Southtown (Tres Navarre #5)(16)

Elroy and the Guide busted inside, both wearing ski masks, carrying shotguns.

They took the flanks, rounded up a couple of stock boys from the back of the store.

Luis told the girl cashier, “We’re going into the office now and open the safe.”

“He—” The girl pointed toward the thing that used to be her boss. “He’s the only one who knows how.”

The Guide looked at C.C. “What the f**k you shoot him for?”

“Fuck you,” C.C. said, but it was an act. C.C. was getting off on being the bad-ass, and the Guide was happy to let him.

We make a little mess, the Guide had told them their first day heading north. Every once in a while, we surface and give them a new headline. That’s the price for your freedom.

C.C. loved it. He thought he was goddamn Jesse James. He’d taken to wearing two pistols. He was the one who shot the convenience store clerk in New Braunfels, and a gas station attendant Sunday night in Seguin that the police hadn’t tied to them yet. C.C. was the one who delivered the headlines. He’d also be the one who got them a lethal injection, if they were ever caught.

They herded the employees to the manager’s office and tied them up. The Guide said to forget about the safe—just get the cash from the registers. They went shopping—grabbed some new clothes, a shitload of ammunition. Elroy picked up a bow-and-arrow set and Luis was like, “What the f**k are you doing?”

The big black man smiled. “Always wanted to be Robin Hood, brother.”

The Guide said, “Time to leave.”

He went back to the office and gave the employees a spiel—don’t yel for help, don’t try anything funny or we’l hunt down your families and kil them.

Luis knew what they’d remember—the guy in charge was an Anglo in a ski mask, medium build, West Texas accent. The police would figure it was Wil Stirman. They’d figure the five of them were stil together, heading north. Four guys did the heist. The fifth stayed in the car, playing lookout.

As it turned out, it would’ve been better if there had been a fifth on lookout.

As soon as they got outside, there was a blaze of headlights. Some guy was shining his brights on them.

A red Chevy. The driver wore some kind of uniform. Luis couldn’t tel through the glare—an off-duty security officer, maybe. The guy was leaning out his window, training a gun on them. He yel ed, “Freeze!”

C.C. and the Guide opened fire. Luis and Elroy took off toward the van, locusts crunching under their boots.

The guard’s Chevy revved and careened forward, toward the van, and Luis knew he was going to die. At the last minute the Chevy swerved toward the glass storefront, where C.C. was standing, a pistol in each hand, firing away. C.C. didn’t have time to jump before the red Chevy plowed into him, slamming him through the glass.

Luis ran up. The Chevy’s engine was grinding. It wasn’t going anywhere, steam bil owing out the hood, gas leaking from its bel y. Behind the blood-spattered web of glass that used to be the windshield, the driver was dead. He wasn’t a security guard—he was a cop. Fucker must’ve been on his way home from his shift, spotted the holdup, had to stop and play hero.

The worst was C.C. He was sprawled on the cement, half under the Chevy, broken glass and locusts al around him. He was screaming, and his leg was pumping like a busted pipe. The Guide yel ed, “Get pressure on that!”

Luis stripped off his shirt and tried to bind the wound. But then he saw what had happened. A plate glass shard had gone clean through C.C.’s calf like a guil otine blade. Nothing was holding the leg together but a few shreds of fabric.

Luis managed to wrap the mess with his shirt, tying off the sleeves like a tourniquet, but C.C.’s eyes were rol ing back in his head. He was shivering.

Luis looked at Elroy, and they didn’t need to say anything. They were both thinking about stained glass, a broken angel feather stabbed in an old supervisor’s gut.

The Guide said, “Get him in the van.”

“He needs a doctor,” Elroy said. “We can leave him here, cal 911—”

“No,” the Guide said. “Nobody leaves the group.”

So they got C.C. in the van and gunned the accelerator, made it to the highway. They drove north into the dark plains of Oklahoma, listening for sirens that never came.

C.C.’s breath smel ed like raw meat. The wound oozed.

They’d just passed the city limits sign when C.C. spat up blood, tried to wipe his chin and shuddered for the last time.

They dug C.C. a shal ow grave in the red earth of a creek bed. They shoveled dirt on his open eyes. A little sneer traced his mouth, like he was going to tel Satan a thing or two.

The Guide took it in stride. He kept the same calm expression as when faced with police roadblocks, or WANTED signs in grocery stores, or the hotel night manager who had the fugitives’ faces on the television as they checked in for the night. The Guide was a Freon-blooded son-of-a-bitch, just like his boss, Wil Stirman.

Third day together, now, and Luis stil didn’t know the Guide’s name. Luis didn’t trust him any more than when they’d first met in the Floresvil e Wal-Mart parking lot, when the Guide had given them al fresh clothes and guns, cel phones with clean numbers—Luis and Pablo exchanging looks, silently promising they would keep in touch.

Stirman had said, “Take these folks to Canada. Get ’em set with paperwork and cash. Anything they want.”