T. Parker - The Famous and the Dead

Armenta had never heard the full version because Bradley had blown him into eternity right there in his own recording studio in his secret castle on the Yucatan. Erin had foretold such an ending in her song. What a journey that had been, he thought now, what an astonishing ten days of trying to rescue her from the hell that he had helped put her in. He remembered the moment he swung open the door to the studio control room and through the glass saw Erin at the piano, facing him, and Armenta standing with his accordion on and his back to Bradley. He pictured it all again: charging into the hushed tracking room, opening fire with his silent machine pistol, the window glass shattering and falling, the dozens of bullets that the bearlike Armenta took before he finally went down in a heap, draped over his instrument. Bradley turned the volume up and started the song again.

But by the time “City of Gold” was over so were his violent memories, and he was sobered again by Erin’s continuing anger and distrust of him. He knew he deserved these things, and likely more. He had been a reckless fool and he had endangered her, Erin, the fire of his heart, his reason for being. How could he have been so stupid? How could he have thought a hidden room could possibly protect her from professional kidnappers and killers? How could he have allowed these men to have observed her, and himself, and their property, long enough to discern the weakness in their defenses? How could he have failed to electrify the perimeter fence of their Valley Center ranch, and install motion sensors and wire them to his central monitor in the bedroom? That fence was his Achilles heel and Armenta had somehow found it. Never again , he thought. I’ll never be that stupid and careless again .

Still, in a larger sense, he had successfully gotten Erin away from her tormentors. That task had been on par with any labor of Hercules, in his opinion. A young deputy and a few friends, up against one of the most powerful criminals in the Western Hemisphere, on his own turf, on his own terms. Bradley had told her he would prevail. He had promised. And he had delivered. He’d taken her back to the home they had made and fortified it against further attack, so she could give birth to the life they had created together. He’d even come away with most of the ransom money. And after all that, still she had left him.

Now he pictured her in Charlie Hood’s dusty hovel down in scorpion-infested Buenavista. What was she doing? Playing her guitar? Watching TV with fucking Charlie? Listening to the hobbled old cop’s war stories? Hanging with Dr. Beth? He turned off the music and cracked his window for a moment and let the cold hit his face. Emboldened, he rolled the window back up and used the voice dial. When she answered, the sound of her made his heart stir. “You’re a soundtrack I never want to end.”

“You’re full of it, Bradley.”

“I’ll always be full of it. Are you okay?”

“I’m fine. Are you?”

“Good. Driving to Escondido for some takeout. Long day. Can I come see you tomorrow? Around noon? You said maybe.”

“I know what I said. I’m not sure yet.”

“Is he moving a lot?”

“All the time. He kicks and hits. I can feel his little fists in there. The doctor predicts a stubborn and gifted person, but he’s just saying that.”

“Why wouldn’t he be stubborn and gifted?”

She was quiet a moment.

“I miss you every second,” he said.

“I miss you sometimes.”

“Say that again.”

“No. It’s already passed.”

“Ouch.”

“Self-defense.”

“It’ll be caesarean, then.”

“Well, he , not it .”

“Dr. David better do a good job.”

“He’s done hundreds of them.”

“I’m going to be there.”

“You should be there.”

“Amazing how cold your voice can get.”

“It just follows the rest of me,” she said. “But you seem stronger the last few days. Your voice and your attitude. You sound different. More positive.”

“I’m bullish on you and me and the baby. Decide on the name yet?”

“I still like Thomas.”

“Jones or McKenna?”

“You keep asking that. Still Jones. We’re married. I’ll honor it.”

“Thank you. I’d like the middle name to be Firth. After your mom.”

“She would be very proud of that.”

Bradley looked out at the black ocean sprinkled with the lights of Oceanside. The Coaster train glided over the fog-misted marsh and he saw passengers reading in their seats, each passenger upright, individually lighted and alone. “I like that time we made love in the sand dunes. How can you make love in a sand dune? We did.”

“And that laundry room up at Zach’s that smelled like fabric softener and dryer lint and somehow it was so. . just took my silly breath away.”

“That time in Nordstrom.”

“We used to have a lot of that,” she said.

His heart sped up at the sound of melancholy in her voice. The sound of loss. It meant that she wanted him back, or soon would. Wouldn’t she? “I dwell on it. I’ll probably go to my deathbed picturing one time or another, what we did. Like, remember-”

“I wish I could dwell.”

“I could help you.”

“I’m going to have a baby and I feel empty and alone.”

“If I was there you would only feel empty.”

“Very funny.”

“What’s the difference between a musician and a large pizza?”

“A large pizza can feed a family of four.”

“It’s important to laugh,” he said.

“I’m trying to talk to you.”

“I’ll listen anytime.”

She was quiet for a long beat. Bradley stayed at seventy down into Carlsbad. The smokestack at the electric plant wafted steam into a starry sky. “Did youth get wasted on us?”

“I don’t see waste, honey.”

“This whole thing. Didn’t you feel golden for a few years? Just really. . blessed and full, like the world was happy to have us in it?”

“I still do feel that way.”

“I don’t. I feel like I spent all my goodness. Pissed it away on a man who lied to me. Like I just got plain old faked out. ”

“Guilty as charged. Again. But I’ve changed, Erin, for the better. You’ll see it as our lives move forward. You and me and Thomas. But you have to let me up off the floor someday, girl. I’m no good for anyone down here.”

“Noon,” she said and rang off.

• • •

Beneath a foreign glow of moonlight he drove the last five miles to El Dorado, Carlos Herredia’s compound. It was in the general vicinity of Catavina, near the middle of the state of Baja California. There were several routes he had been brought in on over the years, some gated and heavily fortified, some roadless and nearly impossible to see unless you knew what to look for. Tonight the way was new. Two SUVs with shooting ports built into the rooftops led the way, and two more followed. Dust billowed through the path of his headlights and surrounded the small convoy.

Coming up the last mile to El Dorado, Bradley felt a fresh wave of nostalgia break over him. The lights of the compound lay sprinkled on the hillside up ahead. And then he saw the spring-fed pasture for the cattle. And there was the nine-hole golf course upon which El Tigre so boldly cheated, and there the paddocks and hot walkers and barn for his thoroughbreds. Then came the helipad upon which sat not one but two immense transport helos and a half dozen smaller, heavily armored gunships. One of the big helos was a CH-47, painted over in Red Cross insignias, the one they had used to carry a thousand automatic pistols down here to Herredia while Hood and the other ATF morons were focused on boxes of clothing going south to benefit poor Mexican children. What an operation that had been! Tonight on the airstrip was something that Bradley had never seen before: a Lear Jet, lean and proud and somehow smug.