Yeager's Getaway, page 27
part #3 of Abel Yeager Series
“Ahhh, if this is Victor Ruiz, I’m trying to find out if you know a Milton Quattlebaum.”
Victor blinked. The name stirred a distant bell. It didn’t so much ring it as brush up against it and gave the clapper a wiggle. “No, I don’ thin’ so.”
“Well, he says he knows you—oh, wait.” There was another pause, filled by the hiss of an open line. “He said to tell you, ‘It’s Cujo.’ Do you know Mr. Cujo?”
“Cujo?” Victor blurted without pausing for thought. “He’s dead. Or, I mean, thass wha’ I heard, anyway.”
According to Yeager, Cujo had flown his plane into a mountain above the village of Rascón. When he crashed, Cujo was flying into a firefight with a highly modified rocket-firing technically illegal aircraft, and he was blowing the shit out of Mexican citizens—bad drug-cartel citizens, but citizens nonetheless. That made Victor want to keep his friendship with Cujo at an arm’s length.
“No, he’s not dead,” McGuffey was saying. “He’s in a prison—Federal Prison Number Eleven to be precise. In Hermosillo.”
“Mm.”
McGuffey paused again as if waiting for more. When it didn’t come, he went on. “Mr. Quattlebaum is charged with terrorism.”
“That sounds really bad.”
Victor had a vague memory that Cujo’s real name was something German, but hearing McGuffey say “Quattlebaum” was like someone saying, “a fermented beverage made from hops” instead of beer.
“It is bad,” McGuffey said.
“What’s it to me?”
“Uh, excuse me?”
“What’s it to me?” Victor repeated. What the American consulate—and by extension, the Mexican police forces—knew about his personal role in the little bang-bang at San Felipe de Christo would go a long way toward how he approached Cujo’s situation. If they were clueless who was involved in the firefight, well and good—Victor could go straight at the problem. On the other hand, if they suspected one tremendously handsome, muscular Mexican of Texas descent—and his butt-ugly jarhead friend—of being involved... well, then, something more devious would be required. Even if Cujo, Yeager, and Victor had saved priests and orphans from certain death, their methodology had been rather... destructive.
McGuffey, at least, acted as if he had no idea of Victor’s role in stamping the shit out of Grupo Verdugo. “Mr. Quattlebaum reached out to the consulate for assistance. The most we could do, we told him, was help him find an attorney. Instead, Mr. Quattlebaum asked us to locate you.” Papers rattled in the background, and McGuffey’s voice changed to a reading tone. “He said, ‘Victor Ruiz is a friend from the old days. He’ll get me a lawyer.’”
“He didn’t say nothing else?”
“No, that’s pretty much it.”
Good for you, Cujo. “Well. Okay, then.”
“Okay what?”
“Okay, I guess I will go see this Mr. Quattlebaum, who I hardly know and can barely remember, and help him find a lawyer.”
“Great, thank you.” McGuffey sighed the way a bureaucrat did when he’d successfully handed off an assignment. “Any message I should pass along to Mr. Quattlebaum?”
“Sure,” Victor said. “Tell him Yeager and Por Que are on the way.”
Also by Scott Bell
An Abel Yeager Novel
Yeager's Law
Yeager's Mission
Yeager's Getaway
Standalone
Working Stiffs
Watch for more at Scott Bell’s site.
About the Author
Scott Bell has over 25 years of experience protecting the assets of retail companies. He holds a degree in Criminal Justice from North Texas State University.
With the kids grown and time on his hands, Scott turned back to his first love—writing. His short stories have been published in The Western Online, Cast of Wonders, and in the anthology, Desolation.
When he’s not writing, Scott is on the eternal quest to answer the question: What would John Wayne do?
Read more at Scott Bell’s site.
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Scott Bell, Yeager's Getaway
