Page 83 of The Texas Murders

A minute later, an agent named Logan appears on camera, standing before a bank of reporters in front of the Tigua Tribal Police Station. This is the same guy who was on the news after the raid, Zebo remembers. At that time, he looked smug and full of himself. Now, with his wrinkled suit and haggard expression, he looks like someone who would like to be anywhere but on TV.

Zebo turns up the volume.

The agent states that there is no word yet on what caused the fire—that will only be known after a full investigation—but he wanted to let the public know that three law enforcement personnel were believed to have been in the building.The reporters at the press conference bombard the agent with questions, almost none of which he answers.

Why were the law enforcement personnel at the location?

“I can’t comment at this time.”

Do they suspect the fire was caused by arson or an accident?

“We won’t know that until we conduct a thorough investigation in conjunction with the fire department.”

But thereisone question he answers: Are the law enforcement officers members of the FBI?

“No,”the agent says.“The officers in question are two Texas Rangers and a member of the Tigua Tribal Police.”

The agent cuts off the interview, and Zebo mutes the sound. He pumps his fist in the air like he’s been watching a sporting event and his team just scored.

“TwoTexas Rangers!” he exclaims.

He reaches for a silver bell sitting on the coffee table. He gives it a hearty ring, and within seconds, his butler arrives. Zebo calls him Alfred, after the stuffy butler in the Batman movies. But the name is meant ironically. His Alfred is more of a bodyguard/head of security than a butler. Zebo’s Alfred is six foot six, built like a heavyweight boxer, and clad in tactical gear, with a sheath knife on one hip, a radio on the other, and a Beretta in a holster at the small of his back.

He calls the prison at the rear of his property a dormitory.

He calls the women held there his lovers.

He calls the heroin he injects into them medicine.

And when he has johns over to the house—only his highest-paying clients—he tells them how much his lovers are looking forward to pleasuring them.

“Alfred,” he says to the mercenary he calls his butler. “I want to celebrate. Bring me the new girl. The one Carpenter delivered the other day.”

“Marta?”

“Yes,” Zebo says, turning the volume of the TV back on and focusing his attention on the news coverage. “It’s time for her to start earning the medicine we’ve been giving her.”

CHAPTER 74

RYAN LOGAN RETURNS to the station after his press conference to find me in the investigation room with a laptop opened to Google Earth. Ava and Carlos just stepped out to make a phone call that might help us, and Ryan and I have a moment alone.

“One of the agents showed me the recording of your interview with Llewellyn Carpenter,” he says, looking contemplative.

For a moment, I expect him to find some fault with my approach. The way I questioned Carpenter without getting him medical attention could certainly be seen as unethical. But the interview with Carpenter isn’t what Ryan wants to talk about—it’s what came after.

“That shot you made,” he says. “I’ve never seen anything like it. That’s a shot you can be proud of for the rest of your life.”

I open my mouth to show some modesty, but he waves me off.

“On a range,” he says, “shooting at paper targets, I could probably try that ten times and get it right once or twice. But this isn’t a range. Those weren’t paper targets.”

I nod, not knowing what to say. There’s a big difference between shooting at targets with wax bullets and drawing your gun in life-or-death situations. There aren’t any do-overs when it comes to real people and real bullets. That’s what I felt Ryan didn’t understand during the raid, when I stopped him from taking a bad shot.

I can see he understands it now.

“When you hear about shooters like Jelly Bryce and gunfighters from the Wild West,” Ryan says, “you never know if you should really believe the stories, or if maybe the legends have taken on a life of their own. Seeing you in that video, I can believe some of those legends.” He nods at me. “You’re a special breed, Rory. They don’t make them like you anymore. You might be the last of your kind.”

This last sentence he says with both admiration and reservation. In his tone is the wish that he could be like me and the realization that he isn’t. However good he might be with a gun, there’s a gulf between us that he doesn’t feel he’ll ever be able to bridge.

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