“So? It’s the thought that counts.”
Edie said, “Look at him, Snapper. He’s not worth the bullet.”
Levon Stichler wasn’t the slightest bit insulted. Edie pulled the gag from his mouth, prompting the old man to spit repeatedly on the floor. The gag was a dust cloth that tasted pungently of furniture wax.
“Thank you,” he panted.
“Shut up, asshole,” said Snapper.
Edie Marsh said: “What’s your name, Grampy?”
Levon Stichler told her. He explained why he’d come to assassinate the mobile-home salesman.
“Well, somebody beat you to it.” Edie described the visit by the burly fellow with the two dachshunds. “He took your scumbag Tony away. I’m certain he won’t be back.”
“Oh,” said Levon Stichler. “Who are you?”
Snapper gave Edie a cranky look. “See? I told you we gotta kill the fucker.”
The old man immediately apologized for being so nosy. Snapper said it didn’t matter, they were going to dump him anyway.
Levon said, “That’s really not necessary.” When he began to plead his case, Snapper decided to gag him again. The old man coughed out the dust rag, crying, “Please-I’ve got a heart condition!”
“Good.” Snapper ordered Edie Marsh to go fetch the
auger spike. Levon Stichler got the message. He stopped talking and allowed his mouth to be muffled.
“Cover his eyes, too,” said Snapper.
Edie used a black chiffon scarf that she’d found in / Neria Torres’s underwear drawer. It made for quite a classy blindfold.
“That too tight?” she asked.
Levon Stichler grunted meekly in the negative.
“Now what?” she said to Snapper.
He shrugged unhappily. “You got any more them Darvons? My fucking leg’s on fire.”
“Honey, I sure don’t-”
“Shit!” With his good leg he kicked Levon Stichler in the ribs, for no reason except that the old man was a convenient target. Edie pulled Snapper aside and told him to get a grip, for Christ’s sake.
Under her breath: “It’s all working out, OK? Reedy signed off on the settlement. All that’s left is to wait for the money. Kill this geezer, you’ll screw up everything.”
Snapper worked his jaw like a steam shovel. His eyes were shot with pain and hangover. “Well, I can’t think of nothin’ else to do.”
Edie said: “Listen. We put old Levon in the car and haul him out to the boonies. We tell him to take his sweet time walking back, otherwise we’ll track down each of his grandchildren and … oh, I don’t know-”
“Skin ’em like pigs?”
“Fine. Whatever. The point is to scare the hell out of him, and he’ll forget about everything. All he wants to do is live.”
Snapper said, “My goddamn leg’s near to bust open.”
” Go watch TV. I’ll look for some pills.”
Edie searched the medicine cabinets to see if any useful pharmaceuticals had survived the hurricane. The best she could do was an unopened bottle of Midols. She told Snapper it was generic codeine, and pressed five tablets into his hand. He washed them down with a slug of warm Budweiser.
Edie said, “Is there gas in the Jeep?”
“Yeah. After Sally Jessy we’ll go.”
“And what is today’s topic?”
“Boob jobs gone bad.”
“How cheery,” said Edie. She went outside to walk Donald and Maria.
After days in a morphine fog, Trooper Brenda Rourke finally felt better. The plastic surgeon promised to get her on the operating-room schedule by the end of the week.
Through the bandages she told Jim Tile: “You look whipped, big guy.”
“We’re still on double shifts. It’s like Daytona out there.”
Brenda asked if he’d heard what happened. “Some pawnshop off Kendall-the creep tried to hock my mom’s ring.”
“Same guy?”
“Sounds like it. The clerk was impressed by the face.”
Jim Tile said, “Well, it’s a start.”
But the news worried him. He had unleashed the governor to deal with Brenda’s attacker on the assumption that the governor would move faster than police. However, the pawnshop incident freshened the trail. Now it was possible that Skink’s pursuit of the man in the black Cherokee would put him on a collision course with detectives. It was not a happy scenario to contemplate.
“I must look like hell,” Brenda said, “because I’ve never seen you so gloomy.” /