“Don’t fuckin’ tell me when to relax.”
“Take it easy, pops. Look, I’m gonna be comin’ by soon. You and me got something to talk about.”
“News to me.”
“I’m gettin’ tired of waitin’ on those names you promised us.”
Snake kept his voice cool. “You’ll get ’em when I said you’ll get ’em. Not an hour before.”
“We need ’em now, Knox. We got guys coming up for trial in St. Tammany Parish. One in St. Landry, too.”
“Talk to Lars. He’ll set you straight.”
“I’m always talkin’ to Lars. He told me I should ask you about it. The names, man.”
“After you’ve fulfilled your half of the bargain. That’s when you get ’em. Then and only then. That’s the deal. I’m hangin’ up now.”
“Wait. That woman of yours, the one who did the splash? She wants to come to where you’re at.”
“Tell her forget it. Nobody comes here. Not till the new passports come in. She’s gotta stick to the rules like everybody else.”
“That’s what I told her. But her and that boy of yours don’t seem to care much for rules.”
“Are you saying you can’t handle them?”
“I’m saying if I have to handle that boy, don’t bitch at me if you have to pay to have him fed through a tube for the rest of his life.”
Snake scratched at his hairline. The dye seemed to be irritating his scalp. “Do what you gotta do. But you’ll want him around later, when the shootin’ starts.”
“I got plenty of gun hands, Grandpa.”
Snake laughed softly. “Alois is more than a gun hand. He’s a mechanical genius. You’ll see what I mean pretty soon.”
“Yeah, yeah, I can’t wait. I’m out.”
Snake hung up. Then he switched off the cell phone, removed its SIM card, and dropped it in the bowl of hair dye Junelle had left on the nearby card table. As he looked down at the black fluid, Penn Cage’s words echoed in his head: Why don’t you ask Forrest Knox that question?
“Everything copacetic, Daddy?” Junelle asked, easing back into the room.
Snake looked into the mirror at the handsome stranger staring back at him. “What do you think about Toons, Junelle?”
She took a deep breath, then gave Snake a sidelong glance. “Just between you and me?”
He nodded.
“He’s a mean son of a bitch. Paranoid. Which I guess is sort of his job. But Toons takes it too far, you ask me. He’s a fuckin’ psycho. The younger girls say he’s sick in the bedroom, too. Which in this club is sayin’ something.”
“I’m a psycho, too, June-bug.”
Junelle gave him a knowing grin. “Yeah, but you’re my kind of psycho.”
Snake gazed back into the mirror and forced a smile so that he could examine his new teeth. Damn, but they were white. Like Chiclets. Yeah . . . the new look would take some getting used to. He looked more like Brody Royal than himself.
“You okay, Daddy?” Junelle asked, lighting a fresh Salem with a kitchen match, then shaking it out and drawing deep on the cancer stick. “You look tense.”
He grunted, turning left to examine his profile.
“You want me to suck it for you?” she asked, blowing out a long stream of blue smoke. “Take the edge off?”
Leaning away from the menthol cloud, Snake turned back to the glass, thinking about his unfinished business. I wonder how far this face can take me? I wonder how close it can get me to Penn Cage—
“Daddy?”
“Later,” he snapped. “After dinner. Jesus.”
“Okay, okay. Don’t get pissy. I’m just tryin’ to help.”
He felt a flash of anger. “You wanna help?” He started to tell her to get the hell out, but upon reflection he unzipped his fly and hung his dick out instead. “Help.”
Junelle laid her cigarette on the edge of the card table and dropped to her knees with a contented smile. Hell, he thought as he disappeared into her bright red mouth. She’s probably been doing that since she was thirteen. Happier sucking dick than doing anything else.
While Junelle fulfilled her destiny, Snake thought about the Cage family.
Chapter 9
When I got home, I told no one what I’d done at the Kuntry Kafé, but on my way into the house I told Tim Weathers to keep his men especially alert tonight. After the acid attack, my warning was redundant. On the orders of John Masters, Tim had already posted extra men outside. They’d come on a plane with eight others from Dallas, the contingent sent to guard the reporters of the Natchez Examiner. There’s nothing like shutting the barn door after the horse has bolted.
Once more my family has been thrown into shock. Annie tried to put up a good front, but I saw right through it. By the time I got home they had heard through the rumor mill how serious Keisha’s condition was. And they weren’t the only ones receiving updates by text message. Mia’s mother, Meredith Burke, called me and demanded that I release Mia from her employment and send her straight home. I didn’t blame her one bit. The problem was, Mia refused to leave. I must admit I was glad, because if she’d simply left, Annie would have fallen to pieces. But obviously changes must be made. I invited Mrs. Burke—who has been a single mother for the past sixteen years—to come by our house and discuss the situation with me and John Kaiser about seven p.m.
An hour before she arrived, Drew Elliott stopped by and delivered six tubes of 2.5 percent solution of calcium gluconate, the only known treatment for hydrofluoric acid burns. I’d called Drew at his office and asked if he could get us enough for the girls to carry some at all times, and he was glad to do it. Watching him instruct them on how to use it brought home the danger like nothing else had. Drew answered several tough questions from Mia and Annie about Keisha’s prognosis, then hugged them both and left.
I took that opportunity to discuss the possibility of moving one or both of them to another city, or even another country. I also raised the possibility of my going with them, though none of these options seemed practical. Where could Annie go that she would feel safe and secure? Not England. My sister, Jenny, is flying in for Dad’s trial. My mother isn’t about to leave Dad during this crisis. That leaves me to take Annie somewhere “safe.” But can I flee Natchez while my father stands trial for murder and my mother walks a tightrope between hysteria and catatonic despair?