Raylan

HE'S A FEDERAL MARSHAL FROM THE HILLS OF

HE'S DISPATCHED DRUB DEALERS AND KIDNAPPERS. BUT CAN HE HANDLE A FEMME FATALE WHO KNOWS

HOW TO USE A SCALPEL?

Oy| Wl A 41 Givens was holding a federal warrant to serve on a l\n I L/i/T man in the marijuana trade known as Angel Arenas, 47, born in the U.S. but 100 percent of him Hispanic.

The state troopers, four of them, watched Raylan and his partner Rachel Brooks, a young black woman, slip on Kevlar vests they wore underneath their U.S. marshal jackets and watched them check their sidearms. Raylan told the officers he didn't expect Angel would resist, but you never knew for sure. He said, "You hear gunfire, come runnin, all right?"

One of the troopers said, "You want, we'll bust in the door for you."

"You're dyin to," Raylan said. "I thought I'd stop by the desk and get a key."

The Kentucky state troopers got a kick out of this marshal, at one time a coal miner from Harlan County. This morning they watched him enter a fugitive felon's motel room without drawing his gun.

There wasn't a sound but the hum of air-conditioning. Sunlight from the windows lay on the king-size bed, unmade but thrown together, the spread pulled up over bedding and pillows. Raylan turned to Rachel and nodded to the bed. Now he stepped over to the bathroom door, not closed all the way, listened and then shoved it open.

Angel Arenas's head rested against the curved end of the bathtub, his hair floating in water that came past his chin, his eyes closed, his body stretched out naked in a tub filled close to the brim with bits of ice in water turning pink.

Raylan said, "Angel...?" Got no response and kneeled at the tub to feel Angel's throat for a pulse. "He's freezing to death but still breathing."

Behind him he heard Rachel say, "Raylan, the bed's full of blood. Like he was killin chickens in there." And heard her say, "Oh my God," suck­ing in her breath as she saw Angel.

Raylan turned the knob to let the water run out, lowering it around Angel, his belly becoming an island in the tub of ice water, blood show­ing in two places on the island.

"He had something done to him," Raylan said. "He's got like staples closing up what look like wounds. Or was he operated on?"

Rachel said, "That's how they did my mother last year, at University of Kentucky Medical. Made one entry below the ribs and the other under her belly button. I asked her why they did it there 'stead of around through her back."

"You gonna tell me what the operation was?"

"They took out her kidneys," Rachel said. "Both of 'em, and she got an almost new pair the same day, from a child who had drowned."

Raylan looked puzzled. "They take 'em out the front?"

"Why not?" Rachel said.

Angel was lying on his back in the hospital bed, his eyes closed. Raylan got down close, brushed Angel's hair out of his face, caught a whiff of hospital breath and said in a whisper, "Did you know," Raylan said, "I saved your life this morning? Another five minutes in that ice water you'd of froze to death. Thank the Lord I got there when I did."

"For what, to arrest me?"

"You're alive, partner, that's the main thing. Maybe a lit­tle pale's all."

Pale—he looked like he was dead.

"They hook my arm to a machine," Angel said. "It keeps me alive long as I can wait for a kidney. Or I have a relative like a brother wants to give me one."

"You have a brother?"

"I have someone better."

Smiling now. He was, and Raylan said, "You know I won't tell where you're getting this kidney, you don't want me to."

"Everybody in the hospital knows," Angel said. "They send me a fax. You believe it? The nurse comes in and reads it to me."

"The fax," Raylan said. "You get to buy your kidneys back for how much?"

"A hundred grand," Angel said, "tha's what they offer. You imagine the balls? They bring a surgeon last night so they can take my fucking kidneys and rip me off twice, counting what they stole from me. They say if I only want one kidney is still a hundred grand."

Raylan said, "The hospital knows what's going on?"

"I tole you, everybody knows, the doctors, the nurses. They send the fax, then one of them calls the hospital and makes the arrangement. Nobody saw who deliver them."

"I don't believe I ever heard of this one. You know the hos­pital called the police."

"The police already talk to me. I tole them I don't know these guys. Never saw them before."

"Or know who's telling them what to do?" Raylan said.

Angel stared at Raylan. "I don't follow you."

"You think your guys came up with this new way to score? They can take whoever they want off the street," Raylan said, "while this doctor's scrubbin up for surgery. Why should they be picky, wait for a drug deal to go down?" Raylan paused. He said, "You want, I'll help you out."

"For what? You find product in that motel room? Man, I'm the victim of a crime and you want to fucking put me in jail?"

"Give me a name. I swear on my star you won't have to pay for either one."

He watched Angel shake his head saying, "You have to go in the woods to find them."

"Buddy, it's what I do. I call Lexington with the names and they e-mail me their sheets. I might even know these guys."

"They grow reefer," Angel said, "from here to West Virginia."

Right away Raylan said, "They're Crowes, aren't they?"

South of Barbourville Raylan with Rachel turned off the four-lane and cut east to follow blacktops and gravel roads without names or numbers through these worn-out moun­tains of Knox County, the tops of the grades scalped, strip-mined of coal to leave waste heaps, the creeks down in the hollows tainted with mine acid. They turned off the Stinking Creek road where it forked at Buckeye and drove up a low rise to the cemetery, a field of gravestones marked mills and messer.

"A few have been here more'n 150 years," Raylan said. "That one right there, John Mills, 'Gone to the Mansions of

Rest.' What would you like on your stone?"

"I don't know," Rachel said. "Can I have a few years to think about it?"

"Gobel Messer's says, 'Meet Me in Heaven.' Confident by the time he passed over." Raylan put the car in gear and crept through the cemetery to the far side. He said, "Now look straight ahead. That's Pervis Crowe's store over there through the trees. I make it 60 yards."

Rachel got out her binoculars, raised them and said, "I'm inside the store, nobody shopping this morning. Now a man's in the doorway lighting a cigarette."

"A Camel," Raylan said. "That's Pervis Crowe. His boys should be along. Have to give their old dad his cut."

"Of what?"

"The money they took off Angel." (continued on page 168)

RAYLAN

(continued from page 80)

"How do we know that?" Rachel still watching the store.

"DEA says Pervis runs the show, he's Big Daddy. The boys hang out, get stoned and chase girls, till the dad tells 'em what he wants done. Does it all from that dinky store. He's the marijuana king of East Ken­tucky, but DEA can't put it on him and make it stick."

Rachel said, "The Crowes' daddy's in the body-parts business now?"

"No, and won't believe his boys are," Raylan said.

"You believe him?" Rachel said.

"Yeah, 'cause he can't imagine himself doing it."

Rachel was looking off.

"Finally here come somebody. Looks like a brother drivin the Cadillac. Only one in the car."

She handed Raylan the glasses.

He raised them saying, "DEA has this guy with the boys only a couple weeks. Drives Coover and Dickie around. His name's Cuba something. It's in my notes with a mug shot."

She opened Raylan's folder and said, "Cuba Franks, 45-year-old African Ameri­can.... Five arrests, two convictions."

He raised the glasses again and watched this guy with the strange name lift a case of Budweiser out of the trunk and hold it in the fingers of one hand to hang down against his leg as he closed the trunk lid. Going toward the store he had the case in both hands again, kicked the bottom of the screen door for Pervis to come open it for him.

Raylan lowered the glasses.

"What's in the beer case?"

"I doubt any Bud," Rachel said, "the way he was holdin it."

"I think it's the old dad's cut," Raylan said. "We'll get out of here and let Cuba run into us down the road."

They drove to where the Buckeye fork came out and waited in the narrow strip of road.

"He's coming," Raylan said, watching dust rising into the trees, watching the Cadillac coming straight at them until it braked and rolled to a stop about 30 feet from the front end of the Audi loaned off the DEA lot in Harlan.

"Wants us to walk up there," Raylan said. "Look us over."

"Now he's got his cell out making a call."

"Who you think he's talking to?"

"Coover and Dickie Crowe."

They sat in the car waiting. Finally Cuba got out of the Cadillac and came toward them, taking his time.

"Turn your recorder on," Raylan said. "Gonna come up on your side."

Cuba did, giving Rachel a nice smile as he leaned in, his hands on the windowsill.

"How you doin? Have some car trouble?"

Rachel said, "Mr. Franks, we'd like to

ask you a few questions and see your driv­er's license." She held up her star hanging from her neck on a chain.

Cuba saw the badge and straightened, looked at the sky before coming back to the window.

"What'd I do? You people been all over me since I got my job."

"We're marshals service," Rachel said. "DEA's the one botherin you."

"I still haven't done nothin. I'm workin as a chauffeur."

"Driving the marijuana boys around?"

"I don't hear their business," Cuba said.

He handed his chauffeur's license to Rachel.

Raylan said, "Cuba, why don't you get in the car so we can talk."

"It's Cooba, how you say my name. But I haven't done nothin, I'm clean, done my time."

Raylan said, "Cooba? Open the door and get in the car."

He did, and Raylan adjusted his mirror.

"What're you doing with the Crowes?"

"I drive 'em around. I was in the racin business, same as their daddy. Quarter-mile dirt, slide through the turns, man. The Crowes thought they could drive— have a pickup with juice? I scared 'em to death showin what real drivin's like. Throw it in reverse, hit the gas, pull the hand brake and spin around."

"Hey, Cooba?" Raylan said. "Every boy in Harlan County knows how to do a reverse 180. Taught by their grampas. So why'd the Crowes hire you?"

"I 'magine so they can sit back, take it easy."

Raylan said, looking at the mirror, "The boys hired you or you hired them? Couple of dumbbells, do the lifting for you."

"Yeah, I'm the boss," Cuba said. "I wait in the car someplace they havin a good time, I'm listenin to Loretta Lynn."

"It's a good cover," Raylan said, "work­ing as their chauffeur. They don't get arrested, you don't either. How much of a cut they get for helping with Angel? Put-tin him in the ice water? Once the doctor removed his kidneys."

Cuba in the mirror stared, didn't say a word.

"Like you don't know what I'm talkin about," Raylan said. "You wouldn't have to've been there. Less you brought the doctor to the motel. That how it worked? I'm thinkin the doctor must've hired you. Caught you stealin his car and signed you up. You look around for some dumb white boys and hire the Crowes?"

"You telling me," Cuba said, "I got somethin goin with takin people's kid­neys and then sellin 'em?"

"I see you as the middleman," Raylan said, "between the doctor and the Crowes."

"You want to talk to Coover and Dickie? Ask 'em about stealin kidneys?" Cuba said, "I be anxious to see that."

Raylan was back in Harlan, reporting to his boss, Art Mullen, Art telling him, "Two

young men, both salesmen, woke up in hospitals without their kidneys. One in Lexington, the other Richmond, two days apart and the week before Angel lost his."

"I remember seein it on the news," Raylan said, "but didn't relate it to any­thing we're doing—yeah, until we found Angel in the tub."

"One thing we know for sure," Art said, "it wasn't the Crowes wearing the rub­ber masks. Both fellas said a man and a woman."

"The president and Mrs. Obama out havin fun," Raylan said. "Making about 20 grand every time they put on their masks." He said, "Imagine you open the door and there the Obamas calling on you? They come in the motel room talking." He said to Art, "Who's playing Michelle?"

Art said, "I guess the doctor brought... a nurse?"

"Who did...? Cuba Franks?"

It stopped Art. Now he was shaking his head.

"What's wrong with me—Michelle Obama's playing doctor."

"It can't be anybody else, can it?" Raylan said. "Don't we have tapes of their state­ments? What the two guys remember?"

"If you want to believe it," Art said.

"It sounded good to me," Raylan said. "Michelle walks up and kisses the guy on the mouth."

Art nodded. "They both gave us

pretty much the same story. How she

approached, got real close "

"She lifts her mask from under her chin," Raylan said, "to free her mouth and presses it into his. The last thing he remembers is getting turned on. As they come apart she hits him with the nee­dle. He dreams of making out with the first lady while she's taking out his kid­neys. I bet you anything," Raylan said, "we find her at UK Medical's transplant center in Lexington."

"The only thing wrong with that," Art said, "there aren't any women doctors on the staff. I checked. The days we're look­ing at, two of the nurses from transplant were away on leave. Gladys, 35 years help­ing to swap old organs for new ones, is now a coordinator, came back from her leave and posted her dad's death notice in the nurses' room. The other one's Layla."

"She have a death in the family?"

"Layla took a two-week leave to nurse her old mom back to health. She says."

Raylan watched them come out of surgery, both in white lab coats, Layla holding the door for Dr. Bob, the young doctor doing most of the talking, Layla using her hands to gesture, shaking her head, talking her way out of whatever Bob wanted to do. Like get laid. Down the hall, he was open­ing his hands to Layla, the hands he had used to restore someone's life and it had given him a hard-on.

They were coming this way again.

Raylan walked up to them—didn't look at Layla—and said, "Excuse me, doctor,

but my sister's suppose to be here, seein about having a kidney transplant?"

Layla, a knockout in her mid-30s, said, "What's her name?'

"Raejeanne Givens," Raylan said, his younger sister's name. "I don't know why I don't see any family. I came straight from the airport."

Layla said, "Let's check on Raejeanne," laying her hand on Raylan's arm and giv­ing the doctor what Raylan saw as a kiss-off look with a shrug. Dr. Bob walked past him without a word and on down the hall.

She said, "I'm Layla. The doctor just finished a kidney transplant and you say Raejeanne needs one? That's funny, 'cause we don't have a Raejeanne scheduled for anything, not even an exam." Layla raising her eyebrows with kind of a smile.

"It doesn't matter," Raylan said. "You didn't look happy talking to Dr. Bob. I thought I may as well step in, see if I could free you. You seemed to pick up on it."

She said, "You want to question me about something?"

"What I'm looking for," Raylan said, "is a doctor takes out kidneys in motel rooms and sells them on the body-parts market."

She was smiling now. "You're crazy."

"Two of 'em said it was a woman took their kidneys. I thought, Well, maybe the doctor had a woman's mask on. You put the donated kidneys in the front too?"

"You put them anywhere you want," Layla said. "What kind of mask was it?"

"Rubber, slips over your head. I think it was suppose to be Mrs. Obama."

"Really."

"Well, the other mask, I'm pretty sure, was the president."

Layla said, "The other mask...?"

"The one Cuba Franks was wearing."

Raylan let that hang to see if Layla could handle it.

She took a moment to shake her head and shrug in her white transplant nurse outfit. Layla said, "I wish I could help you," started to turn away and stopped. She said, "Why can't the doctor be a woman?"

"I'm told all the MDs here are men."

"She could be from another hospital."

"You're right, except Cuba knows this place. He's been here once or twice with his boss, Harry Burgoyne. You know Cuba Franks?"

"I don't think so," Layla said. "I wish I could help you," and started to walk away.

Raylan let her take a few steps before saying to her, "Layla, you're not the one stealing kidneys, are you?"

He may as well get that said, thinking it would stop her and she'd turn around. Not Layla. She raised her hand over her head to give Raylan a lazy kind of wave, often seen in movies.

Cuba was staying with Layla in her apart­ment on Virginia Avenue, the other side of South Limestone from the UK campus

and hospitals; Cuba on the pull-out sofa, Layla with the bedroom to herself when they weren't using it. She liked to come home and have a drink while she took off her whites and sat down to watch the news in a T-shirt and panties. It would turn Cuba on and they'd go in the bedroom. Layla never said a word and he'd wait for the gasp, the groan, like all the air was being sucked out of her.

This evening she came in talking about Raylan Givens and Cuba felt a tug in his gut and thought, Shit, though it didn't surprise him. The man kept on the job.

Layla stepped up to him in her nurse outfit, put her arms around his neck and kissed him on the mouth from tender to hard. Finally easing off she said, "I think we should hold up on doing Harry. The marshal would've talked to him. This might blow your mind, but I'm thinking the one to do next is the marshal. We wouldn't even have to lure him. Raylan has more ques­tions for me."

"Where you want to do it, here?" "I was thinking right in the tub." "How we get him out of here?" "In the wee small hours of the morning," Layla said, not quite singing it, "we drop him out the window, put him in the car.... Or we wait till he's coming to and walk him out to the car."

"You haven't figured it out yet," Cuba said. "I will," Layla said.

Art Mullen said, "You want to take some­one along."

"I got to locate her first. I'll call her again or go over there, 156 Virginia Avenue, push her buzzer till she answers. I wanted to give her time to get jumpy before I make my appearance."

At 2:30 a.m. he put on his cowboy hat and went to visit Miss Layla.

Raylan used his burglar picks to open the front door without disturbing the manager. He went up the stairs to Layla's apart­ment and knocked on the door. He stood before the peephole in his hat—no way she wouldn't know him—and knocked again, giving the door three firm raps.

He waited.

She'd be looking at him by now, wonder­ing how to play it.

"I'm not here to make an arrest," Raylan said, his face close to the door. "I want to talk to you about something."

Finally he heard her voice.

"At three in the morning?"

"I been trying to get hold of you," Ray­lan said. "You told the hospital you took leave to nurse your mom back to health, but you never went near her. You know the time I mean?"

There was a silence.

Her voice said, "I met my boyfriend. I actually was in New Orleans."

"Let's get him to vouch for you," Raylan said, "and I'll quit worryin about it."

"He's married," Layla's voice said.

"I could have a word with him," Raylan said. "What's his name?"

"I don't want to get him in trouble."

"I start arrestin people for committin adultery I'd never get home for supper."

Layla's voice said, "Wait till I put some­thing on."

Raylan imagined Layla standing on the other side of the door bare-naked and wanted to come back with a cool line, but couldn't think of anything that wasn't stu­pid and said, "Okay," and waited.

Cuba had pulled on his pants and was strip­ping the bedding from the sofa. He said, "Raylan," shaking his head. "I could hear you lyin to each other."

Layla had on a black kimono with touches of red here and there. She told Cuba to put on his shoes and wait in the bedroom. "With your gun," Layla said. "He comes in, we'll lie to each other some more. I'll see how it goes, the kind of mood he's in. I'll have the needle ready." She looked around the room. "Maybe in the kitchen. I'll get him relaxed first."

"When he ain't lookin," Cuba said, "you pop him with the needle?"

"And you take him out when we're fin­ished," Layla said. "Get him to disappear."

"Not hang him on a corner and call emergency?"

"He knows us," Layla said. "He gets on dialysis we're fucked." She took time to look at Cuba and said, "Am I right?"

Cuba said, "You always right, aren't you?"

She opened the door and said to Ray­lan, "Follow me," and took him through the living room to the kitchen, where two vodkas over ice waited on the coun­ter. She watched him grin as she handed him one.

"To ease me down," Raylan said. "Tell you the truth, I came here with the same idea. Let you know I'm not gonna snitch on you, tell the hospital you didn't take off to see your old mom. She wouldn't of known you, you wore a sign with your name on it."

"I told you, I met my boyfriend," Layla said.

"His name Cuba Franks?"

Layla gave him a tired look, shaking her head. "Whoever Cuba is, he's not my boyfriend."

"He brought his boss to the hospital a couple times. Mr. Harry Burgoyne?"

"I still don't remember him," Layla said. "Why don't you finish your drink and leave?"

"You haven't eased me down," Raylan said, "have you? The Crowe brothers did some work for Cuba one time. Lifted Angel Arenas on the bed to get his kid­neys removed. I thought, Why didn't they do him in the tub, save messin up the bed? I guess they were still learning. The Crowes gave Angel a week to come up with a hundred grand—the second biggest mistake Cuba ever made, hookin up with the Crowes."

Layla had to ask:

"What was his first mistake?"

"Getting involved with Miss Transplant," Raylan said. "Why he's hiding in the bed­room right now."

She said, "You can't just...search my apartment."

"I've got cause," Raylan said. "Reason to believe a wanted felon's in there."

"Why you've come after me all of a sud­den," Layla said, "I'll never know." She moved closer to Raylan leaning on the yellow-tile counter, his body against the fucking drawer she had to open to get the needle.

"You learned how watching, 11 years on nurse's pay. Only you do your surgery in motel rooms."

"I think you're crazy," Layla said. "You want to look in the bedroom? Go ahead."

She threw her cigarette in the sink and watched him walk out of the kitchen in his cowboy hat. Layla opened the drawer and picked up the syringe.

Now the tricky part: walk up behind him and jab the needle into his arm before he saw her. She tested the needle, got a squirt and went after Raylan, almost to the bedroom, his left hand reaching for the doorknob, right hand slipping inside his suit coat. Behind him now Layla said, "Raylan...?" Saw him hesitate, start to turn his head and jabbed the needle hard through his coat and into his right arm. Saw his hand come out holding the Glock. Saw him look at her, his eyes turn­ing dreamy, his knees giving up, and he stumbled against the door, hat on, gun still in his hand, Raylan in his good-looking navy suit sliding to the floor.

"Cuba? You can come out now."

They dragged him to the bathroom and stripped off his clothes, everything, Layla using scissors to open the legs of his pants to pull them over his curl-toed cowboy boots, Cuba thinking they looked custom-made. Layla had Raylan's hat cocked on her head, not knowing how to wear it. She took his legs, Cuba his upper body, straining to lift Raylan over the side of the tub. Cuba thought he should be higher, so his chin wasn't on his chest; it didn't look right.

"We should move him up higher," Cuba said.

She was looking at his privates, Cuba pretty sure she'd make a remark.

"Would you say he's hung or not?"

"A guy knows how to use what he has," Cuba said, "or he don't." He looked at Raylan again. "I want to ease him up so he's higher in the tub."

Knowing she'd say something else.

"Why? What difference does it make?" She said, "Do what you want, as long as he's on his back," and left the bathroom with Raylan's clothes and his gun.

Cuba turned to watch her, in the bed­room now dropping Raylan's clothes on the bed. He watched her take off the hat and toss it by the clothes, on the bed, and almost yelled at her, Get the hat off the bed, it's bad luck.

He stopped to think, Like what?

They already had the worst kind of luck waiting for them, once they let a federal marshal die. It would be the same as a homicide, their intention being the same as killing him.

Or hang him on a corner and call the hospital.

He'd thought of that. Do it but don't tell her. Give the man a chance.

He looked at Raylan's head against the end of the tub, chin stuck to his chest like he couldn't move it, and saw his face twitch, Raylan's face, like a fly was bother­ing him. Now his hand came up his bare chest to his mouth and Cuba turned to the bedroom. He saw Layla in there at the dresser laying out her things for the surgery, her scalpels, her swabs and alco­hol, her staples she'd use to close him up. Cuba raised his voice to tell her, "Girl, he's movin."

He saw her look up at the dresser mirror.

"He's all right. He might not've got the whole shot. I'll be there in a minute, maybe give him another one." She said, "Get him comfortable and he'll nod off."

Raylan heard her say, "Goddamnit, I didn't bring gloves."

He heard her say, "Not that it matters."

He could see Cuba with 20/20 vision he was so close. In the tub with him, bend­ing over, trying to hug him and inch his deadweight up higher, Cuba straddling his legs. Maybe all they gained was an inch. He could hear, but it was like you were all the way taken down by shine. No, straight whiskey. With shine you felt you were quadriplegic and didn't dare try to talk. Bourbon turned you alive.

Cuba said, "I get a hold on you, you take hold of me and pull yourself up. You know what I'm sayin? Pull yourself up as I push."

Raylan got his hands under Cuba's arms, trying to get a hold on Cuba's silk shirt, and it tore down the middle. Cuba said it, "You tore my good shirt."

Raylan said, "Fuck your shirt," let his hands slide down Cuba's back to the Sig Sauer and slipped the gun out of his waist. Raylan and Cuba almost nose to nose in each other's eyes, Raylan wonder­ing if Cuba felt him take it. He looked like he did. Raylan brought the Sig around to Cuba's belly and heard Layla say:

"What're you guys doing, getting it on?"

Raylan looked past Cuba's shoulder to see her standing in the doorway. She said, "Cuba...?" She said, "Cuba, his eyes are fucking open..." and she was gone—in the bedroom getting his gun, Raylan sure of it. Cuba staring in his face.

"She wants me" Raylan said. "Or maybe you, I don't know."

He saw her in the doorway aiming his Glock at him, holding it in one hand and turning sideways to strike a shooter's pose and fired—he saw the gun jump—and fired again and fired again, and Cuba let out a gasp of air and slumped against Raylan, wedging the Sig between them.

He said to Cuba, "You alive?" He didn't get an answer and said, "Or dead." He put his ear to Cuba's mouth but didn't hear a rattle of breath.

Layla said, "Cuba...?"

"I imagine," Raylan said, "he's in hell by now, the poor man. I'm placing you under arrest," Raylan said, "for taking his life. Lay down the weapon." He couldn't

say "your weapon" since it was his. He hoped she'd drop it, the jolt setting off the semi-hair trigger and shoot herself. He felt sometimes he could talk to that gun he called Buddy, to himself. Here we go, Buddy, stay loose. He still had the Sig in his hand stuck between their bodies. But it was coming...and she was firing again, the Glock in both hands now. She fired four rounds at him ducked behind Cuba— Jesus, realizing he was using the man for cover. He pulled out the Sig and extended it past Cuba's shoulder and saw her right there framed in the doorway and put the Sig on her, and hesitated two, three beats and she was gone.

He lay there with Cuba on him think­ing, You didn't shoot her.

Why didn't you? She's standing right there.

It was work to free himself of Cuba, the man not helping any. Raylan lifted his body enough to push it aside and pull himself out of the tub. He checked the Sig, racked the slide to make sure it was loaded and stepped to the doorway.

Layla was on the other side of the bed with his Glock. She looked up and had the gun pointed at him in the same motion. Ray­lan didn't move, standing there naked in his cowboy boots holding the Sig at his leg.

She seemed at ease in her kimono asking him, "How are you feeling?"

"Groggy," Raylan said. "Like I've had too many."

She said, "What's that, Cuba's gun? I hate

to tell you, before you try to use it "

"I checked," Raylan said, "it's loaded." He said, "I don't want to shoot you. Okay?"

She said, "I thought you wanted to arrest me," sounding surprised.

"It's up to you," Raylan said.

"Well, I don't see us shooting it out," Layla said, raising both arms over her head, the kimono coming open enough to show her bare-naked under it.

She said, "Would you like to pat me down?"

This was a first for Raylan: a girl with a gun in her hand exposing herself to him.

Get him horny and shoot him?

It's what she tried.

Swung the Glock down to aim eye-level at him and Raylan raised the Sig past his hip and shot her dead center, inches below the heart, the round punch­ing her off her feet to go down grabbing at the bedspread. Raylan circled in his cowboy boots, picking up his suit coat, put it on and took it off to stand in front of her naked. He stood looking down at her surprised expression, her eyes not yet losing focus, turning to glass. Layla said, "I can't believe you shot me."

Raylan said, "I can't either."

THEY DROVE EAST THROUGH THE WORN-OUT MOUNTAINS OF KNOX COUNTY, THE TOPS OF THE GRADES SCALPED. STRIP-MINED OF COAL

From Raylan by Elmore Leonard, available from William Morrow, an imprint of HarperCollins, on January 31, 2012.