Shadow Prey

hope so. If he’s caught right away, the television coverage will come and go too fast.” Sam had a broad face, with smile lines around a wide, soft chin. His hair was salt-and-pepper, his eyes deep and thoughtful. He had a belly, which bore down on a wide belt with a turquoise buckle.
    “Not if Leo moves. He should be in Oklahoma City tomorrow, if his car holds out,” said Aaron. “If the two . . . attacks . . . come right on top of each other, the TV’ll go nuts. And the letters are ready.”
    Sam paced down to the water’s edge, watched it for a moment, then turned and spoke back up the sand spit.
    “I still think the first two were a mistake. We wasted Bluebird, doing that second one. Those killings won’t have the impact we need . . . .”
    “We needed some low-risk attacks to start . . . .”
    “Wasn’t low-risk for Bluebird . . .”
    “We knew he might have a problem . . . but we had to set a tone. We had to make it a war. We can’t just have a couple of assassinations. We have to make the media think . . . War. We have to pump this motherfucker up. It has to be big, if we want to get . . .”
    “The Great Satan,” Sam snorted. “It’ll be for nothing if we can’t get him out here.”
    “It wouldn’t be for nothing—the ones we’ve already taken are bad enough. But he’ll come,” Aaron said confidently. “We know he comes out here. We know why. We know where. And we can get at him.”
    “No,” said Sam. “We know he used to come here. Butmaybe no more. He’s got the media watching. He wants to be president . . . . He’s careful . . . .”
    “But once he’s here, he won’t stay away. Not with the monkey he’s got on his back.”
    “Maybe,” said Sam. He thrust his hands into his pockets. “I still think the first two were bullshit killings.”
    “You’re wrong,” Aaron said flatly.
    Sam stared out at the water. “I don’t want to waste anybody, that’s all.” He bent, picked up a flat rock and tried to skip it across the river. Instead of skipping, it cut into the surface like a knife and was gone. “Shit,” he said.
    “You never were any good at that,” Aaron said. “You need more of a sidearm.”
    “How many times have you told me that?” Sam asked, hunting up another rock.
    “About a million.”
    Sam flipped the second rock out at the water. It hit and sank. He shook his head, thrust his hands back into his jean pockets, stood quietly for a moment, then turned to his cousin. “Have you talked to Shadow Love?” he asked.
    “No.”
    “Are you still planning to send him to Bear Butte?”
    “Yeah. I want him out of here,” Aaron said.
    “Shadow Love is a weapon,” Sam Crow said.
    “He’s our kid.”
    “Every man comes to earth with a purpose. I’m quoting the famous Aaron Crow himself. Shadow Love is a weapon.”
    “I won’t use him,” said Aaron, walking down to the water’s edge to stand by his cousin.
    “Because he’s our kid,” Sam said. “Don’t let that fuck you up.”
    “It’s not that. The fact is, Shadow scares the shit out of me. That’s the real problem.” Aaron kicked off his battered sneakers and took a half-step so his toes were in the water. It felt cool and healing. “I fear for what we did to that boy, when we left him with Rosie. We had work to do, but . . . She wasn’t quite right, you know. She was a lovely woman, but she had some wrong things in her mind. You say we made a weapon. I think we made a crazy man.”
    “Remember, once, a Crazy Horse . . . ?”
    “Not the same. Crazy Horse loved a kind of life. A warrior life. Shadow’s not a warrior. He’s a killer. You’ve seen him; he hungers for pain and the power to create it.”
    The two men fell silent for a moment, listening to the water ripple past the sandbar. Then Aaron said, in a lighter tone, “How long before we fuck up, do you think?”
    Sam threw back his head and laughed. “Three weeks. Maybe a month.”
    “We’ll be dead, then,” Aaron said. He made it sound funny.
    “Maybe not. We could make it up to Canada. Sioux Valley. Hide out.”
    “Mmmm.”
    “What? You think we don’t have a chance? We’re just a couple of dead flatheads?” asked Sam.
    “People who do this kind of thing . . . don’t get away. They just don’t.” Aaron shrugged. “And there’s always the question, Should we try? ”
    Sam ran a hand through his hair. “Jesus,” he muttered.
    “Exactly,” Aaron said, with a