Red River

By Bob Guess

Sixty-four-year-old Radison Jefferies is more familiar with failure than he would like to be. The former best-selling author has written three poorly received books in a row and blown through millions of dollars. Just as financial failure becomes an unsettling reality, he inherits his fathers Texas farm. It appears that unloading it to a buyer is the answer to eliminating his debts. But as Radison heads from California toward Warner, Texas, he has no idea that selling the farm will become the least of his worries.

After deciding to search for a farm conglomerate to buy the land, Radison soon discovers that not all of the towns residents welcome his return, even for a short stay. Ned Kuster is a bully of the first order who is less than thrilled that Radison has shown up to, what he mistakenly believes, claim his wife, Margaretwho also happens to be Radisons first love. While his personal safety hangs in the balance, Radison inadvertently unearths long-held secrets as fate ultimately rises up to meet him.

Red River shares the tale of a washed-up authors journey to Texas to sell his fathers farm where he is forced to confront his past transgressions.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: May 11, 2017
• ISBN: 9781532023279

Bob Guess

Bob Guess is the author of Waiting for the Green Flash, Plastic Princess, Kumpel, and a children’s book titled Hey Mister How’s Your Sister? Kumpel received two national awards for Best Historical Fiction of 2012. Mr. Guess resides in San Diego, California.

Book preview

Chapter 1

He knew she owned a Derringer pistol. He had bought it for her. A protection a notch above the pepper spray she had previously relied on. That she could shoot it, and shoot it well, was not in doubt. He’d arranged for her shooting lessons himself. Nor could he afford to question that she had the gun pointed at his crotch under the table and that her threat to make him an instant eunuch was real. She was amazingly honest for one in her trade.

He had regretted taking his obsession with first-person research to this point. Now he regretted it as much as any man shot in the groin in the best restaurant in Santa Monica. He would be the first, you say? Damn! So how else does an author whose story involves a prostitute write authentically about such a person without first-hand knowledge? She had offered him the complete package but he’d taken a deep breath and stayed with just the interviews. She could not have cared less, just show me the money, Jerry McGuire. She had been good to her word. She had given him access into the business of the packaging and selling of human bodies for sex. He had found the enterprise, at its core, to be an ugly and disgusting one. Baby Doll was the Pretty Woman before she met the millionaire, and he was as close as anyone would ever come to a savior. He had painted the picture of her future and the need to take her life back from the pimps and exploiters. He had been her mentor, she his. There had been only one problem. The money. They were sitting here because of the money. Which, as they say in court, had not been forthcoming. He’d run up a tab of five thousand dollars and just neglected to pay.

You’re trying to say Radison Jefferies, the big time writer, doesn’t have my five Grover Clevelands?

"Five Grover Clevelands! Priceless. Nobody calls a thousand dollar bill a Grover Cleveland! Baby Doll, you are so noir. You’re perfect!"

Nore, nore. You keep saying that. Have you got a hair lip and can’t say whore?

No, noir. Not whore. I’ll explain it to you sometime. Even your name is perfect. A whore who calls herself Baby Doll.

That’s my real name, jackass.

Yes, and mine is really John Grisham.

So you gonna be my John one way or the other, huh?

Listen, Baby Doll, I’ll get you your money.

"No, you’ll get me my money today—like in now today."

May we just finish our meal?

You think I’m gonna sit here and watch you eat those insects?

They’re snails, not insects, mollusks I think is the category.

We used to step on those slimy things when I was a kid. Made a crunchy wet sound, like crushing on a grape that has a shell.

Thank you for that appetizing bit of information.

Let’s go, Jefferies. Let the help put your plate out in the alley so those insects can crawl off to freedom. I don’t want to shoot you, and I don’t want to hear you munchin’ on a shell with those little tails hanging out of your mouth.

They left and went to Radison’s Mercedes, parked almost in front of the restaurant in a handicapped space. A blue handicapped placard hung from his rear view mirror, a spot it frequented when he looked briefly for regular parking and found none. He had persuaded his doctor to issue the notice three years ago after his knee operation. It had long since expired, but as Radison reasoned, what policeman had the time to check the date of issue. Baby Doll noticed immediately.

You handicapped?

Yes, diminished capacity.

So the badge is gonna throw me in a cell for what I do and rich folks just think the laws aren’t meant for them.

It’s just a sticker, Baby Doll, not a capital crime.

Scab on the sore, Jefferies, scab on the sore.

Radison drove away from the curb after helping Baby Doll into the passenger seat. She gave him a WTF look but got in anyway. Radison had known Baby Doll for three months now, and had driven her to destinations more than a few times, but could not get comfortable appearing with her in public. Baby Doll’s physical appearance didn’t scream whore like some of the ladies to whom she had introduced him. Those escorts wouldn’t have been any more obvious if they’d had a mattress on their back and a sign hanging from their neck. Baby Doll dressed well, in quality clothes befitting a young black businesswoman, which of course she was. She was tall, slender, and confident. She had not yet acquired the veneer of hardness her occupation ultimately bestows upon its practitioners. Her progression into the business had not been an unusual one. She was born and raised in this city, one of five children of a public utility worker and an in-home seamstress. She graduated from high school with good grades but the family lacked the resources to pay college tuition, given the needs of the six other members of the family. She enrolled in the local junior college and took fast-food jobs for a year. She wanted out of the crowded three-bedroom home and was able to get an apartment with three other girls, but the rent was a stretch. A professional opportunity presented itself, dancing in a strip bar. No one questioned her bogus ID, but a young man who worked with her father recognized her and an hour-long screaming bout with her parents ensued. Baby Doll remembered the duration, she said, because the TV was never turned down and five American Idol singers debuted and departed while the confrontation raged on.

Entertaining customers with lap dances led to entertaining them in the prone position and a new career. She had a pimp in the beginning, but she told him she was leaving the stable to be on her own. Once independent, she proved to be an intelligent capitalist. Her apartment was on the fifth floor of a mid-priced condo building. A potential customer was told to wait at a designated spot and call her ten minutes later. When he’d arrived at the spot, Baby Doll zeroed in on him with a pair of powerful binoculars. Police, even in civilian clothes, are easy to spot and Baby Doll had never misjudged. She had no sheet, as Radison’s noir PI would have said. Radison had passed her test. His body hadn’t looked like a chiseled cop since his high school football days. He was near six feet and walked with the bounce of an athlete, toe to heel and in short, purposeful strides. The body had not kept up with the vigor of his walk or his quick mind. A slight paunch dropped unchecked over his belt and continued around the circumference of his waist. His hair was combed straight back and there was no clear line where the blond melded with the grey. Forehead wrinkles had become permanent but the cool blue eyes directed attention from the rest of the face, which seemed to be on the verge of giving way. In a tailored suit he looked younger; today he was all of his sixty-four years.

They entered the bank. Radison looked warily at the guard at the door. Face it, he would never feel comfortable in Baby Doll’s company regardless of the circumstance. The click-click of her stiletto heels resonated and seemed to draw attention she enjoyed but were a cringe factor for him.

There was a line of six people, the ill-fitting couple joining it. Radison had no bankbook with him and had no idea as to any identifying account number. As he remembered it, he had two accounts: one checking, one savings. Savings was like a sick joke. He’d never saved for anything, the future and old age out of mind, out of the question that he’d ever enjoy either. A looming dread had been with him since he was a teenager. Articulating it had made him a best-selling author, a war novel that all but ignored the usual heroics and battle scenes for a story of a Marine gripped in fear but functioning. His thoughts were interrupted by a man who’d finished his bank business and had stopped to study Radison.

Hey, are you Radison Jefferies?

Yes, Radison answered wearily.

Oh, don’t worry. I’m not an autograph collector.

Good.

You know, you should change that picture on the back cover of your books. You’re not thirty anymore.

Thank you, I’ll take a selfie and rush it right down to my publisher.

That last book. Not so good. Westerns are not your thing, I’d say.

Dying to know why you didn’t like it.

No need to be sarcastic. I did spend twenty-five wasted dollars on it. I’ll tell you what was wrong with it. You gave nineteenth century cowboys twenty-first century sensibilities. And no one cares about the Mexican-American War. A Civil War setting would have been better.

And you’re a critic for what publication?

No publication, just a nobody who unfortunately bought your book. I’m sorry I bothered you but I’m glad I got to see the man. You know, Mr. Jefferies, you write better than you are.

Radison blinked but said nothing.

As the man approached the door he turned, You should write another book about Viet Nam. Now that was a great book.

Radison felt Baby Doll’s piercing stare.

What? he said.

You’re really a jerk, aren’t you?

So its been said.

Radison finished his business and handed Baby Doll the bulging envelope of hundred dollar bills. The money had been there in checking, plus a lavish bonus of three thousand, twenty-six dollars left over. God, I am so broke.

Well, I guess this is it. I’ve really enjoyed our time together.

Deja Moo, Jefferies.

Pardon?

The feeling that I’ve heard that bull before. Strictly a business deal, Jefferies.

Okay. Business it was. So chao em, sayonara, auf wiedersehen.

Not goodbye, Jefferies. I’ll be with you forever, immortalized in print. The nore nigger. Baby Doll, the whore who helps the PI find the leopard with the ruby eye. That is still the story, isn’t it?

Authors always reserve the right to make a sharp turn right or left if it expedites the story.

Well, don’t think about expediting Baby Doll out of the story lest I come looking for you.

Point understood. Now, may I drop you someplace?

No thanks. We’re done.

Chapter 2

His agent had called the meeting. Fine, he needed some paying gigs or an advance on his next book. What he hadn’t expected was that the agent would invite Radison’s accountant as well. Like inviting your wife along on a weekend retreat with your mistress. He knew news from his accountant, Rob Cohn, wouldn’t be good. When you get emails questioning your credit card markers, you begin to realize your salad days now consist of just the peeled carrots. William Masters, known by all as Billy, had been with Radison since the days when a young writer, just out of UCLA and two tours in Nam, had sought him out with a rough draft of a novel he’d been working on from year one into the university’s writing program.

Billy and Radison were looking at their fortieth anniversary, eleven books, two movies, and sales of several million (always exaggerated on the back cover bio) later. It was no secret in the business that Radison Jefferies had lost the best-seller touch and had cranked out three flounders in a row. Critics seemed to favor sports analogies in their depiction of his literary state: Jefferies has lost his fastball, and Jefferies has lost a step. What worried Radison was that he had lost readers. Lots of them. Radison hesitated at the door to Billy’s outer office. He knocked on the door, though he didn’t have to—knock on wood for good luck, cross all your groin hair, spit three times on a horned toad (and he’ll spit back at you), all the tricks that had worked over the years. He entered. A lovely brunette sitting at the outer desk gave him a bleached smile that dazzled. New girl, but delicious as had been all who preceded her.

Mr. Jefferies, so nice to see you, she cooed. Mr. Masters said for you to come on in. Apparently Cohn and Billy had heard the greeting. They were standing and facing the door.

Hello, Radison, said Rob, putting out a large but soft hand.