Charming Grace by Deborah Smith Page A

part? Armand hooked us up with a multi-state ring that bribed interstate truckers to look the other way when we ‘stole’ their big rigs. No risk, no sweat, nobody got hurt, and we all got rich.
    “If this scam was any easier,” Armand said, “every congressman in Louisiana would want in on it.”
    So we had an easy gig, and I pushed college out of my mind, or pretended to. The next few years of our lives were as heady as they were miserable—miserable only for me, not Armand. We had money. Lots of money. We paid cash for a fine little ranch outside New Orleans. Armand decorated the big-porched house like a cross between a casino bar and Graceland; I set myself up in a three-bedroom doublewide next door and turned one of the bedrooms into an office with a drafting table. We drove brand-new trucks, a Jeep, and a couple of sports cars, entertained a stream of wild women, owned season tickets to all the big sports teams, and spent a small fortune on four purebred quarter horses, which lived in an air-conditioned barn I designed in Frenchie’s honor.
    So what was my big problem, other than being an as-yet-uncaught felon?
    When I dreamed at night, down where I was still Gigi Noleene’s good kid, I saw nothing but failure. Mine.
    Did I want me and Armand to be caught? Hell, no. But maybe we just ran out of the luck that keeps hope free.

    It was a steaming hot night in July. I remember yellow streetlights over the deserted industrial park outside New Orleans, highlighting moths as big as the bats chasing them. Driving a forklift, I was busy moving pallets stacked with hot-from-the-factory boom boxes off one of our borrowed tractor trailers. The driver turned his Redman tobacco cap backwards and smoked a hand-rolled cigarette as he yakked with the driver of a second truck, which was being unloaded by a couple of our ‘associates,’ as Armand called our fellow thieves.
    Armand lounged between the two big trailers, grinning and rocking on the heels of fine leather loafers, his hands inside the thousand-dollar pants pockets of a nice tan suit. When we finished he’d head into the city for a late dinner with a blues singer in town to work on her new album. Me, I was in old jeans and would head back to the ranch to read a book on architecture and catch a Knicks game on TV. Armand’s newest sports car waited nearby, with a polished Glock laying on the hood. My brother loved guns the way he loved his cars and Rolex watches. The shinier the better.
    Suddenly the night went crazy. A small army of cops came running out of the shadows, all of them wearing flak jackets and black camo jumpsuits with FBI on the back in big neon letters. All of them yelling “Down, Down, don’t move!” All of them pointing major ammo our way.
    Armand had always had a plan for this kind of emergency. He’d drilled me on it—even made me swear on Mama’s memory. If we ever get caught, bro, you head for the nearest woods and don’t stop ‘til you hit Canada, but me, I’ll stay as a decoy. I can stand doing time as long as you’re not locked up, too.
    So of course when we got caught I jumped off the forklift and headed straight for Armand. “You swore!” he yelled, waving both arms at me like I was a horse he could shoo away. I saw one of our associates grab Armand’s pistol. About that time somebody cut the lights and war broke out. Hell, I’ll never know who was shooting at who. Our guy was shooting wild, and the FBI guys returned the favor. All I knew was I couldn’t let Armand get hurt. I grabbed him in a bear hug.
    The hand of God punched me on the right side, just below my ribs. The next thing I knew I was on the ground, gasping for air and living in a world of hurt. “Boone!” Armand yelled, then flattened himself over me like a mother hen hiding a chick, his arms around my head, his body shielding mine. The details are a little fuzzy to me, since I was involved in trying to breathe deep enough to suck the blood back inside my body.