Page 24 of Midnight

“Blood loss,” Gunner said. “Seen it dozens of times when questioning hospitalized witnesses and perps. That whole blood transfusion should help.”

“Truth,” Asher said, and leaned forward. “I want to talk to some of Dad’s regular customers. Find out if he’d had trouble with anyone recently. But I don’t know who to call.”

Dylan stood up. “Is anybody else hungry besides me?”

“There’s a cafeteria. I know where it is,” Gunner said.

Asher frowned. “Have you been here before?”

“Naw… I asked an orderly who was out in the hall. Wherever I am, I like to know my options,” Gunner said.

“Then lead the way,” Dylan said.

They stood in unison and headed for the elevator.

Chapter 5

Everett and Freddie Brandt were back in Amarillo, hiding in their rooms with the shades down and the curtains pulled, and their car only yards away from the exit door.

They couldn’t look at themselves in the mirror, and wouldn’t look at each other. Freddie was afraid to open his mouth and make Everett mad. He would never have guessed that his brother had the balls to kill someone, and now he felt afraid for himself. He was always doing something wrong. What if Everett got fed up and just shot him, too?

Everett was bothered that he’d had to do it, but after Freddie popped off about selling the bar, it became an act of self-preservation. He had no idea that he’d put the fear of God in Freddie, and would have been horrified to know that Freddie was now afraid of him. It had yet to occur to Everett that Freddie had left his DNA all over Jacob Kingston when he tackled him. All he knew was that they bungled what they’d set out to do, and killed a man.

They were sitting in the darkened rooms with the TV on low, waiting for the local news to air. They needed to know if they’d been made, and how far and how fast they should run.

Freddie was hunkered down on one end of the sofa and Everett on the other.

“I wish we’d never gone to see Pop,” Freddie muttered.

Everett frowned. “What do you mean?”

“If we hadn’t gone, then he would have died without telling us what he did, right? And if we didn’t know it, then we wouldn’t be in this trouble,” Freddie said.

“Just because Pop told us what he did, didn’t mean we had to act on it,” Everett said.

Freddie’s eyes widened. “Then if we didn’t have to, why did we do it?”

“It was our inheritance,” Everett muttered.

Freddie frowned. “I don’t know what that means. Pop stole money and gave it to Brenda. So that makes it hers, right?”

Everett’s chin jutted stubbornly. “But she’s dead, Freddie. So, by rights, now it’s ours.”

Freddie sighed. “I don’t want it. I just want all this to go away. Can’t we just forget about it?”

“Well, we can’t just forget about it, can we, Freddie? Because a man is dead, and the cops won’t quit looking for us. We’re either going to jail, or we’re going to die. Depends on who shoots first.”

Freddie dropped his head and started bawling. “I don’t wanna die.”

“I don’t suppose Jacob Kingston was planning on dying, either, but he did, didn’t he? We don’t always get what we want. If we can find that money, we’ll have all we need to get out of the country. Live in style in Mexico,” Everett said, and upped the volume. It was almost time for the evening news.

When it began airing, as always, it led with a teaser about their biggest story, and to their horror, it was about the break-in and shooting at the Tumbleweed Bar, then went to a commercial.

“Well, we made the news,” Everett muttered.

“What do we do?” Freddie asked.

“Nothing yet. They don’t know our names. They don’thave any witnesses, beyond whoever was driving that black truck, and I think it was just making a U-turn. Our car wasn’t parked out front. We parked on the side, remember? I bet they didn’t even know anything was going on.”