The Ranger - Ace Atkins [102]
The big woman in the flowered dress, the woman who seemed to be in charge, didn’t bother to look up, her hands still laced over her head, but kind of mumbled, “Mr. Johnny Stagg serves on this board.”
“Tell him I got what’s mine,” he said. “The rest he can shove up his ass.”
The door bust open and five of Gowrie’s boys came in with some pillow sacks and smiles on their faces. They looked like this was all in good play, like those Army maneuvers in the woods, and if they got shot it wouldn’t be bullets but paint.
None of ’em had turned twenty yet, including that son of a bitch Charley Booth. All of ’em, dirty and bald-headed, in heavy coats and gloves. None of ’em had shaved in days, and they stunk. How in the hell had Ditto ended up here?
Prison would be a hell of a vacation. He’d shack up with the biggest nigger in the place to get free of this shit.
Gowrie reached over the ledge of the teller’s booth, making the little girl with all that makeup jump. She put her hands up in the air, leaving hundred-dollar bills scattering to the floor. “I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry.”
Gowrie just laughed, fishing a Blow Pop from a candy jar and tearing off the wrapper. “Throw in all these, too. You don’t need to paint yourself up like a whore . . . And smile sometime. Son of a bitch, this old town is sad.”
Quinn had to lay facedown on the bed to relieve the pressure on his backside. He had a pillow up under his face so he could watch the door, converse with the nice black nurse who’d come in to check on him every fifteen minutes. She wanted him to take some more pills, put him on a pain drip, but he said no thanks and asked again about his clothes.
She said they’d been thrown away.
“Even my boots?”
“Even the boots.”
He tried to close his eyes. He heard a knock on the door.
Anna Lee Stevens walked in and stood over him, then sat at the edge of the bed and looked down at the bandages on his legs and back. She touched his arm and smiled. She’d been crying.
“Luke got called,” she said. “We thought you’d died.”
“Wouldn’t have hurt as bad.”
“What happened?”
“Boom brought Hondo back.”
“Who’s Hondo?”
“My uncle’s dog,” Quinn said, smiling.
“You’re laughing?”
“Why the hell not? Beats crying.”
“And Wesley? He’s dead?”
Quinn was silent.
She moved her fingers back and forth across his forearm and just stared at him, grabbing his watch and starting to cry a bit. Quinn watched those sleepy eyes and her soft red mouth as she leaned over and kissed him on the forehead.
“What’s that for?”
“Because I felt like it,” Anna Lee said. “You need it.”
“I didn’t kill Wesley.”
“I’m so sorry, Quinn,” she said. “Those men should all die.”
Quinn grabbed her wrist lightly and lifted his head, their faces maybe two inches apart. He could feel her breath on him before she shook her head and stood.
She got halfway to the door, turning back once to smile.
“Anna Lee?” Quinn asked.
Lillie Virgil burst into the room and nearly bumped into her, dressed in full Tibbehah County Sheriff’s gear, with ponytail threaded through ball cap and holding a police radio. “You look like shit,” she said. “Hey, Anna Lee.”
Anna Lee smiled at Quinn before heading out. Quinn wondered what her husband had done with the bullets he’d dug out of him.
“So you got shot in the ass?”
“Just some buckshot,” Quinn said. “And a bullet in the shoulder.”
“I thought bullets bounced off Rangers.”
“You’re in a good mood.”
“Why the hell not?” Lillie said, standing over him and then turning her back to answer a call on the radio, a lot of squawking and static, but it was clear some shit was going on at the Citizens Bank Building. “Gets better and better.”
“Wesley sold me out.”
“Boom told me.”
“You expected that?”
“I wasn’t surprised,” she said. “I never wanted him a part of what we’d been up to.”
“He was my friend.”
“We can sing ‘I’ll Fly Away’ sometime later,” she said. “I got ten troopers blocking the roads out of the county. We got Gowrie bottled up, and now he’s come right back for more. I think he’s lost his