T. Parker - Storm Runners

Cedros walked to the edge of the platform and looked into the swirl. He held on to the railing. He could feel the power of the water all the way up here, miles away from the place where it would formally create power by turning the gorge turbines. Here, the river’s power was invisible — it came off the raging surface as a kind of force field, like when the same polarities of two powerful magnets push stubbornly against each other. Like if you tossed a quarter into this river, thought Cedros, it would float above the water on an impenetrable mattress of pure energy.

Choat moved up close to him. Cedros noted his burly hands on the railing. Cedros had never known that Choat’s calves were three times the size of his own. He thought of Ampostela.

“Right here it’s only seven hundred cubic feet per second,” yelled Choat. His voice seemed unnaturally loud and strong, booming out of him like something amplified. “October, always low. By May, June — one thousand cfs. That’s why we built the power plant and the Pleasant Valley Reservoir. So we can break this reckless mule of a river, make it work for us.”

“I can feel the power coming off it.”

“I want you to burn down Frankie Hatfield’s barn with all her rainmaking stuff in it,” ordered Choat. “Right to the ground. Totally hasta la vista . That will be my good-bye to Miss Hatfield. Do it at night. Use a ton of gas or lighter fluid. Do it quickly and get out fast. Then move up here and do your job. Bone your wife and raise your brats. You’ll be free.”

Cedros looked down at Choat’s hands on the railing. He thought of looking down on Ampostela’s as he waited for the man to draw his gun. He realized that he was in almost as much danger here but he had a choice. Choat was giving him a chance to earn his life whereas Ampostela had valued it at less than nothing.

Cedros looked up at the director. Through the wavering cigar smoke, Choat’s clear gray eyes and forward-tilted head told a clear and believable story: My God, my God. John lost his footing on the platform and the intake chute took him. Cedros saw himself fastened by the river to the grate like a stain on a wall, permanent and unmoving. They’d have to dam the river upstream just to scrape him off.

“Every time I do something for you I have to do something else worse to cover it up,” he said.

“Tavarez made fools of us. We’re done with him. The fire in the barn ends our concern with the rain bitch. You and I go our separate ways. We bear our secrets as gentlemen do. We’ll be judged by God and history, not the changing laws of a squeamish democracy. It’s time for you to demonstrate ultimate spine.”

“Okay.”

“Good. Good, John.”

They stood for a moment and watched the river rage in the chute.

“I love this place,” said Choat. “Some of the happiest years of my life were spent here. I loved being a ditch rider. But Joan hated the cold and much prefers the Madison Club to the Gorge Transmission Line. A happy wife is a clear conscience.”

“It’s special up here. I want to learn how to ride a horse and fish.”

“The simple dreams of a simple man. I hear that cocktail shaker all the way back in Bishop, don’t you?”

“Can we drive by the cabin in the gorge?”

“We can do whatever the hell we want, John. I thought you knew that by now.”

When he got back to the motel, Marianna, already in her little black dinner dress and black heels, pulled the curtains and took John into the spacious bathroom where she untaped the recorder from the small of her husband’s back. They played the conversation on the platform and Cedros was relieved to hear Choat intoning over the deep groan of the captured river. His voice sounded distant, threatened by chaos, but clear.

I want you to burn down...

Marianna then wound up the tiny microphone wire that had ridden up his chest and into his shirt pocket. She put everything into the padded FedEx envelope with the PI’s Birch Security Solutions address and account number on the air bill.

She turned and kissed him hard and deep. He was surprised but in a good way.

Marianna peeked from the bathroom to see Tony still watching TV then quietly locked the door and faced the counter. She flicked off the heels and hiked the black dress to present herself to her husband, leaning forward on the counter with one hand, the other supporting the bulge of Cathy. Marianna pleasurably watched in the mirror as her husband did his thing. They smiled at each other though each was actually looking straight ahead. Then John’s smile went crooked and his eyes fogged up like a beer mug brought from the freezer. The whole thing was over in less than a minute, as she knew it would be. He was never much for endurance when he was terrified, which he had been a lot lately. Get him relaxed, though, and the little bantam could go forever. He was the most generous, thoughtful, and deliciously nasty lover she’d ever had.

A moment later Cedros put on a jacket over his bare trunk, drew open the curtains, cracked a beer, and strode outside. The October trees were a blast of red and orange in the ice-colored sky. The Sierra Nevada Mountains loomed beyond him, snow-dusted and sharp. He smoked a cigarette, which he was doing more frequently the last two weeks. He sucked down the warm smoke and celebrated the fact that he had not only cheated death one more time, but made arrangements so that he would never have to do it again. Plus he’d gotten a nerve-tingling quickie from which his heart was still pounding. He pictured her in the mirror.

He watched the little fish dart away from him in the creek and he engaged Pat and Joan Choat in conversation on their patio as they power-drank cocktails. He glanced back into his room to see Tony smiling at the TV and Marianna with her purse slung over a shoulder, leaving to take the package to the front desk for one-day delivery to Birch Security Solutions.

That night Brad Lunce let Tavarez into the library and uncuffed his wrists.

“I heard they’re making room for you in the X.”

“How good is your information?” asked Tavarez.

“It comes down from the guys who know. I heard there’s a senator behind it.”

“State or U.S.?”

“They’re the same, right?”

“What else did you hear?”

“Gyle was for it. He had to be. He’s the warden.”

“I’ve been a model prisoner.”

“Except for shit like this.”

“Nobody knows, do they, Brad?”

“Not about this they don’t. We ain’t telling. Me and Post have families. We just need a little help.”

Tavarez studied Lunce’s unintelligent blue eyes for evidence of betrayal. One word of this and he’d get the X, whether Frankie the weather lady lived or died. He saw nothing in Lunce aside from the usual hostility, resentment, and untargeted meanness.

“You got less than an hour, dude. Enjoy your porn.”

Over the next fifteen minutes Tavarez got terrible news from almost every part of the country, every area of his life.

He read the messages — some in code and some not — his eyes hardly moving from the words, his breath slow and shallow, his heart thumping with the frustration of the captive.

Ruben — his old road dog from the Delhi F Troop — had exhausted his last appeal and would now face the spike at the Q. Tavarez thought of Ruben’s rough voice and hearty laugh, his unquenchable lust for Darla, whom he had impregnated at age thirteen and married three years later after dropping out of Santa Ana Valley High School. It seemed like just a few months ago, not twenty-two years. Tavarez calculated that he hadn’t seen Ruben face-to-face in almost fifteen years. Now he never would.

His mother and father were “okay” according to the men he had assigned to watch over them. Reina cooked constantly, then gave her creations to neighbors, friends, and relatives. She actually socialized very little. Rolando spent most of his time in the garage in a white Naugahyde recliner, watching TV and reading boxing magazines. They missed Mike, and remained angry at his ex-wife, Miriam, for cutting off their visits to the grandchildren. Tavarez’s heart beat with pure fury at the mention of Miriam, then with palpable love at the mention of his children.