Bad Company Read online

  “But what’d you use it for?” the man in the Stetson asked.

  “In theory, it could be an anti-helicopter weapon,” Carroll replied.

  “You’ve tried this?”

  “No, sir. That would be illegal.”

  “Where’d you get these?”

  “I modified them myself.”

  Every overdone thing about the man in the Stetson cried “cop.” Was that why Carroll hedged his answers?

  “These don’t look legal to me,” Stetson man said.

  Carroll’s mouth pursed, a thin, colorless line behind which his lips disappeared. His answer, however, was polite. “Thirty-seven millimeter shells are legal if you use one and a quarter ounces of propellant and if the barrel of the flare gun doesn’t impart a twist to the shell when fired.”

  Stetson man opened a flare gun, held it up to the light, and peered down the barrel. He hefted one of the rounds.

  Carroll might be right, Mai decided. Properly placed in the target, say the fuel tank, that might bring down an unarmored ‘copter. Surely, this modification was illegal? No matter. What interested her was Carroll’s ability to modify flare guns and their cartridges to turn the combo into a pocket-sized RPG.

  Stetson man thanked Carroll and walked away empty-handed. Mai pretended to read a pamphlet on why feminism was a tool of the New World Order and brought Siobhan Dochartaigh to the surface.

  He’d seen her when she was a half-dozen tables away and recognized her at once. The red hair was hard to miss, and she again stood out in a crowd of beer-belly husbands and polyester-clad wives. Watching her, he’d only half-assed listened to the dude in the Stetson. The guy kept talking, and Carroll was certain she’d walk off in another direction. He’d probably been rude to a potential customer, but this woman was a good enough excuse for missing a sale.

  When she stepped up to his table and looked over the pamphlets, his mouth went dry. He picked up the room-temperature bottle of water the convention center provided and swallowed some.

  Her jeans were tight and flared at the ankle to accommodate a pair of sturdy, black boots. Beneath the same, well-worn bomber jacket he’d seen before, she wore a cotton tee-shirt. It didn’t mold to her shape but didn’t hide it either. No telltale of a wedding ring. Around her neck was a leather thong with an odd-shaped charm: three swirls emerging from a solid center. He didn’t remember that from before. A sparse scattering of freckles splayed over her nose and cheekbones, and she wore a hint of green eye shadow and mascara. He focused on her mouth, lips shining with some copper-colored gloss he bet was far more sophisticated than the flavored crap his kid sister chewed off her lips.

  Sophisticated. Yeah, that was the word. But that daunted him. He was an underemployed ex-soldier from a small town; his first significant exposure to another culture had been Operation Desert Storm.

  No, he thought, remember the time you walked up to the best-looking woman in a bar and dropped a line on her? He’d been in uniform at the time, and it was right after the Gulf War when women gave fucks to soldiers as an act of patriotism. He cleared his throat so he wouldn’t squeak when he spoke.

  She looked up at him and smiled. “That guy you were talking to,” she said, and he savored the sound of her accent. “Copper.”

  Shit, he thought. “Yeah, spotted that right away,” he lied. “Uh, how’d you know?”

  “They have a universal stench about them.”

  “Uh, you don’t remember me, do you? We, uh, talked a couple of months ago in Las Vegas. About Killeen.”

  “Oh, yes, of course. You’re Jay, right?”

  “Yeah, and you’re Siobhan. How, uh, how have you been?”

  “Good, and yourself?”

  “Great, just great.” God, Carroll thought, could you be more lame?

  “What’s that you’re selling there the copper was so interested in?”

  That was a good opening. Talking about his wares.

  He picked up the flare gun, opened it to show her it was empty, and handed it over. His voice deepened to a professional timbre. That always happened when he talked about something he knew well.

  “It’s a standard-issue, military flare gun with some modifications so you can fire this cartridge.” He held the flare gun and the cartridge a good distance apart so no one could accuse him of loading the gun.

  “Jesus Wept,” she said, “you could take down a helicopter with that. Short range, of course, but doable.”

  Her knowledge startled him. Most women he’d encountered shunned weapons. “Exactly,” he replied. “That’s what it’s designed for.”

  “You come up with that?”

  “No, a guy on the circuit showed me.” He replaced the items on the table, his fingers drumming as he thought about how to prolong this encounter. “Why’d you tell me that guy was a cop?”

  “I’m not fond of coppers mostly, but I didn’t know if that flare gun combo was legal. I thought I should warn you.”

  He smiled, and his wink came almost naturally. “They’re both within ATF parameters. Separately. And thanks. For, uh, the warning.”

  “You’re welcome. What’s ATF?”

  “Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms. Feds. G-men. They regulate gun sales in the U.S.”

  “I see. Well, wouldn’t the Brits be surprised if one or two of their choppers got popped with one of those?” She smiled and nodded toward the flare guns.

  “So, how many would you like?” he joked.

  “Not buying today,” she said, her laugh soft and sexy. “Still keeping a bit of a low profile, if you take my meaning.”

  “Of course.”

  “It’s a good idea, though. The flare guns. I’ll pass it along to some friends the next time I speak with them.”

  No, no, don’t let her move on. He thought he should give her one of the flare guns, but they were expensive. Something else to get to talk some more, but what?

  His books. Now, this was something he could talk about all day.

  “If you’re not, uh, buying, how about some reading material?” he said, picked up a copy of The Turner Diaries, and handed it to her. “You, uh, you might relate to it.”

  She took the book and flipped it over, eyes moving over the synopsis.

  “It’s about how patriots take back their country,” he said.

  “Is it about Ireland?”

  “Uh, no. Here in the U.S.” His tenseness evaporated, and he squared his shoulders. “In that book the government passes laws against guns and sends people to jail for having them. There’s a resistance movement that fights back. I, uh, you know, thought it might be familiar.”

  She reached into her jacket pocket. “How much?”

  “Take it. On me. Please, I’d like you to have it.”

  “Thanks. That’s kind of you.”

  When she smiled at him, the room and its occupants receded, as if they were the only two here. Such a cliché, he thought, but her smile had been sincere, not the smirk of someone pretending interest while she figured out how to split.

  As quickly as it left, his shyness returned. “Are you, uh, staying for the whole show? Looking for anything in particular?”

  “I don’t know yet.”

  Keep her talking, he thought. “So, uh, what do you think of the U.S.?”

  When he heard the faint sigh, he winced, afraid he’d been too blunt. Her eyes were sad.

  “I’m a long way from home,” she said.

  “Yeah, that can be tough.”

  “Can you go home, Jay?”

  Puzzled, he replied, “Sure, if I wanted to.”

  “I can’t go back.”

  “Oh. Wow. I’m sorry for bringing that up.”

  “It’s all right. I should apologize for heaping my troubles on a stranger.”

  “No, it’s okay. I mean, if you want someone to talk to…”

  “I will say, at places like this, I feel comfortable around people who know how to protect themselves.” She held up the book. “Who know what it mea
ns to fight for your country.”

  I’m dead and in heaven, Carroll thought. Who knew politics would get this woman talking? That was good, but talking always led to his usual bout of foot-in-mouth disease.

  “These are good folks,” he said. “If the government is after you, they’ll protect you until the government takes away their means to do that.”

  Had he emoted too much? No, don’t let this opportunity pass, he told himself. His confidence came back.

  “How about a bite to eat?” he asked. “We could talk about the book.”

  “Who’ll watch your booth?” she asked.

  That was good; she hadn’t said no.

  “I’ll cover the table until my buddy gets here.” He unfolded a small, blue tarp to drape over the table’s contents. “The people in the other booths will make sure no one bothers anything. We look after each other.”

  “All right, then, but let me buy lunch, in exchange for the book.”

  That wasn’t how he wanted it to go, but if it meant spending time with her, he’d put his male ego aside.

  “Sure. Thanks. There’s a decent food court here. Is that all right?”

  “Perfect. You won’t have to be too far from your work.”

  He came around the table to stand next to her, close enough to smell a nice perfume. Not the flowery stuff his sister used. Not the cheap stuff he’d smelled on some women at gun shows. He wondered if he should touch her elbow and guide her or something, but she might not like that.

  “Uh, this way,” he said, pointing.

  She waited until he walked beside her. Okay, he thought, this is good; this is really good.

  They both ordered a burger and fries—chips Siobhan called them. She got a Diet Coke, but he wanted a beer to calm his nerves. He led them to a table in a relatively unoccupied corner of the food court.

  “Hey, J.T.,” came a voice from nearby. “Who’s watching the booth, man?”

  What he did not need. Great timing, Lamar, he thought. Siobhan looked up from her meal, so he’d have to introduce her.

  “L.D., I was starving. I couldn’t wait forever for you to get back,” Carroll said. “L.D., this is Siobhan. Siobhan, one of my Army buddies, L.D.”

  She wiped her hands on her napkins and shook L.D.’s hand. “How do you do?”

  L.D. gave her hand a single jerk, his whole body fidgeting. L.D.’s lunch had probably come from their meth stash.

  “Hey, hi,” L.D. said. He looked at Jay. “How long are you going to be?”

  It wouldn’t be cool to say he was hoping to get laid, so he said, “You had your break. Let me have mine.” He raised an eyebrow and cut his eyes to Siobhan, hoping L.D. got the hint. He must have; he walked off without another word.

  “Sorry,” Carroll said. “His manners have always left something to be desired.”

  “He seemed a bit jumpy.”

  No, shit. “That’s L.D.” Again, he was at that damnable point where he didn’t know what else to say, but Siobhan took care of that.

  “Is this your line of work, then?” she asked.

  “Mostly. I work odd jobs now and then. I like to see the country, and going from show to show is a way to do that. Lots of interesting people are on the circuit. The vendors, I mean. A few real weirdo ones but mostly good folks.”

  “What about the circuit—is that what you called it? What about it attracts you?”

  “I believe in being independent, you know, not relying on the government to protect me. Most people get all nervous when you talk about what it takes to do that. Not here. We can talk guns, bitch about the government, and nobody looks twice at you. How about you? Uh, what do you do?”

  “I raise money for an Irish charity.”

  His personal radar pinged. Charity people were liberal and anti-gun, but his impression was she was comfortable here. She’d said she was. “What do you have to do for that?”

  “I meet with businessmen and such, talk about the poverty and deprivation, and they write checks.” She smiled and leaned toward him, lowering her voice. “And the money goes for a variety of supplies and needs.”

  “Oh, yeah. I get it.” That wasn’t so bad, and, holy fuck, he sat at a table having a burger with an IRA chick.

  “Where are you from, Jay?” she asked.

  He savored her accent again, but small talk was small talk. Not cool to suggest fucking right away. “Upstate New York. Where in Ireland are you from?”

  “County Derry. My ma and da worked a farm there, but we moved into Belfast when I was ten. Da got a job at Mackie Metal. Ma…” She shrugged, her expression hardening. “Da worked nights, and Ma didn’t like sitting at home in what to her was a big city. She left a couple years after the move and went to England. I haven’t seen much of her since.”

  Unbelievable they shared that miserable history. He hoped he sounded casual when he responded. “Yeah, I know how that is. My mother left my father, too.” He recognized the bitterness in his tone, but why fight it? “She had a good life, a nice house, and she left me and my Dad but took my sisters. He finished raising me, but you know how they can be. They don’t remember you grew up.”

  “I wouldn’t know.”

  Her tone made him look at her. Her narrowed eyes, the firm set of her mouth said she could be dangerous, but he found that arousing.

  “Paras shot my Da when I was sixteen,” she said. “The bastards who sold out to the Brits.”

  “Yeah, the Loyalists or something.”

  “Whatever name they use, traitor is what they are.”

  She was so different from most women he’d known. If they were on the make, you knew it right away. If all this woman wanted to do was fuck some guy she picked up at a gun show, she was way subtle about it.

  No, the confidence she oozed meant she wouldn’t go for subtlety or coyness; she’d tell him what she wanted. She didn’t seem like a hanger-on, looking for sex. Could it be she was more like him, obsessed with a cause? He could admire that and appreciate its uniqueness in a woman.

  He watched her face as he asked the next question. “Is that what made you join the IRA?”

  The flinty eyes, the no-nonsense tone when she answered aroused him even more.

  “I never said that, now, did I? And if I had, that’s not something to talk about in the open, is it?”

  His eyes searched around them before returning to her. “Sorry about that.”

  “It’s the accent,” she said. “Easy assumption to make.”

  She smiled at him, and he relaxed, thankful he hadn’t blown it. Making small talk with women was not one of his skills. Most of his conversations revolved around getting an agreement to fuck and working out the logistics.

  He knew his mother had colored his view of women, his belief all they were good for was sex. That was all she’d been interested in when she left his dad for her boss. The women he’d dared to be halfway serious about all turned out to be like his mother—flighty and faithless. But this woman…

  This woman seemed to have something in common with him, and with that epiphany he realized he didn’t want to fuck her and move on. He wanted something more. Friendship and her company for something other than sex.

  Well, sex eventually, but getting to know her could be foreplay.

  As he wondered what to say next, she said, “You said L.D. was your Army buddy… Ah, that’s right. You mentioned you served.”

  He felt good she’d remembered that about him. “Yeah. I got out in ’92. My unit was one of the first to roll into Iraq.”

  “Some friends of mine were in the British Army for that. They brought us back some useful skills.”

  He heard her reply but didn’t process it because the images came to him.

  “It was short and sweet,” he said, trying to get the dead Iraqis out of his head. He could not go PTSD on her. “But I could never see why we had to go there and risk our lives for their oil. We got all built up like the Iraqis were eating babies or some shit, but they were scared, more scar
ed of Saddam than us. I felt sorry for the bastards.”

  “Is that why you left the Army?”

  No, not the time to go into that. “It’s a long story. Another time.”

  She frowned but said, “Sure.”

  Damn, he shouldn’t have been so abrupt. He opened his mouth to apologize, but she brought out the book he’d given her.

  “This is a good read, then?” she asked.

  “Oh, yeah. I’ve read my copy so many times it’s falling apart. More people would appreciate it, if they could get their hands on it. You see, the mainstream publishers are controlled by the government. They suppressed it.”

  “Don’t you have freedom of the press?”

  He smiled. “That applies to the media, but if you agree with the government, you can say whatever you want. Doesn’t work when you disagree.”

  “But you’re selling copies.”

  “The author distributes them real cheap, so he can get the word out. I end up giving most of the copies away. Anti-government beliefs get you put on a list, you get harassed, and you’ll get detained when martial law comes.”

  “Martial law? Here?”

  He shrugged. “Some believe it’s inevitable.”

  She scooted her chair close to him and leaned toward him. He glanced down to make sure the table hid his lap, as he reacted to her nearness. Her voice low again, she said, “I went to a meeting in Montana. They talked about that.”

  “How did you… I mean that meeting was invitation only.”

  “I was invited.”

  Carroll gulped; he’d tried like hell to get to that meeting of militia groups from all over. You had to have creds, credibility. A foreign woman, hell, any woman, wouldn’t be allowed.

  “How?” he asked.

  “The person who was invited had too much of a public persona, a political image. He sent me instead. It was obvious I wasn’t welcome, though. They thought I was there to serve coffee. It was tiresome rhetoric and no action. There comes a time, you know, when talk isn’t enough.”

  Good emotional control kept him from gaping, but he couldn’t stop more blood from heading below his waist. She was almost too good to be true. Open your mouth, he told himself; say something intelligent.