“You had a gun pointed at me, Xena the Large.” He rubbed his jaw with his palm, filled the kitchen with the scratch of bristles against rough flesh.
Roberta placed her hands by her sides.
Bubba smiled gently at her.
Very softly, he said, “So, should I kill you now?”
Roberta shook her head once from side to side.
“You sure?”
Roberta nodded, very deliberately.
“You pointed that gun at me, after all.”
Roberta nodded again. She tried to speak, but nothing came out but a gurgle.
“What was that?” Bubba said.
She swallowed. “I’m sorry, Mr. Miller.”
“Oh.” Bubba nodded.
He winked at me and there was that green and angry light dancing in his smiling eyes that I’ve seen before, the one that said anything could happen. Anything.
Leon used the kitchen table for support as he got to his feet behind Bubba.
“Little man,” Bubba said, his eyes on Roberta, “you reach for that Charter twenty-two you got strapped under the table, and I’ll unload it into your balls.”
Leon’s hand fell from the edge of the table.
Sweat poured from Corwin’s hair, and he blinked against it, placed his palm against the doorjamb to hold himself up.
Bubba walked over to me, kept his eyes on the room as he leaned in and whispered in my ear, “They’re armed to the fucking teeth. We’re gonna be leaving in a rush. Got it?”
I nodded.
As he crossed back to Roberta, I watched Leon’s eyes glance first at the table, then over at a cupboard, then at the dishwasher, which was rusty, caked with dirt along the door, and probably hadn’t washed a dish since I was in high school.
I caught Corwin Earle doing the same; then he and Leon’s eyes met for a moment, and the fear dissipated.
I had to agree with Bubba’s assessment. We were, it seemed, standing in the middle of Tombstone. As soon as we dropped our guards, the Tretts and Corwin Earle would grab their weapons and show us their vivid reenactment of the OK Corral.
“Please,” Roberta Trett said to Bubba, “go.”
“What about the clips?” Bubba said. “You wanted the clips. Do you still want ’em?”
“I—”
Bubba touched her chin with the tips of his fingers. “Yes or no?”
She closed her eyes. “Yes.”
“Sorry.” Bubba beamed. “Can’t have ’em. Gotta go.”
He looked at me and cocked his head and headed for the doorway.
Corwin pinned himself against the wall and I trained my gun on the room as I backed out after Bubba, saw the fury in Leon Trett’s eyes and knew they’d be coming out after us in a hurry.
I grabbed Corwin Earle behind the neck and shoved him into the center of the kitchen by Roberta. Then I met Leon’s eyes.
“I’ll kill you, Leon,” I said. “Stay in the kitchen.”
The whiny, eight-year-old’s voice was gone when he spoke. What replaced it was deep and slightly husky, cold as rock salt.
“You got to make the front door, boy. And it’s a long walk.”
I backed into the hallway, kept the .45 trained on the kitchen. Bubba stood a few feet down the hall, whistling.
“Think we should run?” I whispered out of the side of my mouth.
He looked back over his shoulder. “Probably.”
And he took off, charging toward the front door like a linebacker, his boots slamming the old floorboards, laughing maniacally, a booming Ah-ha-ha! tearing up through the house.
I dropped my arm and ran after him, saw the dark hall and the dark living room swing crazily from side to side as I charged behind Bubba and we ran full out for the front door.
I could hear them scrambling in the kitchen, the swing of the dishwasher door opening, then dropping on its hinges. I could feel target sights on my back.
Bubba didn’t pause to open the screen door between us and freedom, he ran straight through it, the wood frame shattering on impact, the green webbing shrouding his head like a veil.
I risked a look back as I reached the threshold, saw Leon Trett step into the hallway, arm extended. I backed up and pointed down the dark hall at him, but I was outside now, and for a long moment Trett and I stared across dark space at each other, guns pointed.
Then he lowered his arm and shook his head at me. “Another time,” he called.
“Sure,” I said.
Behind me, on the lawn, Bubba made a great racket as he cast what remained of the door off his head and boomed that crazy laugh of his.
“Ah-ha-ha! I am Conan!” he shouted, and spread his arms wide. “Grand slayer of evil gnomes! No man dare test my mettle or strength in battle! Ah-ha-ha!”
I came out on the lawn, and we jogged to his Hummer. I kept my back to the Hummer and my eyes on the house, gripping my gun in both hands as Bubba got in and unlocked my door. Nothing in the house moved.
I climbed in the fat, wide machine and Bubba peeled off from the curb before I’d even shut the door.
“Why’d you renege on the clips?” I asked, once we’d gotten a full block between us and the Tretts.
Bubba rolled through a stop sign. “They annoyed me and fucked up my counting.”
“That’s it? For that you held back the clips?”
He scowled. “I hate when people interrupt my counting. Hate it. Really, really hate it.”
“By the way,” I said, as we turned a corner, “what was with the evil gnomes thing?”
“What?”
“There were no evil gnomes in Conan.”
“You sure?”
“Pretty much.”
“Damn.”
“Sorry.”
“Why do you have to ruin everything?” he said. “Man, you’re no fun at all.”
25
“Ange!” I called, as Bubba and I came bounding into my apartment.
She stuck her head out of the tiny bedroom where she worked. “What’s up?”
“You’ve been following the Pietro case pretty closely, right?”
A needle of hurt pierced her eyes for a moment. “Yeah.”
“Come into the living room,” I said, tugging her. “Come on, come on.”
She looked at me, then at Bubba, who rocked back on his heels and blew a large pink balloon of Bazooka through his thick, rubbery lips.
“What have you two been drinking?”
“Nothing,” I said. “Come on.”
We turned on lights in the living room and told her about our trip to the Tretts’.