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  As far as Vince was concerned Lo, the Noble Red Man was a lazy, shiftless, easily intoxicated and prone to drug abuse slacker like Summer.

  She sure could shake her booty.

  Maybe he'd throw her a fuck when he caught up with her. One she wouldn't like. And he was going to catch up with her if it's the last thing he did. She had no idea the value of the contents of the Camaro's trunk. That Palm Springs geezer was salivating like a hungry dog, waving a hundred gees.

  All over an ancient map of some obscure shithole in the desert that Vince took in trade from a cat burglar that owed him four grand. Vince could be pretty fucking scary. Dude wasn't really a cat burglar, just a meth addict who would lift his own mother's dentures. But he'd had some pretty sweet scores, Vince had to admit. One of them was the contents of a storage locker in Aurora, CO, which contained the artifacts including the map.

  There was also a model 72 Winchester which the cat burglar sold to a collector in Aspen before he blew all the money on whores, booze, and meth, which Vince was happy to supply. Then the guy went in the tank.

  Vince couldn't report the Camaro as stolen. They both carried too much baggage. Nor was Summer stupid enough to keep it for long. First things first. Vince had to find a new set of wheels. He phoned a dealer he knew and left a message.

  He needed a gun too.

  ***

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  "One Lousy Little Automatic"

  Arthur Funderburk had kept his guns in a cabinet in a corner of his bedroom. Arthur Funderburk only used them on his birthday, the 4th of July and New Year's Eve when he fired them in the air, drunk as a sailor. Summer's friend Eunice had a cousin who was killed by a falling bullet on New Year's Eve.

  Summer went into the bedroom where her mother Maria lay snoring like a beached whale. The gun cabinet stood in the corner.

  Summer took one look and said, "Ethan I thought you said you didn't sell the guns!"

  The upper part which used to hold a Remington 12 gauge and a Springfield 30.06 was empty.

  "Just a sec!" Ethan squeaked through his inhale. A moment later he appeared in the bedroom and went up to the cabinet.

  "Well shit. Ma or June musta took 'em or something. Try the bottom drawer. What you want guns for anyway?"

  "I would just feel safer."

  Summer crouched and drew the bottom drawer. She had to fight with it because it was a cheap cabinet and somewhat warped. The drawer suddenly popped free with a rattling sound. Inside lay a gun cleaning kit, a couple of loose brushes, a leather holster, a dozen bullets in different calibers, and a Beretta .25 in its original box.

  "What happened to the Glock and the Mag?" Summer said rhetorically.

  "Fuck if I know. What's wrong with that Beretta?"

  Summer plucked the tiny black handgun from its box and put it in the pocket of her cargo pants. She grabbed a box of Wolf .25 ammo.

  "Don't shoot yourself," Ethan said, returning to his game.

  Maria snorked, opened her eyes, and sat up in bed. "Hello, baby," she said. "What are you doing here?"

  Summer sat on the bed and hugged Maria who smelled like cigarettes and stale bread. "My boyfriend beat me up so I left him."

  "Oh dear," Maria said, holding Summer's chin in her hand and looking at the shiner. "Oh dear. Are you all right?"

  "I'm fine, Ma. He might come here looking for me."

  "Did you tell the police?"

  Summer just looked at her.

  "Never mind. I'd fix you something to eat but there's nothing in the house."

  "That's all right, Ma. I got money. You want to give me a list I'll drive down to the Bosselman's and pick shit up."

  "That'd be swell, Summer. Just swell. Maybe you could get me a bottle of Four Roses."

  "Sure, Ma. What happened to Pa's truck?"

  "It's out back. Needs a battery and a couple of tires. You ask Joe Jeffords, he'll get it running for you. Just give him twenty."

  Joe was an itinerant mechanic who lived two trailers down. Summer was going to need transportation. Pa's old Ford 150 hadn't been licensed in years. But first she had to sell the Camaro.

  It was six-thirty when she knocked on the door of Joe's faded turquoise and white trailer. She heard a grunting noise and the trailer creaked as someone came to the door. Joe looked like a russet potato, long black hair gathered in a ponytail. He squinted at her hard for a minute before his face cracked in a broad grin.

  "Summer! What are you doin' back in town? How the hell are ya?"

  "Hi, Joe. I wonder if you could fix up Pa's truck so it runs. I got money."

  Joe opened the screen door. "Come on in."

  He went to the ice box and took out a six pack of Coors, held it up.

  "No thanks."

  Joe popped one loose then popped it open. He chugged half the can and sank into an old over-stuffed chair with cotton ticking peaking out at the seams. His trailer smelled of stale body odor and cigarettes. He reached for a pack of Pall Malls next to an overflowing amber ashtray and lit it with a match.

  "Needs a battery and two tires. I was just waitin' for Maria to come up with the money."

  Summer removed her wallet form her front pocket and peeled off two hundred dollar bills. She reached over and set them on the cheap coffee table next to the ashtray. "Here's two bills. That should cover it. You think you can have it up and running by tomorrow morning?"

  Joe puffed and grabbed the money. She could see the calculations behind his eyes. Joe knew where to get discount auto parts. Possibly the same place she planned to sell the Camaro.

  "Sure, sure, I got to go into town anyway. You want to ride along?"

  "No thanks, Joe. I got stuff to do. I'll check with you in the morning."

  Summer went through the Camaro carefully, checking to see if Vince had concealed anything in the door panels or beneath the seat. She found an ounce of primo in the center console, took it in the house and tossed it to Ethan.

  "Holy shit! Thanks, Sis!"

  She loaded the Beretta's tiny magazine, jammed it in and jacked one into the chamber. She stuck it in her front pants pocket. She got in the Camaro and drove fourteen miles to the Bosselman's at the intersection of State Highway 89 and Cross Creek Road. The Bosselman's stood in the Southeast quadrant surrounded by big rigs, pick-ups, and two non-chain motels. The kind of places they didn't vacuum under the beds. As dusk settled in the Bosselman's lit up like a refinery. The smell of gas lingered in the air. Summer drove around to the back, a broad parking lot that melded into the desert. There were dozens of cars parked in clusters and at the very rear, adjacent to the sand, a couple low riders, some souped-up Civics and WRXs and a dozen gangbangers slouching around in drooping pants and hoodies to the subterranean beat from the open hatch of an Eclipse.

  Summer drove right up to them. The boys saw the car first and liked what they saw. Then Summer got out and they liked it even better.

  "Hey there pretty mama, whatchoo need?"

  "You can roll with me anytime."

  "Oye guapa!"

  One thick as a brick Aztec rolled up to her with his hands in his pockets. He had a silver stud through his nose and a sideways Diesel hat. "Whassup, pretty lady?"

  "I don't know, pachuco. You tell me."

  "Tha's some bad ride."

  Summer grinned and leaped onto the hood. "You like this ride? 'Cause I'm looking to deal."

  ***

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  "Permission"

  Permission was a ghost town. Population: 126, mostly retirees. The wood bones of dead cabins announced the town seconds before Beadles reached the epicenter, the only part that remained alive. Quint's Cafe and Convenience. It was right across the street from the long boarded Permission town hall, a nineteenth century Quaker-like structure with a bell tower and stained glass. It had also doubled as the Lutheran Church.

  Once Permission had been a bustling town of 20,000, the gateway to the Permission Gold Mine which had yielded over a ton of the precious yello
w metal until the vein petered out in the sixties.

  The town hung on as a tourist haven, a cheap alternative to Breckinridge although the slopes weren't as good and the ski lift broke down a lot. Permission was the scene of Randall F. Fitzroy's shoot-out, resulting in his death. Fitzroy was buried in the town cemetery on a plateau overlooking the basin. Fitzroy had been a notorious gun slinger and bank robber, although he did serve a brief stint as sheriff of No Go, Wyoming in the eighteen nineties. His final shoot-out took place July 1, 1901. Fitzroy got his man, a bounty hunter by the name of Earl Goodwood, but Goodwood got Fitzroy. They were buried side by side.

  Beadles had learned all this from the internet. He parked diagonally across from Quint's next to a Yukon Denali. It was evening and Quint's was by far the brightest thing in Permission. Beadles got out and headed across the street toward the one-story red brick emporium. Light shined from the cafe, a couple of cowboys joking with the waitress behind the bar. They were the only patrons.

  They glanced at Beadles as he took a seat three stools down at the end of the bar.

  "Gettin feisty, arentcha Al?" the waitress said. She turned and came toward him with a big red smile, a plump woman of about fifty wearing a peach-colored dress, white apron, gray hair done up in a bun. Gold stitching on her left breast said "Madge."

  "Hello, cowboy," she said. "What can I get for you?"

  Beadles read the menu on the back wall over the counter. "I'll take the Quintburger, side of cole slaw and Coke please."

  "You bet."

  One of the cowboys swiveled toward him on the red naugahyde stool. His face was broad and friendly beneath the wide-brimmed Stetson. His belt buckle was saucer sized. "What brings you to Permission?"

  "I wanted to visit the State Historical Society."

  The cowboy smiled sympathetically. "Hell, that's been closed for years. Ever since old McGill died. He was the only thing kept it goin', ain't that right, Bob?"

  The cowboy next to him who looked to be in his sixties cradled a cup of coffee between his elbows. "Ahuh that's right," he said without turning his head.

  "That's a shame," Beadles said. Madge placed a cold glass of coke before him.

  "Do you know what they did with its contents?"

  "What's your interest," Al said.

  "I'm an anthropologist. I'm doing research on an American Indian tribe known as the Azuma."

  Al's face wrinkled like the Mississippi Delta. "Azuma? Ain't never heard of 'em. You heard of 'em Bob?"

  Bob didn't move. "Nope. Never have."

  Beadles stood up and stuck out his hand. "Vaughan Beadles."

  Al shook. "Al Barnes. And this here fossil is Bob Woodley."

  Madge put the burger down next to Al and moved Beadles' coke.

  "Only reason we stick around's 'cause we're hermits. Ain't that right, Bob?"

  "Mm-hm. That's right."

  "Ol' Pete McGill died back in '08. Christ, he musta been ninety if he were a day. Colorful character. Actually served as a deputy sheriff back in the day. That would be in the fifties and sixties I reckon."

  Beadles could not prevent himself from downing half the burger. "Any idea what happened to the contents?" he said while chewing.

  "County cut a deal with some wholesale junk man to come and haul it off."

  Beadles set the burger down, anger flaring. "How could they do that? From what I understand the collection contained priceless artifacts! They would have been worth a fortune in a straight ahead auction!"

  Al was nodding before Beadles finished. "It seemed mighty fishy to some of us too, friend. That was County Executive Meredith Martin. She got indicted for bribery and I believe she did some time in prison."

  Beadles removed a small spiral pad and a pen. "Meredith Martin?"

  "Yessir. Her husband was Cole Martin. They owned that big spread up Cold Canyon Road, but he sold it when she got sent up. God knows where he went., Bob, you know where Martin went?"

  "Nope."

  "You can always check with the County Assessor, but they won't be open 'til tomorrow. Where you stayin'?"

  "Best Western Breckinridge."

  "Well good luck to you, Vaughan. Hope you find what you're looking for."

  ***

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  "Wheels"

  Vince's father walked out when Vince was nine, leaving his mother to raise Vince, his brother Luke and sister Frances on her own. South End, Boston, 1990. Vince grew up on the streets with the Southies, a white trash street gang that fought turf wars with the blacks, robbed convenience stores, sniffed glue and shot dope. A lot of those guys were dead or in jail Vince did four years at Billerica for aggravated assault.

  He tried enlisting but his record kept him out. He drifted west working a variety of hustles including fake roofer and fake asphalt repair usually on seniors. He'd worked construction a couple summers, just enough to sound like he knew what he was talking about. He'd landed in Vegas six years prior and took to it like a journalist to an open bar.

  Vince hustled. He worked as a bouncer at a dive on Fremont, dealt a little meth on the side. Dealt a little more. Picked up a couple girls whom he ran at mid-level hotels like the Golden Nugget. He stole and he fenced. He was smart enough not to steal in Vegas--unless some mark was just begging for it. He would drive to Arizona and Colorado, case the big summer homes abandoned in winter, cut the power, break in and loot the place.

  Almost got caught a couple times, once by a big dog.

  Vince learned a lot in Billerica, including how to shut off home alarm systems and how to deal with aggressive dogs. You gave them hamburger mixed with roofies or ketamine if you could get it. He burgled a couple veterinary clinics and sold the stuff to the Playboy Bloods who used it to induct runaway girls into their stable.

  Eventually Vince got his own stable, four hos who kept him in a style that was barely tolerable. They were junkies but he lost them when an undercover Narc saw him waling the shit out of Brigit one night in an alley behnd the Hard Rock and he ended up doing 30 in County.

  When he got out his hos had gone elsewhere.

  He tried the fight game, training at Pitbull's Gym and managing himself. His first three fights in Fight League West ended in first round knockouts. Well all right he thought. Here we go. Success at last. He moved up to International MMA Promotions and got submitted in the second round by some cowboy from Idaho. He overextended his Achilles tendon and was told he'd be out for at least twelve months. The fights paid shit anyway. He couldn't cut it in the UFC so there went that.

  His luck changed when he wandered into Dante's. Blistering September day, the sun so hot you could cook flapjacks on the sidewalk. The interior was cool, dark, and fragrant. Mid-afternoon, the usual collection of pathetic losers, Arabs and blue collar stiffs watching a Rubenesque blond five years past her sale date spread it from table to table. Vince was just going to grab a quick beer and leave.

  Summer took the stage like a thunderstorm. She crackled with wicked good looks and that smile. She was way above his grade but he had to try. She wasn't using when he picked her up. The trick was to make them come to you. The next day he was back, sitting at a table near her stage reading a comic book. Mars Attacks Popeye. Never looked up. He came back the next day and did it again.

  She never so much as glanced at him. Like she was too good for him. So he cooked up another scheme.

  Now the bitch was just another ho, only she had his car and goods. And she'd slipped him a roofie. No one did that to Vince and lived. The ungrateful bitch. He got hard just thinking what he was going to do with her when he caught up.

  Emilio phoned back at noon. Emilio owned Emilio's Auto Emporium.

  "Vince, mon, how you been, man? You still shackin' up with that hot broad Summer?

  "I need a set of wheels, Emilio."

  Emilio heard the impatience in Vince's voice and didn't ask about Summer again. "Whatchoo need, mon? Come on down. I just scored a sweet little Porsche Boxster. This baby'll do 180."
>
  "I need something that can hold shit and go anwhere."

  "Mon, I got Jeeps, Hummers, Range Rovers, I got 'em in every size and color. Come on down."

  "I gotta take the fuckin' bus. I'll be down around two."

  Vince showered, put on a clean set of clothes, grabbed a leather backpack and walked--WALKED!--twelve blocks to the Wells Fargo Bank where he kept a safety deposit box. Some fag with a rivet through his ear walked him back. When he was alone, Vince drew out the deep box, sat and opened it. He took out $15 thou leaving five for emergencies. He took the kilo of pharmaceutic grade coke he'd taken from a dentist passed out in his room at The Hacienda, Vince's Ho Shameeka having slipped the dentist a roofie. It was a pain-free removal.

  Vince caught the Bernstein Boulevard bus, rode it twelve miles through town, transferred to Airport Road and got off at the bus stop a block from Emilio's. The sight of Vince approaching via prison stroll, wide-brimmed stetson set low over the sunglasses, the gaucho mustache, the jeans and boots caused Emilio's new salesperson Sally to chirp like a frightened bird and rush into the showroom to inform her boss that bad news was on the way.

  Emilio was hustling a young Iranian drooling on the Enzo. $265,000. The Persian had come straight from Caesar's Poker Tournament where he'd walked away with a cool half mil.

  "Emilio," Sally twerped in kewpie doll voice.

  "What is it Sally?" Emilio said, looking up and past her shoulder to where Vince had just enetered the showroom. "It's all right. I know him. Would you help Mr. Viderous with this item? He may want to take it for a test drive."

  Sally turned her charms on the Persian who grinned like a flower opening to the sun. Emilio intercepted Vince by a knee-high Lamborghini.

  "Vince, mon, you're scaring the customers."