Page 40 of Road Refugees

Chapter Thirteen

Heaven

“Yeah, that’s the work of Byron Riddlesberger, all right.”

Tanner Principato was a surly, gruff, manly sort. I was beginning to think all Bare Boners were like that, aside from maybe Wolf Glaser. Tanner was the guy who’d owned Paws-n-Gauze, the airlifting service for injured rescue dogs. When he wasn’t at med school, he helped his wife run Hang Town Ranch somewhere nearby. Townshend had visited there once. It was a refuge for battered dogs, so of course Town had immediately called Tanner when we’d reached the log cabin. He came out with his wife Unity, an inked spokeswoman for the cannabusiness. The people one met in Arizona! Mickey Finn was resting comfortably in our mudroom on top of a crazy amount of blankets Town threw at us. She was breathing fast and shallow, but I felt all of her major bones and didn’t find anything broken.

Linus had nipped at our heels the entire way home. Now he had bedded down near Mickey, not close enough to annoy her, but to tell her he was there for her. Mickey could not look at us, maybe associating us with her former torturers. If we came close, she lifted her nose to the ceiling, making us mentally vanish. I realized everything is new to her. Even lying in a room without bars was new. She listlessly lapped up water I gave her but proceeded to pee her blankets. She did not know how to go outdoors. I guessed her to be about three years old, some of her limbs crooked from the cramped cage. Unity was with her now as we all convened in the living room. It wasn’t cold, but I was stoking a fire just to be doing something—to create a homey atmosphere, I suppose. I was good at that, and not much else.

But not all Arizonans were outstanding. Tanner was just confirming that Riddlesberger was, once more, the culprit in a lowdown and deadly scheme.

Town gestured. “Lytton told me a few weeks ago that the Friends of Distinction don’t push up on you in your territory.”

“True,” Tanner barked. He seemed more of an army officer than Town, the gold-hearted man who wouldn’t hurt a spider. “They don’t interfere with us. And their power base is Flagstaff now, I fucking suppose. But yeah, that colossal asswad has some property, if you take the exit for Highway Lake, it’s up there. Mostly Leonbergers like this one.”

I had seen that turnoff. It made my skin crawl thinking of Riddlesberger so close by.

Tanner continued, “Maybe Lytton didn’t want to blow your mind, seeing as how you’re so close to your service dog. Maybe he thought it wouldn’t matter, wouldn’t come up.”

Town’s eyes flashed. “Boy, did it come up. Tanner, you’ve got to see the destruction this colossal asswad created. He could’ve given those dams to the humane society.”

“Or to us,” growled Tanner. “That’s what we fucking created Hang Town Ranch for. To rehab injured and abused animals.”

I interrupted. I wasn’t accustomed to butting into the conversations of men, but I knew different rules applied with bikers. “Do you know a scrotum named Billy ‘Stomach’ Ginsburg? He’s almost a bigger scrotum than Riddlesberger.”

Tanner nodded, serious, hands clasped between his knees. “I know that scrotum. He used to come into town from Highway Lake, once to get some ink at Knoxie’s shop. We ran him out on a fucking rail.”

I wrapped my arms around my torso, looking at the ground. “He was the one who pulled me into that abandoned bar in Flag.”

Town sat even straighter. “Does he have a shaven head with a giant scar?”

I gasped. “That’s him!”

Town said, “After you left the bar—”

“When you saved my life,” I interjected.

“—Navarro, Fred Birdseye, and Funkhauser came busting in, shooting up the place. Someone hit that dirtbag, not sure where, but he went down like a bomb. He might not even be alive anymore.”

“I’d of heard about it,” Tanner said with assurance.

Town pushed on. “If he’s been exited, they have a reason to have their eyes on us.”

“You know what?” Wolf Glaser interjected. “I’ve had it up to here with these twatwaffles pushing up on us like this. It’s time we pushed back. They’ve already basically claimed Flag as their turf. They’ve been shitting on us from a great height for a long time now.”

“I know,” agreed Tanner. “But it’d create a huge clusterfuck if we just barged on in there taking everyone to the ground. We need a subtler approach.”

Wolf nodded. “We need Santiago Slayer.”

Tanner lifted his chin at Wolf, indicating his agreement. Right off the bat, Wolf stood and whipped his cellphone out, walking toward the back sliding door.

Santiago Slayer? Was that a real person? Didn’t having a name like that make him the center of attention?

Crybaby said, “I thought Slayer was acting in telenovelas in Mexico City. Using the name Santiago Segovia.”

“He was,” said Wolf. “But his posting of backstage antics with actresses on Instagram gave him too much exposure. The wife of someone he smoked recognized him from the hit, so he had to go back underground. Tanner’s probably telling Tobiah to post an ad in Craigslist.”

I asked the logical question. “What is Craigslist?”