“What about my money?” Frank asked.
Pine stepped close and jabbed Frank in his lower back, just above the right hip, a vicious, powerful, unseen punch that sent tendrils of curdled pain shooting through Frank’s groin. Frank took a half step to his left, recoiling from the blow, and Jack brought his fist around in a swinging, roundhouse blow, driving his knuckles into the soft tissue under Frank’s left ear.
Frank went to his knees.
Now they could use their boots as well. Frank fell sideways and curled up, protecting his face and head with his arms. He pulled his knees into his chest and pressed his heels into his haunches as hard as he could, covering his balls with his feet. His body shuddered under the onslaught of punches and kicks, but most of Frank’s mind had retreated down into the darkness, hiding out in the raw, wild place that had been sealed and secure until it had been ripped open when he kneeled in the dirt yard with Annie. He thought of her now, and his only wish was that she had gotten the safe out of the barn and was taking the whole damn thing far, far away from this town.
Sturm let the clowns kick at Frank for a while. “Jack was right. You weren’t born here. This land is my land. This land is my family’s land. It sure as shit ain’t your country, son. My Great-great grandfather worked his way out here with the goddamn chinks on the railroad. He saw how much this valley had to offer, chased the fucking Indians out, and my family has been here ever since. And will continue to be. Long after my bones are gone, long after this town has dried to dust and blown away, the ground will replenish itself, and when Theo returns as a man, all of this will be his.”
He realized that Frank wouldn’t or couldn’t make a sound. “That’s enough.” He jumped down off the pickup and lifted Frank’s chin. One eye was swollen nearly shut. Blood ran from his hairline. Frank’s lips had been split like overripe tomatoes. “This was for your own good, son. It was your own damn fault. Understand this, I spared you. I’m giving you a chance. Leave. Now. You got a full tank of gas. Hell, I’ll even leave that box of liquor with you, just so you understand there’s no hard feelings. But let’s make one thing very, very clear. You get to thinking you’re man enough to come back here, you’ll force me to pull the trigger. So help me God, you’ll be down at the bottom of the town pool with Dr. No back there, keeping that goddamn lizard company.”
Frank spit blood on Sturm’s boots. His tongue found a few alarmingly loose teeth. He took a deep breath and winced at how his ribs seemed to be stabbing into his lungs. Still, he found enough strength to sit upright and look Sturm full in the face with his good eye. “What about my money?”
“You just don’t give up. Sometimes, that’s admirable. Sometimes, it’s just fucking stupid,” Sturm said. He stood. “Theo. Bring me that envelope on the dash.” He looked down at Frank. “Boys didn’t want me to give you this. They wanted to split it between themselves.”
Theo came back with a manila envelope and handed it to his father.
Sturm knelt down, tapped the thick envelope on Frank’s skull. “There’s two months of wages in here. However,” he said, slapping Frank in the head, hard. “I subtracted payment for not fulfilling your duties. If I were you, I would consider this amount to be extremely generous, given the circumstances.” He tossed the envelope into Frank’s lap and stepped back. “You’ve got a full tank of gas. Use it. I’d head north, I were you. Get yourself a job on a ranch somewhere and just enjoy breathing.”
Pine and Chuck moved slowly towards Sturm’s truck, clearing the way to the car for Frank. Chuck was still trying to get his breath back. Theo flung his beer bottle at Frank. The bottle shattered on the pavement, flinging foam and glass into Frank’s face.
Frank blinked slowly, making sure there was no glass in his eyes, and moved his body even slower, checking that nothing had broken from the beating. His muscles felt like he’d fallen into a harvester. But he could move, the bones still held together. He stood, met Sturm’s eyes, and without bothering to count the money, turned and walked stiffly to his car.
The only sound he could hear was his own boots scuffling along the pavement. The skin at the back of his skull crawled over itself to get away from the impact of a bullet that could come at any time. Frank figured that this was the moment when he would find out if Sturm was to going to really let him go or simply have a bit of fun and shoot him. And if Sturm went ahead and shot him, well, Frank told himself that that was okay. He’d kept them out here long enough. To die now, instantly, that wouldn’t be so bad. He wouldn’t even know it happened. It would be over and done with, like snapping his fingers. Lights out.
It was all he’d ever wanted for his animals.
But his heart wasn’t listening to the calm, reasonable voice. It thudded urgently away, skipping over itself as it ricocheted around his ribcage. Like the skin along his back, now squirming down his spine like a twitching toad, it wanted away. That part of him just wanted to crawl into a hole and hide.
In the end, they didn’t shoot him. Didn’t even threaten it. Frank walked back to the car and as he dropped into the driver’s seat, he saw the men hadn’t moved. They simply watched as he started the car, backed up across the highway, and headed south, down to the detour.
Frank kept his foot on the floor and watched them in his rearview mirror until the blood red pinpricks of Sturm’s taillights disappeared. Nobody waved goodbye.
* * * * *
He found the turnoff, and drove through the fields, slower now, looking for a place to hide the long black car. He crossed over the irrigation ditch and followed the twin tire tracks that snaked along the edges of the foothills. He found a spot, twenty yards off the dirt lane, up a dry wash. The mud had been baking for months, and was now harder than concrete. A couple of oak trees flanked the creek bed, filtering out the starlight.
He backed the car up and shut the engine off and just listened for a while. Frank didn’t think that anyone would actually follow him, just to make sure he left; Sturm had seemed awfully sure of himself. After a few moments, the crickets in the tall, dead grass gradually filled the silence with their creaking, throbbing calls.
He wondered how long it would take Sturm to get back to the ranch.
He wondered if Annie and her family had gotten to the safe.
He wondered if he would hear any gunfire.
To distract himself, he tore open the manila envelope. It felt thick, and he thought there was a chance that Sturm had upheld his end of the bargain. He pulled the stack of bills out and flicked on the interior light. His fist was full of goddamn singles. He quickly killed the light, and counted by feel. If they were all singles, and it certainly looked that way in the quick flash of light, then he had been sent on his way with about three hundred lousy bucks.
“You sonofabitch,” Frank whispered. Three hundred wasn’t enough to get to Washington, let alone Canada. Three hundred bucks wasn’t shit. He stuffed the cash back into the manila envelope and shoved it under the seat. The car suddenly felt close, suffocating, as if the seat, ceiling, and steering wheel were all crushing him.
He swung the door open and climbed out. His body, stiff from sitting still, screamed at him to stop. He stumbled sideways and fell into the bank of the creek. Pain squatted over every nerve in his body and warned him in no uncertain terms that he wasn’t allowed to move again for a long time. He agreed wholeheartedly and promised the pain that he was in no hurry to go anywhere anytime soon.
So he relaxed into the bank and watched the stars crawl sluggishly across the sky. The high-pitched roar of some big cat silenced the entire valley for a while. The crickets knew they were safe, and started calling to each other after a few minutes. An owl hooted in the gnarled oaks above him. A mosquito whined in his ear and without thinking, he slapped at it.