Dark End of the Street

“You a cop?” she said, looking at the gun in my belt. Her T-shirt was soaked and covered in mud, her hands plastered with blood and dirt.

“Actually, I’m a college professor.”

She looked at the men fanning into the cotton field and then back at me.

I tried a crooked grin. “Music history.”

She shook her head and ran ahead of me down a row of cotton. A man yelled out behind us and fired off a round. The heavy blast thudded in my ears and I tackled her to the ground. My elbows stuck into the tilled earth as my hand reached over her mouth.

“Trust me.”

She nodded slowly and I let go.

I could see the Ghost from the edge of the cotton field. The girl was by my side, keeping low on her stomach and breathing hard. I peered back and saw a black man about halfway through the field with a rifle in his hands and the kid I’d knocked down approaching to the rear.

I’d killed one man in my life and possibly a second in Chicago. Never made me feel good. But these people would take my life and the girl’s without a thought. I didn’t know what she’d done or why she was here, but these were evil men. They were rapists and killers and there was only one way through the field.

I looked at the parking lot where a loose swarm of bugs collected around tall yellow lights. The cicadas ticking all around like a million clocks.

I tightened my grip on the rifle, tucking the stock into my shoulder, and aimed at the black man.

“Drop it,” I yelled.

The man pointed his gun at me and fired. Clumps of dirt flew into my eyes.

I aimed the rifle for the man’s chest and squeezed the trigger, dropping him in the field.

A booming shot echoed behind us.

I grabbed the girl’s hand and we ran toward the lot and to the Bronco.

At the edge of the pavement, two large guards with crew cuts ran toward us. I fired off two shots at their feet and they hauled ass back to the casino.

I reached into my pocket for my keys, hand shaking as I tried the lock.

“Shit,” I yelled, finally finding the right one. We jumped inside.

I reached over and unlocked the passenger door and the girl hopped in beside me.

The side mirror exploded into slivers and I turned around as the kid was reloading his shotgun. I threw the Bronco into reverse and then spun out of the lot, smelling hot tires.

I swung onto Highway 61, the song “Shake ’Em on Down” blaring from my CD player.

I tried to steady my breath as the cold, black night zoomed past the truck.

I turned to the girl and offered my hand.

“I’m Nick.”

The girl managed a bruised grin and took my hand.

“I’m Abby.”

Chapter 14

PERFECT LEIGH PACED the casino security room as one of Ransom’s goons ran the fast-forward on the video surveillance with one hand and held his broken nose with the other. The tape featured hours of countless cars coming into the west parking lot, close shots of drivers’ faces and of license tags. Rednecks with broken teeth and drunken smiles. High-dollar hoodlums from Memphis with greasy hair and sunglasses. The boy had promised Ransom and her that an old Bronco wouldn’t be hard to spot. Boy didn’t know Ransom too well. If he did, he wouldn’t have made a promise he couldn’t be sure to keep, she thought, wiping away the yellow wax that stuck to her new T-shirt. The little sequin heart now dirty and spoiled.

She ground her teeth together and looked at the pyramid of television screens. She wondered what Ransom would do with Humes’s stupid dead ass. Shit, all he had to do was tell the Tunica sheriff that someone had tried to rob the casino and then shot down their brave head of security. Ransom would then probably bend over and wait for his ass to be smooched.

The boy played with the controls, scanning the images until he found the one they were searching for: gray Bronco, big white guy with a scar across his eyebrow. Dumb grin on his face as he noticed the camera.

“Yeah, keep smiling, fuckhead,” she said. Maybe Abby MacDonald had more friends than she thought.

The boy drummed the fingers of his left hand and ran the tape forward to the close shot of the Bronco’s license plate. Louisiana. Sportsman’s Paradise.

She looked at his hand drumming. He noticed when he looked back at her. He stopped and softly felt his nose again.

Suddenly, a pulsing cold air whooshed into the room and she crossed her arms over her body. They must’ve cranked down the A.C. to about forty degrees. A man put a rough hand on her shoulder and spoke loud. Too close to her ear. She jumped.

“C. J., call Mr. Jim and have him run this plate,” Ransom said. Jesus. She didn’t even hear him come in. “Tell him I need it now.”

The boy rewound the tape, pressed the play button, and Ransom inched closer to the screen and studied the man’s face in the monitor. He froze the image and kept it wavering there.

“Sit down, Miss Leigh,” Ransom said. He took a seat. Gray hair in a tight ponytail. Black crocodile-skin boots. Black jeans and button-down shirt. Concho belt. Even his eyes were black. Dead black pools set into his bony, haggard face. A million cigarettes. A million fistfights.