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  It's only moments before another voice asks, "Can you tell me your name?"

  There's not much sense in bullshitting as my Wyoming driver’s license is in my wallet, and I'm sure the hospital has gone though it looking for my insurance cards.

  "Mike…Mike Reardon." I pry an eye open to see a matronly salt-and-pepper-haired woman in a white smock bending over me, eyeing me over half-glasses.

  "Good for you. You've got a concussion, you've been in a semi-coma, and I suspect some swelling of the brain. You're going to be with us a couple of days. Anyone we should call? I'm Doctor Samuelson by the way, and your nurse at the moment is Inga."

  "Hi, ladies," I manage, letting my eye go shut again. "Nobody to call. Did my phone make it?"

  "I don't know. Ask Inga to check for you. I'll be moving you into a room and out of the ICU. You've got enough scars for a ward full of smallpox patients. Hard life?"

  "Rough and tumble, most from Iraq."

  "Well, I figured that from the eagle, globe and anchor tattoo. Thanks for your service," she says, and I try to smile, but it doesn't work, and I wince instead.

  "What time is it?" I ask.

  "Almost noon. I'll try and get you upstairs before lunch is served."

  "Soup, maybe?"

  "That we can do."

  "Did those a-holes, pardon my language…did they steal my wallet?"

  "Nope, all your ID is there, and you had eighteen nice fresh hundred-dollar bills plus smaller stuff. Not that you'll have it when you leave, that is if you pay your way. Welcome to Mercy Medical. I'll check in with you before I leave today. How's the pain?" she asks, and I know she's leaving as her voice seems to come from the doorway.

  "Better than the alternative," I say. "I hate drugs, so it's tolerable."

  She laughs and is gone.

  I'll bet the old boy referred to as Emmitt, the redhead's kid, was one of the guys who met me with a pipe or baseball bat. And the Indian in the hallway, and God knows how many others, were the ones who put me in this hospital bed.

  I guess they never heard the Biblical saying 'do unto others.'

  I'm just the guy to teach it to them, but I've got to heal up first. Then I'm going to teach them my version: 'Do unto others as they did to you, only worse.’

  Sorry, Jesus.

  5

  Inga with-the-ice-blue-eyes brings me my personal belongings as soon as I'm rolled into my room. However, some things are missing. The room's not private, but the guy in the other bed is behind a drawn curtain. My first call is to Rosie's and Paul Feldman, its owner.

  "Mr. Feldman," I ask, "as I know you know, as you were kind enough to call and get me a ride to the hospital, my pickup is still in your lot—unless you had it towed?"

  He laughs. "Nope, I've been watching over it. Your doc will tell you I've been checking on you. Really sorry that happened here at my place."

  "Hell, I'm sorry it happened anywhere. Any idea who the boys were behind the bats?"

  "Yeah, I've got an idea. Send the cops around and I'll fill them in."

  "No, sir. No cops. I'll handle it myself when the time comes. Any idea where my Glock might be? It isn't with my things here."

  "No idea. You were armed?"

  "Yeah, but I don't advertise it and would appreciate it if you didn't. I'm permitted."

  "The cops have already interviewed me," he says.

  "And I'm sure they'll come have a chat with me, but I'll tell them nothing."

  "Okay. You’ve got a steak and a few beers coming whenever. Like I said, sorry that happened at my joint."

  I barely disconnect before a familiar, if not friendly, face leans in the door. "You got a clear head?" The detective I met at DiAngelo’s, whose name is DiAngelo, is asking.

  "Never claimed to have one, even before it was covered with knots."

  He steps in without being invited. Again, he's dressed immaculately, not for a dick from New York or San Francisco, but top end for North Dakota. He's in a brown-toned tweed jacket, a knit tie with brown and light blue, and a light blue shirt with dark blue monogrammed initials on a sleeve. The jacket has suede patches on the elbows. Perfectly creased khaki colored slacks match one of the tones in the coat. Belt and jodhpur boots match, as if made from the same hide—even the tan leather holster clipped to his right side matches the belt. There's a thousand-dollar camel overcoat draped over a forearm. He runs a splayed-fingered hand though his hair as he enters and his long shiny black hair falls exactly back into place. He drops the overcoat on a chair. The gray sideburns are a little too perfect, and I suspect he spends more time in the beauty shop than any of the beautiful women I know. But that's just a guess.

  He smiles and shows some expensive dental work, leans against the end of my bed, looks me up and down, then asks, "You slip on the ice or did you get the shit kicked out of you?"

  I smile, purposefully a little sheepishly, "I got a face full of mace or wasp spray, got shoved through the back door, and that's the last I remember."

  "Who was behind the spray can?"

  "Big guy is all I know. Some Mongolian mother-fucker, pardon the expression."

  "Not many Mongolians around here, but lots of Indians. Who might have had it in for you?"

  "Hell, I haven't been in town long enough to make any enemies."

  "Oh, yeah. It doesn't take long for some guys. I heard there was a little scuffle in the front of the place a couple of nights ago, and you might have been involved?"

  So, I lie. "Not me. Night before last, I had a beer and a sandwich and went home and curled up in my camper."

  He shakes his head in doubt. "Not what I hear."

  "That's how it was, detective."

  "Where are you staying?"

  I lie again. The last thing I want is for the cops to be nosing around my equipment trailer. "Here and there, wherever I can find a place to park for the night. Camper moves around. You know."

  "Yeah, a patrolman's report says you got run out of the Ace Hardware parking lot a couple of nights ago. We frown on that around here."

  "Okay, won't happen again. My first night in town, and I didn't know the rules." I yawn as if I'm about to nod off, encouraging him to leave, but he doesn't, so I say, "If you hear anything about who was behind the bats, I'd sure like to know."

  He looks a little more serious. "I don't think I have to tell you to leave this to us."

  I lie even more earnestly, "Oh, God, no, I don't ever want to see those guys again. I just want to know who to stay away from."

  He nods, but doesn't look convinced. Then asks, "You going to work for Owens-McKittrick?"

  "That oil well service outfit…."

  "Yeah, where you met my lady friend, Amber."

  That comment rings of stay-the-fuck-away-from-my-girlfriend. But I skip right over it. "Nope, didn't get on there. They would have hired me as a roustabout for thirty bucks an hour, but I was looking for a security job."

  He looks a little smug. "Yeah, I saw the concealed carry permit in your wallet, and the empty holster at the small of your back, but no weapon. You want to file a theft report?"

  And admit I had a weapon in a bar, no way. "No, I just didn't bother to remove the holster before I went out. I thought I might eat someplace that served booze, so I left the PPK in my camper." I lie again, as my weapon was a Glock, not a Walther.

  "Right," he says, but the look on his face says 'bullshit.' "So …" he continues, but maybe my yawns are working as he's eyeballing the door, "…you're not interested in filing charges? Walther is a nice weapon."

  And not the one I lost. "Against who? A can of wasp spray and some Mongolian. I'm sure you've written a report."

  "Oh, yeah, paperwork, the bane of all cops. But nothing will come of it."

  "Such is life," I say, and yawn again.

  "See you around, Reardon," he says, a little knowingly, and I'm sure he's run my record, not that there's much to find if you don't count the guys I've shot in righteous shootings and my general courts martial fr
om the Corps.

  He heads for the door.

  I call after him. "I'll probably be heading out of town when I get out of here."

  He pauses in the doorway and gives me a very doubting look, then points an index finger at me and cocks his thumb with the other hand like he's bringing a police special to bear.

  "I wouldn't discourage you. In fact, I'd think it might just be the smartest thing you've ever done." And he's gone.

  My plaster has been replaced with a fiberglass cast, from just below the elbow to just behind my knuckles, with a roomy thumbhole. I'm studying it and thinking about how to do what my sweet mama always said, "When life hands you lemons, make lemonade." I think I know just how to do that in this situation.

  I'm in a full day and night before Doc Samuelson wanders in and gives me a quick exam then announces she's cutting me loose. I'm sorry to say Inga is off for the day, and I didn't get to pry her phone number out of her. This town is not so big that I won't see her somewhere.

  I call the local cab company for a ride and am informed that it'll be an hour before they can get someone to Mercy Medical, so I call someone who may just be wanting to keep me in his good graces in this litigious world of ours. Paul Feldman, who owns Rosie's.

  "Paul?" I ask the girl who answers, and he comes on the line. "If you've got time, I need a lift back to your place to get my truck."

  In ten minutes, a fancy Land Rover rolls up under the portico in front of the hospital.

  Before I settle into the passenger seat, he offers, "I got a line on your friends."

  "Good," I say and settle back for the ride to my rig. "I'll even let you off the hook for the steak and beer."

  "No way, Jose. Just don't wipe the floor up with them in my joint."

  "Not if I can help it. It'll be a while before that happens."

  "By the looks of you and that cast, it'll be at least six weeks."

  I smile without looking over. "Don't count on it, my friend. Don't count on it." Then I turn to him and ask, "you know a welder who's got some sculpting skills?"

  "Strange request, but, yeah, I know a guy who lost a leg out in the patch and was a welder. Now he makes a lot of goofy metal sculptures."

  I laugh. "So, you know a sculptor who knows how to weld. That'll probably do."

  When we get back to Rosie's he offers me lunch and a beer and gives me the names of the guys who damn near beat me to death, but the hospital filled me up with a good breakfast, so I pass. Besides, I want to find this guy Howie Doolittle, a sculptor whose name and address I've been given by Paul. As my cash has been drained by the hospital, I find an ATM and am replenished with four hundred bucks. I punch the address into the computer in the Ford, and it takes me out of town to a farmhouse in the middle of some fallow fields. There's smoke coming from a stack on a small red barn next to the house so I head there. I pass some decent metal replicas of life-size deer, elk, and bears on the way.

  I'm in debt to Paul as I have a to-do list in my pocket, and as I suspected, three of the names were the guys trying to break into my trailer. Real spoilsports and real stupid, as they'll soon learn. Emmitt Radiston, Maggie's son; John Broken Toes; Albert Many Horses; Harold McAdams, also an Indian; and some guy whose name Feldman didn't know but is a Russian who's only about five feet eight and weighs over two hundred and has a twisted right arm. He should be easy to find.

  A bell rings loudly when I push the barn door open.

  Howie is perched on a rolling stool, his single leg dangling, working on a life-size crane. He looks up and pushes up his welding mask, as I slip in and quickly close the door to try and keep the cold out. More critters of all sizes and shapes adorn the place, as well as a forge, a few propane tanks, and lots of raw metal.

  "What can I do you out of?" he asks as I walk over and extend my right hand.

  "A specialty job, if you're interested?" I ask.

  6

  The metal sculptor doesn't look like an artist but more like the oil patch welder he was before losing the leg a hand's width above the knee. In fact, by the size of his biceps and strength of his grip, he resembles an old blacksmith who bends iron for a living.

  "Can't interest you in a life-size whooper?" he asks with a smile and nods his head toward the bird he's working on, which is just now getting its wings.

  "No, sir. I've got some heavy work to do, and this is what I need." I begin explaining, and he listens intently.

  In two hours, I'm heading out of the metal menagerie, shy two hundred bucks. My fiberglass cast now has an exoskeleton. A one-eighth-inch-thick, inch-and-a-half-wide strip of cold iron runs down both the back and underside of my forearm, over the fiberglass. It's formed into a ring around my hand and another just below the elbow. A half-dozen three-eighths-inch-high nail-sharp spikes are welded across the back of the strip across my hand and across the palm side, and teed-up with a dozen down the strip on top and bottom of the arm. It's made in two pieces so it bolts together and can be removed. My wrist now is protected by the fiberglass, and doubly by the iron cage. It's now more than just a fair weapon. I'll have to remove it to get the cast off, but it's the price you have to pay.

  I feel a little like a knight from King Arthur's court. Damn little, but a little.

  As my sweet old mom would say, I've made lemonade out of the lemons I've been handed.

  My first stop back in town is a Rite Aid, where I pick up some gauze and wrap the whole forearm so the spikes are hidden in the depths of cotton gauze. Then I find a Boot Barn and pick up a couple of XXL shirts that will fit nicely over the arm, although they are a little on the sloppy side otherwise.

  Now to stay away from Rosie's for a few days and anywhere else where I might be tempted to test my new arm armor. I shouldn't be rushing in where angels fear to tread anyway. It's time to do some homework.

  The Williston Community Library is an impressive structure across Davidson Road from some ballparks, tennis courts, and recreational buildings. Williston may be suffering from the boom, but it's also prospering. The town's a really nice blend of the historic and the new.

  The girl behind the counter has plain black-rimmed glasses, black hair pulled into a bun, and a nicely mounded blouse buttoned high, but otherwise is not like the librarians I remember, with piercing ebony eyes and just enough bright red lipstick. I'd bet a ten-dollar bill against a doughnut that she has a pair of bright red come-fuck-me five-inch heels in her closet and does most of her reading in the romance section. She's all business, however, I'm sorry to say, as she directs me to the newspapers and a computer. I can understand her reluctance to strike up a conversation, as I look like a refugee from a recent gang war.

  The computer's better than the paper variety as the search feature takes me directly to the subject at hand—dope and prostitution, so I bear down on the task at hand.

  I work for a couple of hours, investing twelve bucks in print copies, then head back to check on the camper and Wells Cargo trailer. Even though it's double locked, I still worry like hell as there are implements inside that could get me hard time. Hard time in a place as friggin' cold as North Dakota would be ice hard.

  The trailer's still there, still locked tight, and the camper is fine, except the water line is frozen. I have to get my head back into cold weather mode. I make a phone call to get some plane reservations, grab some clean clothes, pack a small carry-on duffle and head out to find a gym where I can shower and change.

  I'm feeling a little paranoid about my stuff as one of the Bakken's major problems is theft. I've been following one of the fastest-growing pages on Facebook, The Fail of the Day, which has lots of Bakken info on a daily basis—mostly about wrecks on the highway and in the fields—and reports a stolen trailer almost daily, and sometimes more than one. They also have missing people reported, mostly women, some of whom have not been found.

  Since every bone in my body aches just slightly less than every joint, and each of those feels like a nail's been hammered in between the bones. Since damn near e
very bad guy in the county now knows my F250, I decide it's a good time to regroup. It'll be at least a week before I'm close to fighting shape, if then, and then I'll have to be careful who and how I challenge.

  So, I've scheduled a flight out of Bismarck back to Vegas to take care of biz, heal up and study up on the Bakken and the dope problem. Since I have no interest in leaving my truck in an airport parking lot, then having to go way out of my way to pick it up as I'll be driving another rig back to Williston, I decide to ride the dog over to the capital and cab it to the bus station. Greyhound to the state capital is a little over a four-hour ride, but it'll give me a chance to read some of the ream of stuff I've copied while doing my research at the library.

  During my last self-imposed assignment—a brand new client got murdered and I took it upon myself to avenge the lady—one of my three vehicles got badly cratered, and it was the center of operations for me. But it's been repaired, refitted and awaits me in my Vegas mini-storage, thanks to my buddy, Pax Weatherwax, taking care of business for me in my absence. My absence involved a sailboat trip to the Cayman Islands where I deposited a duffle bag full of cash that I'd relieved from a drug cartel, as a number of their members no longer needed same—unless cash is the form of exchange in Hades. I brought the dough back into the country via bank transfers and, like the good citizen I try to be, will claim it on my tax return as consulting fees.

  My Dodge van served as camouflage on many a job; and as home, from time to time, with its fold-down cot, sink with instantaneous hot water, and even a porta-potty—the throwaway bag kind. But those aren't its most valuable assets. It has an abundance of hideout storage—most in the side panels but some in ceiling and floor—several license plates, a variety of magnetic signs and magnetic color striping that allows me to appear to be a local plumber, a landscaper, a pizza delivery man, and even a SWAT vehicle, as I carry magnetic red lights as well.

  It also contains personal disguise accouterments, including coveralls to match the signs and, thanks to an old buddy who's now a Hollywood guru, facial disguise.