Mike Lawson - Dead on Arrival

‘I don’t buy that you’re willing to risk jail time because you’re a little short of cash,’ Pugh said.

‘First of all, I’m not a little short, I’m a lot short. But you’re right, this isn’t totally about money. Mostly, but not totally. You know what happened after I nabbed your ass? After the goddamn FBI made you that deal?’

‘No.’

‘Well, other than the fact that you didn’t go to jail, my boss, this D.C. asshole, blamed me for you getting off. He blamed me ! I didn’t have a damn thing to do with the deal the Bureau cut you, but my boss was pissed because the FBI got all the glory, so he decided I was the one who’d screwed up. So even though I finally got the evidence to put you away, I’m no longer a supervisor and I’m working for some jackass who doesn’t have half my brains. I might even get demoted. So I’m not a happy girl, Jubal. But I think two million dollars will make me happy, particularly if it comes from Oliver Lincoln.

‘But enough talk about me. Let’s consider your situation. You’re livin’ here in your double-wide-’

‘It’s not even a double-wide,’ Jubal said.

‘Whatever,’ Hall said. ‘It’s like living in a coffee can. And this job you’ve got. A junkyard, for Christ’s sake! But if you had two million bucks, you could get yourself a new identity, go live someplace nice, maybe even start making meth again.’

Jubal nodded his head unconsciously.

‘How would we get the money out of Lincoln?’ he said.

‘All the FBI needs to put Lincoln in jail is proof that you actually met with him,’ Hall said. ‘If they had anything tangible, a good-citizen witness, a decent photograph of the two of you together, then they could use your testimony to nail him. Unfortunately all they have is that one crummy picture Randy took and your word that you met with him, and we both know what your word is worth. But what do you think the FBI would do if they had something like this?’ Hall reached into her purse and handed Pugh an envelope.

Pugh opened the envelope and looked at the photograph that Emma had made.

‘Where the hell did you get this?’ he said.

‘I made it,’ Hall said. ‘Actually, I got a computer geek that works at the NSA to make it for me.’

‘What’s the NSA?’ Jubal said.

‘A government agency that spies on Americans,’ Hall said.

‘But won’t some expert be able to tell that this picture isn’t real?’

‘Probably not,’ Hall said. ‘The guy who made it doesn’t run the one-hour photo place at the drugstore. But it doesn’t matter. We’re not planning to show that picture to some expert at a trial. We’re just gonna show it to Lincoln.’

Pugh looked at the photo again. ‘He doesn’t have his sunglasses on in this picture.’

‘Right,’ Hall said, ‘which makes it easy to identify him even with the fake beard.’

‘But he never took off the glasses when we met,’ Pugh said.

‘Sure he did. You just don’t remember — and Lincoln won’t remember if he did either, when you met seven-eight months ago.’

‘But Lincoln’ll know this is a fake,’ Pugh said. ‘If I’d had this kinda picture, I would have given it to the FBI when they arrested me.’

Hall shook her head sadly, the gesture conveying her disappointment in Pugh’s ability to reason. ‘Just get me another beer, Jubal,’ she said.

Jubal struggled to get out of the recliner; recliners were made for drunks to pass out in, not to get out of once they were drunk. He went to his refrig erator, opened it, and said, ‘There’s only one left.’

‘So? I’m your guest. Act like you have some manners.’

Pugh gave her the beer and collapsed back into the recliner.

‘You didn’t answer my question,’ he said. ‘If I had a picture like this, why wouldn’t I have given it to the Bureau?’

‘Because you’re so sly,’ Hall said. ‘See, you’re going to explain to Lincoln that you gave the Bureau that one bad photograph because you had to give ’em something to get your ass off the hook. But, clever bastard that you are, you kept this photo because you figured, when the heat died down a little, and if Lincoln didn’t go to jail, you could use that photo to blackmail him. Oh, yeah, you’re a very cagey guy, Jubal. And you have something else going for you: you have a witness.’

‘A witness?’

‘Yep. At the waffle house where you met Lincoln is a waitress named Sandy Burnett. Do you know Sandy?’

‘Yeah. Ugly girl with bad teeth.’

‘That’s right, an ugly girl with bad teeth who’s so much in debt that her landlord’s about to evict her from the shotgun shack where she lives with her two kids. Sandy, for a very modest fee, will be willing to testify that she saw you and Lincoln together.’

‘But why didn’t she tell the FBI she saw us together when they questioned the people that worked at the waffle house?’

‘Because of you , Jubal; because you told her not to. You gotta remember, back then you were the biggest badass in Frederick County, and she knew if she testified against you, your boys would kick the bad teeth right out of her head before they killed her.’

Jubal sat there a minute, rubbing his hand over his unshaven chin. ‘I still don’t buy that you’d be willing to-’

‘Oh, for Christ’s sake, use your damn head! Let’s say you got caught trying to extort money out of Lincoln. You wouldn’t go to jail. All you’d have to do is point the finger at me. You’d just say that nasty little Patsy Hall, a government agent, came to you with this scheme, and you thought you were really helping the government. You didn’t know this bad DEA agent was trying to blackmail Lincoln. And it would take the FBI all of two minutes to find out that I flew out here. Do you understand now, Jubal? The best thing that happens is you get rich; the worst thing that happens is I go to jail.’

Pugh stared at Hall, scratching at the stubble on his chin. ‘Shit,’ he said. ‘I wish you hadn’t drunk my last beer.’

Hall was embarrassed to be seen in public with Pugh, but she wanted to keep him happy. They drove to a tavern in Victor of his choosing, and it was just the sort of place that she’d expect him to pick: video slot machines and pull tabs for ambience; glassy-eyed deer heads over the bar; neon beer signs on every square inch of wall space remaining. All the male customers wore baseball hats, and all the hats were emblazoned with some kind of slogan. CATCH ANDRELEASE, MY ASS was a popular one.

They took seats at a table as far away from the jukebox and the pool table as they could get, and she ordered a pitcher of beer and poured a glass for herself and Pugh. Hall had always known Pugh wasn’t a stupid man, and in spite of the amount of beer he’d consumed he continued to prove it.

‘What’s to keep Lincoln from killing me when I tell him what we want?’

‘Good question,’ Hall said. ‘He just might try to do that. But you got two things goin’ for you, Jubal. The first is that Lincoln would have to find you. Remember, you’re in the Witness Protection Program.’

‘Yeah, but you found me.’

‘Yeah, but I work for the government. Lincoln doesn’t.’

‘What’s the other thing?’ Pugh said.

‘I’m bringing in a team, private security guys,’ Hall said, ‘and they’re not gonna let him kill you. I’ll tell the team they’ve been contracted by the Witness Protection Program to — well, protect you. I never thought I’d say this, but keeping you alive is suddenly very important to me. And that reminds me. I was gonna pay the security guys out of what we took from Lincoln, out of the four million. That’s kinda stupid now that I think about it. We’ll ask Lincoln for four and a quarter. He can afford it.’