“Who’ll be the sheriff, then?”
Forrest grinned. “A friendly face.”
Billy drank off his whiskey, leaned forward, and waited for his cousin to lay out the plan. He expected a classic Forrest Knox gambit: ballsy as hell, yet as intricately choreographed as a ballet. But Forrest said nothing. He had no intention of telling them anything. Billy expected his father to raise hell, but after staring at Forrest’s face for nearly a minute, Snake settled back in his chair with a malevolent smile. It was as though Forrest had cast a spell over him.
“So,” Forrest concluded. “We’re all clear? Tomorrow you walk in there for questioning?”
Snake laughed. “I reckon so, nephew. I reckon so.”
“Good. Now, I want to discuss a couple of things with Billy. We’re going to take a walk down to check the food plots.”
Billy started to get up, but Snake said, “Hold up one minute. I heard you’ve changed your orders on Tom Cage. No more shoot to kill, they say.”
In an instant the beast that lived behind Forrest’s imperturbable mask revealed itself. “Who told you that?” he asked in a barely audible voice.
But Snake was not intimidated. “Never you mind, nephew. Is it true?”
“It’s true.”
Snake looked at Sonny as if to say, You see? Then he said, “And why would that be?”
“Tom Cage is one of the moving parts in the deal I’m making to save your ass.”
Snake slowly went red again. “You mean to save your real-estate deals down in New Orleans, don’t you? This ain’t about saving us up here at all.”
Forrest looked at the floor as though by so doing he could bleed his fury into the wood. After half a minute he composed himself and looked up again, focusing on each man in turn once more.
“The crystal meth business is for suckers,” he said. “You found out why this morning. Every man they brought in is facing a mandatory minimum sentence. You may be right that none of them will turn on you—this time. But sooner or later, somebody will give you up. If we stay in that business, we’re going to end up in Angola one day. You guys may be willing to take that chance, but I’m not. The deals Brody has got me into will make the money we’ve earned in the past look like a joke. I’d be better off paying you to stay out of business than to risk you staying in. You understand? And I’m willing to do that, for a reasonable amount of time. What I won’t do is stand by while you go rogue and try some crazy shit like Brody did, and bring more heat down on our heads. Because the day you become a liability to me . . .”
Forrest didn’t finish this sentence. He didn’t need to.
Snake was shaking his head, but when he finally spoke, he only seemed to have one thing on his mind. “I want Tom Cage dead,” he growled. “The rest of it I can live with, but not that. I think the doc knows enough to put us all in Angola, and he’ll do it, too.”
“Why?” Forrest asked, sounding genuinely interested. “Why would he do that?”
“Because of what we done to that nurse of his back in ’68.” Snake looked hard at Forrest. “You know what I’m talking about. You were there.”
Forrest acknowledged this with a nod.
Billy was pretty sure they were talking about a gang rape, but he had no desire to know more.
“Dr. Cage might feel some bitterness about that,” Forrest conceded. “But he cares about his family a lot more than he does revenge. You leave him to me.”
“To him that nurse was family,” Snake said. “He loved that nigger, and he had a natural child by her. Why else would he have gone so high up to keep us from killing her?”
Billy had no idea what Snake was talking about.
“He probably did love her,” Forrest said. “I don’t give a shit about that. I care about security. Dr. Cage wants to watch that granddaughter of his grow up for as long as he can. He’ll do a lot for that privilege.”
Snake held out a shaking hand and pointed at Forrest. “Mark my words, boy. You try to cut a deal with Tom Cage, and he’ll fuck you in the end.”
Forrest looked more intrigued than angry. “Why is that, Uncle?”
Snake sat so still he looked carved from stone. “I’ve never trusted that motherfucker. Not since your daddy died in his office.”
For the first time Forrest looked rattled. “What the hell’s that supposed to mean?”
“It’s just a feeling I always had. I don’t like that that nigger woman was in there when Frank died, especially so soon after what we done to her.”
Forrest sneered and shook his head. “You’re nuts, Unc. Daddy was doomed the second those batteries fell on him. The pathologist told Mama that.”
“Yeah, well . . . fuck him, too.”
Forrest’s voice hardened. “You’re the one who took Daddy to Dr. Cage’s office. You should have taken him to the hospital. That’s something else the pathologist told Mama, if you want to know.”
“Fuck the pathologist!” Snake roared. “I know what I know. And I want Dr. Cage dead. The rest you can have your way on, but I want that SOB in the swamp!”
Forrest stood, then walked over to Snake and spoke in a voice so soft and sibilant that Billy was reminded of the warning hiss of the moccasins for which his father had been nicknamed.
“Listen to me, Uncle. I say who lives and dies in this outfit. Not you, and not anybody you might call in the dark of the night. Me. Anybody crosses me on that, he’ll be chewing over old times with Leo Spivey. Am I understood?”