“How was it done?”

“I rode off when they caught him,” Stillwell said. “I guess that makes me a coward. I said my piece, but no one was listening. It was Chains LeDoux told me to ride off if I didn’t have the nuts for it. You know who he was?”

Quinn nodded. “I heard some.”

Lillie stood up and looked into the back of the property, to the woods and rows and rows of young pine trees. Quinn turned to see where she was staring and saw two figures walking at the edge of the woods, a glint of light off some field glasses, and then they disappeared.

“You have a lot of hunters around here?” Quinn asked, still watching the woods.

“Some,” Stillwell said. “Why?”

“That your property behind you?”

“I got fifteen acres of them pines.”

“You may have some poachers,” Lillie said. “We’ll check it out but you may want to call Wildlife and Game.”

Quinn was still seated and leaned forward, elbows on his knees. “So you didn’t see it?”

“I saw them catch the man, take him away.”

“Are any of the old riders still around?”

Hank Stillwell bowed his head and closed his eyes, nodding over and over to himself. “You are aware that Chains LeDoux goes free from federal charges in a few weeks?”

“Yes, sir,” Quinn said. “I just heard the news from Johnny Stagg.”

“I ain’t forgot,” Stillwell said. “I got a lot of guilt and shit. Someone like Chains doesn’t have the right to be out and among living, breathing humans. If he comes back to Jericho . . .”

“Bad news?” Lillie said.

“Real bad,” Stillwell said.

Quinn stood. The old man remained in the recliner, where he probably spent most of his days and nights. Quinn scanned the woods again but didn’t see anyone roaming the edges. Lillie had already walked to the door, fingering at her handheld radio, calling for Kenny to sweep the roads around the Yellow Leaf church for some poachers out and about.

“‘Poachers’?” Stillwell said.

“Who else?” Quinn said.

“It’s Chains’s people,” the old man said, unchanged and not moving from the chair. A quiet heat poured into the room, smelling of sweet red oak. “Y’all realize they’re back?”

Quinn nodded, Lillie walking toward the thin metal door and out into the cold. He stood there and looked down at Stillwell, gaunt and graying, shoulder-length hair and beard with still some red in it. He could see the man riding with bikers back in the day.

“When’s the last time y’all went out and patrolled around Choctaw?”

•   •   •

Diane Tull performed happy hour at the Southern Star twice a week and an acoustic set at The River at the Sunday service. She liked the performances at the Star a bit better, as she could include her whole band and drink Jack Daniel’s on the rocks while she sang. She pulled out a torn piece of notebook paper from her Levi’s jacket and read the set list. A little changeup from last time.

“Kiss an Angel Good Morning”

“I’m the Only Hell My Mama Raised”

“Come Early Morning”

“She Called Me Baby” (Reworking a bit with “He Called Me Baby”)

“Trailer for Rent”

The last song of the first set was the newest. Diane didn’t care much, if anything, for what was coming out of Nashville these days, but she was really digging what the Pistol Annies were recording. She did like a singer from Alabama named Jamey Johnson. And, of course, good old Alan Jackson. But those guys were hardheaded and not part of that Hollywood sound, where producers never heard of pedal steel, Porter Wagoner, or that a good night of heartbreak and drinking was good for the soul. If she had to hear another song about how much a man loved sitting his porch and sipping sweet tea, she swore to Jesus she was going to blast her radio with her 12-gauge. Country music was about a man and a woman, drinking hard, and getting through life. She was sick to death of folks trying to put a glitter ball over Hank’s grave.

“You want another?” the bartender Chip asked.

“I’m good.”

“You look like you’ve had a hell of a day.”

“Lots on my mind,” Diane said. “Say, go ahead and pop the top on a Coors. I’ll bring it up with me.”

She took the beer and reached down for the handle on her guitar case and walked up to the narrow little stage, where J.T. had leaned an upright bass, not sure why he changed up from the electric. A mandolin lay at his feet to play for certain songs.

Diane pulled the microphone close to the raised stool and positioned a second mic alongside her Martin guitar. Their drummer was a guy from Holly Springs named Wallace who’d played for a lot of big bands in Memphis and New Orleans. He knew all the songs by heart. They’d only gone through the list a few times, with him nailing every bit.

She passed the list around and then shook her head. “How about we do that new one, ‘Hard Edges’? I think I have it down.”

J.T. and Wallace shrugged and she dug into the song, the lyrics reminding her a hell of a lot about Caddy Colson, back when she’d been a woman taking off her clothes so the men didn’t look her in the eye. Some of the late-night conversations with that girl had left Diane cold. She tried to think about Caddy as she sang and how those hard edges hide that tender heart. Diane enjoying the music so much, thinking how the song would sound better with that lap steel to go with J.T.’s mandolin, that she didn’t even mind there were only about seven folks in the bar. She knew from a long time back, you didn’t play for the crowd, you played for yourself.

They went from “Hard Edges” and wove back into the set, getting a few songs down the line into that Don Williams classic, “Come Early Morning,” one of those songs that brought her back to how much joy the radio and old LPs on her grandmomma’s console player used to bring her. J.T. loved it, too, and would work in a harmonica part with the bass. Diane got so into it, she nearly missed the six men in leather and chains walk in the front door of the Star. They wore leather jackets, jeans, and heavy biker boots that thumped on the wooden floor.

Two of them walked up to the bar and the other four took seats close to the stage, kicking back and slumping in their chairs, seeming to already be drunk as hell. They wore beards and tats and motorcycle vests over their jackets. Didn’t take long before they were catcalling and calling out requests. Diane had to politely say, in her quiet country voice, “We appreciate you. But we don’t do requests.”

One of the men hollered out, “So what do you do and when?”

Diane turned to J.T. and J.T. shook his head, leaning in saying for her to forget it and play on. And maybe they had rattled her, god damn them, but she didn’t feel like playing “He Called Me Baby” and asked Wallace and J.T. to head into “Tulsa Time.” And there were more catcalls and beer bottles slamming on tabletops, shots of liquor, in shadows and neon. One of the men had a bald head and crossed eyes, tattoos across his face and down on his chin, and a weird inked circle across his Adam’s apple. He wore a T-shirt without sleeves and kept on staring at her tits as she played, Diane wishing like hell she hadn’t worn the glittered tank top reading Momma Tried and her tight bell-bottoms.

She kept her eyes down on the Martin, playing on through “Tulsa Time,” that long streak of gray hair covering her face and eyes. She finished out the set and then with slow, steady steps walked back to the ladies’ room. She splashed cool water in her face and tried to calm herself.

The door opened. In the mirror, she saw the inked man come up behind her. He slid the dead bolt closed.

“You know who I am?” His voice sounded ragged and guttural like his vocal cords had been cut.

She shook her head and held on to the sink bowl.

“You know our colors?”

She nodded.

“I like your singing,” he said.