The Last King of Texas (Tres Navarre #3)(45)

"The property on Green Road."

Mara nodded. "For a couple of years I had this stupid idea maybe Sandra was going to make it. Farm life. New school. Perfect for her. She never got into trouble. Made it all the way through high school. Even started college before Zeta got interested in her, you know — in a new way. Zeta decided it was a good match."

"And was it?"

Hector turned his beer bottle in a slow circle. "Zeta was old-fashioned. Didn't want his wife going to college. But he was good to Sandra. Looked out for her."

"You believe that?"

More silence. "She and Zeta would've worked things out, wasn't for the Brandons. After the Old Man caught her, she didn't have no choice but to take his money and run. Sanchez would've killed her for what she did, her fault or not. But, man — it could've been different for her. She almost made it out."

"And you?"

"What about me?"

"Did you make it out?"

Hector smiled sourly. He dabbed his finger in the circle of sweat at the base of his beer, smeared a line of water away from the bottle. "I'm a man. Ain't the same for me."

"You decided to keep living on your grandmother's property. Those chickens in the coop, the garden — those things require maintenance. Somebody cares about that place."

"Go home, gringo. Quit while you're ahead."

"Zeta's gun — the gold revolver. He left it with you."

The sour smile faded. "Say what?"

"The gun didn't go south with Zeta. He should've ditched it, but for some reason he couldn't throw away that gift from Jeremiah Brandon. He left the gun in San Antonio with somebody — I'm guessing you. The fact that police found it near Aaron Brandon's house is important. You see?"

Mara's eyes darkened to a dangerous shade. "Be careful, gringo."

"'Cause the thing is, Hector, if somebody was to frame Zeta, you'd be in a good position to do it. What with Zeta staying at your place and all, and you doing business with Sanchez's old rival Chich."

"I told your friend in the goddamn Panama hat—"

"Yeah, I know. You told George you'd think about it. All I'm saying is maybe you should think a little harder. Let us hear from you."

Hector studied me for another stanza of Shelly Lares, then reassembled his cold smile. "You'll hear from me, gringo. Now lo siento, eh? I got to do this now to keep appearances."

Then he got up and pushed me off my stool as hard as he could.

I went toppling backward and on the way down managed to connect just about every part of my body with something hard and wooden. I landed with the seat of the stool in my gut, my left leg laced through the spokes. The floor was sticky. A beer bottle cap was pressed into my palm.

Mara stood over me. The crowd was silent, waiting for a fight.

Mara disappointed them.

"Be cool to the homies, gringo," he told me. "Stick around. See how long before they drag you out with the trash."

He grabbed his PalmPilot and walked toward the exit, the old gunshot wound making his gait only slightly stiff. The locos in the corner laughed at my expense.

I got up, dusted myself off.

In the reflection of the hammered tin, I watched Hector Mara getting into his old Ford Galaxie and pulling out of the lot.

When someone humiliates you in a bar, you don't really have a choice. You've got to sit back down and finish your drink, just to prove you can. So I did.

I listened to another Shelly Lares tune. I thought about George Berton, tried to remind myself that George was a big boy who knew what he was doing, and he'd just yell at me for interfering if I called him now. I thought about Hector Mara's initiation to Zeta Sanchez's set until my leg started to ache. I looked at the little red circle the beer bottle cap had bitten into my palm and thought about a hundred other places I would rather be than the Poco Mas.

Then another round of laughter erupted at the locos' table in the back and I decided I might as well add insult to injury.

I grabbed the Budweiser that Hector Mara had refused and went to talk to a girl I knew.

TWENTY-ONE

Her name was Mary. The last time I'd seen her, just before Christmas, Ralph Arguello and I had rescued her from an underage prostitution ring by throwing her pimp off the Navarro Street Bridge. Her liberation had been one of the only good by-products from my search for a rich client's runaway daughter.

Mary was wearing tonight what she'd worn back in December, which was a bad sign — partially unbuttoned denim dress, black hose, thick-soled pumps, way too much makeup in an effort to conceal her fifteen years. Her hair poured down either side of her pretty face like slow-motion loops of caramel in a candy bar commercial. Her ankles were crossed and her shoulders tensed as she sat on the young man's lap and watched me walk up to the booth.

I looked at the guy in the porkpie hat. "I need to talk with your lap-warmer for a minute."

Porkpie stared at me, his mouth spreading into a dazed grin, like he'd just gotten a much bigger birthday present than he expected. "That a fact?"

His three friends in the booth watched, waiting for some kind of cue. The one with the Raiders jacket could've been carrying just about anything underneath. I tried not to dwell on that.