From his high perch, Baron would often watch the procession of funerals driving slowly to one of the cemeteries in town. The graveyards of the myriad churches had long since been filled. He knew fatal drug overdoses occurred far too frequently. With no hope, people were turning to needles and pills for something to make them forget how desperate their lives had become.
And yet he had also watched moving vans coming in, carrying with them new families with fresh hopes. He didn’t know if they were just picking at a hollowed-out carcass. He didn’t know if the town had a reasonable shot at a do-over.
But maybe it did.
Though it was fully beyond his control, he carried the demise of his family’s creation as a personal failure. And he always would. And anyway, the town would never let him forget that he had indeed failed them.
He rose from behind his desk.
It was too early to go to bed. And he had somewhere he wanted to go. It was sort of a ritual of his, in fact.
He left the house by the kitchen door and entered the six-car garage that had held only one vehicle for the last three decades.
It was the old gardener’s pale blue 1968 Suburban. Baron had had to let go all of the few remaining household staff after his parents’ deaths, yet he had managed to hold on to the gardener, because there was a lot of property still to keep up. After the land was sold, however, that changed. The gardener, nearly ninety by then, had left his truck to Baron and gone to die in a nearby nursing home, having outlived his wife by several years.
It was fortunate that Baron had been an engineering student in college, with a mind that seemed to know intuitively how any type of mechanical apparatus worked. He had been coaxing life out of the Suburban all this time. Yet, after five decades, he wasn’t sure how much life it had left.
Or how much I have left.
He climbed into the Suburban and drove out of the garage. The overhead doors no longer functioned, so he kept them open, with the key to the truck under the visor.
He wound his way down the hill, past the neighborhoods that had sprung up from Baron land and that held the best views in the city, other than his. At least the homes that were still occupied did.
He reached the main road and sped up.
He had money in his pocket. He intended to spend it.
The Mercury Bar was really the only place in town where he felt he could get some peace.
He pulled into a parking space on the street and got out.
He left the tuxedo jacket in the truck. He knew that he was an easy enough target around town without looking too eccentric.
He was a Baron. The last one.
And if his health remained intact, he had maybe thirty more years of this crap to endure. It was no wonder he needed a scotch and soda or two or three of them.
Yet tonight the current John Baron would get more than simply a drink.
Chapter 12
BARON CLOSED HIS eyes and inwardly groaned.
He reopened his eyes and kept his hands clasped around his cocktail. It was his—well, he couldn’t remember how many he’d had. The previous ones had felt great going down, though.
This one was even better.
And then they had come along to spoil it.
“You that dude John Baron, ain’t you?”
Baron looked over at the three young men who were standing next to his seat at the bar.
The young female bartender nervously wiped out a glass and watched the confrontation.
Baron lifted the glass to his lips, took a sip, and let the smooth scotch cut by soda work its way down his throat. He set the glass down and said, “I am. Is there an issue?”
The men were dressed in dirty jeans, T-shirts, and oversized sneakers with no laces, and two of them wore Pittsburgh Steelers caps.
The first man, the largest of the trio, grinned maliciously. “An issue? Man, we ain’t got issues. But maybe you got some stuff hanging over you.”
“Such as?”
“Your damn family screwing this whole town.”
“And exactly how did they do that?”
“Closed the mines. Shut down the mills.”
“After running them for decades and providing employment for much of the town? Probably for your parents. And grandparents. And great-grandparents.” He took another sip of his drink. “Thus I see no evidence that we screwed anybody.”
“You ain’t give me no job,” said the man.
“I didn’t know it was my job to give you a job,” replied Baron.
The second man spoke up. “You live up in that big house on the hill. Think you’re better’n we are.”
“I can assure you that not only do I not think I’m better than anyone, I know that I’m not. As for the big house, looks can definitely be deceiving.”
“My mom says you got old coins and jewels up there. She said you just pretend to be poor.”
Baron turned to look at him. “Pretend to be poor? Who the hell would do that? Would you?” He looked at the other two men. “Or you?”
“Mom says you folks are inbred. Marry your sister and stuff. Screws up your mind. So maybe you would pretend to be poor.”
“Well, I don’t have a sister. And I’m not married. And I’m not pretending to be poor. So strike three and you’re out.”
“Don’t think so,” said the first man. He shoved Baron so hard he nearly toppled from his stool.
The bartender said, “Hey, don’t make me call the cops. Leave him alone.”
“You gonna let a girl fight your battles?” said the second man in a sneering tone.
“I’m warning you,” said the bartender, her hand on her cell phone.
The man pushed Baron again. “You gonna do that? Hide behind a girl, asshole?”
Baron threw the rest of his drink in the man’s face.
“No, I’m really not,” he said, standing up and towering over them.
His face dripping with scotch and soda, the man swung his fist at Baron, who caught it and wrenched it up and then behind the man’s back.
He gave him a hard push and sent him sprawling on the floor.
Baron blocked the blow from the second man and lashed out with his fist, catching him on the chin.
But the third man kidney-punched Baron from behind and he staggered and fell down against the bar.
The other two men jumped up and started punching and kicking him. There were other people in the bar, but none of them tried to stop the pounding Baron was taking.
Except one.
“FBI!”
Amos Decker had his weapon pointed at the men.
They all froze.
“Get away from him. Now!” barked Decker, who had just walked in to see this beating. After the men retreated, he glanced at Baron. “You okay?”
Baron, his lip bloody and his right eye puffy, struggled up and managed to stand while holding on to the bar, clutching at his side.
He rubbed his hand along his back and stretched. “No permanent damage, it seems,” he said, though he did wince in pain.
“He threw his drink in my face,” said the first man. “He started it.”
The bartender said, “No he didn’t. You jerks did.”
Decker snapped, “And it’s three on one and you guys are half his age?”
“You needn’t detain them,” said Baron.
“What?” said Decker.
Baron next looked at the bartender, who had started to punch in 911 on her phone. “You don’t have to do that. These young men are obviously a bit intoxicated. I’m sure they meant no harm.”
“I’m pretty sure they meant a lot of harm,” countered Decker. “To you.”
Baron held up his hand. “Nevertheless, it really won’t do any good to have them arrested. And it might do far more bad.”
“You sure?”
“Quite sure, thank you.”
Decker glared at the men. “You so much as think about touching this guy, your asses are mine. Do you understand?”
The largest of them glared at Decker as he wiped scotch from his eyes. “Whatever.”
Decker holstered his gun, marched forward, grabbed him by his shirt, and slammed him up against the wall. “No, not ‘whatever.’ Do you understand?”
“I understand, I understand, okay? Shit!”
Decker let him go and pushed him toward the exit. “Now clear out!”
The three men slowly left, each of them looking back at Decker and Baron before the last one slammed the door behind him.
Decker looked at Baron. “What was that all about?”
“Didn’t you hear?”
“No, I apparently came in too late.”
“Well, the gist of it was that the town is going to hell and it’s my fault.”
“Okay,” said Decker slowly.
“It’s not the first time I’ve heard it, and it’s doubtful it will be the last.”