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  Not wanting to be next, Angus stepped over the hound’s back. Sat on him like a saddled horse. Locked his legs around the beast’s gut, squeezed his thighs, crushed the hound’s insides. The hound yelped and growled. Angus slid his forearms in front of the hound’s throat, hugging and pulling it toward his chest, rested his chin on the hound’s head. Leaving no gap between his body and the hound’s. Angus felt as one with the hound, its heart pounding with his own, rattling against the bones of his chest. Angus closed his eyes, pushed his hips forward, arched his back. Pulled the hound’s head with him. Bones parted from joints, tendons lost their elasticity, and the only beating heart Angus felt was his own.

  The men and women screamed, beyond vehement, they were a sunburnt coil of frothing bloodthirst. They started to shake their cans of unopened beer. Popped the tops. Arcs of white foam shot into the fenced ring and onto Angus.

  Winded, Angus ran his tongue around his lips, tasted the foam and blood that freckled and smeared his frame, counted two hundred and forty Mississippis in his head, took in the violent crowd still hollering, “More! More! More!” He hadn’t felt a rush like this since fighting in the logging camps.

  At Angus’s feet, Ned lay mauled. The slight rise and fall of his chest contrasted with the hound beside him, still. Behind Angus, the gate unbolted, and McGill stepped into the ring with the rucksack of crank over his shoulder.

  Angus turned, approached McGill and the four olive-skinned men that spread out behind him. The dog handlers. They’d long black hair and thick, ungroomed goatees, with blue bandanas wrapped around their heads, the darkest skin in a fifty-mile radius. Their shirtless arms and chests were heavily inked with cracked skulls, the number seven, fighting dogs. Each rested his hand on a pistol with an extended double clip pushed down into the waistband of his chinos. The leader, the one whose tattoos crawled up onto his face, spoke. “This puta kill Stone Man.”

  Angus regretted nothing he had done to Ned. But he did regret the dog. And was curious to see how McGill would handle this.

  McGill was all teeth as he spoke over the onlookers, whose excitement had only grown more uncontrolled. “Save it, Manny, you still got three left. This bastard just upped the stakes. Gonna replace Ned in the ’Brook tomorrow. Don’t you worry, you’ll get paid for your precious dogs. And then some.” He slapped a wad of cash in the gangbanger’s hand, and the three of them slunk back, mollified.

  McGill pulled the rucksack from his shoulder, offered it to Angus, and said, “Here’s your crank. Go get blasted so you can make me a mint on side bets tomorrow, Chainsaw.”

  Angus stared at the rucksack of crank, thinking of all the savagery it had brought: a dead pharmacist, a dead backwoods man in a dress, a beat gook and beat bartenders, dead Liz, Ned barely audible with a lifeless beast beside him. Angus smiled as he saw his opening. Told McGill, “Time to reconcile your shitty choices.”

  * * *

  Just as the first guard reached across his body for the holstered .45 H&K pistol, Fu heeled his right foot into the guard’s forearm, trapped it across the man’s stomach. Fu’s left hand flowed like a whip, walloped the guard’s right temple. His right palm came like an uppercut beneath the guard’s jaw. Rattled and chipped the guard’s teeth. Fu doubled-palmed the dazed guard’s chest, knocked him backward into the second guard, who’d pulled his pistol. A shot sounded and a bullet ripped a hole in the first guard’s lower back. “Fuck!” the man yelled.

  Fu dropped to the ground and spun to his left, sweeping the third guard’s legs from beneath him. His head of Willie Nelson–style locks slammed onto the rocky earth, sent an echo throughout his frame. He went stiff. Fu stayed low to the ground, hammered the man’s nose and mouth. The guard’s limbs thrashed and Fu pressed his right forearm into the guard’s Adam’s apple till his stiffness ceased.

  Fu lurched low, his left and right arms spread away from his body like wings. The second guard stepped toward him with his pistol, and Fu sprang up from the ground. His left hand formed a claw, came down on top of the guard’s skull, torqued it down into Fu’s right hand, which came palm up like an offering, the ridge of his hand knifing the guard’s throat.

  The guard went red-faced and dropped his pistol. His hands grabbed his throat. Fu spun behind him, offered left-right hammer punches to the guard’s kidneys, worked his way up the spine till the guard hit the ground like a suicide jumper to street pavement. Fu stepped back to the Jeep, got in, and shifted into drive.

  * * *

  Earthy lines split across McGill’s forehead as he questioned, “Kind of shit you spitting?”

  Angus moved like the wind, rooted a steel toe into McGill’s gut. McGill dropped the rucksack. Doubled over. Angus slapped the back of McGill’s head down into his left knee. Drove him backward into the quartet of gangsters. Gave Manny a straight right to his jaw. Pulled Manny’s pistol from his waist with his left. Pushed it into his fat mass of a nose and pulled the trigger. Eyes, lips, and cheek diced across McGill and the cholos.

  The onlookers chewed on crazy and hollered, “Motherfucker shot Manuel!”

  From the far corners of the surrounding field, the dozen men who guarded for McGill came running toward the ring. The other ten men who watched the fights and took wagers from the onlookers started to push through the crowd.

  The Mutts reached for their pistols. Angus reached down for McGill’s head of hair. Pulled McGill up into a headlock with his right arm. Flexed his biceps. Pinched and pulled McGill’s larynx in the bend of his elbow. McGill was ripe-faced and gagging, a pistol jammed into his ear. His eyes doubled in size as he looked at the bangers pointing their guns at him and Angus, and he rasped, “Don’t fucking shoot … you … ignorant wetbacks!”

  Purcell removed his hand from the backpack, bringing with it a shiny piece of steel. He slung the pack back over his shoulder, nudged Jarhead, and said, “You starting to see you didn’t just come here to fight?”

  Jarhead muttered, “I seen enough.”

  Purcell said, “Like it or not, we gotta help Chainsaw Angus.” And he propelled Jarhead through the crowd, into the ring.

  McGill turned his neck left to right, loosened Angus’s clench, and spat out, “Release those fucking hounds!”

  McGill’s men fought through the crowd, who started tossing full bottles and cans of booze at the ring, along with chunks of grilled chicken, goat, and venison. Their screams crescendoed. “Fight! Fight! Fight!”

  From behind Angus, the plywood doors at the other corners of the ring opened. Angus retightened his hold around McGill’s neck and growled, “You rotten bastard.”

  Three oversized hounds came at Angus. Two stood their ground, watched the third drill into the muscle of Angus’s right calf. Break his skin. Savor the cow’s blood that coated his body. Angus tried to kick the dog from his calf, but the dog jerked his leg like a rag from side to side. Tested his balance.

  One of Manny’s bangers accidently fired a round at Angus. Missed and grazed McGill’s chest. McGill hollered, “You stupid son of a bitch!”

  Angry onlookers screamed, “They shot McGill!” Everyone started elbowing, pushing, and punching, creating a drunken and doped mosh pit that stomped anyone who hit the ground into a fevered mucilage. And McGill’s men were right in the middle.

  Before another cartridge could be spent, Jarhead came into the ring, leveled one of the bangers with a punch to the kidneys from behind. Reached over the next gangster’s shoulders with a palm to the throat. Purcell cleaned up behind him, kneeled down, hammered the first fallen in the face with the butt of his gun and took his pistol. The third met Jarhead’s hooking fist at his temple and hit the ground.

  Purcell and Jarhead watched Angus release McGill to the fizzing hound that lockjawed his leg. Angus punched the pistol into the top of its skull, pulled the trigger. Bark and bite sundered into chunks. The other two hounds growled and waited for Angus to approach.

  Jarhead hollered, “Look out!” But it was too late.

  Angus turne
d right into McGill, who buried a thumb into Angus’s unbandaged wound. Angus pounded the butt of the pistol into McGill’s wrist. Then brought it across McGill’s face.

  McGill shook his head. Licked the ooze from his lips. Raised his fists to Angus.

  Angus ignored his pain, laughed, pushed the pistol into his waistband. He wanted to punish McGill. He jabbed McGill’s chest wound, calling up fresh waves of blood. McGill dropped his hands to his chest. Angus balled his fists into McGill’s shirt. Pivoted his right foot, leaned, and swung McGill into the lunging hounds behind him.

  McGill stumbled to the ground with, “I’ll feed you your fucking—”

  And then the hounds spread his threats over the rocky ring like oil staining pavement.

  Angus pulled Manny’s pistol from his waist. His left shoulder oozed and mixed with the cow’s blood and animal fat that dressed his body. He looked down at the gangsters scattered on the ground in front of him like dumped-out cans of Ol’ Roy Dog Food. Knelt down, felt the ache of his right calf that was chewed gum. He pulled a pistol from one of the convulsing wounded, stood, pushed it into his waistband. Faced Purcell and Jarhead. Each was untrusting, burning stares through the others.

  Outside the ring, McGill’s men were limp slabs of muck beneath the crowd’s footing as the onlookers bloodied one another with bottles and fists. Purcell parted his lips, this time with a question. “Now what?”

  Angus smirked, he was confused by the old man, and Jarhead, a fighter who’d threatened to beat his face in but now wanted to help him. Angus turned to Purcell and said, “My experience with strangers helping strangers is, they always have a personal motivation.”

  Purcell replied, “Ain’t got time for your past philosophies of how one man wrongs another. Some dicks is crooked, others is straight, but they can all be used for fucking.”

  Three onlookers stumbled through the open gate and into the ring. One hollered, “Fuckers is gonna pay for what you done to McGill!”

  Angus raised his pistol, germinated the air with each man’s complexion while telling himself he wasn’t leaving without getting to the barn, taking McGill’s money. He sized up his options. The odds of three men fighting their way to the barn were better than the odds of one. He needed the other two for that, but nothing else. He swatted at the flies buzzing around his head and said, “McGill’s take from the ’Brook is in the barn.” He paused, assaulted Jarhead with his eyes, and said, “Know you didn’t come here to fight, leave empty-handed. You won’t if we make it to the barn.”

  Jarhead didn’t trust Angus, could read his manner. He looked to Purcell, who held a pistol in each hand. Then nodded to Angus and said, “Lead the way.”

  * * *

  Fu sat watching the chaos unfold. Nudged Whalen and said, “You stay in Jeep. I will find Angus. Fulfill our agreement.” He stepped from the Jeep. Made his way into the chaos of men and women blistering one another with fists, bottles, and sticks. Fu punched, palmed, and snapped his way toward the ring. In the furious swirl no one seemed to take special notice of him, but Angus, fighting to get out of the ring, caught his eye from a distance and he came up short. Fu felt hands reaching for his shoulders. In one motion, he spun around with his left arm circling over the top of the man’s forearms, coming up beneath the arms, pulling them tight to the left side of his rib cage as if flexing his biceps. Fu spread his legs shoulder-width apart and dropped below the man’s center of gravity while his left forearm applied upward pressure, arm-barred the man’s elbows. The arms gave and the onlooker screamed.

  Fu released him. Felt a bottle shatter over the rear of his skull, then a punch to the ear, a kick to his right leg, then to his left, then another punch and another kick and another bottle and he dropped to the earth.

  * * *

  Angus started out into the pandemonium. Men and women screamed, “He’s the one that fed McGill to the hounds. Beat his ass!”

  Angus tried to save his ammunition in case McGill’s men were guarding the money in the barn, used his fists as much as possible while dodging the drunken with their broken bottles and makeshift clubs. Jarhead and Purcell battled behind him, punching and elbowing the sotted and stumbling. Taking a punch or a knee from out of nowhere every few steps.

  A broken bottle swept Purcell’s ribs, cut through his shirt. He turned and palmed the fresh wound. Jarhead fisted the snaggletoothed bottle wielder in the gut.

  A piece of wood hit Angus’s right arm. He shouted, “Inbred bastard!” And dug the fingers of his right hand into the onlooker’s eyes. Kicked him into the other onlookers and kept fighting.

  Making it to the barn, Angus shouldered open the door. Jarhead was one step behind him. Purcell was last, keeping pressure on his wounded rib cage. He slammed and bolted the door, turned to Angus, and asked, “Where’s it at?”

  Angus pointed to the rear of the barn, where aged two-by-sixes made up a closed door to another room. Light bounced beneath it. A female voice shushed other voices with a loud, “Quiet!” Shadows creaked the planked flooring on the other side of the door. The female voice called out, “Daddy McGill, that you? The hell’s going on out there?”

  Angus pointed the handgun he’d pulled from Manny and splintered the gray wood with each pull of the trigger, the sound of the gunshots rattling Purcell and Jarhead. When the screams echoing from the room ended with the thud of bodies hitting the floor, Angus quit shooting.

  Dried blood flaked from Angus’s sweaty forehead, and he acted fast, kick-stomping the door open. In the back room, he stood with his pistol smoking and smiled at the slabs of chip board overtop sawhorses, five-gallon buckets pushed beneath for chairs. Crumpled sacks lay on the floor. Fluorescent lighting overhead outlined the stacks of crumpled bills banded together on top of the makeshift table. It was McGill’s take from the ’Brook.

  To the side, next to a rusted cast-iron wood stove, three men and a woman lay painting the slatted floor with themselves. The men were still alive. Goat had been shot in his right thigh. Walkup, in the ear. Lang in the gut. Scar lay motionless. Ragged blond hair clung to her face like strips of raw bacon, mascara in Alice Cooper–style circles around her eyes. Her chest lumped out a bloody Drive-By Truckers T-shirt with a cartoon picture of an old-timer carrying a pick.

  Angus stepped toward the three bleeding men. One looked up at him and pleaded, “Please don’t shoot me no more. Take what you want. McGill’s Bronco is out that back door, keys is in it. Just don’t—”

  Angus smiled and shot them without contrition.

  Behind him, Jarhead’s and Purcell’s ears rang as they inhaled the fresh gunpowder and smoke that hovered in the air. Jarhead burst out with, “Didn’t have to shoot them. Already said to take what you want. Even told you McGill’s Bronco is out back.”

  The barn walls shook under the crowd’s fists.

  Angus looked at the three pulpy-faced men who lay limp on the floor, sizing up his options again, knowing he’d a way out. He said, “No, I didn’t need to, just like I don’t need to split McGill’s money with either of you.”

  Angus spun around to Jarhead, his gun pointed at the lone figure.

  But Jarhead’s fists were already coming at Angus tight as sledgehammers, ready to shatter the leathered barbarian’s skull. He planted a left hook into Angus’s right hand, knocked the gun from his grip. Threw a blinding right cross that caught Angus on the chin, knocked him back across the makeshift table of money that scattered across the floor like birdshot.

  Angus blinked his eyes wide, saliva the shade of rosewood dribbling down his chin, and got out, “You punch like a mule. Let’s see if you take one like a man or a bitch.” And sprung forward with a right-shoulder feint.

  Jarhead’s left hand pawed against his temple, anticipating the attack. He bobbed his head to the right, believing the feint was a punch to his left. Angus cut the air at ten o’clock, swung the bottom of his left fist down. A hammer fist depressed the cartilage of Jarhead’s nose, then a right vertical punch parted Jarhead’s l
eft eyelid like hot asphalt.

  Jarhead blinked red, tried to step back. Angus came with a low right roundhouse kick, frogged the muscle of Jarhead’s left thigh. For a split second, Jarhead’s leg turned to a bed of eight-penny nails. He shifted his balance to his right leg, slapped the air with his right hand, delivered a side-palm to Angus’s left temple, planted his left foot, and cut up the center of Angus’s body with a left uppercut to the throat. Angus stutter-stepped backward. Coughing and tearing up, he quipped, “Sneaky motherfucker.”

  Jarhead’s left hand guarded his chin. His right hung loose in front of him. His sight was damped by moisture and blood. His lungs heaved. The air he pulled in felt like frosted straight razors etching new expressions of hurt beneath his rib cage. Angus was a black blur, his left and right arms spread like he was hugging a redwood. He slammed his palms against Jarhead’s ears and popped his eardrums.

  Sound was the needles pricking Jarhead’s mind as he felt for Angus’s wrists. Angus gripped each of Jarhead’s ears, sledged his cranium down onto Jarhead’s. The echo of blackness waved to the back of Jarhead’s skull, sent all those needles clacking down his spine. His knees buckled, his eyes did an undertow, and he swam into unconsciousness.

  Purcell stepped to Angus with his pistol leveled, pulled the trigger, click-click-click. “Son of a bitch!”

  Angus slapped the pistol from Purcell’s grip, knuckled his eye, knocked Purcell to the floor. He said, “Motherfucker, try to shoot me? You sit tight, old-timer. I’ll get to you after I bloody your boy a bit more.”

  Angus straddled Jarhead’s limp form, laughed as he drove one fist after the next into Jarhead’s face.

  The back barn door creaked opened.

  Angus turned to the beat, cut, and pulpy outline. “How the shit—?”

  Fu stepped into the barn, bent, and rolled sideways. His legs cartwheeled up into the air coming forward. Fu’s left foot came down on the barn floor, the shin of his right leg came down across the back of Angus’s neck. Knocked him facedown on top of Jarhead.