The shrivelled boudin stank like shit, and even looked like a desiccated turd to Crawford Wynne. But it was all he’d found approaching edible while rooting in the refrigerator, so he sliced it up and dumped it in the pot with the étouffée leftovers from Jerome Benoit’s lunch before his buddy had headed out in that ridiculous ape outfit to the equally ridiculous charity rally. Shit, they were supposed to be fucking outlaw bikers, not bleeding-heart bucket-shakers. Benoit had asked Wynne to accompany him, despite the fact he was as welcome as a fart in a space suit anywhere the Cottonmouth MCC were these days. Fuck ’em. They were a bunch of limp dicks, and he was sorry he’d ever hooked back up with his old crew after skipping out of Maine. Back in the day the Cottonmouths were feared, now they were laughable, and his politics didn’t sit well with their bright new image. They were running scared from a bunch of niggers up in Baton Rouge instead of showing the spearchuckers the meaning of respect. Only one way to do that and it was to stamp down on their necks. Hard. At least Sower’s gang had the balls to admit they were criminals and weren’t afraid to show it. They didn’t hide behind false facades – all that patting disabled kids on the heads that the Cottonmouths got up to was enough to make him barf – and he’d heard on the grapevine that Sower’s gang were actually stepping up their activities since the big man himself had been taken in by the law, making things very difficult for those hoping to keep Sower behind bars. Shit, if it weren’t for the fact his head could end up on a stake outside Casa Sower, he’d have loved to be in on the action.
The fuck had he been thinking?
That was the problem, he hadn’t been thinking straight. When the Emergency Services Unit, a locked and loaded tactical team, had grabbed Albert Sower in a morning raid, Wynne had to admit that he’d panicked. He’d already served a stretch in the Maine State Prison at Warren and had no wish to return, and had taken the alternative instead. He spoke with some tight-assed bitch called Clancy, an investigator working for the DA’s office. He’d made all the right noises, pledged his assistance as a concerned witness, and then – at first opportunity – lit out for the South. In his head it was the right thing to do: he’d no intention of going state’s evidence against Sower, but some of his buddies might not see things that way. They were known for hitting first, asking questions later, then, only as a final resort coming to a fair judgement. Up until a few weeks ago he’d kept in touch with his old biker pal, Mitch Delaney, but things had gone cold at that end. He hoped that Mitch had lit out – as others in the gang apparently had – and not actually made the mistake of turning fink. Do that and Wynne himself would happily cut up Mitch’s face next time he saw him. Loyalty to your crew was important to Wynne, and there was nothing worse than a rat. It’s why it pained him so much that the Cottonmouths had turned against him. For fuck sake, he’d only rolled with one of the skanks that took up the bitch seat on Ron Edgerton’s Harley. Where was the crime in that? They were supposed to be a brotherhood, one for all and all for one, and in his mind that meant that the sisters were fair game. Goddamn liberals, they’d be adding PC after their MCC moniker next, the politically correct assholes.
At least Benoit was still a swinging dick. He’d backed Wynne in the fistfight that broke out at the clubhouse, only because he had a gripe with Edgerton, the guy claiming ownership over the woman, but that was still something. He’d allowed Wynne to crash at his place, and they’d even talked about forming their own breakaway faction of the Cottonmouths, maybe adding a tag of their own: The REAL Cottonmouth MCC. Benoit had gone off to the rally to catch the ears of a few of the guys they might recruit. Wynne had wished him luck, but he didn’t hold much hope. Benoit was as skilled at diplomacy as he was at cooking. And if the sour étouffée were anything to go by then their gang would remain a duo for some time.
Ah, who was he to complain about Benoit’s lack of culinary skills? Wynne knew his limitations: he would burn water if left to his own devices.
He rattled the pan on the hob and set a heat under it, reminding himself to regularly stir the slop before it coagulated into something resembling a Texas field pancake. Immediately he ignored his own advice and slumped in a chair at the kitchen table, pushing aside spoiling dishes from a previous meal of dirty rice. While he waited for his late breakfast to warm he idly scratched at the tattoo on his face. It was an unconscious trait. Sometimes he forgot about the ink, and even he was occasionally surprised when catching his reflected image. The tattoo was a brand that didn’t fit with the new improved Cottonmouths, not when Nazi symbolism sat badly with fundraisers. He wondered if his tattoo was the real reason a fight was picked with him, him poking the woman just the excuse that his old pals had found to oust him from the club. If he’d a choice in the matter he’d cover the tat – it made him too identifiable in any crime – but he couldn’t grow a beard for shit, and now he’d lost so much hair up top he’d taken a razor to the rest of it. Why cultivate on your chin what grows naturally on your ass?
He brayed at his own wisdom, the sound a phlegmy crackle in his throat. He hawked up and spat on the nearest plate, making a silent bet it wouldn’t affect the rank taste of the rice if he fed it back to Benoit for his supper. He laughed again, planning on playing the prank on his buddy. He’d delight in telling him the secret ingredient afterwards. Benoit would see the joke: after all, this was the guy who ate the contents of an ashtray on a five-dollar bet.
There was a rattle and thud at the back door.
Jesus! Speaking of the devil. Benoit was back sooner than expected. Wynne thought of transferring the rice to the concoction in the pan and inviting Benoit to share his breakfast instead. He reached for the fouled plate, and only then wondered why the fuck Benoit had come in by the back door. Probably forgot his key. But why force the door when he knew Wynne was inside? A prickle of warning went through him, and he began to rise. His butt had barely cleared the seat when he sat down heavily again. The gun aimed at his head enforced his reaction.
‘He’s in here,’ said the fair-headed man behind the gun.
Wynne squinted at the guy, and it took him a moment to recognize the clean-cut face.
Wynne grinned, began to stand a second time. ‘Hey? What you doin’ all the way down here, Wel—’
The gun slapped up against his jaw, and it was as much out of surprise as it was the blunt impact that sat him down again.
‘Whathafugg?’ he mumbled through his bruised lips. He tasted blood in the back of his mouth.
Another familiar figure entered the room, but any relief at spotting a friendly face was buried under the growing agony in his mouth. Wynne probed at a cracked tooth with his tongue while blinking up at his old friends.
‘Jesus,’ said the dark-haired man as he glanced around the less than salubrious kitchen. ‘We’d have saved ourselves some trouble if we’d thought to look for a cockroach in the sewer. This is some shithole you’ve scurried to, Wynne.’
Dabbing his mouth with his sleeve, Wynne said, ‘If you’d have let me know you were looking I’d’ve given you directions. What the fuck is this all about, guys?’
The blond jerked his head at the door. ‘Hector will explain all.’
Wynne tried to struggle up, his heels skidding in the grime on the floor as he pushed back in the seat. ‘Hector? He’s here? Now wait up a goddamn minute …’
Before he could say another word, Wynne was grabbed and held in his seat, the gun pressed against his neck, fingers digging deep into his scalp. A third man announced his arrival by rapping his knuckles on the door jamb. He ignored Wynne, instead casting his gaze over the unsavoury room.
‘Something’s burning,’ Hector declared.
The dark-haired man grabbed Wynne’s food off the hob and dumped it in the sink alongside other unwashed pans and crockery. As an afterthought he clicked off the heat.
‘You should have let it burn,’ Hector said. ‘The smoke would’ve camouflaged the stench of this place. Wynne, it does not surprise me that you live like a dog cowering in its own filth.’
Wynne wasn’t a coward, but he was under no illusion why Hector and the others had followed him to Morgan City, or what that meant for him. ‘Jesus, Hector, I don’t know what you’ve been told but it isn’t the truth. You know I’d never turn on Albert, right? I was just talking shit, stringing the cops along, keeping the door open so I could slip away.’
‘Huh,’ said Hector, unimpressed. ‘So you are to be forgiven for running away? That is a disloyalty in itself.’
‘No. You don’t understand. I ran so the bastards couldn’t use me, so I couldn’t be forced into saying anything against Albert. They were pressing me into making a deposition, but I told them fuck all then got outta there.’
‘You make a weak argument, Wynne. Running away is abandonment. Abandonment is betrayal. Betrayal is unforgiveable.’
‘No, man. I’d have come back. All you had to do was say the word and I’d’ve come running.’ Wynne looked up at the gunman, then across at the dark-haired man. ‘Come on, dude. Jacky Boy! You know me. I wouldn’t turn on you guys.’
‘Don’t kid yourself, Wynne,’ said Jacky Boy. ‘I know you all right. I know you’d cut your own mother’s throat if she didn’t suck your dick hard enough. As far as you were ever concerned, it was all about you, dude. You ran to save your own ass, and that’s all.’
Hector indicated that Wynne stand. When he wasn’t quick enough, the gunman stuck the muzzle under his chin. ‘Get up.’
Wynne stood, and he was turned around on tiptoes.
Hector eyed him, as if weighing up a prize turkey in a butcher’s shop window.
‘What shall I do with you?’ he wondered aloud.
A runnel of sweat ran down the side of Wynne’s face, but he daren’t wipe it away. He felt it drip down his shirt collar.
In another room a telephone started ringing.
Hector turned his head fractionally, listening to the distant tinkle as if guessing what it meant. Returning his attention to Wynne he’d come to a decision. But it wasn’t a case of ‘saved by the bell’ for Wynne.
‘I was going to punish you here, leave you propped on the front porch. But your other pursuers are dogged. They will be here soon, and as much as I look forward to meeting them in person it will impede on the time I have with you. I’ve travelled far to find you, Wynne, and am not going to spoil my enjoyment now. Come, and you can be thankful that I give you one last opportunity to serve Alberto.’
Wynne almost went to his knees, but he was shoved forward. Jacky Boy grabbed his arm, while the fair-haired man prodded him in the spine with the gun. Wynne turned to look back at Hector. ‘Jesus, thank you! Thank you, Hector! I … I thought you’d kill me for sure. Thanks for giving me another chance. I’ll do …’
Hector shook his head.
‘I didn’t say I would spare you.’ Hector turned up the side of his mouth. ‘You will serve as notice to those who might choose to follow.’
He was bundled out the door, just as a vehicle pulled up opposite the house. The gun to the back of his head demanded silence, but there was no way Wynne could holler for help, because at Hector’s words he had almost swallowed his tongue.