Paul Levine - Illegal

Payne got out of the Mustang, Adam's Louisville Slugger in hand. Metal alloy. Only eighteen ounces. It made a metallic clonk hitting a baseball. Payne wondered for the thousandth time just what sound would it make crushing a skull.

He took a few swings, as if in the on-deck circle. Two-handed, level and strong. A line drive swing. Then, one-handed. A fine whoosh through the warm night air.

Payne crept toward the half-hidden trailer. An Airstream about twenty feet long, a silver sausage. Propane tank leaning against the hitch. Metal poles cockeyed in the ground, propping up a torn, green-striped awning. A muddy Chevy half-ton pickup sat alongside. Someone had taken the trouble to back it into the trees. Faster exit, maybe?

Ten feet from the door, Payne could clearly hear the television. Music and the high-pitched voices of a cartoon. The smell of cooked pork drifted from the trailer's open windows.

Payne thought about Rutledge and his smug assumptions.

"Hell, if someone killed Javier I'd gut the bastard like a hog."

"And you think I'm like you?"

"More than you know."

Payne figured that, under the right circumstances, everyone is capable of killing. No great revelation there. Just the searing awareness that homicide is grafted onto our genes.

Payne's murderous intent came with a promise attached. He had looked Rutledge squarely in his flinty eyes and given an oath along with a bloody handshake. In return for the whereabouts of Manuel Garcia, he would give up the search for Marisol. He would kill tonight and go home tomorrow.

But I lied.

Not for one moment, not for the infinitesimal blink of a faraway star, would he let Tino down. It was easy to choose which promise to break.

To hell with you, Rutledge.

Approaching the trailer, Payne tripped. He caught his balance and realized he'd just trampled Our Lady of Guadalupe, or at least a knee-high statue of her, jammed into the dust just outside the front door. Her eyes were lowered in prayer. Pink blossoms grew at her feet, and her dainty shoulders were covered with a turquoise shroud.

The Virgin won't protect you, Garcia. She's got a higher calling than hit-and-run drivers.

Now, standing on the doorstep of the old trailer, Payne felt exhilarated, a weight lifting from his body like a Zeppelin untethered from its port. Gripping the baseball bat in one hand, he drew his foot back and smashed in the flimsy screen door.

"I'm here, Garcia! Goddammit, I'm here at last!"

I lost the bet, Javier Cardenas thought.

He couldn't believe it. Here was Payne, sneaking up to the trailer like some Special Forces wannabe.

Bastard's gonna kill the guy, and it's gonna cost me a Black Ice bow.

Not that Cardenas had paid for the sleek hunting bow, which must have cost six hundred bucks new. He'd seized it as evidence from a hunter who lacked a license. He also confiscated the guy's arrows, broad heads, tree stands, camo gear, and tent. If the hunter'd had an English bulldog, Cardenas would have taken that, too.

Now he sat in his cruiser, under a white alder tree, engine idling, A/C on, iPod plugged in, listening to Salma Hayek whisper "Quedate Aqui" from the Desperado soundtrack. The cruiser was parked on a small rise near Manuel Garcia's rusted-out trailer. Cardenas had been waiting two hours, convinced Payne wouldn't show up and he'd win Sim's Mossberg shotgun, the combo over-under model with 12- and 20-gauge barrels. That was the bet, the Black Ice bow for the Mossberg shotgun. It seemed like such a sure thing.

"Payne's not a killer, Sim."

"You think you're that good a judge of character?"

"It's what I do."

"And here's what I'm gonna do, Javie. I'm gonna shoot a wild boar with that bow and arrow. The one that used to be yours!"

They had bantered a few minutes. Planning a trip to Hog Haven up in Geyersville. Been going there since Javier was ten years old. Hunting those huge smelly boars with the wide snouts, sharp tusks, and grouchy dispositions.

"Don't shoot till he's ten yards away. Then make it a kill shot."

Simeon had barked those instructions when Cardenas was a boy and repeated them to this day. Instilled confidence and courage.

Back then, Cardenas knew that if he missed a shot, Uncle Sim would be there to rescue him. These days, Cardenas was not so sure. The certainties of childhood had been replaced by the complexities of the adult world.

He endlessly replayed the phone call with Charles Whitehurst. Like polishing a jagged piece of quartz, he kept finding new angles. On the surface, the lawyer appeared concerned for Simeon's welfare. But underneath, Whitehurst feared losing his biggest client. If the government took over the business, he could say adios to all those legal fees.

So Whitehurst's advice-convince Simeon to plead out-was never sincere. Then what was the real purpose of the call? What message was the lawyer sending? It could only be one thing.

That everyone would be better off with Simeon out of the picture.

To drive home the point, Whitehurst had told Cardenas about Simeon's will, to hell with attorney-client privilege. And what about that bone-chilling statement?

"The sad fact is, the only way for your uncle Sim to achieve his fondest wish is for him to die."

How the lawyer must have rehearsed that line, pruning the words of any manifest intent.

Earlier today, when Simeon had called, Cardenas did not mention the conversation with Whitehurst. He hoped Simeon would bring up the indictment, ask for advice, but of course, that did not happen.

Cardenas was lost in a fog of conflicting emotions. Simeon was a surrogate father, no other way to put it.

Now Cardenas watched Payne kick open the trailer's screen door.

Heard shouts.

Wondered if Garcia had a gun.

Thinking it was just as likely that Garcia would kill Payne as the other way around. He wouldn't arrest Garcia for murder. The man would be defending his family and his home against a violent invasion by a man sworn to kill him. But if Payne killed Garcia, different story. Cardenas would arrest Payne for premeditated murder.

Either way, Payne was gone, and Sim would be happy. For now.

Poor Jimmy Payne. Heads, you lose your freedom. Tails, you lose your head.

Keeping his eyes on the trailer, Javier Cardenas checked the clip on his 9mm Beretta and waited to see who walked out the door.

As he burst through the fallen door, Payne scanned the dimly lit trailer, his heightened senses taking in a stained leopard carpet, the glow of a small television screen, and a short, chunky woman washing dishes at a small sink.

The woman dropped a plate and screamed. A piercing sound, made sharper by the aluminum walls. Something stirred behind her, a lump rising from a quilt on a gaucho bed.

The form of a man. Boxer shorts, bare feet, and a dirty wife-beater tee.

Manuel Garcia.

Shorter than Payne thought. Square head. Round body. A fifty-five gallon drum with arms and thick-fingered hands.

"Hey, asshole!" Payne wailed. "Remember me?" He stepped toward the bed and cocked the bat, yelling a phrase he'd practiced just for this occasion."?Te acuerdas de mi, pendejo?"

Garcia grunted and dug a small revolver from under a pillow. Turned toward Payne, fumbling with the gun. Fredo in The Godfather, hapless under pressure.

Payne's backswing clipped the curved wall. Shit. His timing fouled up, he swung and missed Garcia.

The woman still screaming.

The gun shaking in Garcia's hand. A shot. A cherry bomb exploding in a tin can, the bullet punched a hole in the metal roof.

Payne swung again. Garcia danced a step backward and the bat caught him just above the knee. Garcia howled and fell, the gun flying into the tangle of quilts.