The drive was long and boring. There were few other cars on the road. It was late and mid-week, not the busiest time for Vegas traffic. I popped a few blues to keep sharp, and some codeine to take the edge off, then I put the finishing touches on my buzz with a joint and whiskey pint chaser.

The barb cocktail made my head tingle and the desert night, the hills in the distance, the wide flat of nothing near, began to trail brilliant colors until I came up on a small shock of a business next to a rundown gas station with old fashioned gas pumps straight out of the Grapes of Wrath.

There was a silver Volvo station wagon parked around back. It was partially hidden by a wreck of a pickup, but I could see the California plates and luggage still secured to the roof rack.

Follow my gut. Connect the dots. That’s what I do that the cops can’t seem to. It takes them days to even track leads, while people die. It’s really a shame.

I parked the car right in front of the place. There was a poorly painted sign that read JUNIORS PULLED MEAT BBQ in crooked red and white letters. Beneath that, in chilly type it said AIR CONDITIONED.

I entered through a screen door and immediately the smell of blood and BBQ sauce hit my nostrils. There was a counter, old, stained, and disgusting. There were a few tables just as stained with broken rusty chairs. It was dead quiet. I looked toward the counter. Behind the stained Formica I saw a door to the kitchen.

I walked forward. I also removed my gun. All I could smell was blood and all I could hear was the buzz of flies.

I saw two things as I entered; two people, a young boy and an older woman, the Hughes family I assumed, bound to a gas pipe. The other was what was left of the father, Andre Hughes, naked and tied to a table. He had been stripped of skin from the chest down to his feet and several large sections of meat from the buttocks and thigh were cut away.

But worst of all, he was being kept alive. Tubes ran air to his exposed lungs through his nose and IVs numbed him to the pain.

That’s what I saw. What felt as I walked deeper into the room was a burning pain across the back of my skull. I’d felt it before. It was probably a wrench being hammered against my head. I reeled forward. The gun fell from my hand, and I managed to half-turn my head and see a large man with long blond hair, a mustache, and a Hawaiian print shirt. He had the wrench.