Free Vanilla Ride by Joe R. Lansdale Page A

not even sure Tanedrue might not blame you for their situation. There’s no future there for you, Gadget.”
    “There’s no future for me anywhere,” Gadget said. “Just let them do what they want.”
    “That’s the drug willies talking,” I said.
    “We’re going to get her help,” JoAnna said, and she reached out and touched Gadget’s shoulder.
    Gadget shook her head. “No use, Mama. I’m lost.”
    “No, you’re not, honey,” Rachel said, and I saw the fire in her eyes. She had it, always did. I knew what Marvin saw in her first time I met her, and right now I was seeing it again.
    “Don’t talk that way, baby,” JoAnna said. “You’re not the first one to make a mistake. I’ve made a few.”
    “Yeah, but I made more than a few in less time,” Gadget said.
    That floated for a moment, then I said, “This business boils down to this: Marvin, you and your family need to pack up some things and hit the road.”
    “You act like these guys are fucking CIA,” Marvin said. “They’re a bunch of goobers.”
    “It’s not the original goobers I’m worried about,” I said. “It’s all them other goobers.”
    “With me and Hap here, the rest of you gone,” Leonard said, “it makes for a smaller target. And we’re not an easy target.”
    “I can vouch for that,” Marvin said. “I thought you two would be dead years ago.”
    “Gee, thanks,” Leonard said.
    “Actually, that was a kind of a compliment,” Brett said.
    “Oh,” Leonard said. “My bad.”
    “But this is my mess,” Marvin said.
    I nodded, said, “Now I’m really going to pour on the juice. You’re a cripple and you’ll just get in our way. We need you to whip someone’s ass with your cane again, we’ll call you up. But we’re past that. Maybe way past. Way I see it, Tanedrue may just let us out of the picture. He’s got nothing to gain. He’s not getting his drugs back, and I bet he can figure pretty quick we don’t have that kind of money to pay back what it was worth. So he could let us go.”
    “That’s what I think,” Marvin said. “That’s what I always thought.”
    “On the other hand,” I said, “he lets us go, then he can’t even tell his bosses that he avenged the loss, and I think he’s the kind of guy that thinks he’s some kind of player, wants to look good in front of his posse. Last time he tried that, he got his ass kicked. So he could feel vengeful. Power, control, being in charge, that’s all very important to these little sucks, and it’s even more important to the middlemen and the men at the top. The other thing”—and I looked at Gadget when I said this—“they may come for Gadget. Not because Tanedrue loves her—”
    “He does, you know,” Gadget said. “He does.”
    “Sure he does,” Leonard said. “That’s why he beats on your ass.”
    “I get out of line,” Gadget said.
    “Honey,” Brett said, “that is pure-dee ole bullshit. Unless you’re trying to kill him and he’s fighting back, you aren’t out of line enough to warrant any kind of physical beating. You think we’re in fucking Afghanistan. Pardon my French.”
    Gadget put her head on the table. JoAnna put her hand on Gadget’s back and looked hard at Brett. Brett looked back equally hard. JoAnna averted her gaze. I could sympathize. When Brett put “that look” on you, you didn’t want to mess with her. In her eyes you could see the next world war.
    “What Hap was saying,” Leonard said, “guy like this, he might come and try and get Gadget. He might even come to kill her.”
    Gadget lifted her head. “He wouldn’t. He loves me.”
    “There’s no way to argue with that,” I said. “She believes it and you can’t talk her out of it. Not until the drugs are out of her system. And even then, not easily.”
    “You don’t know nothin’,” Gadget said, jumping up from the table, running to the back of the house, disappearing into a bedroom, slamming the door.
    JoAnna looked at me, said, “No