Iron River Read Free Page A

lips through the camcorder. It looked like: Let’s do business, assholes.
    Enough, thought Hood. Close the deal. We’ve got audio and video, and Tilley is good for a bigger payday .
    Tilley slid the sawed-offs into an old duffel bag and carried them to the van. Ozburn stood by the open back door with the cigar in his mouth, watching the guns go in. While they worked, Tilley seemed to be telling Ozburn something long and detailed, a joke or a story maybe. Ozburn handed him a wad of money. Black Suit stood a few feet away, scanning the lot.
    Tilley went back to the Trooper and bagged up more product. Hood couldn’t make them out, but they were handguns. Tilley was still jabbering away, like the deal had suddenly become minor and what was really important was what he had to say. Hood guessed he was talking about the next deal. Good.
    Ozburn gave Tilley another wad of bills, then slammed the van doors shut. Tilley worked the money into his jeans pocket and walked back to the Trooper. The young man in the black suit closed the doors, and the three men stood facing each other in the poor light of the parking lot.
    Hood saw that all three men were more relaxed now. There was a postgame feel in their postures, and Ozburn seemed to be telling some tale of his own. He reached out and straightened the young man’s necktie.
    Then Black Suit stepped forward and pulled at something on the chest of Ozburn’s flannel shirt. Tit for tat, thought Hood. It looked like a button string unraveling.
    Then it caught the light and Hood realized what it was.
    Black Suit gave it a yank and the wire lengthened.
    Hood knew that this was where they either killed Ozburn or ran for it. They ran for it: Tilley barging through the hedge of spindly oleander and off into the darkness, and Black Suit right past the tow truck and into the DQ lot. Ozburn spat out his cigar and went after Tilley, and Hood slid down the back side of the Guns a Million rooftop, dangled from the service ladder, and dropped hard to the pavement.
    He followed Ozburn and Tilley. From the corner of his eye he saw Bly jump from the tow truck with her weapon drawn and Holdstock pinwheel over the top of the bin like a gymnast and run toward Bly.
    Hood left his weapon holstered, tucked his elbows in tight and made time. Past the oleander was one of the large vacant lots common to desert towns, vast, for sale, lumped with sage and cholla in the slight moonlight. Beyond the lot was a stout adobe wall and within the wall was old Buenavista—the town square, the bars and restaurants and the hotel. And beyond the heart of the city was the border fence.
    Big Ozburn plodded along a hundred yards ahead of Hood. Hood couldn’t see Tilley. When he pulled up even, Ozburn pointed and Hood saw Tilley another hundred yards ahead, coming up on the wall.
    A few seconds later Hood scrambled gracelessly over the rough adobe and plopped down into the town square. There were lanterns in the trees and a fountain gurgling and lovers walking and sitting on the benches, the women sleek and the white shirts of the men faintly luminescent. Through them barged Tilley, then he rounded the statue of Buenavista’s founder and turned up the street toward the restaurants.
    Hood gained. The street was narrow and steep and the desert cobblestones were uneven. He heard Ozburn huffing along behind him and he felt the sweat burning into his eyes. He saw the crowd breaking up ahead of him, parted by stout Tilley. Hood ran past an ice cream shop and a festively lit bar and a leather shop and a jewelry store, though he was barely aware of them.
    At the first intersection, Black Suit appeared from a side street and fell in next to Tilley. Both men looked back at Hood, and when he saw Black Suit reach inside his coat, Hood dove behind a decorative clay planter filled with succulents and yelled back at Ozburn to get down. A little bullet grazed the planter and ricocheted, buzzing like a fat hornet. A twenty-two, thought Hood.