The Renegades Read Online Free PDF

our wounds. Terry’s got a deep cut over his eye and a torn ear, and his jaw is swelling up like it’s broken. I have a cut lip and a swollen eye, and my forehead has a lump the size of a baseball from hitting the car. But we’re okay, none of it is that serious. Terry calls in. I kneel down by Eichrodt and check the restraints and I watch the cars going past just a few yards away on the highway, and it dawns on me how close I’ve just come to getting killed by this guy.”
    I pause for a moment and sip my tequila. The boy drinks beer. I relight my cigar then pass the lighter to him and he relights his. Down on the Sunset Strip the sidewalks are busy with people. The cars move slowly. Taillights twinkle and brake lights flash. A million hearts, a million hustles.
    “I read the papers, Coleman,” he says. He yawns. Like a lot of teenagers, he is eager to be unimpressed. “You and Laws found a handgun and forty-eight hundred dollars in a toolbox in the truck. You found brass that matched the gun, and the bullets that killed the couriers. That would have nailed Eichrodt in court but he never made it to trial.”
    “Correct.”
    I watch the parade on Sunset. The cops have pulled over a black Suburban and I think of all the black Suburbans I saw in Jacumba, where I grew up. Jacumba squats at the Mexican border down east of San Diego. Noman’sland. Suburbans are the vehicle of choice for soccer moms and Mexican drug traffickers, and there were no soccer moms in Jacumba.
    “I’ve already told you one thing that didn’t make the papers,” I say. And I’m sure he knows what it is.
    “The suitcases,” he says.
    “Yes.”
    “Well, what was inside? What did you do with them? How come they didn’t make the news?”
    “Before I answer that, I want to tell you something. It’s something that the young don’t understand. It’s the most important thing I’ve learned so far and I want to give it to you now. Listen: Things in life only happen at two speeds—fast, or not at all. That’s why you need to know what you want. Because when you know what you want, you’ll be able to see the difference between chaos and opportunity. They’re twins. People mistake one for the other all the time. You get about half a minute to decide what you’re looking at. Maybe less. Then you have to make a choice.”
    “So what was in the suitcases?”
    The boy is staring at me now. I’m about to tell him something that I’ve never told another person, something damning and dangerous and unretractable. I’m going to do it because I see big potential in this young man. He’s gifted by history and inspired by his blood. I think he’s what I’m looking for.
    I curl a finger at him. He leans in and I whisper in his ear.
    “The couriers’ money, Mexico bound. Four suitcases. Three hundred forty-seven thousand and eight hundred dollars.”
    He sits back and his brow furrows again and he looks out the window then returns his gaze to me. He wants to smile but he doesn’t want to be caught smiling. Love has a face. So do fear and envy and surprise and every emotion under the sun. His face is joy.
    “Incredible.”
    “Not really.”
    “You and Laws took it.”
    “Did we?”
    “You had to. It’s the whole point of the story—chaos turning into opportunity.”
    “I’m glad you understand that. Because this is where the story begins to get interesting. Another beer and another cigar?”
    “Oh, yes.”
    I nod to the waitress and she nods back.

4
     
     
    Yolanda led Hood down a hallway in the rear of the admin building of the Mira Loma Detention Facility, then down a flight of stairs half-hidden behind some vending machines. The door to the IA room had no window, just a plastic shield with the numerals 204 on it. There was no electronic card entry. She opened the door with a bright new key and placed the key in his hand.
    Inside, the office was small and cold. Four cubicles shared an empty common area. The carpet was sea green.