Free The Bootlegger’s Legacy by Ted Clifton

weeks. His primary source of product was currently in Juarez, Mexico, and Pat had established a base of operation in Las Cruces, a quiet little college town of about 25,000 people. Just perfect for his needs—and it wasn’t in Texas. He had a few employees there and in El Paso, Texas, who helped him manage the shipments coming from Mexico. The operation had just become too big for Pat to keep it all in his head. This was very troubling—he felt like he was becoming too visible.
    After he’d outgrown his original supplier he’d started dealing with an Italian Texas family, headed by John Giovanni. He knew almost from the moment the deal was set up that this was probably a mistake. The Giovanni Texas group made him nervous—very nervous. He was sure they knew he was buying from the Mexicans and no doubt didn’t like it. The Texas guys were different. Pat realized a little late that he should have stayed away from them. While most of his dealings were casual and friendly, these guys were really bad people. If it hadn’t been for the network of county, state, and city officials who would only deal with him, he was sure those crooks would have buried him a long time ago. His operation ran smoothly, with little interference from the feds or the state cops, all because he greased a lot of wheels. As a matter of fact, Pat’s business was probably one of the biggest contributors to government corruption—right after the oil industry.
    His Texas connection was the reason he was starting to plan a way to get out. Those hoods seemed more like New Yorkers than Texans, and it was making Pat really nervous. The Mexican guys, by contrast, seemed like gentlemen. They were always very gracious and they seemed to genuinely care that everything was going the way he wanted. He’d been to the homes of the two main owners, down in Juarez, and met their families. He thoroughly enjoyed their company.
    As it turned out, the kid was nine and the birthday party was—well, a birthday party. Cake and ice cream, gifts—Mike liked the Erector set—relatives, neighbors and a bunch of other kids being annoying. Bugs was in her element, as excited as the kids were. Pat snuck off into his office and poured another Wild Turkey, straight up. Much better way to enjoy a kid’s birthday party.
    While sitting and enjoying his drink Pat decided that he would go to Las Cruces the following week. He had his own plane—a Beech Twin Bonanza, a model that had just been introduced the year before. After World War II, it had taken some time for the domestic aircraft industry to come back to life. Pat had learned to fly in the early thirties and seemed to have a knack for it. The plane was something of a secret—Bugs knew nothing about it. It was registered in the name of his company, Blue Devils Development, and it was kept in a hangar at Wiley Post Airport, just a little northwest of the city.
    On his business trips, he always told Bugs he was flying out of Will Rogers Field on Braniff. She never questioned this and had no idea he was flying himself in his own plane—she would have worried herself sick. The plane also usually held some special cargo on the return trip for some of his more discerning customers.
    The next few days were uneventful for Pat—boring, really. He made some rounds to be sure all of his big customers were getting timely shipments and everyone was happy. He called Sally and begged forgiveness for whatever he’d done wrong. He suggested they should go out on the town that night and visit some nightclubs. Sally played hard to get, but eventually relented and said she would meet him at the Lincoln Club—her favorite club and one of his top customers. It was located a couple of blocks from the state capital, and there was always a big delegation of politicians and celebrities.
    Pat pulled his big Cadillac into the Lincoln’s parking lot. Passing up the valet service, he parked the car himself. He wanted to make sure the idiot kid who