Asa

 

In the morning, we showered together as we had the night before. Corinne knelt down and took me into her mouth, running her hands up and down the backs of my legs, until, finally, I pulled her to her feet, turned her round, and we had energetic sex against the wall of the shower.

 

It was a good start to what was going to be a make-or-break day. Though neither of us said it, we both knew that there were two very different ways in which today could end, and both were equally probable.

 

We filled up with gas and then headed back the way we had come. Though I tried not to let Corinne notice, I was constantly on the alert for anyone following us. I had a hunch that, if the Mafia had been on our tail, we would have known about it by now, but it was better to be on the safe side.

 

# # #

 

Just after lunch, we arrived at the home of Deputy Porter Crucero. Although, anyone who had seen him arrest me the other night wouldn't necessarily have guessed it, Porter and I went way back. In high school, we had been friends, and were damn near inseparable. It was safe to say that, since then, our lives had taken dramatically different courses, but I figured that if I was going to be turning myself into anyone, then choosing someone who might have some residual good feelings toward me was probably best.

 

From the look on his face when he opened the door, Porter Crucero had not been expecting the town's most wanted man to arrive at his house with his boss's daughter in tow.

 

"Asa," was all he said.

 

"Hey, Porter, how's it going?"

 

"I suspect better for me than it has been for you," Porter said. Then he looked at Corinne and added, "Or, then again, maybe not. Would you like to give me some idea of why you're here?"

 

"I'm turning myself in."

 

If his face had looked surprised when I arrived, then that was nothing to how it looked now. He recovered himself and shook his head.

 

"Well, I didn't have anything else planned for my day off so, what the hell, let's do this."

 

"Can we talk before you take me down the station?"

 

Porter shrugged. "That's not normally how we do things, but 'normal' is not a word I would use to describe any part of this."

 

We sat down at Porter's kitchen table, and he made the three of us coffee. I'd have to say it was the most surreal experience I could have imagined.

 

"Before we start, Asa," said Porter, setting down the coffee in front of us and seating himself, "I think I need to make some things clear."

 

"Fire away."

 

"I hope it won't come to this, but ..." Porter paused, wondering how best to explain himself. "Look, do you remember Artie Reed?"

 

I nodded. Artie had been another of our little circle of friends. He had gone bad in a big way after school and was currently serving a life sentence in prison, having narrowly escaped the death penalty on a technicality.

 

"You know what happened to him? Where he is now?"

 

Again, I nodded, wondering if having Corinne in on this little meeting had been a good idea.

 

"You know who put him there?"

 

I nodded again. "Rumor tells me that it was you."

 

"Rumor is right," Porter said. "I loved him like a brother when we were in school, but I sent him down, and, when I did, I fully expected him to end up on death row. And beyond."

 

"Well," I acknowledged, not liking the general trend of this conversation. "He did some bad things."

 

"And you're going to tell me that you're all sweetness and light?"

 

"No," I said, firmly. "But I think we'd both agree there's a difference between what Artie did and what I do."

 

Porter held up his hands. "No doubt about it. I wouldn't be asking for death for you. But I saw that book, Asa, before your boys stole it back. I know you're guilty."

 

"Of selling illegal alcohol."

 

"The law is the law," said Porter, sternly. "I'm not vindictive. I wouldn't go after you for more than you've done, or try to pin other crimes on you. Your dad taught me that," he added to Corinne. "But you broke the law, and I plan to make you pay to the extent of the law. I just want that understood, before we go any further. And, if you try and make a run to the door now, then I also want it understood that I will try and stop you. We were friends once, and those were good times, but they were a long time ago. I'm not saying you didn't have it tough growing up, but so did I, and I'm here, and you're there. And that's the way it is."

 

Porter sat back and waited for my response.

 

I nodded. "Well, I appreciate you being up front with me, Porter."

 

"Figure I owe you that much," Porter said. "There were times back in the day when you had my back when no one else did."

 

"We had to stick up for each other back then."

 

Porter nodded. "But you reach an age when you've got to decide which way you go, and you made your decision, Asa."

 

I nodded. I felt that making me feel bad about my life choices while arresting me was a little bit much.

 

"You think you've got enough on me to make it stick?"

 

Porter laughed. "That's your game, huh? Well, we'll try. We might not have your book anymore, but we've got some other stuff that might surprise you. I wouldn't call it a slam dunk, but I'd put my money on you doing hard time."

 

The plan, so far, was not going my way, and I could see Corinne getting anxious. Time for me to play my trump card.

 

"You know Tony Rassi's mob, yeah?"

 

"I know of them," Porter said carefully. "They keep themselves pretty clean in the open. You never hear a word against them, and there's never a shred of evidence."

 

"No one wants to testify against them."

 

Porter nodded ruefully. "Hard to blame folk for that. The Mafia has a bit of a reputation when it comes to snitches."

 

"What if someone could give you hard evidence?"

 

He tried hard to hide it, but I saw the spark of interest in Porter's eye. The man who took down Rassi's gang would not be a mere deputy for long.

 

"What sort of evidence?"

 

I shook my head. Years of experience had led me to never trust the police.

 

Porter pulled a face. "I've never been one for deals with criminals. That's another thing I learned from your dad, Corinne. Letting one off to put another inside just seems like a wash to me."

 

"I sell hooch," I said, a little injudiciously perhaps. "You want me to list what Rassi's into? You want me to list the deaths that I can tell you he's responsible for, that you can't ever pin to him? Who do you want walking the streets?"

 

"Ideally, neither of you," Porter said honestly. "The thing is, Rassi is a vague promise. You have no idea the number of times we thought we had something on him, only for him to wriggle out. Taking him down is not guaranteed. You, on the other hand, are sitting here right now, in my kitchen, telling me that you sell illegal hooch."

 

I sat up straighter in my chair. "Have you been recording this?"

 

Porter shrugged. "Just a little precautionary thing, when you have a known criminal in the house."

 

"That's inadmissible!" Corinne cried angrily.

 

"True," Porter said. "But it's a hell of a start. You see how easy it is to put you away, Asa? Rassi ... I want him, but I don't think you can give him to me. And, like I said, doing deals with criminals just doesn't sit well."

 

I took this in. It had been a good idea, and I didn't think we'd have gotten a different response if we'd tried another deputy. Now there was only one thing left to do.

 

"Corinne, can you give us a minute?" I asked.

 

Corinne frowned deeply, but got up and headed into the next room, not saying anything, but glaring at Porter on her way out.

 

I turned back to my old school friend. "I need you to get Corinne home safely and keep an eye on her." I outlined my Mafia concerns, and Porter listened.

 

"Damn it, Asa, why'd you have to drag her into this? The trouble Brian has with that kid anyway."

 

"She's a good girl," I said firmly. "I just want to make sure she's going to be all right when I'm gone."

 

Porter nodded. "Of course. I'll see she's taken good care of."

 

"Thanks."

 

Porter drained the last dregs of his coffee. "You want to say goodbye to her before we head down the station?"

 

# # #

 

I had no idea how I was going to say goodbye to Corinne. She was going to blame herself, of course. This had been her idea, and now she was going to beat herself up for how it had turned out. That was the last thing I wanted, but if I didn't say goodbye, then I knew both of us would regret it. How quickly that kid had wormed her way into my life and turned it upside down. I wouldn't be going to jail now if it hadn't been for her, and, yet, I found I could not regret one moment of the time we had shared. What a girl.

 

"Corinne?"

 

Corinne looked up hopefully as I walked in. "Did you ...?

 

"I have to go now."

 

"Go?" It was heart-breaking to watch her face fall.

 

"Porter's going to take me in."

 

"No!" she practically screamed.

 

I went to her, and she fell into my arms, hugging me tightly, as if she could not bear to let me go.

 

"It's all my fault," she murmured tearfully into my chest. "If I had just left you alone. If I hadn't had to hook up with the most dangerous guy in the room, if I hadn't wanted to mess with my dad, if I hadn't ..."

 

"Then I wouldn't have known you," I said, drawing her back to look into her tear-stained eyes. "And for the pleasure of knowing you, I'd do back-to-back life sentences, and more. I wouldn't have missed it for the world."

 

"But if it wasn't for me ..."

 

"I'd have wound up here one way or the other," I said. "At least this way I got to ..." I struggled to put what she had given me into words. But it was something that couldn't be expressed in mere words. "Look, I should never have come to see you one more time, and I should never have taken you to the waterfall. I should never have let you stay in the car at the warehouse, and I should never have carried you off from the motel yesterday. Don't blame yourself. I've done the wrong damn thing every step of the way. I've been telling myself I'm doing it to protect you, but that's just an excuse. I couldn't let you go. And, even now, even with all that's going to happen, even having said it was all wrong and all a mistake, I don't regret one second of it, and I'd do it all again in a heartbeat."

 

Corinne stared. Even if I had stopped short of using the 'L' word, I think she couldn't quite believe that I was finally saying all the things that she had so desperately wanted to hear me say.

 

"I have to go now."

 

She opened her mouth to speak, but I held up my hand. "Will you do one thing for me?"

 

"Anything," she breathed.

 

"Be a good girl."

 

# # #

 

Back in the kitchen, Porter sat at the table, waiting for me. "You really do care about her, don't you?"

 

"Were you listening in?" I asked, irritated by the intrusion.

 

"She's a pretty girl," Porter said. "Stunning, really. I have to admit that, at first, I thought you were with her for ... well, you know. And who could blame you? And then perhaps you stuck with her to get some revenge on Brian. That's what I thought. But that's not it, is it?"

 

"No," I said, honestly.

 

Porter drummed his fingers on the table a while. "So, how would this informant thing work then? There's usually some paperwork to fill out, but it's at the station, and I'm guessing that, for now at least, you'd rather keep the sheriff out of this. So, you might have to just take my word for it." He looked up at me. "So, what about it? Do you trust me, Asa?"

 

I nodded. "Oh, yes. I trust you Porter. You've had my back before, remember?"

 

Porter nodded. "Let's take that bastard Rassi down."