Snake grinned. “Yeah. A nice little op. Billy’s left for Toledo Bend already.”
A vague answer, at best, but Sonny didn’t ask for clarification. Billy Knox owned a luxurious home on Toledo Bend, the vast man-made reservoir that lay on the Louisiana-Texas border. He called it his “fishing camp,” but it was nicer than the homes in the most affluent subdivisions of Natchez.
Snake reached into an Igloo and handed Sonny an ice-cold Schaefer. “Yeah, him and Joelle Brennan pulled out before six this morning.” Joelle was Billy’s latest squeeze; she ran a local health club and was built like a brick shithouse. “You and me can leave as soon as you’re feeling steady.”
“Are we flying over?”
Snake shook his head. “Drivin’. Flying back, though. Alibi city.”
Sonny couldn’t begin to fathom this strange arrangement. He looked at the beer, then handed the can back to Snake. “I’d better pass after all the drugs they give me.”
Snake downed the Schaefer in five gulps.
“You gonna fly drunk?” Sonny asked.
“Shit. I’m twice the pilot drunk that most men are sober.”
Sonny was only making conversation to divert his friend; Snake had walked away from a half-dozen crashes that would have killed less hardy men.
“What gun is that?” Sonny asked, pointing to the rifle leaning against the chair. “That ain’t your regular .22, is it?”
Snake gave Sonny an odd leer, then picked up the rifle and ran his fingers down its long barrel and checkered stock. “Something special. For tonight.” He held the rifle out to Sonny. “Check it out.”
Sonny groaned as he reached for the gun. One of the bruises on his chest was shaped like the heel of a Red Wing boot.
“Never mind,” Snake said, noticing his grimace.
“You gonna shoot that damn coon or just torment it some more?”
Snake laughed and looked down at the cage. “I was, but this little lady has a job to do tonight.” He touched the trap with the rifle barrel, and the coon went batshit. A blood-chilling scream came from the needle-toothed mouth and pointed snout.
A shiver of foreboding went down Sonny’s spine. “Granny always said, if a coon was big as a bear, it’d be the baddest thing on God’s earth.”
“She was right!” Snake kicked the cage, then whooped when the coon went for his boot. “Look at that bitch go. She’d rip my throat out if she could!”
“Run right up your leg,” Sonny agreed.
Snake stopped smiling. “Why do you think Dr. Cage and that Ranger didn’t kill you last night? That was a hell of a risk, dropping you off at the hospital like that.”
A swarm of yellow jackets rose up in Sonny’s chest. “The Ranger wanted to. It was Dr. Cage who saved me. He said he couldn’t kill a man in cold blood.”
Snake shook his head in wonder. “I wish we could fly over to Toledo Bend. You oughta rack out in the backseat of the truck while I drive.”
Not a chance, Sonny thought, despite his exhaustion. If Forrest decided that last night’s events made him a liability, he would never reach Toledo Bend alive. It was even possible that this decision had already been made. Billy Knox was a businessman; sentiment didn’t figure into things. And Forrest was like an admiral on a battleship, moving plastic figures around on maps with a stick. To him every soldier under his command was expendable.
Sonny turned at what he thought was the sound of footsteps, and a tall, rangy man in black pants and a high-collared shirt walked around the corner of the house. Sonny was so jumpy that he leaped to his feet, but Snake raised his rifle in greeting. The newcomer was Randall Regan, Brody Royal’s right-hand man.
“What are you doing here?” Snake asked.
“Delivering a message,” Regan rasped, like a man with laryngitis. “Last night Forrest said no phones, period. And I think ours are being tapped.”
“What’s wrong with your voice?” Snake asked. “You swallow a wasp or something?”
Regan scowled, then unbuttoned his collar, revealing a nasty reddish-purple bruise that covered his throat.
“What the hell did that?” Snake asked.
“Penn Cage. He braced me in a public restaurant about the Royal Insurance bitches you dumped out in the swamp. He knew every detail. I didn’t say a word. But later, he sucker-punched me in the bathroom.”
This answer worried Sonny, but Snake started laughing so hard that Regan buttoned his collar again, all the while looking like he wanted to strangle Snake Knox.
Once Snake stopped laughing, he said, “What’s your message?”
Regan’s reply sounded like the wheeze of a diphtheria patient. “Brody doesn’t want you to wait until tonight. He wants it done right now. Or as soon as it can be done. He wants you to get word to Forrest.”
“Tell Brody not to worry. Forrest knows what has to be done.”
Regan pointed at the cage on the ground. “What the hell are you doing with that thing?”
“You’ll find out.” Snake chuckled and kicked the trap again. The raccoon went crazy, biting the steel wire in a futile effort to reach her tormentor.
I know how you feel, Sonny thought, touching his chest where the Texas Ranger’s boot had driven into his sternum. Jesus God.
CHAPTER 70