Invasion USA (8 page)

Of course, other customers had been more than happy to have Louly wait on them. Tom suspected some ol' boys came in and bought stuff they didn't really need, just so they could shoot the breeze with Louly for a while. That was all right, too.

The fella buying windshield wipers was the only customer in the store at the moment. As soon as he was gone, Louly turned to Tom, threw her arms around him, and gave him a big hug. He patted her on the back. She put a hand on his chest and pushed, putting some distance between them. She said, “What the hell, Tom. You're the Lone Ranger now or something?”

Tom grinned. “How does a kid like you know anything about the Lone Ranger?”

“I had to show my daddy how to work his DVD player so he can watch all the episodes he's bought on disc. Don't change the subject. You could've gotten yourself killed, charging in on those bank robbers like that. Then what would I have done for a job?”

“Gone to work for SavMart, I guess, like everybody else in the world.”

Louly rolled her eyes. “No thanks. I like this place.”

“I'll sell it to you and retire.”

“One of these days I'll take you up on that offer.”

The banter was well-worn and concealed the affection between them.

“Have you found out anything about those guys?” Louly went on. “I've heard people say they belonged to that M-15 outfit.”

Tom's expression grew more serious as he nodded. “That's right. Sheriff Gorman identified the one who was captured, and he's definitely M-15.”

Louly shivered. “From everything I've seen and heard, that's one scary bunch. They killed poor old Burt Minnow like he was nothing to them, like somebody swatting a fly.”

“Yeah, I'll be staying closer to home for a while, since they may be holding a grudge against me. You think you're up to working some longer hours?”

Without hesitation, she nodded. “You're worried about Bonnie, aren't you?”

“Well, yeah. More about her than about me, to tell you the truth.”

“That doesn't surprise me a bit. I'll be here whenever you need me, Tom.”

He gave her a friendly pat on the shoulder, a gesture that would have gotten him in trouble a lot of places. Thankfully, political correctness had only a tenuous grip on Little Tucson; people didn't see sexual harassment everywhere they looked.

“Thanks. I don't think you'll have any trouble here—”

“If I do, there's a baseball bat under the counter.”

Tom smiled, but he knew a baseball bat wouldn't be much protection against the likes of M-15. Louly would only be here during the day, though, and he didn't think the gang would retaliate in broad daylight.

Then he reminded himself of what had happened this morning at the bank, and earlier in the week to Burt Minnow, and he wasn't so sure.

“I'm going to see about getting the guys to come in more often, so you won't have to be working by yourself any.”

“That's not necessary, but if it makes you feel better, I won't argue with you.”

“Good. You shouldn't argue with your boss.”

“Especially one as stubborn as you,” she teased back at him.

He went into the small, crowded office and made some calls. Sal Guerrero, one of his part-timers, agreed to come in and work the rest of the day with Louly, and he and Mitch Hobson would split the shifts until further notice so that Louly would never be alone in the store. That made Tom feel a little better. He left, heading for home.

Bonnie had planned to stop by Carla May Willard's house, but she might be home, too, by the time he got there, Tom thought.

8

Carla leaned her forehead against the cool tile of the wall inside the shower and let the water cascade down over her. She closed her eyes and stood there, soaking in the heat and steam. After a moment the shakes hit her again, and she had to grab hold of the bar that ran around the inside of the shower. Her hands gripped it tightly, squeezing harder and harder, and that helped control the shuddering.

But it just grew worse, and finally Carla sagged against the wall and let herself slide down it until she was sitting on the floor of the shower. The water hit the top of her head and streamed over her face, plastering down her hair. She kept shaking, her breathing ragged as she sobbed. Tears welled from her eyes and were immediately washed away.

She wished that the memories could be washed away so easily.

Even before she had gotten to the hospital, while she was riding in the back seat of Lauren Henderson's sheriff's department cruiser, she had been dreaming of a shower. She felt so incredibly filthy, and not just from rolling around on the sandy bottom of that wash. This filth stained her both inside and out, and she couldn't wait to wash it off.

Lauren had made it clear in a firm but reasonably gentle manner that she couldn't clean up until the doctor had examined her and evidence had been gathered.
Evidence
. That was a delicate way of putting it, when what they really did was to swab that bastard's semen out of her vagina, comb her pubic hair so they could recover any hairs or bits of skin he'd left behind on her, and scrape under her fingernails in hopes of finding skin or blood samples there, even though she had told Lauren she hadn't clawed the man. It was just procedure, covering all the bases. The son of a bitch had gotten away, but the authorities might get their hands on him someday and they wanted all the DNA evidence they could get so they could convict him.

Carla didn't care if he was convicted or not. She wanted him dead, not in prison.

At least the other one had been caught. Tom Brannon had seen to that. Mr. Brannon had shown up before the second man had had a chance to rape her. Why couldn't it have been just a little earlier?

And why didn't she feel any cleaner when she had been under this shower for a long time, so long that the hot water was starting to run out?

The bathroom door opened, and Deputy Henderson's voice asked, “Mrs. Willard? Are you okay in there?”

Carla forced her voice to work. “Y-yeah. I'm fine. I . . . I'll be right out.”

“Okay. No rush. I just wanted to be sure you were all right.”

The deputy had brought Carla home and offered to stay and keep an eye on Andy and Emily while Carla got cleaned up at last. She was grateful for that. She just wasn't up to looking after her kids right now. She would have to find somebody to help her, maybe her mother. Although that would mean that Carla would have to put up with her mother's endless carping about how she never should have married Danny Willard.

That was absolutely right, of course. If Danny hadn't been such a worthless bum, she wouldn't have been carjacked, kidnapped, raped, and almost killed. If he hadn't abandoned them, she might not have been driving along Main Street right at that particular moment. Yes, there was no doubt about it. It was all Danny's fault.

The shakes had subsided somewhat. Carla pulled herself to her feet and shut off the now cold water coursing from the shower head. She opened the stall and stepped out, picking up a thick towel from the back of the toilet and wrapping herself in it.

After she had dried off and put on a robe, she left the bathroom and went into the dining room of her modest home. Deputy Henderson was sitting there, playing some sort of board game with Andy, who seemed fine despite the bandage on his head. Carla was surprised to see Bonnie Brannon in the dining room as well. She was sitting cross-legged on the floor, rolling a ball back and forth with Emily.

Mrs. Brannon smiled up at her and said, “Hello, Carla May.” At least she had the good sense not to ask her how she was doing. That wasn't surprising. Carla had always thought Mrs. Brannon was smart and sweet. She should have married Brian, she told herself. Then Mr. and Mrs. Brannon would have been her in-laws, and everything would have been all right. None of the bad things would have happened to her.

Carla started to cry again.

 

 

“Lord, here we go again,” Lauren Henderson muttered under her breath, then immediately regretted it. Of course Carla Willard was upset. She had been kidnapped, raped, and terrorized. She had every right to cry. Thankfully, she didn't appear to have heard Lauren's comment.

Bonnie Brannon had, though, and she shot a quick frown of disapproval in Lauren's direction. Lauren shrugged and made a face as if to say she was sorry. And she was, of course.

Carla's crying set off the two kids. Bonnie got off the floor, cuddling Emily in her arms as she did so, and as she went over to Carla, she said to Lauren, “Why don't you take Andy out in the backyard for a little while?”

Lauren nodded. “That's a good idea. I hear Andy's got a dog, and I'd like to see it. Okay, Andy? You'll show me your puppy, won't you?”

He sniffled and wiped the back of his hand across his nose, but he nodded in answer to her question and walked slowly toward the back door.

Lauren hesitated. Quietly, she said to Bonnie, “Sheriff Gorman told me to keep an eye on—”

“It's all right, you'll just be in the backyard. And if the sheriff gives you any trouble, just let me know. Buddy Gorman and my husband have been friends for years.”

“Well . . . okay.” Lauren stepped out into the backyard with Andy, who knelt down and called a short- legged, long-bodied dachshund pup from its doghouse in a corner of the fenced-in yard. Lauren smiled and said, “A wiener dog! I love wiener dogs.”

“His name is Frankie.”

“For Frankfurter?” Lauren guessed.

“Yeah,” Andy said with a grin. His eyes still had some tears in them, but he was all right again now.

“How old is he?”

“I don't know. I've only had him a couple of weeks. My mom got him for me 'cause I did good in school this year. She was afraid I wasn't gonna pass, so she said she'd get me a dog if I did. I was afraid she wasn't gonna keep her promise, but she did.”

Andy picked up a rubber ball that was lying on the ground and tossed it across the yard. The dachshund pup went after it, short legs churning rapidly. Andy laughed and clapped his hands as Frankie retrieved the ball and brought it back to him.

Lauren looked down at the boy and the dog and shook her head. When she saw something this innocent, it was hard to believe the evil that was
Mara Salvatrucha
could exist in the same world. Surely that was some bizarre alternate universe.

But it wasn't, of course. The evil was here and now, and it wasn't content to lurk in its own dark corners. It was eager to crawl out into the light, to befoul and pollute and ruin the rest of the world for the good people who had worked so hard to make decent lives for themselves. Ever since she had become aware of that evil, Lauren had longed to smash it, to drive it back into its hole and bury it so deep that it could never see daylight again. That desire was one reason she had gone into law enforcement.

The fact that she got to pack heat didn't hurt, either.

The back door opened, and Bonnie Brannon came out, still carrying Emily. Carla followed them. She had put on some jeans and a shirt and wore flip-flops on her feet. Her eyes were still a little red and swollen, but she looked a little more composed now. Lauren hoped that the condition lasted. Carla had a couple of kids who were depending on her to be strong.

“If you need to get back to work, Deputy, I can stay here for a while,” Bonnie said. “Carla's called her mother, and she's going to come stay with her for a while.”

Lauren nodded. “That's a good idea. But I can stay as long as I need—”

“It's all right, really,” Carla broke in. “I appreciate everything you've done for me, Deputy, but I think it would be better if... if you went on back to work. Having you here . . . well, it's just a reminder of . . . of what happened.”

Lauren felt a flash of irritation, but then she realized that Carla didn't really mean to sound ungrateful. She just wanted to get a sense of normalcy back in her life, and she couldn't do that as long as Lauren was hanging around in uniform, with a service revolver holstered on her hip.

“All right, that's fine. But if there's any problems, any sign that something's not right, call the sheriff's department and somebody will be here right away.”

Carla nodded. “I will. And thank you again.”

Lauren reached down to pet the dachshund. “So long, Andy,” she said to the little boy. “Take good care of Frankie.”

“I will,” he said. “I already promised my mom I'd feed him and change his water and clean up his poop.”

Lauren tried not to grin. “Well, if you do all that, I'm sure everything will be fine.”

She nodded to Carla and Bonnie, then went back through the house and out to her car parked in front. As she pulled away, she felt a tingle of apprehension. Members of M-15 didn't get caught and put in jail very often. Hardly ever, in fact. So this case was going to get a lot of publicity, and the gang probably wouldn't like that. The leaders wouldn't want one of their men convicted and sent to prison. That might make them look weak to the other members of the gang. They would do
something
, Lauren thought. She was convinced of it.

The question was what form the evil would take this time, and how far would it poke its ugly nose into the light?

 

 

Tom and Bonnie Brannon lived about a mile east of Little Tucson, on an asphalt road that curved around on itself through a wide-flung residential area sprawled along the banks of a small creek that ran most of the year but often dried up in the middle of summer. There were half a dozen houses on the road, none of them in sight of the others. The Brannon house was an old, Spanish-style dwelling, with adobe walls, a red tile roof, and a tree-shaded patio in the center of the house. It wasn't as old as it looked, having been built in the 1940s. The original owners had kept it up well, and ever since Tom and Bonnie had bought the place in the seventies, they had taken good care of it, too. It was a cool little oasis in what was often a sea of sweltering heat. Tom always felt a sense of relief when he came home, as if he were withdrawing from the hectic pace of the real world into a haven of peace and relaxation.

He felt no relief today, though, because when he drove up the first thing he noticed was that Bonnie's Blazer wasn't parked in the two-car garage attached to the house.

That didn't have to mean anything, Tom told himself. She might have stayed longer than he expected at Carla May's house. Or she could have driven out to SavMart to pick up some groceries.

He parked the pickup in the garage and went inside, pausing in the kitchen to put his fists in the small of his back, press hard, and stretch his spine. It had been a long day and he wasn't as young as he used to be. Some of his muscles were starting to ache a little from the strain he had subjected them to during the fight with the two gang members. He had a right to expect that, jumping around like Captain America as he had.

He thought about getting the phone book, looking up Carla May's number, and calling her house to see if Bonnie was still over there. The problem with that idea was that if he did, Bonnie would think he was checking up on her—and rightly so, because that would be exactly what he was doing. Maybe it would be better to wait a while longer, he decided.

Hell with it. He was going to call Carla May's house and just see if Bonnie was there. If she didn't like it, tough.

Before he could pick up the phone, though, he heard a noise in the garage, a heavy thump as if something had fallen over. It wasn't the door of Bonnie's Blazer, he knew that. He would have heard the engine as the SUV pulled in.

Nobody had any reason to be messing around in there. Tom stood stiff and still for a long moment, listening intently, but he didn't hear anything else.

The door leading from the kitchen into the garage was close enough for him to reach. He put his hand out and turned the lock button on the doorknob. That wouldn't keep anybody out who really wanted in, but it might slow them down for a few seconds. Then, moving quietly, he headed for his den.

The gun cabinet in there held two shotguns and three rifles. They were locked up and unloaded, of course. Tom went into the den, took a ring of keys from his pocket, and unlocked the cabinet. There was an unhurried efficiency to his movements as he took down a pump shotgun, unlocked a drawer in his desk, took out a box of shells, and loaded the gun. He dropped a handful of extra shells in the pocket of his shirt. Then he moved back to the kitchen, holding the shotgun level just above his waist.

No one was there. The door appeared to be undisturbed. Tom heard something in the garage, though—the sound of an object scooting along the floor. Somebody was moving things around in there.

Planting a bomb, maybe?,
he wondered.

Holding the shotgun with his right hand, he reached out with his left and unlocked the kitchen door again. He grasped the knob and took a deep breath. Then he twisted the knob, flung the door open, and lunged through it into the garage, sweeping the shotgun from side to side as his eyes searched for a target.

He heard a startled yelp and saw movement from the corner of his eye. His finger was already tightening on the trigger as he snapped the barrel in that direction.

He eased off on the pressure just in time to stop the shotgun from blasting as he recognized the muscular, hairy body and bushy tail of his dog Max. The big mutt was part golden retriever and part something else. Tom stared as Max recovered from his surprise and came toward him, tail wagging. Tom's nerves were still stretched so tight they were jangling.