’m fine, Carl. Really. Please, just go.”

I shook my head. “I can’t do that, ma’am.”

Her lip trembled. “You have to.”

“Did he hit you?”

Her hand rose reflexively to her eye. She shook her head. “No. I, uh…” Her eyes darted away from mine. “I walked into a door.”

“Into the knob?”

She squinted at me, then winced and touched her eye again. “The knob?”

“Did you walk into the knob?” I repeated.

“No. The, uh, frame. The door frame.”

I stared at her without speaking.

She stared back, blinking. “What?”

“You didn’t walk into a door, Mrs. Talbott.”

“Sure I did.”

“No,” I said, “you didn’t. That injury obviously came from a closed fist. Now why did he hit you?”

Tears welled up in her eyes. “He didn’t,” she whispered.

“Is he here?”

She nodded.

“Where?”

She cleared her throat and wiped away the tears gingerly. “In his den.”

“Drinking?”

Her composure shifted and a sarcastic tone crept into her words. “Oh, yes. He is having himself a drink.”

I moved forward to enter the house. I thought for a moment that she might refuse to let me in, but her automatic good manners took over and she stepped aside. Once I was inside, she closed the door behind me.

“What are you going to do?”

I ignored her question. “Do you want to go somewhere else tonight, Mrs. Talbott?”

“Go somewhere else?” She shook her head. The motion was tentative at first, then stronger. She squared her shoulders, brushed back a lock of her hair and stared me directly in the eye. “No! I won’t be driven from my own home, Carl.”

“It might be safer for you.”

“I’m perfectly safe here.”

I shrugged. The haughty tone I was used to from her had returned. With that, I knew I’d never get her to go to a shelter or even a friend’s house. “Where’s the den?”

She regarded me for a moment. “It isn’t worth it, you know.”

“What isn’t?”

“Going up against Jack. He’ll win. He always does.”

“I’m not going up against anyone,” I lied. “I just want to talk to him about what happened.”

“I told you. I walked into a door.”

“And that’s why you called 911?”

She bit her lip for a moment. “I…was confused.”

“No, you weren’t.”

She didn’t answer me, only regarded me carefully.

“The den,” I said.

She pointed down the hallway to my right.

I turned and strode down the tiled hallway. My boots didn’t click on the tile surface so much as they made a satisfying thud. I took a short flight of stairs up to another hallway. This one opened up into a cavernous, almost museum-like room full of overstuffed furniture. The oil paintings on the wall depicted grand generals, including one of Napoleon on a rearing mount.

Straight ahead, the hallway continued, but my eyes went to the dark mahogany door to my left. Strains of guitar music slipped through the cracked door into the great room.

I gave the door a nudge. The music grew louder as the door swung open. The guitar had a Mexican twang to it, but the tune was classical. Jack Talbott sat in a high-backed leather chair, his eyes closed. He held a glass half-full of amber liquid in one hand and an unlit cigar in the other. Were it not for his sagging jowls and round belly, he’d have the look of an athlete just barely past his prime. His gray-white hair was stylishly combed over to disguise how much it had thinned.

I stepped into the room. Talbott must have heard the sound of my boots on the den’s hardwood floor because he opened his eyes. A moment of surprise registered in them before the veil of arrogance fell back into place.

“Officer Carl Riggins,” he rumbled over the sound of the Mexican guitar. “What’s the occasion?”

I pointed at the stereo. “Can you turn that down?”

Talbott regarded me for moment, then reached for the remote on the table next to him. He pushed a button and the music died abruptly. “I’m surprised,” he said.

“Surprised at what?”

“The music. I would’ve figured you to like it, given the obvious Mexican influence.” He smiled coldly. “But I guess where Mexican is considered, you only like what comes out of the gutter.”

Isabella’s image flashed in my head. A small ball of hate for Jack Talbott burned in my chest. I tried to ignore it. “What’s going on here tonight, Jack?”

He raised the drink to his mouth. The ice cubes clinked as he sipped. “Nothing,” he said when he finished swallowing. “I don’t even know why you’re here, unless you’re looking to buy a new Ford or something.”

“Doris called 911.”

“I’m sure it was a mistake.”

“She’s got an injury. Her eye.”

“Really?” He took another drink. “And how did that happen?”

“You hit her,” I told him.

He smiled. “Is that what my lovely wife told you?”

“She didn’t have to tell me. It’s obvious from the injury.”

“Really?” he said again. “You’re an expert on injuries, are you?”

“Enough of an expert to know she didn’t walk into a door.”

Jack took another slug from his glass, draining it.

“I’m going to have to take you in, Jack,” I told him.

He chuckled and set his empty glass on the table beside him. He clamped the unlit cigar between his teeth and shook his head indulgently. “No, Carl, I don’t think so. I think what you’re going to do is turn your ass around and get the hell out of my house.”

“I can’t do that.”

“Yes, you can.” He patted his pockets for a light. “There’s no problem here. If Doris says she walked into a door, then that’s what happened.”

“You can’t hit your wife, Jack.”

He found his Zippo in his front pocket. “I can do whatever I want. This is my town.” He removed the cigar from his mouth and gave me a hard stare. “Now I’m done playing with you. Get out of my house or I’ll get the Chief down here.”

He put the cigar between his teeth and struck the lighter.

“Don’t light that cigar,” I told him, my voice low.

His eyebrows shot up. “You’re giving me orders now, Carl? In my own house?” He shook his head. “I don’t think so. That’s not how it works. Like I told you, this is my to—”

I took two quick steps and whipped my open hand through the air. The blow caught both of his hands at the fingers. The cigar and the lighter flew from his grasp, clattering against the bookcase.

Talbott’s face reddened. Rage settled in his eyes. “You son of a bi—”

I latched onto his wrist with one hand and his elbow with the other. With one swift lever motion, I dumped him out of the chair and face-first onto the hardwood floor. He grunted while I ratcheted the handcuffs onto his wrists.

“What the hell do you think—?”

“You’re under arrest for assaulting your spouse,” I told him. “You have the right to remain silent. You have the right to an attorney.”

He let loose a string of curses, but it was nothing I hadn’t heard before.

“Let’s go,” I said. I pulled him to his feet.

“You can’t do this to me!” he barked at me. He pulled his lips back, baring his teeth. “You are finished!”

“Finished here,” I grunted in agreement and shoved him toward the door.

“I want to see the Chief!”

“You can call him from lockup.”

His eyes flared open at the word, then narrowed again. “Finished!”

I took him by the elbow and walked him out of the study and into the great room. Doris stood by a chair, her eye wide with wonder. “Jack?” she asked, her voice breaking.

“This is your goddamn fault!” he screamed at her.

“Shut up,” I told him and forced him down the hallway.

“Jack?” she called after him.

“You did this, Doris!”

I pushed him face first into the flat adobe styled wall. I flattened my hand against the back of his head, pressing my thumb into his jaw. I found the mastoid and drove the thumb into it. Jack screamed.

“I said to shut up,” I growled into his ear. “Do you understand me?”

He nodded frantically, but as soon as I eased off on the pressure, his eyes filled with venom again. “You’re going to pay for this. You are going to pay like a mother—”

I drove my thumb into his jaw again and he yelped. “Maybe so,” I whispered, “but between now and then, you are going to feel a lot of pain if you don’t stop yelling at her. You got that?”

He nodded again. I released the pressure. His eyes burned with red-hot hate, but he said nothing.

“Jack?” Doris’ wavering voice floated down the hallway. “What do I do?”

“Wait here,” I told her. I swung Jack away from the wall. We marched out the front door. At the Explorer, I searched his pockets and found nothing. I opened the back door and guided him into the seat.

“You’re finished,” Jack told me, his voice low and deadly.

“Yeah, you said that.” I shut the door. The brief blip of a siren caught my attention and a second Explorer pulled to a stop behind mine. Wes Perez hopped out of the driver’s side. His face was etched with concern.

“¿Que pasa, Carl?” he asked, his tone worried.

Much more slowly, John Calhoun stepped out of the passenger side and made his way toward us. His perfectly combed iron gray hair, creased jeans and impeccably white shirt were familiar and gave me an odd comfort.

“I just arrested Jack,” I told them both.

Wes’s eyebrows shot up in surprise. Old John’s face remained impassive, but even in the dim light of the driveway, I saw the sheen of sweat on his cheeks and chin.

“What for?” Wes asked.

“He hit Doris.”

Wes muttered a curse and glanced at Jack in the back seat of my rig.

“That what Doris said?” John stared at me from under the brim of his Stetson.

I held his gaze. “That’s what the bruise on her face said.”

John didn’t answer. He pressed his lips together and swallowed.

“You sure this is such a great idea, Carl?” Wes said. “I mean, this is Jack Talbott we’re talking about here.”

“I know. And Jack Talbott hit his wife.”

“Which I gather she’s not saying,” John added.

“He hit her. And he’s going to jail.” I looked from one to the other, shaking my head in amazement. “Why are you two so afraid of him? Why is this whole town so afraid of him? Because he has money? So what.”

Both men were quiet for a second. The ticking sound of their patrol Explorer’s engine cooling mixed with the sound of the cicadas while we all stood in the driveway and waited.

“He’s got more than money,” Wes finally whispered.

“Like what?” I asked.

Wes glanced up at me, his normally warm Mexican features spiked with worry. Before he could answer, yelling and thumping erupted from the rear of my patrol vehicle. Jack’s muffled demands to be un-cuffed and released wafted out to us. The eyes of both men pleaded with me.

“Might be best,” John said. “You could write a report. Let the judge figure on what to do.”

The tickle of anger that had exploded on Jack inside the house had been worming its way back into my chest since the two of them showed up with their worried faces, walking on eggshells. I reined it in before I blasted both of them.

“I’m taking him in,” I said through gritted teeth. “Now do me a favor and stay here with my rig while I finish up this call.”

Without waiting for an answer, I strode to the rear of the Explorer. As soon as I swung open the rear door, Jack’s voice boomed out from the back seat.

“—Wes, you goddamn wetback turncoat! Get me out of these cuffs or your cousins are going back across the Rio Grande! Do you hear me, Wes? You fucking bean-eater! I’ll make sure your primos —”

I removed a camera I kept back there for photographing evidence and slammed the door again. Jack’s voice dropped to a muffled roar. A quick check showed three shots left on the roll of film.

John cleared his throat. “If you’re gonna be a while, Carl, maybe we ought to un-cuff him. Just while we’re waiting on you to—”

“He stays cuffed.” I looked up at John, then over at Wes. “And I swear to God, boys, if I come out and he’s not still cuffed and stuffed, I will gut-shoot all three of you.”

Both men blanched. They knew I didn’t mean it, but they knew I meant business, too. I didn’t wait for their reply. I headed back into the house.

I entered without knocking. I found Doris in the great room, curled up on a small couch and rocking slightly. Tears streaked her face.

“Doris? I’d like to take your picture, if that’s okay.”

She looked up at me. Her eyes no longer held the arrogant denial I’d seen earlier. Instead, she bore the same haunted, fearful look she’d had when she answered the door. She shrugged. “It won’t matter now.”

I snapped an overall shot of her, then zoomed in for two close-ups of her face. Each time, she flinched when the flash flared as brightly as a muzzle blast.

I lowered the camera and thanked her. She stared back at me with a shaken mien.

“Why are you doing this?” she asked in a voice thick from crying.

“Just because he’s rich doesn’t mean the law doesn’t apply to him.”

She sniffed and a sad smile tugged at the corner of her mouth. With a shake of her head, she said, “Oh, Carl. You’re such a romantic. One of these days, reality is going to hit you like a runaway semi.”

I didn’t know what to say to that, so I touched the brim of my hat and left.

Once outside, I saw that Wes and John had moved out of hearing range from my vehicle. They looked like two dogs that were waiting to be whipped for tearing up their master’s drapes.

John watched me approach. “You gonna need us at the station, you figure?”

I shook my head. “Wes’ll be enough. He can drop you at home first, though.”

John nodded in agreement and obvious relief. “All right, then.”

I gave Wes an upward nod. “See you at the station after, all right?”

His eyes darted to John and then back to me. “Sure,” he said with false camaraderie.

I opened the driver’s door to my Explorer and stepped up into the seat. Jack’s verbal harangue washed over me immediately, but I ignored it and dropped the camera on the passenger seat. I turned the ignition, lowered the gear lever into Drive and headed toward the station.

Jack became strangely silent once we reached the station. His stream of threats and insults for the entire ride dried up. It’s a phenomenon I’d seen before. When the previously ambiguous concept of jail suddenly looms as a very concrete reality for the prisoner, it can be a sobering moment for some. I was surprised it affected Jack in that way, though.

I removed his handcuffs, took his belt and his watch away. The thick band was gold and heavy. I put him in a holding cell at the end of the hall. He rubbed his wrists and glared at me, but didn’t say a word. I decided that booking photographs and fingerprints could wait. I needed to get the paperwork done before morning came. Besides, I figured he needed to spend a little time sweating.

Molly was waiting for me at my desk when I closed the door to the hallway of jail cells.

“You really arrested him?” She shook her head in wonder. “I thought I’d never see the day that happened.”

“Why?”

She looked at me like I’d asked the most foolish question of the decade. “Because he’s Jack Talbott, that’s why. This is his town.”

“I keep hearing that. And you know what? I don’t get it. I never have. So he’s got some money. He’s just a big fish in a small pond.”

Molly shook her head. “No, Carl, you’re wrong. It’s not just that he’s richer than anyone else in town. Hell, he’s richer than everyone else in town put together. But it’s more than that.”

“Power?”

“Yeah, that, too. But not the kind you’re thinking of. He’s got plenty of that, but that’s not what makes this his town.”

“Then what?”

She eyed me for a moment. Then she said, “I’m surprised you haven’t figured it out. You’re a cop. You’ve been here four years. You’ve seen how he is.”

I turned up my palms and spread my arms. “Enlighten me.”

“He has something on everyone in this town. Something on them or something that they want.”

“Everyone? Come on.”

“Everyone,” she insisted.

I thought about it for a moment, remembering his tirade toward Wes when I opened the back of the Explorer.

“He said something to Wes about his cousins.”

She nodded. “Three of Wes’s cousins are illegals. They work on Jack’s cattle ranch.”

“And he holds sending them back to Mexico over Wes’s head,” I finished.

“Exactly,” she said. “That’s the way he works. If he doesn’t have something on you, he finds out what it is you want and strings you along until he does. And if he can’t get anything on you, he just plain runs you out of town.”

“That’s pathetic. It’s loco.”

“It’s Jack,” she said. “And it’s La Sombra.”

“Jack’s town,” I muttered, shaking my head.

“Now you’re starting to understand what you’re up against.”

I took a deep breath and let it out. “Well, he’s not above the law as far as I’m concerned. And he doesn’t own me.”

Molly considered me for a moment. Then she said, “That’s when he’s the most dangerous, Carl.”

I looked into her eyes. I wondered how she knew these things. I wondered what Jack had on her.

“Don’t ask,” she said, reading my gaze. “Just leave it alone.”

I nodded slowly. “All right. I need you to make a copy of that 911 call for me, though.”

“Why?”

“It’s evidence.”

She didn’t answer. Without another word, I headed upstairs to write my report.

Wes walked in when I was about halfway through the face sheet of the report. I looked up. He stood across the room from me, his thumbs looped in his belt while he chewed on his lip.

He glanced over at the closed door. “You got him in holding?”

“In number three.”

He nodded, then looked back at me. “You figure your charges will stick?”

“I reckon they should.”

“Should?” Wes barked out an exasperated laugh. “Maybe in El Paso, they’d stick. Hell, probably not even there. You might not even be able to make these stick in Dallas, Carl. But this isn’t Dallas and it ain’t El Paso.”

“I know.”

“It’s La Sombra. And La Sombra is—”

“Jack’s town.”

We stared at each other across the room. Wes ran his hands through his thick black hair and sighed. “I…I don’t think I can be with you on this one,” he muttered.

I nodded in understanding. “Do what you gotta do.”

He drew another deep, wavering breath and let it out in a rush. “I’m sorry. Really. But my cousins —”

“Go,” I said. I kept any accusation out of my tone.

Wes pressed his lips together and left the room.

I resumed typing, waiting for the storm.

“What in the goddamn hell do you think you’re doing?” the Chief roared at me.

“My job, sir.”

“Your job? Your job is to arrest criminals around this town.”

“That’s what I —”

“You arrested Jack Talbott!” the Chief screamed. “What the mercy fuck were you thinking?”

I looked into the Chief’s contorted, red face. His hair was tousled with sleep. Even his vain, handlebar mustache was tweaked. His mouth hung open slightly. I could see the permanent blackness of his gums, but he must’ve scrambled out of bed so fast he didn’t even stop to stuff a wad into his lip. The sourness of his breath and unbathed body drifted into my nostrils.

When I searched his eyes, though, I found no trace of the rage or anger I expected. He was afraid.

“What’s he got on you, Chief?” I whispered. “Just holding your job over your head, or is it something more?”

“What?” he sputtered. The red drained from his face and he became pale. “What did you say to me?”

“He’s just a man,” I said. “He’s not the devil.”

The Chief held out his hand, his fingers shaking. “Give me your badge, Carl. You’re done.”

I shook my head. “No.”

His eyebrows flew up. “No? You little outsider son of a bit—”

“I wonder what the newspaper would think of a cop getting fired for making a domestic violence arrest,” I said.

The Chief’s jaw clenched.

“Or even the TV station over in El Paso. They’re always looking for corruption cases.” I smiled without humor. “Those news boys would like nothing more than climb up some small town police chief’s ass and point out all the things he’s doing wrong.”

He dropped his hand to his side. “Go home,” he growled through clenched teeth.

“I’m not finished with my report yet.”

“You’re finished for tonight,” he said, leaning forward. His eyes flickered with rage. “Now go home or I’ll fire your Yankee ass for insubordination. Try’n get someone to give a shit about that, boy.”

Days passed. Jack’s arrest was the talk of the town and yet it wasn’t. The newspaper didn’t report it. No one mentioned it in polite circles. But in the undercurrent of conversation, when people were sure that no one else would hear, I knew they were talking about it. People eyed me with a curious mix of dread and admiration. By arresting him, I’d only accentuated my own status as an outsider, despite being a part of La Sombra for four years.

The Chief had released Jack later that same night.

Since then no one at the station spoke to me, except Molly and even she waited until we were alone. We kept our conversations to bare minimum.

I finished my report and turned it in.

I worked my shifts. Everyone in town played the surface charade of politeness but their actions were devoid of warmth. Their nods of hello were perfunctory. They spoke to me briefly and about nothing of consequence. My calls for service dipped to almost nothing.

I felt more like an outsider than ever before.

On my days off, I drifted down into Mexico, hanging out in La Cuidad Juarez and listening to music. I saw several beauties there, but none had the grace or mystery of Isabella.

She drew me back. She drew me to the Tres Estrellas, where she worked. I rolled back into town and straight to the bar.

The twang of Johnny Cash’s Ring of Fire danced out of the jukebox. There was a momentary dip in conversation when I entered and walked to the bar. Or maybe it was my own paranoia, after the week I’d had.

Isabella watched me from behind the bar as I slid onto a stool. Her eyes held a curious mixture of emotions, none of which I could quite place. A hint of a smile tugged at the corners of her mouth. She threw the white towel over her shoulder and walked over to me.

“Carlos,” she said, and rolled the ‘r.’ She leaned forward on the bar. The movement accentuated her cleavage. The scent of her perfume, musky but with a hint of orange, wafted over me.

I smiled. I couldn’t help it. It was the first personal attention I’d had in a week that wasn’t cold or distant. And it was from Isabella.

“I really need a drink,” I said.

The hint of a smile grew into a sultry promise. “I think I can take care of that for you, vacquero.”

“I’m counting on it,” I said, surprised at the sudden undercurrent of sexual tension.

“What’s your pleasure?” she asked. When she finished speaking, her full lips remained pursed in my direction.

I tried to swallow, suddenly nervous.

“Tequila?” she whispered. “Beer?”

My throat was dry and I forced myself to swallow.

“Something else?” she asked innocently, but her eyes told a different story.

“Cerveza,” I managed.

The smile spread knowingly across her face. She was taking delight in her effect on me. Without a word, she retrieved a bottle of Carta Blanca, popped the top and set it in front of me. Then she drifted away.

I sat and sipped the cold, bitter brew.

No one spoke to me.

Sip by sip, I drained the beer. Without being asked, Isabella replaced it. I sat still and wondered about things. She’d been cool and distant to me ever since I’d been forced to shoot Pete Trower right here in this same bar. I realized with a jolt that he’d died just a few feet from the stool I sat on.

So why the change?

Every once in a while, I glanced up at the long mirror behind the bar. I recalled how it had been shattered by a bullet from Pete’s pistol that terrible night a year ago. I could still almost smell the acrid odor of gun smoke in the air. Could still see Pete’s pained eyes when he asked Isabella if she could ever love him.

I downed another beer and another and Isabella slid bottle after bottle in front of me. I drank her in along with my Carta Blanca.

The bar heated up as patrons filled the stools and the tables and the dance floor. The jukebox roamed from Mexican to country to classic rock and back again. No one said a word to me. I was alone in a sea of boots, buckles and cowboy hats.

Except for her.

I met her eyes several times over the evening. Most of the times she gave me a mysterious half-smile, like a Mexican Mona Lisa and flicked her gaze away. But once she caught my look and held it. Her eyes smoldered. I imagined her in the half-light of her bedroom, staring at me with those eyes out from underneath her long hair falling down.

She was a dream.

A voice ruined the moment.

“You think you’ll ever get into that?” Jack Talbott sneered at me from three barstools away.

I turned to him. Renny, who taught third grade at the elementary school, and Sal, who managed the Salvation Army Thrift Store, sat between us. Both shifted uncomfortably in their seats.

“Never happen,” Talbott said. “Never ever.”

I stared at him for a moment, my brain dulled by the many beers and maybe even more by Isabella’s presence. Then I drawled, “Ain’t you supposed to be in jail or something?”

Renny and Sal slipped off their stools in unison and moved away.

Jack didn’t show any anger. He smiled his best Public Jack smile. “I was out before you made it home that night.”

“That’s temporary,” I said and smiled back at him. “Soon as you go to court, you’ll get to spend a little more time in the gray bar hotel. It don’t matter who you are.”

Jack shook his head. “I already went to court.”

My smile faltered. “When?”

“This morning. Saw Judge Chavez.”

I squinted, trying to work things out. I didn’t get a subpoena to appear for testimony.

“Funny thing,” Jack said smoothly. “You weren’t there.”

“I was —”

“Whoring down in Mexico, way I hear it,” Jack finished. He motioned his head toward Isabella. “Probably trying to find some of that, right? Just a more basic version?”

Anger rushed up my shoulders and into the base of my skull. I tightened my hand around the beer bottle. The song on the jukebox ended. Aside from the occasional clink of glasses, the bar was silent.

Jack waited for the music to start up again, then leaned forward and spoke over the strains of Travis Tritt. “Since you weren’t available and my wife refused to testify…well, Judge Chavez said he’d just have to rely on the police report.”

The report would be enough, I thought. I nailed him in that report.

“’Course, there wasn’t any report.”

I narrowed my eyes at him.

Jack’s smile broadened. “I guess you’re not much of a cop, Carl. Making arrests and then not filing reports and all.”

“I turned in that report,” I said, and immediately wished I hadn’t.

He shrugged. “Not according to the Chief of Police, you didn’t.”

“I did,” I said, unable to stop the thick words from falling out my mouth. “I wrote every word of what happened.”

“Really?” Jack asked. “Did you keep a copy?”

My jaw fell open. I didn’t answer.

Jack slid off the stool and stepped in close to me. The rich aroma of his aftershave washed past my nostrils, out of place in this bar full of people who worked for a living. My anger returned. I wanted to blast him in the head with the bottle in my hand, but I knew if I did, he’d win.

“Welcome to the big leagues,” he hissed in my ear. He motioned at Isabella with his head. “Enjoy that attention while you can. She probably thinks you’re hot shit, mister big cojones, but this game ain’t over yet. Not by a long shot.”

Before I could answer, he turned and sauntered out, returning hellos with a wave and nod.

I called in sick the next morning.

The dry, dusty Texas air gusted through my small back yard, bringing the faint whiff of cattle with it. I sat on the back steps and sipped water, nursing a hangover. My thoughts climbed around the problem in front of me, grappling with my options. I didn’t see that either of them were good ones.

Stay in La Sombra and wait for Jack to find a way to get revenge.

Leave town and start over somewhere else.

I sipped the water, swallowing past the taste of bile in the back of my throat.

When I got my discharge from the Army at Fort Bliss, I was already in love with Texas. After growing up in Plasti-California, I found the genuine friendliness of the Lone Star State refreshing. The men always seemed straightforward and honest to me. And the women were kind, even in their rejections. Everyone seemed ready with a smile or a helping hand.

My discharge papers in my back pocket, I toured the state on my motorcycle, stopping off in Dallas, Houston and San Antonio. The bigger cities seemed like less sincere, though, almost as if they were playing at being Texan. They gobbled up the smaller towns nearby with that attitude like some giant, gaseous planet pulled at its moons.

Eventually, I circled back to West Texas and El Paso, unsure if I would stay or not. The day I rolled into La Sombra and stopped off at Tres Estrellas changed my mind for good.

I told myself it the friendly people that I’d been looking for all over Texas and found in La Sombra that made me decide to settle here. That I loved the mix of America, Texas and old Mexico that seemed to find a way to live together. That La Sombra put me at peace.

But it was her.

Isabella.

I knew she was the fantasy of every man in town. The way her hair hung in full curls around her brown face. Round, sultry eyes full of mystery. And every curve screamed woman.

It was more than that, though. I sensed it immediately, though I’d spent the last four years trying to define it. I don’t know if I can yet or if I’ll ever be able to. But there was an enigmatic quality to her, one that makes a man feel that if he can just be chosen by her, he will be complete. That if he can make things right with her, everything else in the world will follow suit. I wanted so much to be that man.

I took another long drink of water and wished the aspirin would kick in.

“Carl?”

I turned to see John Calhoun standing at the corner of my house. His immaculate jeans and white shirt were the same he always wore on duty, but he was without his hat, gun belt or badge.

He pointed toward the front of my house. “I knocked, but…”

“It’s all right.” I waved him over to the wide steps where I sat.

John strolled over, his steps even and measured. I didn’t expect him to sit, but he lowered himself slowly onto the same step I sat on with the barest trace of a sigh.

“Get you something, John?”

He shook his head. “Reckon not.”

We sat in silence for a little while, staring out at my dusty back yard.

Finally, John gestured toward the sandy lot. “Ain’t had a chance to do much with it since you moved in, I see.”

I shrugged. “Always seemed that something more important needed doing.”

“Yup,” John said. He removed a small pouch of tobacco from his pocket and slipped a pinch of leaf into his lip. “Things work that way sometimes. If that’s the reason, that is.” He held the pouch toward me.

I shook my head and said nothing.

John leaned away from me and spat into the dirt. “’Course, a man might figure you left it like this ‘cause you didn’t figure on staying around long enough.”

“Long enough for what?”

John spit again and wiped his lip. “Long enough to sink roots.”

I clenched my jaw. My head throbbed at the temples. “Jack send you? Or the Chief?”

Genuine hurt seemed to register in his deep gray eyes. He gave his head a small shake. “No one sent me, son.”

“Then why are you here?”

He regarded me for a moment with the air of a father who knew any advice he gave his teenage son would go unheeded. Some mistakes a man just has to make on his own, his eyes seemed to say.

“I figure you might need someone to talk at,” he finally said. “What with all that’s happened recently.”

I looked away and took a long drink of water.

“See,” John paused to spit and continued, “I reckon that you’re thinking on what your next move oughta be.”

“Next move?” I asked, but I knew what he meant.

“Yup. Whether you should stay and fight or just cut loose and move on.”

“And you’re figuring to give me some advice.” I couldn’t keep the bite out of my tone, but John didn’t seem to notice or he chose to ignore it.

“Maybe not advice,” he said. “But some information, yeah.”

I didn’t answer. The clacking sound of a grasshopper’s wings briefly filled the silence.

“You’re thinking it ain’t right for Jack to get away with the things he does,” John said. “You’re thinking someone ought to do something and that if no one else will, well then maybe it ought to be you.”

“What makes you think you know what I’m thinking?”

“’Cause you ain’t the first person to go up against Jack Talbott.”

I turned to face him, searching out the craggy lines of his face for the truth behind that statement. His iron eyes held my stare without blinking.

“You?”

John shrugged. “It don’t matter none. What matters is this — you can’t win, Carl. It don’t mean it’s right, but it’s the way it is. He’ll find a way to destroy you. That’s what the sonofabitch lives for. All that money of his is just what makes it possible.”

“What’s he got on you, John? What did he —”

“It don’t goddamn matter!” John snapped.

I raised my eyebrows in surprise. The motion sent jolts of pain through my head.

John rubbed his eyes with both thumbs in frustration. Then he turned his gaze back to me. “You’re not listening,” he said. “You can’t win. You should just go. There’s nothing left for you here in La Sombra.”

I didn’t answer. John held my eye for a long minute, then dipped his chin in a nod. Without another word, he rose and strolled away. I listened to his footsteps disappear, then the truck door open and close and finally the engine rumble to life. When that sound faded in the distance, I looked out at my desolate backyard.

He was wrong.

There was one thing left for me in La Sombra.

The next morning, I drove over to her small house. I knew it well. I’d given her a ride home from Tres Estrellas a few times. Once, we even shared a cup of coffee at her kitchen table. She told me her dream was to buy the Tres.

“So do it,” I’d told her. “If it’s your dream, do it.”

“Oh, Carlos,” she said with a sad, knowing smile. “No banker is going to give this senorita a loan.”

“Maybe they would.”

She’d only shaken her head and said, “No, it’s all about numeros y dinero. I have no collateral.” She sighed and smiled tiredly at me. “Working there is as close as I’ll get to my dream.”

“You should never give up.”

“Who said I gave up?” Her tired smile perked up a bit. “What about you, Carlos? What’s your dream?”

I never told her. Not that night. Not ever.

Maybe the looks she cast my way were true and maybe they weren’t, but I needed to know. I knew I wasn’t going to find out inside the Tres, so it had to be at her house.

I stopped half a block away and stared.

I rubbed my eyes and stared some more.

Jack Talbott’s oversized red truck sat prominently in her driveway.

I stared and stared, a hole of fire burning in my chest. I stared until it had burned out everything that mattered. Then I left before I had to see that son of a bitch saunter out her door and to his truck.

The badge clattered onto the Chief’s desk. He looked up at me from his newspaper.

“What’s this?” he growled.

I dropped my issued gun belt next to the badge. “You got your way,” I told him.

He folded the newspaper and regarded the gun and badge in front of him. Then he looked up at me. “I didn’t figure no Yankee’d last round here.”

“You crooked bastard,” I whispered.

The Chief laughed and returned to his paper. “Crooked? Oh, that’s good. That’s good.”

I turned away and headed toward the door.

Behind me, the Chief continued to chuckle into his newspaper.

I tucked the two manila envelopes into my backpack and zipped it shut. The sound held a sort of finality to it, but I didn’t mind.

There was a knock at the door. I shouldered the bag and strode across the room.

Wes stood on my porch. He gave me an embarrassed grin when I opened the door.

“Hey, Carl.”

“Wes.”

“You really leaving?”

“Really.”

He sighed. “Madre Mio, Carl. I’m sorry.”

I waved his apology away. “It doesn’t matter.” I handed him my keys. “Just send whatever money you can get for this stuff to my parents’ house in California. The address is in an envelope on the kitchen counter.”

He nodded. “All right. I can do that.”

“Square up the rent with Mrs. Gallion first, though.”

“Sure.”

I held out my hand. “Good knowing you, Wes.”

He took my hand and clenched it tightly. “Hasta Siempre, Carl.”

I cut the motorcycle engine in the bare parking lot outside the Tres. It was early yet, but the neon “OPEN” signed burned a blood red in the small window next to the front door. Below it, a new sign pronounced, “Under New Management.” Beneath those words, a picture of a beaming Isabella smiled out at me.

She found her dream. She got her chance and she took it.

I wanted to go inside and ask her if it was worth it. If she felt like she’d given up something more than the obvious that night she let Jack Talbott into her bed. I wanted to think that he played her just to get to me, but I didn’t want to hear her answer. I didn’t want to hear that she’d played him, that this was the way the world worked and that dreams weren’t free.

Most of all, I didn’t want to see her again now that everything had changed. I didn’t want to admit that she was only a shadow of a dream. I wanted my last memory of her to be that mysterious, smoky gaze she gave me from across the bar.

I thought about the envelopes in my backpack, one addressed to the Texas Attorney General and the other one to the U.S. Attorney General. Maybe they’d make a difference and maybe they wouldn’t. I’d mail them once I hit El Paso.

After that, I was turning north. I knew if I went south, all I’d find would be pale imitations of Isabella. Maybe I’d find my dream somewhere else up north, if the price wasn’t too high.

Or maybe I’d just have to accept that some dreams don’t come true.

I started the motorcycle and swung a wide, slow circle in the gravel lot. Once I hit the main street, I goosed the accelerator and headed out of Jack’s town for good.

Notes

In the Shadow of El Paso first appeared in the 2007 anthology, Map of Murder (Red Coyote Press).

Jack’s Town is previously unpublished.

One of the things I wanted to capture is the character of Isabella as that mysterious, sensual, “perfect” woman that most men desire at some point in their lives. I wanted to show that such women do not exist except in our own minds — every one of them is a real woman when you get right down to it. A real person, with far greater wonder and weaknesses than that fantasy image. My means of making this point was two-fold. One, Carl doesn’t “get” the girl. Two, her actions, particularly in “Jack’s Town,” show her own humanity.

The issue of domestic violence shows up in “Jack’s Town.” This is something I’ve seen far too much of in my “other” career for it not to make an appearance somewhere here.

I also try to explore classism and social dynamics in both of these stories, both in comparing the Mexicans to the Texans, the Texans to the New Mexico cowboys, Jack Talbott to the rest of La Sombra, and the citizenry of La Sombra to Carl, the outsider, even though he’s been there for years.

All of this may not even register with the reader, which is fine. This is a short story, not an essay. Still, these were the things that were on my mind as I penned these two Texas tales.