Shots Fired: Stories From Joe Pickett Country Read online

  “I had nothing to do with taking your birds,” Shorty said. “The gentlemen inside said you owed them and they were just retrieving their property. I just said I’d make the introductions, is all.”

  “Don’t talk,” Nate said, pushing the gun into Shorty’s spine.

  “Be careful that don’t go off,” Shorty said. “It’d likely cut me in half.”

  Nate said, “Then you’d be really short.”

  He pushed him through the door, keeping the ranch hand in front of him. Over Shorty’s shoulder, Nate saw two men sitting at his table with cups of coffee in front of them. They were Saudis.

  “Greetings from my father,” the younger of the two men said. He was olive-skinned, well-groomed, and well-dressed in a crisp white shirt, charcoal slacks, and tasseled black loafers. He had a thin, perfect mustache over perfect white teeth. The lens of a pair of wire-framed sunglasses poked up from his shirt pocket.

  The other man was older, thicker, darker, wearing an open-collared yellow shirt and a black blazer. He didn’t smile. His eyes were locked onto Nate’s face. He had a thicker black mustache and his hands were under the table. Nate turned Shorty slightly so the older man would have to shoot through Shorty to get to Nate.

  The younger man noticed what Nate had done and shook his head from side to side as if trying to alleviate a terrible misunderstanding. “No, no, none of this is necessary. Please put the gun away and let Mr. Shorty go home. We can all be good friends here.”

  Nate didn’t move.

  “I’m Lamya Abd al Saud,” the man said. “Everybody I graduated with at Stanford calls me Rocky. You know my father. He says you’re a talented, amazing man, but he’s disappointed in you. He asked me to come here to invite you to see him to explain your recent insult.”

  “You know them?” Shorty said to Nate. “Jesus.”

  Nate ignored Shorty, keeping his eyes on the older man, watching the man’s shoulders for even the smallest bit of motion from his hands hidden under the table.

  “This is Khalid,” Rocky said, gesturing to the dark man. “He’s with me because my father asked that he come along. Khalid, please greet Mr. Romanowski.”

  Khalid nodded his head, but never broke his stare.

  “Let me see your hands,” Nate said to him.

  Khalid shot a glance to Rocky. Rocky nodded back. The older man withdrew his hands from beneath the table and put them flat on the surface.

  “There,” Rocky said. “Are you happy now?”

  “Nope. Where are my birds?”

  “They’re safe. My father is admiring them.”

  Nate said, “Admiring them?”

  Rocky nodded.

  “Shorty, hit the trail,” Nate said, pushing the man aside.

  “I don’t have a vehicle,” Shorty protested. “I came out here with Rocky and—”

  “Hit the trail, Shorty,” Nate said. “And as you walk away from this place, forget you were ever here. If anybody ever asks you to bring them out here again, your answer will be that you don’t know where it is.”

  “They said—”

  “Hit the fucking trail, Shorty,” Nate said through clenched teeth.

  • • •

  KHALID DROVE and Rocky was in the passenger seat of the rented white Cadillac Escalade. Nate sat in the backseat. Khalid had asked Nate to leave the .454 at home before he would drive them.

  “I’ve never seen a handgun like that,” Rocky said. “Five cylinders. I wish to fire it.”

  “Wish denied,” Nate said.

  Khalid shot a glance at Nate in the rearview mirror.

  “My father is looking forward to seeing you,” Rocky said affably, turning in his seat.

  Nate nodded. “Did he come here in his 727?”

  Rocky shook his head. “That was his old plane. The new one is a 737. It is very luxurious, very well appointed. He prefers staying on the plane because it’s more comfortable than the hotel accommodations you have here. You’ll like it.”

  “I just want my birds back.”

  Rocky laughed. “I’ll never understand the fascination you and my father have with falcons. It’s a mystery to me. I prefer fast cars and fast women. Blond women with big lips. And movies. I’m a great fan of American movies. Especially the gangster movies and the Westerns. I love the Westerns. I don’t see why your people don’t make them anymore.”

  Nate didn’t care what Rocky liked.

  Rocky gestured out the window at the sagebrush plains, the foothills, the slumping shoulders of the Bighorn Mountains. “This looks like a place for a Western movie. I expect to see a cowboy ride up any minute.”

  As they passed Shorty walking on the road, Nate looked out the back window. Shorty was chasing the car, his arms outstretched. Thinking that somehow they hadn’t seen him.

  Rocky said, “Poor Shorty.”

  Nate wondered if his birds were worth this.

  • • •

  THE OUTSIZED PRIVATE JET sat brilliant white and gleaming in the morning sun on the concrete apron of the Saddlestring Regional Airport. Two-foot-high Arabic writing was scrawled the length of the fuselage along with green Saudi Arabian flags. Small private planes had been moved to accommodate the craft and were parked under the wings of the 737, looking like small white offspring.

  Khalid had a key to the lock on the gate and he drove the Escalade to the base of the aircraft.

  “Please,” Rocky said, gesturing to Nate to get out and ascend the stairs into the jet.

  Al-Nura Abd al Saud, Rocky’s father, sat in an overstuffed leather armchair in a book-lined private office paneled with dark rich woods and gold fixtures. A monitor and DVD player was mounted into the wall next to stacks of movies. Nate glanced at the titles, noted pornography and dozens of old Westerns: Fort Apache, Red River, Shane, She Wore a Yellow Ribbon, The Searchers. Al-Nura was grossly fat and soft. His robes were cream-colored cotton and they shimmered and draped when he stood up. He wore the distinctive red-and-white-checked kaffiyeh head covering held in place with a common agal band, as befit a descendant of the Royal House of Saud. Al-Nura beamed and struggled to his feet when Nate was shown into the room by Rocky.

  Al-Nura took both of Nate’s hands in his and shook and caressed them, saying, “It is so good to see you again, Mr. Romanowski. I was afraid something had happened to you. Please, let’s sit and talk. It’s time to catch up.”

  Rocky stood to the side, his false grin pasted on. Khalid slipped in through the doorway and closed the door behind him, taking the corner of the room where he could watch Nate and Al-Nura without moving his head.

  Nate sat on a plush ottoman across from Al-Nura. The fat man settled back into his chair before the cushions had fully recovered in his absence.

  “Would you like a coffee?” Al-Nura asked. “A brandy? A water? We have the whiskey you like.”

  “I’m fine.”

  Al-Nura shot a glance at Khalid. “Coffee.”

  Khalid crossed the room, opened another door, ordered. In a moment, a woman appeared with a silver tray with a samovar and two tiny cups. She was slim, blond, stunningly beautiful, with a full red mouth and a short black dress. She looked made-to-order for Rocky. Nate glanced over, saw the predatory look on Rocky’s face, and guessed she served more than coffee.

  “Thank you,” Nate said as she poured him a cup.

  “You’re welcome,” she said in a whisper. East European, Nate guessed by her accent.

  “That will be all,” Al-Nura said, not looking at her.

  She swished out, leaving her scent in the cabin.

  “I have five of those on board,” Al-Nura said.

  “‘Those’ being women,” Nate said.

  Al-Nura raised his eyebrows, assessing Nate. “Yes,” he said, after a beat. “All blondes. Bosnians, Albanians. They have nice women there who need jobs. T
here is no struggle with them. They know why they’re here.”

  Nate shook his head, said, “We can get right to it.”

  Al-Nura looked at Rocky and Khalid, said, “See what I told you about him? He is like this.”

  “No respect,” Rocky said, nodding. Khalid didn’t respond, but stood there dark and smoldering, his black eyes never leaving Nate.

  Al-Nura laughed, a sound from deep in his chest. “All business, no sense of fun. That is Nate Romanowski, the Master Falconer.”

  “You have my birds,” Nate said.

  “Yes. But only for a while.”

  “I want them back.”

  “I can see why,” Al-Nura said. “I was admiring them. Especially the peregrine. She is a cold-blooded little bitch, isn’t she? I see why you prize her. If she were a woman, I would take her to my bed.”

  Rocky laughed at that.

  Nate said, “If she were a woman, she’d turn you into a eunuch.”

  Rocky’s laugh ended abruptly and he stepped forward. Only when Al-Nura smiled did Rocky uncoil.

  “You are right,” Al-Nura said. “What do you call her?”

  “I call her a peregrine falcon.”

  “What? You don’t give her a name?”

  “No.”

  Al-Nura shook his head. “That is interesting. I’ve never known a falconer not to name his birds.”

  “I don’t own them,” Nate said. “We have a common interest. So I don’t name them. They name themselves.”

  Al-Nura studied Nate, looking for something. His black eyes scoured Nate’s face, his neck, his hands.

  “I want a bird like that,” Al-Nura said.

  “I know.”

  “I sent you sixty thousand dollars for six young wild peregrine falcons, and the money came back without a note.”

  Nate nodded.

  “That’s not the way we do business.”

  “It is now.”

  Al-Nura sat back, his brow furrowed. “It was not enough? You’ve raised your prices?”

  Nate reached out for the tiny cup of coffee. As he did so, he noted how Khalid tensed up and leaned forward on the balls of his feet, ready to lunge forward if necessary. Nate sipped the bitter coffee.

  “Peregrines aren’t rare anymore,” Nate said. “They’re off the endangered list. You can get them through captive breeders. You don’t need to get them through me.”

  Al-Nura dismissed that with a quick wave of his hand. “No. I want wild birds. No captives.”

  “They’re good birds from those programs,” Nate said. “There’s nothing wrong with them.”

  “No!” Al-Nura barked, his face flushing red. “Wild birds only. Like yours. I am a master, I won’t own domestic-raised birds.”

  Al-Nura started to stand but decided it wasn’t worth the effort. He waved his arms as he spoke. “My people have hunted with falcons for thousands of years, it is the sport of kings. It is our tradition, my birthright. We were falconers before you even had a country. I have hunted with golden eagles from Afghanistan. I’ve killed deer with them. I can no longer get the eagles because of your war there. So I want the deadliest of falcons, the Rocky Mountain peregrine. The king of falcons for the sport of kings. You must help me.”

  Nate said nothing.

  “I know that you can capture some young ones,” Al-Nura said, his voice lowering from his outburst. “You know of nests here. You know where to find some.”

  Nate sipped the coffee.

  “Here,” Al-Nura said, reaching into his robes and pulling out a brick of cash. “One hundred and twenty thousand dollars. Twice what the birds should cost. I give you half of it now, the other half when you bring me the birds. And you get your falcons back. It’s a good deal. You can have the Bosnian for your pleasure as well.”

  “I’ve got a woman,” he said, wishing immediately he hadn’t revealed that.

  “I didn’t fly all the way here for nothing.”

  Nate said, “I’m afraid you did.”

  His words hung there in silence. Al-Nura didn’t erupt, but sat still as if he hadn’t heard them. Khalid’s only reaction was to shift his eyes from Nate to Al-Nura, waiting for a signal. Rocky was stunned.

  “No one denies my father,” Rocky whispered. “What’s wrong with you?”

  Nate stood up slowly so that Khalid would have no reason to react.

  “Thank you for the coffee,” Nate said. “I want my birds back now.”

  “I don’t understand,” Al-Nura said softly. “We’ve done business before. We were friends, professionals. We belong to a very small group of master falconers.”

  “I’m beyond that,” Nate said.

  “Why won’t you assist me?”

  Nate considered the question for a moment, said, “Because I don’t like you anymore.”

  Al-Nura said, “Khalid.”

  His movement was lightning swift, too fast for Nate to ward off. Khalid was suddenly behind him, a hand on the top of his head jerking his face skyward, the bite of a razor-sharp blade like a wasp sting a quarter of an inch above his Adam’s apple. Khalid pressed in with the knife. It was so sharp Nate couldn’t feel the cut itself, only the thin hot stream of blood that crawled down his neck into his collar.

  “Give him half of this,” Al-Nura said, breaking the brick of cash and handing $60,000 to Rocky, who stuffed it into Nate’s pants beneath his belt.

  “You get the other half when you bring me the wild peregrines.”

  • • •

  THE NEXT MORNING, an hour after dawn, Nate launched himself down the cliff face. The northern wind had picked up and was starting to buffet the tops of the cottonwood trees two hundred feet below on the banks of the stream, making a liquid sound. He was protected from the wind by the rock wall, but he could hear it howling above him as well.

  He rappelled down, feeding rope through the carabiners of his harness, bouncing away from the sheer rock with the balls of his feet. Tightly coiled netting hung from his belt.

  Fifty feet down was the nest. It was a huge cross-hatching of branches and twigs and dried brush, cemented together by mud, sun, and years. It was well hidden and virtually inaccessible from below, but he’d located it the year before by the whitewash of excrement that extended down the granite from the nest, looking like the results of an overturned paint bucket.

  As he approached it from above, he noted the layers of building material, from the white and brittle branches on the bottom to the still-green fronds on the top. The nest had been built over generations, and had hosted falcons for forty years. Nate couldn’t determine if all the inhabitants had been peregrines, but he doubted it. The original nest, he thought, had been built by eagles.

  The nest came into view and Nate prepared for anything. Once, he had surprised a female raptor in the act of tearing a rabbit apart for her fledglings and the bird launched herself into his face, shredding his cheeks with her talons. But there were no mature adults in the nest. Only four downy and awkward fledglings. When they saw him, they screeched and opened their mouths wide, expecting him to give them food.

  He guessed by their size that they were two months old, and would be considered eyas, too young to fly. If taken now, they would need to be immediately hooded and hand-fed until their feathers fully developed, and kept sightless in the dark so they didn’t know from whom their food came. If the birds saw their owner, the falconer would be imprinted for life as the food provider and the bird would never hunt properly or maintain its wild edge. Nate didn’t like taking birds this young, not only because of the work involved, but because of the moral question. He no longer wanted to own his birds, preferring instead to partner with them.

  But here they were. So where was the mom? He almost wished she would show up and drive him away.

  He spun himself around and the landscape opened up as far as he co
uld see. The sun was emerging from a bank of clouds on the eastern horizon and lighting the trees and brush with burnt orange while darkening the S curves of the river. There were no birds in the sky.

  Without extracting the net from his web belt, Nate sighed, kicked himself free of the cliff face, and descended to the creek bottom.

  • • •

  THAT NIGHT, Nate sat at the back booth of the Stockman’s Bar, illuminated in shadows cast by the light over the vacant pool table. The Stockman’s was a long dark wooden tube of a place decorated with ancient deer and elk heads and knotty pine. There were six men at the bar sitting on stools. Shorty sat on stool number four. Shorty refused to look at Nate, who nursed a beer and waited for his friend, Wyoming game warden Joe Pickett.

  At eight, the game warden entered and squinted against the gloom. Nate nodded, and Joe walked back to join him, sliding into the seat across from Nate.

  “Long day,” Joe said, putting his hat crown-down on the table. Joe wore his red uniform shirt with the pronghorn antelope patch on the sleeve.

  “Thanks for meeting me,” Nate said, signaling the barmaid for two beers.

  “I can’t stay long,” Joe said. “I haven’t been home yet. I was in the timber all day checking elk hunters.”

  “Find any?”

  “Plenty. But you don’t care about that.”

  “No,” Nate said.

  “You said something about a permit.”

  Nate nodded. “I need to capture a few birds.”

  Joe thanked the barmaid for the beer, sipped it, and studied Nate’s face. “When did you decide to follow the regulations?”

  “I always have.”

  “Like hell, Nate.”

  They sipped their beers.

  “I stopped by your place on the way here,” Joe said. “I noticed your birds were gone. I thought that was unusual.”

  Nate nodded.

  “I don’t suppose they flew off?”

  “Nope.”

  “Does this have to do with that big jet at the airport?” Joe asked.

  “Possibly.”

  “I always wondered what you did to make money,” Joe said. “Since there’s never been any visible means of support.”