The Devil’s Share (16 page)

The gray-haired guard turned to look at her. There was blood on his lips. “How far do you think you'll get before that truck's spotted?”

“For Christ's sake, shut up,” the truck driver said.

Conlon was shaking now. She turned to Hicks. “We need to get going.”

He nodded, but didn't move. His HK hung from its sling, muzzle down. He had one hand on the butt.

Sandoval looked at him, said, “Well,
jefe
?”

Hicks looked down at the kneeling men. “What she said.”

Sandoval said, “You sure?”

“Yeah. Let's move.”

She went to the back of the Cherokee, unslung her HK, slid it into the tac bag there.

Hicks came up behind her, took off his rifle, said, “Better check the road.”

She went out to the highway. Taillights in the distance. The Taurus and the truck. She watched as they grew dimmer, vanished. Nothing in the other direction.

There was the sound of a scuffle behind her. She turned fast, heard Hicks say, “No!” Then a figure came out from behind the boulder, running, hands bound behind him. Conlon.

She angled to cut him off. He slammed into her, and they both went down on the blacktop. He was panting as he rolled away, tried to get back to his feet. She kicked at his legs to trip him, missed, and then he was up and running again, down the center of the road, his gait awkward, the bound hands throwing him off balance.

He yelled, “Help! Somebody help us!” and Sandoval stepped out from behind the boulder, said calmly, “Stop.” A beam of red light bisected the darkness, shone on the running man's back.

“No!” she said, and rolled to her feet. “Charles! Stop!”

He turned toward her, stumbling, backpedaled. A red dot centered on his chest; then came the clack and snap of a rifle bolt. He spun around, legs tangled, fell face first onto the road.

She ran toward him, heard feet behind her. She reached Conlon, knelt beside him. He lay with his right cheek on the blacktop, eyes open. Hicks knelt next to her, said, “Goddamn it.”

She tried to turn Conlon over, saw the blood soaking through his white shirt. She pulled off her left glove, touched her middle finger to his carotid artery, trying to feel a pulse beneath the skin. She tried another spot on his neck, an inch lower. Nothing.

“What?” Hicks said.

She sat back on her haunches. “He's dead.”

“You sure?”

“Yes.”

Sandoval stood on the shoulder, watching them. He'd turned off the laser sight.

“What happened?” she said.

“He got up, took a runner,” Hicks said. “I told him to stop.”

She pulled her glove back on, feeling the anger. Taking dirt from the road, she rubbed it against the spot where she'd touched him. It would cover any fingerprint or DNA she might have left.

“We were almost out of here,” she said.

“I don't know what got into him. He just panicked, ran.”

“We have to get him off the road. Help me.”

They gripped his bound arms, rose. He was dead weight between them.

“Careful,” Hicks said. “The blood.”

They half carried, half dragged him across the road, his shoes scuffing on the blacktop.

“You shouldn't have let this happen,” she said.

“He shouldn't have run.”

“They were your responsibility.”

Sandoval was back behind the boulder now, shouting at the others to stay where they were.

They laid Conlon alongside the Cherokee, out of sight of the men. She and Hicks were both out of breath.

“You bastards,” the older guard said. “You murdering bastards.”

“Shut up,” Sandoval said. “I won't tell you again,
papi.
”

She went around to the front of the Cherokee. Bugs flittered in the headlights. She looked at Sandoval. He had the butt of the HK braced on his hip.

“I told him to stop,” he said. “Everyone heard me. He should have stopped. He didn't. What was I supposed to do?”

The skinny guard she'd taken from the first car had his eyes closed, was mumbling to himself, the cadences of prayer.

“We have to go,” Hicks said.

“Just drive away,” the truck driver said without turning. There was rising panic in his voice. “Leave us here. Just drive away. You got what you want.”

“Be cool,” Sandoval said to him. “Just stay where you are. Everything's gonna be all right.”

Hicks looked at her. “We don't have a lot of choice here.”

“No,” she said, knowing what he meant.

The other guard had gone silent for a moment, was praying again. The Hail Mary.

“Wait a minute,” she said. “Let's all just take a breath here.”

Sandoval had moved to stand behind the older guard. He popped his gum, looked at Hicks. “Your call,
jefe.
”

She took a step closer to the Cherokee, the rear hatch still open. Wondering how long it would take her to get the HK out, if the safety was on.

“No,” she said again.

Hicks looked at her, then turned back to Sandoval, nodded.

“Wait,” she said, and then Sandoval lowered the HK and shot the guard in the back of the head. Blood sprayed the boulder.

Beside him, the truck driver screamed, threw himself to the side. Sandoval took a step back, aiming now, fired three more times, the only sound the clack of the rifle bolt, the grunts of the men. Then all four were facedown in the dirt, gray gunsmoke drifting through the headlights.

She felt dizzy, the earth tilting under her feet. She reached the Cherokee, grabbed for the HK. Hicks drove a shoulder into her, knocked her away. She caught her balance, spun to face him, and then a red laser sight touched the center of her chest. Sandoval had the HK to his shoulder, finger on the trigger.

Hicks took a step away, said, “Hold on now. Everybody just hold the fuck on.”

She looked at Sandoval. The laser was steady. She wondered what she would see when he fired. If she'd see anything at all.

A low moan came from one of the men on the ground.

Hicks looked at her, said, “It was the only way.”

The red dot climbed her chest, blinded her for a moment, centered on her forehead. She held her breath.

Hicks said, “He'll do it, you know. If you make him.”

The laser traced its way back down her body, hovered over where her heart would be.

“Sandy,” Hicks said. “Ease up. It's okay.”

“You sure of that, man?”

“I am.”

Sandoval lowered the rifle. The red dot trailed down her leg and into the dirt at her feet.

Another moan. The skinny guard's right foot began to scuff softly at the dirt.

“Sandy,” Hicks said.

Sandoval shook his head. “It can't be just me, man.”

Hicks looked at him for a moment, then reached into the back of the Cherokee, took a dark automatic from the tac bag, a suppressor already threaded into the muzzle. He worked the slide.

“Don't,” she said. Her mouth was dry.

“It's the only way,” he said again, then walked over to the men, leaned over and carefully shot each of them in the head.

The night was silent again, except for the chugging of the Cherokee's engine. She couldn't breathe.

Hicks pulled off his balaclava. His face was damp with sweat.

“Time to go,” he said.

 

SIXTEEN

They rode in silence, Hicks at the wheel, Crissa shotgun. Sandoval was behind her, looking out the window. All the weapons were disassembled and back in the tac bag, along with the balaclavas and jumpsuits.

A car passed them in the opposite direction, didn't slow. She flipped down the visor, watched Sandoval in the mirror there. If they planned to kill her, he'd be the one to do it. A shot to the back of the head, then her body dumped in the desert. The last witness to what happened back there, what they'd done.

He saw her watching him, leaned forward, touched her shoulder.

“Hey,” he said. “I'm sorry. I got a little rattled back there, that's all. We all did.”

She drew away from his hand. “Rattled? That what you call it?”

“Hey, he called the play. We told him to stop. He didn't. There wasn't much choice.”

“We could have caught him,” she said. “Brought him back.”

“Maybe, maybe not. But we'd all be fucked if he made it into those hills, wouldn't we? We'd never find him. I did what I had to do.”

“No one wanted it this way,” Hicks said without turning. “But it happened. It's over.”

Sandoval said, “She's not hearing you, man.”

“You didn't have to do that,” she said. “There was no reason.”

She felt a tightness in her stomach, the first pulse of nausea. She couldn't be sick. Not here, not in front of them.

“You want us to drop you off?” Hicks said. “You can walk back, wait around for the highway patrol, tell them what happened. That what you want?”

The Cherokee's headlights cut through the darkness. On either side, an endless expanse of nothing.

“I know we're all emotional right now,” Hicks said. “But we need to use our heads. We're still on our timetable.”

Her cell phone began to buzz. They'd crossed into the service area of another tower. She took it from her jeans pocket, dropped it. Her hands were trembling. Hicks looked across at her.

The phone buzzed again on the floor. She picked it up. When she answered, Chance said, “We're on schedule. Transfer was a bitch, had to back the trucks tailgate to tailgate. But it's done. I'm en route. How'd things go on your end?”

She took a breath. “We'll talk later.” Sandoval was watching her.

“You all right?” Chance said.

“I'm fine. Something unexpected came up.”

“Anything I should know about right now? If so, you need to tell me.”

“No. It doesn't affect you. Just stay on schedule. What about the others?”

“Soon as we did the transfer, they booked. Fine with me. That little guy made me nervous. I'll ask you again: Is there anything I need to know?”

“No.”

“And you're okay?”

“I am.” Knowing then they couldn't risk killing her until the truck got where it was going. If she fell out of contact with Chance, if he couldn't reach her, it would spook him. He'd ditch the truck, head off on his own.

“You don't sound it,” he said.

“This phone's done. I'll call you in a little while from another one.”

“Right,” he said. “Later.”

She ended the call, turned the phone over, and pried off the back cover. She tugged the SIM card free, snapped it in half, then powered down her window and tossed it out. The battery went next, the phone itself a mile after that.

“You should both do the same,” she said.

“We will,” Hicks said. “You okay?”

“Why wouldn't I be?” She looked out across the blackness of the desert. The moon hung low over the mountains.

“There really was no other way, you know,” Hicks said. “We couldn't just leave them there after what happened. Four witnesses, only one way that was gonna play out. All of us in prison. Death row maybe.”

“If we're caught, that's five felony murder counts,” she said. “For all of us. Whether we pulled a trigger or not.”

“Like I said, we didn't have a choice.”

“Forget her,
jefe,
” Sandoval said. He sounded almost cheerful. She could hear the release of tension in his voice. It was the way she usually felt herself after doing work, getting away. But not this time.

“Minute that dumb fuck took a runner, there was only one way it could go,” Sandoval said. “She doesn't understand that. But give her time. She will.”

She looked back at him. “You were so concerned about witnesses, why didn't you kill me, too?”

“I almost did.” Sandoval grinned. “Heat of the moment and all that. Fuss you were making, it seemed like the right thing to do at the time. But your boyfriend here talked me out of it.”

She looked at Hicks, wondering how much he'd told him. He kept his eyes forward. She wanted to be out of there, far away from the two of them. Realizing now how foolish she'd been. She'd thought she had a handle on everything, every detail, all of it under control. And then it had all come apart as she watched.

There was more traffic from the opposite direction. They passed through a small town that was gone as suddenly as it appeared. Beyond it, Hicks slowed, then turned down a side road that led to the abandoned ironworks he'd scouted two days before. Their headlights passed across the front of the massive building, reflected off the few panes of glass left in its windows. One smokestack still stood, but another had toppled into a side yard.

The transfer car was parked here, a rented Hyundai. Sandoval would take the Cherokee, wipe it down, ditch it. The tac bag with the guns would go into a flooded quarry they'd found two miles away.

Hicks parked the Cherokee behind a pile of rusted girders, killed the engine, but left the headlights on. They got out, and Sandoval brushed past her, took a two-gallon plastic gas container from the back of the Cherokee. He got the jumpsuits and balaclavas from the tac bag, dropped them into an empty lidless fifty-five-gallon drum. They would have hair on them, DNA. He poured gas over them, shook the plastic container until it was empty, then dropped it in. Fumes rose up.

“Stand back,” he said. He took matches from his pocket, lit one and used it to touch off the others, then tossed the flaming pack into the drum. The gas-soaked clothes went up with a
whoomph
and a puff of black smoke.

“That's it for me,
jefe.
I need to get on the road, dump this shit. See you back at the house.”

He opened the Cherokee's driver's side door, turned to Hicks, lifted his chin at her. “Tell her she's got nothing to worry about.
Se acab
ó
.
Everybody gets to go home, right?”