BILLY KNOX SAT at the oak desk in the study of the lodge at Fort Knox, a Walther pistol before him. Two of the three young men who had attacked Henry Sexton stood across from him, their eyes pinned as though flying high on speed. Fear had done that: raw, gut-churning fear. Their wounded friend—the one the old lady had plugged in the belly—lay on a bench against the wall opposite the desk, a tarp folded under him to stop him bleeding onto the upholstery. His name was Casey Whelan. Sonny had injected him with something that was supposed to stop the pain, and Snake had wrapped two turns of camouflage-pattern duct tape around his mouth. Though the tape had slipped a bit, the screaming had finally subsided, but Whelan was still moaning.
Snake Knox stood behind Billy like an older ghost of his son. Beside Snake crouched the seven-hundred-pound razorback Forrest had killed with a spear, the shaft of which still jutted from the hog’s back. And near the hog, concealed behind a partly open door, stood Forrest Knox himself.
“Why do you think Brody chose you guys to kill Henry?” Billy asked.
“It was Randall Regan give us the job,” answered Charley Wise, the braver of the two boys. The other boy, Jake Whitten, had said nothing since their arrival. “Randall’s my uncle, Mr. Knox. I don’t even think Mr. Brody knows us by name. He’ll come around to wells when we’re drillin’ sometimes, even had a drink with us once. Told us stories about chasin’ * and getting into brawls and such. But it was Randall who called us with this.”
“And what did he say?”
“He asked us to come out to Mr. Royal’s place on Lake Concordia. He told us he had a job for some tough boys, and there was good money in it.”
“How much?”
“Five grand apiece.”
Sonny whistled, and Billy and Snake shared a look. “What did he tell you to do?”
“He said to grab Mr. Henry and bring him to Mr. Brody’s house on the lake. To that basement room out there. They wanted to question him about something.”
“Did they mean to kill him?”
The two boys looked at each other. “I’m pretty sure they did,” Charley said. “Uncle Randall hates Mr. Henry. Always did. But he didn’t want us to take any guns on the job, in case a cop stopped us. He also told me that if Mr. Henry had anything in his Explorer, like a computer or anything, to bring it with us. That’s why we brought them files along.”
Charley pointed at a stack of banker’s boxes on the floor to his left.
“That’s the only smart thing you did tonight,” Billy said. “And what brought you to us?”
“Mr. Royal, I guess you could say. Once that old bitch shot Casey, we hauled ass and called Uncle Randall. He cussed up a storm and told me he’d call me back. I figure he must’ve called Old Man Royal at that point, because he called back and told me he couldn’t help Casey. He told me not to go to any hospital within a hundred miles, and that if his or Brody’s name got mentioned, we’d be dead by sundown the next day. I called Mr. Thornfield because I know some guys in the meth business, and I always heard your crew had a first-class operation. Cops on the pad, and even a doctor for emergencies.”
Snake grunted behind Billy. Billy and Sonny shared a worried look. From the moment Sonny called Billy about the three boys, Billy had figured the only choice was to liquidate them (and then decide how to handle Brody Royal going rogue). But to Billy’s surprise, Forrest had wanted to hear out the boys first. He thought it might be possible to let two of them live. Billy saw no sense in taking this risk, but he’d humored Forrest by giving the boys a chance to tell their side of the story. He wondered what Forrest was thinking now.
Casey Whelan gave out a long, guttural moan. Billy looked over and saw a froth of blood on the duct tape covering the boy’s mouth. He shook his head with distaste. Raiford Prison in Florida, where he’d served a stretch for dealing coke in the early eighties, had been filled with hapless would-be criminals like these.
“I know we messed up, Mr. Billy,” Charley admitted. “But we’ll make it right. Let me run over to the hospital. I’ll finish the job right now. That son of a bitch won’t ever write another line in that newspaper.”
Billy toyed with the Walther on his desk, then glanced over his shoulder. “What do you think, Daddy?”
Snake replied in a dry voice, like palm fronds rattling in the wind. “You send boys to do a man’s job, you get what we got now. A clusterfuck.”
“That hospital’s crawling with cops now,” Billy thought aloud. “Sheriff Dennis is over there, and maybe even the FBI by now. If they caught you, you’d spill everything you know before an hour passed.”
“No, sir!” Charley practically yelped. “I know how to keep my mouth shut.”
“Yeah. What about you, Jake? You’re mighty quiet.”
The burly young roughneck standing behind Charley shook his head like a confused little boy. Fear had rendered him physically unable to speak. He couldn’t keep his eyes off Casey Whelan, who appeared to be dying on the bench.
“Well, Pop?” Billy said, mostly for the sake of his father’s pride. The real decision belonged to Forrest.
“They look like talkers to me,” Snake rasped.
Charley looked like he was straining not to pee down his leg.
“Ya’ll stay here,” Billy said. “I’ll be back in a second with somebody who knows about gunshot wounds. Don’t say a word while he’s in here. You understand?”
Jake and Charley nodded anxiously.
Billy pushed open the door behind his desk and went out. Forrest was already walking down the hall to the master bedroom, where a Steve McQueen movie was playing on the flat-screen.
“Did you hear all that?”
Forrest nodded. He’d changed out of his state police uniform, into jeans and a Who Dat? New Orleans Saints sweatshirt.
“What do you think about their story?”