David Putnam - The Replacements

I nodded. “Maybe, but in the end, it’s really not going to matter.”

Drago said, “Like I’m gonna believe you don’t know Warfield’s a player in all this. Right. And I’m a Jewish pope. If by some crazy quirk of fate you really are dumber than dirt, and really don’t know Clay Warfield, you two are walking dead. That’s all I gotta say. You’re walking dead, and don’t even know it.”

Drago kept up his verbal barrage until I turned off the asphalt onto the dirt road, then he went silent again. After a few minutes, I felt around for the interior light switch while negotiating the narrowing dirt path. I turned on the interior light. “Look, see if he’s being good.”

I didn’t want two tons of trouble loose, not even for one second. Marie looked back. “Yeah, but his hands and feet are turning a little purple.”

“Damn straight,” Drago said, “I’m not gonna tell you again, loosen these up, or when I do get loose, I’m gonna rip both your heads off and shit down your necks.”

“We’re almost there,” I said, “and if you don’t tell us what we want to know, then it’s not going to matter whether you have feet and hands.”

“I’ll save you two darkies the trouble. I didn’t give it up in the joint where I was locked up with a thousand assholes all wanting what I got. Think about that a minute. You think you’re going to be any different? You think you’re going to be able to get me to talk? You’re outta your little pea brains. I did twenty-five years in the joint without telling a soul. Don’t you think I don’t know what time it is? That once I tell you, Warfield told you to take me off the board? I’m no dummy. So you better listen, I’m not gonna tell a couple of Beavis and Buttheads like you one damn thing. You understand? I’ll take it to my grave if I have to.”

Marie pivoted in her seat. “Fair warning then, the trip to your grave’s going to be ugly, painful, and very noisy with all your screams.”

I leaned over close to her and whispered, “Jesus, Marie, where’s this coming from?”

She didn’t whisper back. “This pile of dog shit is all that’s standing in the way of rescuing three little children and keeping me from getting home to my kids. Hand me those garden shears.”

Who was this new Marie? I had gone bad early in life, broke the law, done things I regretted more and more as I got older. I came back from that place and improved my life. To think Marie was headed down a similar road made me ill. We had to get this thing done and over before she lost that innocence I held so dear. Before it became too late to turn back.

The van bounced as I went around the metal arm that blockaded the fire road. The headlights illuminated the ‘No Trespassing’ sign. One of my cell phones buzzed. I checked. Mack. I didn’t want to talk to him. He could add nothing to what was about to happen. Something I no longer had the stomach for, especially not with my Marie present. Jonas proved that much when I had him out in the same place earlier. Stuck now, we had no choice, and had to play this scenario all the way out. The lack of options made me irritable. I stopped in the exact same place as before and shut off the van. With mountains all around, the darkness closed in. I couldn’t help thinking that we were trapped in a metal box with a wild animal, and I welcomed the opportunity to get out.

Drago went quiet again in anticipation of the upcoming trauma to his body.

I focused and turned my voice serious. “Last chance, tell us where you hid the money, and we’ll let you go.”

I was unable to move from the van. Drago wasn’t going to make this easy. I didn’t want Marie to see what had to be done to save the children. I couldn’t help thinking that Drago had been only eighteen, hardly more than a child, when he had committed the armored car robbery and killed the guard. Now, twenty-five years later, he lay in the back of the van, a dangerous product of our rehabilitation system. We’d failed Drago and society twice, once in child welfare, and once in the penal system. The same as Jonas Mabry.

I left Marie in the passenger seat and got out. Without a moon and no ambient city lights here in the mountains, we were in pure darkness. My skin itched with the thought of other Karl Dragos loose in the world.

I opened the back doors. Drago didn’t move. I pulled out the dirk and slit the cord binding his ankles. His legs fell apart and he moved them to get back circulation.

“Come on, slide out.”

He rolled over on his side and tried to inch out the back, difficult with his oversized belly, like a worm that had swallowed a Volkswagen Beetle. I reached in, took hold of his cold, bloated foot, and pulled, really putting my back into it. The man didn’t budge.

“I think the only way this is gonna work is if you cut me loose,” he said.

Marie appeared at my side. “Honey, I think he’s right, otherwise we’d need a crane.”

I slid open the side door and showed Drago the Glock. “I will shoot you, you understand?”

“No you won’t, darkie. I know what you want, and you won’t get the money if you do something stupid like that. You won’t get the money for your little shit-assed kids. I heard you talking. You two are a couple of real tools. Cut me loose and let’s talk turkey.”

I didn’t move. The 9mm Glock was large enough to drop a normal-sized running man, but might only piss off Drago. If I had to shoot him, I needed something larger, something more on the order of a Sharps.50-caliber buffalo rifle.

“Come on, man, cut me loose and let’s get to negotiating. I needed some help to pull off what I got in mind anyway. I’ll cut you two in for twenty-five percent. Twenty-five percent, that’s more than fair.”

How could we possibly align ourselves with the likes of Karl Drago?

Marie sensed the dilemma, gently put her hand on my shoulder, and with her other hand, took the dirk. She leaned in and cut Drago’s hands loose.

“Ah, Jesus, that burns like a thousand fire ants eatin’ my skin. It’s on fire, I tell ya.” He stayed on the floor of the van, rubbing his wrists. “Can’t say that I blame you, it’s a lot of dough we’re talking about here. If you’re not working for Clay, then you’re just a couple of freelance operators. Okay, I get it.”

I walked backwards to the rear of the van, keeping Marie behind me. We waited. I held the Glock at my side, prepared to raise it and dump all fifteen rounds in the magazine, center mass, right into his chest where his heart should be. If he had one.

Drago struggled up to his hands and knees and backed out of the van, bringing with him the pile of litter. Bottles and paper wrappers rattled and fell to the ground. The dark washed out all color, turning everything to different shades of grays and blacks. Drago blotted out the van’s dark shape. His white-gray skin glowed, his eyes recessed in shadow, as he continued to rub his wrists. An ironic sight in his striped boxers. Had he not been so dangerous, he would have looked ridiculous.

“That took some real balls to grab me right under the nose of those Feds,” he said.

Quick as a cat, he leapt at us.

I brought the gun up and fired, hitting him in the thigh. Marie yelped. Drago tumbled and rolled in the dirt as we backed away.

“You shot me. You son of bitch, you shot me.”

I pulled Marie under my arm and held her there. She had never seen anyone shot. Sure, at the hospital she’d witnessed the aftermath, but that was different. Never right in front of her. Who could be prepared for the way the violence snapped? I was saddened for her, and again wished she had not been there to witness the unwelcome actions of the lowest sub-level of man.