Long Tale Press

CHAPTER ONE

Vincent Ten Ponies slid his thumb under the corner of the card, bending it up from the grass-green felt. His hand was calm and steady, but his heart began to beat hard. Ace of Clubs. One corner of his mouth curled up a little. He leaned back in his chair and crossed his arms. A waitress put her hand on his shoulder.

“Don’t need anything right now, Darlin’,” he said.

The dealer finished the down cards around the crescent of anxious gamblers and dropped his own card, face-up. Nine of Hearts. Vince pushed his whole pile of chips out front, nearly twenty-thousand dollars, leaving a shiny trail of crushed down felt. The dealer waited for the other bets, then started dealing the second cards. Vince watched the gamblers to his right. Ten of Diamonds to the first. Stay. Three of Spades to the second. Hit me. Ten of Clubs. Bust. Jack of Hearts. Hit me. I’ll stay. Good, no face cards so far. Vince’s card was next. It floated in the air, a paratrooper’s slow and anguished descent. He held his breath. Jack of Diamonds.

“Blackjack,” Vince gasped, turning over his Ace.

The dealer pushed a pile of chips into Vince’s, doubling it. Vince heard the other players go bust or win, not caring. He stared at his own pile, drumming his fingers on his leg, calculating. If he quit now, it would mean a few months more flying for Clive, but not years. But it also meant many more chances of getting caught or worse. Double it, and he had his own plane free and clear. Right now. He remembered the old Cheyenne stick game he played with his father, gambling for the pile of toothpicks in the middle of the mint-green kitchen table. Vince always seemed to win. But his father had let him win, hadn’t he? “Life’s a gamble,” Pop would say. “Put yourself out there. Win or lose don’t matter.” Of course, Pop didn’t have forty-thousand dollars at stake.

The dealer picked up the cards from around the table, dealt from the shoe, looking at Vince’s pile of chips. Vince’s card spun to a stop against his thumb. He lifted the corner. King of Diamonds. He leaned back again, waiting. An Eight of Clubs for the dealer.

“Let it ride,” Vince said.

The dealer looked over his shoulder to the pit boss, a bull-necked man in a tailored suit. The boss nodded his okay. The rest of the bets were placed. Vince’s pulse climbed. His heart thudded against his ribs, a caged animal testing the bars. The second cards went down. Again Vince focused on the players to his right. The first got an Ace. Blackjack! The dealer pushed chips out to the man. Nine of Clubs to the next player. Stay, he said. The old man next to Vince took a two. Hit me. Then a Three of Clubs. Hit me again. Seven of Hearts. Bust! “Goddamn it,” the old white man said, spinning out of his chair in disgust. Vince hardly noticed. His card was next. A Ten of Spades.

“I’ll stay on that,” he said. Once more he folded his arms.

The rest of the players got their cards. All stayed. The dealer took a three. Vince stopped breathing, squeezing his lips into a tight, thin line. The dealer pulled the next card, flipped it. Queen of Diamonds.

“Twenty one,” the dealer said, then pulled in all the chips on the table.

Vince dropped his head and, for a moment, breathed out all hope. He pulled off his aviator sunglasses, wiped the sweat from his hairline and rubbed his wet palm on his jeans. Now he heard the slots ringing out in the main hall, the inane chatter of tourists gambling at the low stakes tables, the murmur of the dissipating crowd that had gathered behind him. The sequined waitresses were annoying, the lights suddenly blinding. He put on his sunglasses and stood, his cowboy boots sinking into the thick carpet. He hated Vegas. Should never have stopped here. Now it would be two years, maybe more. Vince gritted his teeth at the thought of Clive’s too satisfied I-told-you-so smile.

He walked out into the molten light of the strip. Next to the valet parking sign stood a woman he could no longer afford. She wore white heels and a white silk dress tight enough to see that was all she was wearing.

“You look like a high roller in need of a good luck charm,” she said. She took his arm in hers.

“Rolled a little too high.”

Her plump lips drew into a half smile. She nodded and rubbed Vince’s shoulder. “Too bad, honey.” She walked to the casino doors and went inside.

He reached for the breast pocket on his t-shirt. There wasn’t one. He had stopped wearing pocket T’s when he quit smoking a decade ago. He decided to go up to his room and finish a bad day with a good drink.

Vince squinted awake at the hot sunlight reflecting off the chandelier above his bed. He’d forgotten to pull the shades. Around him was pink, foil face wallpaper, a sequin shower curtain peeking out of the bathroom, chrome and clear plastic lamps and chairs, white furniture. All this shiny shit to impress the rubes, he thought. Probably decorated by a mob boss’s wife. At least the room was free, if you call forty-thousand dollars free.

He reached around the empty bourbon bottle on the night stand for his sunglasses and the remote. The TV sat beyond the foot of the bed on a gaudy white and silver leaf dresser. He aimed the remote, noticing that he hadn’t taken off his jeans or one of his socks. He clicked on the TV. Nineteen pay-per-view porn channels and CNN. He checked CNN. George H.W. Bush was in full campaign mode, decrying the shameful waste of the American drug culture and promising to do whatever it took to stop the stuff at the border. “Fine, keep an eye on that shit,” Vince said aloud. “Better keep Clinton in the loop, too, ‘cause he’s gonna whip your ass.” Nobody was going to stop it, of course, but as long as they were pouring money and resources into trying, they weren’t watching Clive’s operation.

Bush went on to list his administration’s many accomplishments in the hemisphere. Took out a dictator in Panama—and cost Vince ten grand in one of Noriega’s banks. Achieved peaceful settlements of long standing civil wars in Nicaragua and El Salvador, closing major markets to Clive. Directed aid money to the Columbian government to help fight the drug cartels and the FARC rebels.

Vince shut off the TV, dropped the remote on the bed. He sat up and reached for his boots with a groan. His forties weren’t any easier on him than the casino had been. He found his other sock hanging half out of one boot, pulled it on, then slid on his boots. He stood up and looked around, trying to locate his shirt. The place would make Liberace wince, but it was the best hotel room he’d seen in a while.

No place for a good Cheyenne boy. No sir. That’s what his father would have said. Vince walked over to the window. He stood with his hand in his pocket and rubbed his thumb over the ribbon-less Silver Star. Twelve stories below people bustled like busy insects, even in the early morning. He laughed at the thought of his father flying over the strip in his duct-taped, open cockpit biplane, decked out in his dusty leather jacket and black cowboy hat, thong pulled tight under his chin, flying goggles like a big bug, swooping between casinos as he sprayed for human pests. All Indian Air Force.

Vince turned away from the window. A rumpled white lump by the bathroom door proved to be his t-shirt. He picked it up and stretched it over his head, careful not to pull off his sunglasses. He took his wallet off the night stand, opened it. Twenty three dollars and a fuel card. His only luggage, a canvas gym bag frayed at the seams, sat on the floor by the bed. He picked it up and walked out the door without bothering to close it behind him. In the hall, a guy was passed out in a cowboy hat and boots and nothing else. No place for a good Cheyenne boy.

The door was open, the airport shuttle empty. The driver was probably on his break. Vince tossed his one small bag on the luggage shelf, then settled back on a hard plastic seat. The shuttle was free, but comfort was an extra. He slouched down, crossed his arms over his chest and closed his eyes. His hangovers rarely included a headache, but he didn’t sleep well drunk and needed catnaps to function the next day. Better to nap here than in the pilot’s seat. Thoughts foggy and incomplete faded in and out, one unconnected to the next. His chin dropped to his chest and he slept.

“When’s your flight?”

Vince jerked awake. The driver’s voice was deep as a kettle drum. Appropriate, as he was shaped like one, wide at the shoulders and deep in the chest, flaring out to a huge and overhanging belly balanced on thin, short legs. A belt and suspenders were required to hold up his brown uniform pants, the man having no ass to do the job. On top of his two chins sat a copper-faced head the size of a basketball with a nose that would have been called Roman if it wasn’t so broad. His hair was thick and greasy and black, hanging past his shoulders. He wheezed from his three step climb onto the bus.

“Your flight,” he repeated. “What time do you leave?”

“Hour.”

“No problem, bro.”

The driver wedged himself into his seat, grunting and snorting like a fat steer, and pulled the door shut. Vince closed his eyes and let his chin drop to his chest again. He felt the bus pull away from the curb. His body swayed to the side as the driver turned onto the street.

“What tribe you from?”

Vince opened his eyes. “Huh?”

“What tribe you from?” the driver asked again.

“Laconic loner tribe.” Vince let his eyelids drop again, giving a nap one more shot.

“That’s funny! I’m Ute. Didn’t want to leave Colorado, but there wasn’t no work at home. My brother-in-law got me this gig. Hell, I’m single . . .”

No surprise there, Vince thought.

“. . . so I figured, what the hell. It’s Vegas, ya know?”

“Mm-hmm.”

“And the tips can be great! Some of these high rollers are pretty free with their cash. I done better than I could have hoped. My brother-in-law wasn’t kiddin’. So how’d you do? Soon as I hit for a chunk here, I’m gonna go back and big-time on the Rez for a while, get the El Dorado and pick up girls. Maybe I’ll get a carload and head up to Denver or down to Albuquerque. So where’s home for you? You headed back to the Rez?”

“No.” Vince couldn’t wait to get in the air. If it weren’t for the necessity of fuel, food, whiskey–and occasionally sex–he’d never land.

“You look Shoshone to me. I can tell stuff like that. I met a Shoshone girl up at Crow Fair once. My mom used to say that . . .”

Vince stopped listening. The Ute kept looking back over his shoulder as he spoke, so Vince held his eyes open, but the fat man’s rambling soon faded to an indistinct bass hum. The strip went past in blurry neon chunks. Only when the bus stopped for red lights did the hawkers, the hookers and the marks come into focus. They finally reached the airport.

“. . . and he gave me a five hundred dollar tip! You believe that?! So what airline?” the Ute asked. “I’ll take you right to it. Nothin’ but the best for a brother, ya know?”

“Just drop me here.” Vince stood, holding onto the rail over his head, and snatched his bag off the shelf.

The driver pulled to the curb and opened the door. “Pretty slow morning. We made good time.” He regarded Vince with the expectant look of a puppy at feeding time, one meaty hand ready for cash.

Vince swept right by him and hopped down the three steps to the butt littered concrete. He started walking to the private end of the terminal. It wasn’t necessary to leave Vegas yet, but there was no reason to stay without money to gamble. He could swing up to Montana. It was half as far as Key Marathon and he had time. But his flight plan was already filed. He hated changing plans. Changing your plan without cause had consequences—like losing forty grand and starting over.

It would be a long flight to Marathon. At least he’d be flying. The Keys were a better place to wait than Bogotá or Caracas. Most of the people spoke English and the cheap hotels were clean. Clive didn’t say when he’d call or what the cargo would be. It didn’t matter. There would be cash at the end and eventually enough for his own plane. If he was patient this time.

CHAPTER TWO

Macy was getting out. She had wanted to get out since she was fifteen. Rage had been ebbing and flowing below the surface for weeks, but she hadn’t allowed herself to realize how angry she was until now. Now she had somewhere to go and no reason to hold back. Now she was going to be free.

Macy and her mother had already planned to work on the yacht. Her mother hated the job, but she didn’t trust anyone else to do it. They would be alone. Macy would tell her she was done with them both, leaving. But not without a showdown. And she would do it on her father’s big sloop, the William Cochrane, which was so appropriate. Macy had choked down her disgust at her father’s egocentric arrogance—naming his yacht after himself.

“If we’re going to do this, let’s get on with it. I don’t want to be out here when the sun gets too high,” Ruth said.

“Did you have to wear a new blouse and slacks to work?”

“Did you have to wear a ratty old t-shirt and paint-spattered shorts? There are people we know out here.”

Macy handed her mother a scraper. She fought off the urge to slash her throat with it.

They set to work crawling over the deck, gouging out old caulk. Ruth huffed and sighed, cursing at a broken finger nail.

Macy watched Ruth’s growing irritation. The June sun climbed higher. Macy stripped down to a white bikini, dug into her work. She was lean and athletic, wiry muscle flexing under shotgun blasts of red-brown freckles.

Ruth looked up. “If you worked that hard at U of M, your grades wouldn’t be so low.” Macy forced a smile. “Let’s take a break, Mom.”

“I suppose I could work on my tan.” Ruth stood up and unbuttoned her blouse, shed her shoes and slacks. She wore a yellow thong bikini underneath. She bore no sign that she had ever had a child. She worked out. She was careful with her diet. Her husband said she was his best advertisement. She had the unnaturally taut skin around her cheekbones, the smile pulled thin that marked a tuck. Her breasts were too firm to be anything but silicone. She kept her hair shoulder length and colored it. Ruth could still draw looks from college boys.

Macy found two beach towels and threw them down on the deck. “How about a drink while we lay out?”

“It’s only ten o’clock.”

“It’s Saturday, Mom. Besides, it’s not like you’ve never had a drink in the morning.”

A subtle scowl crept over Ruth’s face.

“Let’s relax,” Macy said. “We can finish tonight.”

“Well . . .”

Macy had her. Ruth would be far easier to handle when she was drunk.

“I’ll run down to the marina store and get some ice. You see what’s in the galley.”

Macy returned with the bag of ice and two cans of Diet Coke. Her mother had brought up glasses and a bottle of Barbados rum. In a few minutes they were both lying on the deck. Macy poured her second drink, already one behind her mother.

Ruth leaned against the forward window of the cabin. “I don’t know how long your father will tolerate your poor performance in school.” She drained her third rum and Diet Coke.

“I stopped living to please Daddy a while ago, Mom. You ought to try it.”

Ruth got up and walked to the rum. Two young men several slips away worked on their boat, watching her. She turned to give them a better look at her breasts and smiled.

Macy winced. “You’re not eighteen, Mom.”

“I’m not dead either.” She hiked up her thong and bent over for the rum. She made sure the boys could see she had the ass of a twenty-five-year-old. She filled her glass to three-quarters and splashed in enough Coke to darken it. She wobbled back to her towel. “Your father and I think it’s about time you took your life seriously. You’ve screwed around and changed majors, just scraping by. We do not scrape by. Your father and I wonder what you are going to do with your life.” Ruth’s face was beginning to flush.

Macy’s blue-gray eyes turned the color of an approaching squall line. “I’ve seduced my way to passing grades. With a little effort I might fuck my way to Honors.”

Ruth flashed a sardonic smile and guzzled her drink. “Sex will only get you so far. Sooner or later they get bored with you no matter how beautiful you are.”

“What are you talking about? You seduced your way to a pretty easy life.”

Ruth’s jaw muscles tensed. As quickly as she lost it, she regained control. “I suppose I did. I was very good at it. Now I don’t have to bother. Your father hasn’t wanted sex for a long time. He would rather fuss over his gun collection or go to the range with his buddies.”

Macy smiled at the inappropriate but predictable turn in the conversation. “Daddy didn’t lose interest in sex. He just found other outlets.”

Ruth’s head jerked up. “I know he’s had affairs. You’re not telling me anything.”

“You know what I mean, Mom.”

Ruth gave her an indulgent smirk. “You know dear, you never have been quite right. There was always something cruel in you, even as a little girl. We didn’t dare let you have a pet.”

Macy’s face went hard and dark. “You know what I mean, don’t you?”

Ruth clutched her glass in both hands, her knuckles turning white. Then she smiled sweetly and crawled toward the rum.

“Come on! When Daddy tried to talk me into breast implants at fifteen, did you really think it was to ‘raise my self-esteem’?”

“You were so poorly endowed, Macy. We thought it might help.”

“You just went along. You always go along. You could have stopped him.”

“Stopped him from what? You refused the surgery. As I recall, you threw a steak knife at your father’s head to make your point, so to speak.”

Macy grew cold. “You knew and you let it happen.”

Ruth waved her hand dismissively. “I couldn’t possibly guess what you are getting at.” She poured more rum, not bothering with ice or Coke, and took a quick gulp.

Macy threw her glass into the lake and drank straight from the bottle. She slammed down the rum.

“When did you decide to leave me to him? It started when you two fought and I got upset. Then he’d come to comfort me. Before long he was comforting me from on top.”

“That never happened!” Ruth was up on her knees, her voice hoarse.

“You know it did.” Macy became calm and deliberate. “It happened the first time right here on the boat. You got drunk. You fought with Daddy and stormed off while I cried. Daddy held me. He ran his hands over my body. And you know what? At first I liked it.”

Ruth reached out her hand to cover Macy’s mouth, but Macy slapped it away.

“You had every man’s attention. You didn’t need either of us. You had yourself and all those eyes. For a while I had Daddy. He talked to me. He took me to the range instead of his buddies. Daddy said we were a team. But it changed. He got rough.”

“Shut up,” Ruth whispered.

“You’re going to hear this.” Macy crawled close to her mother. “How he used to hold me, moan in my ear that it was us against you.”

Ruth lunged. Macy’s auburn hair was short, but not short enough to keep Ruth from yanking her head sideways. Macy grabbed her arm and twisted. Ruth’s cheek smacked against the deck. Macy pressed her face into the wood and caulk.

“You guys all right?” one of the boys called from the other boat.

“Mind your own fucking business!” Macy yelled.

The boys dropped their eyes and went back to work.

Macy leaned down, her hot breath in Ruth’s ear. “Then his hands went lower. It felt wrong, but it felt good. His face twisted over me when he came. I know that face as well as you do.”

Ruth thrashed against Macy, but she was too strong.

“He used to push into me and groan my name, not yours. ‘Macy, Macy’.”

Ruth convulsed under Macy’s weight, gasping.

“Each time was less tender. Did it happen that way with you? He began to hurt me. I wanted it to stop. I knew that other fathers didn’t do these things. Why didn’t you stop him? I knew I would have to stop him myself, and I did. I made him an ugly little promise one night when he was with me. After that he left me alone, not that he wanted to.”

Ruth stopped struggling, helpless in Macy’s grip. She began to mutter, her cheeks glossy with tears. “You took him away from me.”

“No, Mom. I was twelve. You are the seductress.” Macy drew out the word into a hiss.

“You were never twelve! You were a devious slut rubbing your cunt on my husband’s knee. I’m glad he hurt you! Now get off of me. I want you off this boat, out of my house.”

“Fine. Oh, by the way, I flunked out of Michigan. Just thought you should know. I got tired of giving old men blow jobs to stay in school. And for what? To be you?” She meant to land a knockout blow as she backed out of the clinch. “Take your fading charms back to Daddy. Maybe if you whisper my name in his ear he’ll want to fuck you again.” Macy let go, backing away a step.

Ruth rose to her knees and took a backhanded swipe at Macy’s face, claws extended. Macy easily evaded the blow and shoved her mother down hard. She grabbed her clothes and jumped to the dock. The boys on the other boat ignored her defiant exit. They watched the fuming beauty in the yellow thong bikini.

There was time. Ruth wouldn’t come home until she had finished the bottle of rum and slept it off on the yacht. Her father was out of town again. Macy was glad to be finished with this life, these people. She didn’t need them anymore. She had an offer of easy work in the Caribbean. True, she had to have a little start-up money, but her parents had plenty. She would take what she needed.

Macy bounded up the steps to the second floor two at a time. She pushed open the double doors to the master suite. A giant four-poster bed stood immaculate against the far wall, not a wrinkle in the red velvet spread. Short lamps with dimmer switches stood on understated night stands at either side. Over the bed was an oil painting of a nude woman reclining in orgasmic ecstasy. The room was a monument to the sex life her mother longed for. She spent most nights in it alone.

There was little of her father here. When he didn’t stay out all night, he often slept in the guest bedroom. He would never leave her, though. She was a prop central to the image he presented to his wealthy patients and friends—handsome, prosperous, Grosse Point plastic surgeon and his cosmetically enhanced trophy wife. Pillar of the community. Supporter of the Arts. Responsible member of the cultural elite. “Fuck him,” Macy said aloud.

Her mother had more credit cards than she ever used. If Macy could find one, it wouldn’t be missed until the next statement. She found what she was looking for when she opened the third drawer. In the bottom tray of a jewelry box, full of ornaments Ruth rarely wore, was a loose pile of credit cards. With it was something she didn’t expect to find. Cash. So her mother kept mad money. Macy lay the cards on the dresser top and opened the neatly folded bills. She counted out twenty crisp hundreds. She briefly thought of taking all of it, but if her mother missed it she would check the credit cards next. Macy counted out ten of the bills, dropping them on the dresser as she did.

She tried to leave things just as she found them. She carefully folded the remaining cash to look as much like the original two grand as she could. She placed the cash and credit cards back into the jewelry box, except for a single Visa card.

One last look around the room and Macy pulled closed the doors to her parents’ bedroom. She walked the length of the wide landing to her own room to gather the few things she needed.

A big duffle bag sat half unpacked by the bed. There was nothing on the sand beige walls but one oil seascape over the head of her bed. Her mother had chosen it to fit the color scheme of the room, not because she especially liked the artist. There was an antique lamp centered on a doily on the dresser. The old oak desk was bare except for her car keys. The queen-sized bed had an expensive hand-stitched quilt her mother had picked out at a local craft fair. It was like a room at a bed and breakfast—clean, homey and completely devoid of anything Macy.

She opened the top drawer of the dresser and stuffed the few things she had unpacked back into the duffle, threw the strap over her shoulder and marched down the stairs without looking back. She walked by her father’s office on the way out. She froze in the doorway and looked at the giant mahogany desk, the gun safe, the brass lamps, a wall full of diplomas, citations and honors. She couldn’t just walk away. Not a chance.

Macy’s fire-red Beemer convertible sat in the drive with the top down. It was a high school graduation present from her father. William Cochrane gave things easily. He accepted blame never. The car was compensation, not an apology. She stowed her bag in the trunk, then walked back into the garage. After a few minutes of rummaging around, she found what she was looking for.

Macy went to the front of the house. A broad and neatly manicured lawn separated the tree-lined street from the pure white of the tasteful clapboard house.

Macy shook the paint can, the tiny metal ball inside making a muffled clink. Starting at the far end of the house, she sprayed, reaching high on her toes, bending low past her knees. She worked her way across the front of the house in billboard-sized letters. When she was finished, she threw the empty can into the hedges.

Blue smoke trailed after the Beemer as she peeled out into the street, cutting off a screeching Caddy. The old driver flipped her off and swore, turning his golf-capped head to watch the nutcase speed away. On the front of the house, black, dripping letters six feet high, from corner to corner of the pristine facade, read CHILD MOLESTER.

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