by William Oday
They screeched to a stop with the front tires on the last inch of pavement.
She backed up and turned onto a new road. The city spread out before them in the distance. Glints of moonlight shone on the windows of the tallest buildings. That had to be the strip. The Mandalay was south of those buildings.
Lily oriented herself to the map in her head and drove on. She reached across the seat, found Piper’s hand and squeezed. “We’re going to be okay.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes, I am.”
She wasn’t. But Piper needed reassurance, not Vegas style odds on whether they were going to survive or not. They’d gotten away from Donny, Zeke, and Jax.
That was enough for now.
49
Night fell and Cade’s grand plan to wait until they had the advantage of darkness wasn’t quite turning out like he’d hoped. The sounds coming from inside the fence were not encouraging. More and more voices filled the air. It was turning into a huge party. The increasingly drunken shouting and crack of shots fired as the evening turned into night scuttled the first twenty plans they’d bandied back and forth during the long wait.
There wasn’t going to be any sneaking in and driving Wesley’s truck away before anyone was the wiser. If anything, it sounded like there was ten times as many people now, and more importantly, ten times as many guns.
It sounded like the Fourth of July in there. Yet another burst of gunfire followed by a round of raucous shouting and inebriated laughter.
No, this wasn’t getting any easier.
Cade stood up and paced back and forth, but pacing wasn’t getting them closer to recovering their belongings either. He cursed under his breath and decided he’d had enough. “I’m going to go take a look.”
He crept through the forest, headed back to the fence perimeter, until he heard the snap of branches and swishing of leaves on his heels. He turned and Hudson nearly bumped into him. “What are you doing?”
“I’m coming with you. To help.”
Cade pinched his eyes shut. “Do you have a weapon?”
“No.”
“Do you have a plan for how exactly one of us with a handgun can take out what sounds like fifty or more armed idiots?”
“No.”
“Then get the hell back there and wait until I return.”
“No.”
“What?”
“I want to help.”
Cade ran a hand over his face. “Tell you what. You can help by staying right here and being ready for when I come back with news about what I’ve seen. It’ll be your job to make sure everything is okay right here. Got it?”
Hudson’s eyes lit up. He was now an important part of the plan and he was committed to doing his best. “I’ll be right here. You can count on me.”
Cade fought off an exasperated sigh and even said “Sounds good,” without too much of a sarcastic tone creeping into his voice. He continued on, keeping low with his head on a swivel.
He made it to the fence and slipped under the spot they’d found earlier.
Another round of gunfire thundered and he ducked behind an old junker, thinking they’d spotted him.
But no. It was just more of the same.
A nearly-full moon cast a dim light on the surroundings, enough for him to make his way through the maze of discarded junk. He edged to the corner of an outbuilding and peeked around.
In the relatively open space at the front of the property, a scene like he never expected to witness in real life was, in fact, happening in the flesh.
In the flesh, literally. Some of the men were running around in underwear. A few of the women were missing their tops. Several barrels had been gathered and placed in the middle. Bright orange fires burned in each of them. A half-circle of flaming black rubber stuck out of the top of one. The burning tires left a biting, choking stench thick in the air.
As disturbing as all that was, it didn’t hold a candle to the main attraction and, he realized, the reason for the gunfire.
Hanging from a tall pole erected next to the front gate was Eugene. Rather, Eugene’s bullet-riddled corpse. They’d lashed his dead body to the end of the pole and raised it for their sick amusement.
One of the half-dressed men staggered over and stuttered to a stop below the corpse. He pointed a handgun up and fired off a few rounds. None obviously hit their target and the rest of the partiers howled with laughter. The shooter tried again and this time hit the dangling carcass that had once been a tinkerer named Eugene.
Cade didn’t have any love for the man, but that didn’t mean he approved of this. It turned his stomach, made him sick to the core. Violent thoughts passed through his mind, but he let them pass in silence. He wasn’t there to right all the wrongs. He wasn’t there to mete out justice to those who so plainly deserved it.
No, he was there to get their stuff.
Nothing more.
Nothing less.
Unfortunately, even that far simpler task looked all but impossible at the moment. There were in fact at least fifty people gathered round. Every single one of them was armed. Handguns, rifles, shotguns, knives. There was a small armory’s worth of firepower in evidence.
While he, on the other hand, carried a single pistol.
Any kind of direct assault was doomed to fail. Maybe they could sneak in after the party died down and everyone eventually passed out. But even then, all it would take was for a single voice to raise the alarm and unleash a hornet’s nest that stung with bullets.
There had to be a better way.
And then he thought of it.
Nothing was going to be a guarantee, but this would at least give them a chance.
He needed to tell the others so they would be ready. He turned to head back.
Unfortunately, he turned right into a handgun pointed at his head. The Puckett who shot down Eugene in cold blood. And he looked ready to do the same to Cade.
“Where in the hell do you think you’re going?”
50
A mouth full of bad teeth grinned at him. Some yellow, others black with decay. “Drop it.”
The last thing in the world Cade wanted to do was drop his weapon.
“Okay,” Rotten Mouth said as an evil light flared in his eyes. He wanted to shoot.
Cade let the pistol fall out of his hand.
The guy shrugged. “Guess you live, for now. If you want to keep it that way, best move real slow. Now, turn around and let’s go show everybody what I found.”
Cade glanced down and saw an iron bar leaning up against a stack of tires.
Rotten Mouth followed his eyes, which was exactly the idea.
Cade ducked and drove forward into him. He wrapped him up and delivered a double leg take down like he hadn’t done since his college wrestling days.
He arched up and then drove him down into the dirt. His shoulder ramming through Rotten Mouth’s solar plexus. That got the reaction he was hoping for.
The breath exploded out of Rotten Mouth’s lungs. His chest convulsed for air, but he wasn’t able to draw in another breath.
Straddling his stomach, Cade reared back and smashed a fist into his face. And then another to the side of the jaw.
The guy’s head whipped to the side. Blood and teeth flew out.
Cade pulled back for another strike, but didn’t get the chance to deliver it.
Something walloped him in the side of the head. He tumbled over into the dirt. Blinking and dazed and wondering why his whole head was filled with agonizing vibrations.
Rotten Mouth was groaning and laughing, blood pouring out of his mouth.
Cade rolled onto his back and waited for everything to come into focus.
A dark figure stood above him holding a sawed off shotgun in hand. A gruff laugh and his pocked face came into focus. “He done beat the piss out of you, Murph! Just look at you!” More raspy laughter.
Murph was slowly pushing up to a sit. He snarled and spoke in a slurred voice. “Help me fi
nd my gun! I’m going to kill this bastard.”
Cade was still trying to stop the ringing in his head. Still waiting for his arms and legs to feel like they were connected to his body. The feeling seeped back into his limbs like thick oil. They were there, but they were heavy and slow and he couldn’t trust that they’d do what he needed them to.
A spear of despair went straight through his heart.
If he died here in this remote speck of nowhere, his daughter would be on her own. His family would be on their own. He would disappear from their lives and they would never know what had happened. And worse, he wouldn’t be there to protect them.
He spotted a handgun in the shadows under a rusted hubcap. If he could just reach it in time.
He stretched out an arm, but it was moving at quarter speed and the guy standing over him saw it from a mile away.
He hopped over and stepped a boot down on Cade’s wrist. He put his full weight on it too.
Cade groaned. Stupid arm was working good enough to feel the pain but not enough to get the gun.
Another shadow emerged from behind the stack of tires.
Another drugged up partier come to help finish him?
The figure picked up the iron bar and swung as the guy with the shotgun was turning to see who’d come.
The bar landed flush to the side of his head. It hit with a sickening crunch that guaranteed the skull was shattered. He slumped to the ground.
The shadow stepped into a pool of dim orange fire light.
It was Hudson.
Another swing and Hudson turned Murph’s lights out a second later. Hudson knelt down next to Cade. “Are you okay?” He grabbed him by the shoulder and helped him sit up.
Cade groaned through it but made it up. “I thought I told you to stay outside the fence?”
“I know, but you were taking forever and I figured you might need some help.”
Cade nodded. “Looks like you were right.” He reached up a hand and Hudson hauled him to his feet. It took a second to steady himself, but then he was good. More or less. “We need to set up a diversion to have any chance at getting our things back.”
“Do you have something in mind?”
“I do.”
“Are they dead?” Hudson asked, his voice trembling.
Cade didn’t know for certain and didn’t much care either. They were either gone or would be soon. The tone in the kid’s voice though made him keep that to himself for now.
“Help me drag them over there,” he said pointing to the inky black space between an outbuilding and a twisted heap of ruined fenders.
They took the weapons and deposited the bodies where they wouldn’t be discovered. With that sorted, they crept away to rejoin Wesley in the woods.
51
Hours passed as they waited in the forest. The sounds of the raucous party within the fence slowly died down and eventually went quiet.
And then it was time to move.
They each had an objective and Cade had to complete his to make the other two possible. He now had the shotgun and Hudson had a handgun, both taken from the two partiers that Hudson had taken out.
Cade squirmed under the fence and kept a look out while the other two followed. Once inside, they didn’t have to say a word. Their missions were clear. Now, it was time to execute.
With a curt nod, Cade crept away into the shadows. The flaming tires in the barrels had burned down and now only dim pools of orange kept the black of night at bay. His biggest worry was clattering into something and waking up the whole lot of them before he was in position. Or accidentally stepping on a passed out drunk and having it end the same way.
So he took it slow. Carefully moving, eyes straining into the darkness at the indistinct shapes. He finally made it into position, a spot behind one of the trailers and facing the cache of five gallon propane tanks across the way. If this worked out like he hoped, they were about to witness a real fireworks show.
Passed out partiers laid around the open space surrounding the burn barrels. Couches and chairs dragged out from somewhere were occupied by others. Something higher up creaked and it was Eugene’s desecrated body twisting in the breeze.
Cade took aim with the shotgun and fired.
Two quick shots and slugs punched through tanks.
The sharp hiss of expelled gas. A spark caught and a ten foot long jet of flame shot out the side.
Voices cried out as people woke up in surprise.
It was a distraction, but it wasn’t nearly enough.
Cade fired two more times.
The sharp clang of impacted metal and the hiss of escaping pressurized gas. The tanks caught the flame of the first one and the fireworks picked up in earnest.
A spinning pinwheel of flame raked across a couch, lighting its occupants on fire. They leaped up, screaming and running. Human torches until they crumpled to the ground.
A man fled across the middle to get away. A tank rolled over and the flame hit full on. Like a welder’s torch on metal. The flame consumed him.
And the smell.
It had been bad enough from the burning tires before. Now, it was worse. Thick, choking, repulsive.
One of the tanks ruptured and exploded. The concussive blast hit like a thunderclap. Fragments of the flaming tank shot into the air.
A figure raced toward the farm truck. It was Wesley following through on his part of the plan.
In the chaos, one of the invaders saw him and drew a pistol to shoot him.
Cade got the shot off first and hit him center mass. He was no longer a threat.
Wesley climbed up into the truck and started the engine. The headlights kicked on and the big diesel engine rumbled. He threw it into reverse and hit the gas. Tires spun kicking out fountains of dirt and the truck lurched backward. It crashed through the gate.
An invader with a rifle stopped in the center of the action and took aim at the truck. He fired and glass shattered before Cade knocked him down.
Cade cursed but was relieved to see that Wesley was okay when the tires turned and the truck straightened out on the road.
Even with the ruptured tanks spewing like flamethrowers, some of the invaders were starting to recover.
Where was Hudson?
Had something happened to him?
If they didn’t get out of there quick, it was going to turn into a pitched battle and they were still vastly outnumbered and outgunned.
Twin lights swept around an outbuilding deeper in the property. An engine roared and the old GMC truck came into view. It swung sideways and took down a guy with a rifle. It smashed through a stack of tires and kept coming.
It hit one of the burn barrels, sending it rolling away and throwing out bits of smoldering tire as it went. The truck skidded to a stop and Cade was already in motion.
Shots fired and bullets pinged off the body as Cade dove into the open passenger door.
“Go!” he yelled as he slammed the door shut behind him.
Hudson hit the gas and the truck jumped forward.
The rear glass shattered and more bullets thunked into the tailgate.
They sped away and caught up with Wesley a little ways down the road. Still following the plan, they kept going. They didn’t stop until they’d taken several turns and gone far enough to ensure they wouldn’t be tailed.
The big farm truck slowed and pulled to a stop.
They followed suit and the three hopped out. Wesley shone a flashlight into the back of his truck. The bikes were gone. The AR-15 and their bags too.
Cade’s mood was quickly turning sour. The elation of escape falling into frustration. He kicked at a pile of tarp and his boot hit something underneath. He threw the tarp back and there it was.
His Get Home Bag.
He grabbed it up and slung it over his shoulder. By the weight of it, he knew it hadn’t been found. He hopped down out of the back to rejoin Wesley and Hudson.
And without having to say it, they all knew it was time for say
ing goodbye.
They shook hands and gave awkward hugs that were nevertheless full of earnest appreciation. Each for the other and all that had passed in their short time together.
“You boys be safe, okay?”
Cade nodded. “You too.”
Wesley patted him on the shoulder. “I know you’re going to find your daughter. She’s lucky to have a father like you.”
Cade swallowed hard. He wished he felt as certain. But he knew he couldn’t, not until she was safely in his arms and he could be there to stand between her and whatever the world decided to throw their way.
What had she been through already?
Had it been anything like what he and Hudson had faced?
All he had were questions. No answers.
They all got in their vehicles and parted company. Wesley back to his farm and a peaceful corner of the world for as long as that lasted.
Cade and Hudson on the road to Las Vegas.
And if nothing went wrong, they’d be there before the sun came up.
52
Lily started the Beige Barfinator and eased out of the parking spot. The early morning sun lanced through receding shadows of the fifth level of the Mandalay Bay’s parking garage. They’d dumped Donny’s car behind the strip mall across the street and sprinted over. Security had helped them into their room. It had taken less than five minutes to gather their belongings, fill up on water and leave.
Right before leaving, she’d left a note in the room and one with the hotel reception desk. She had no idea where her father was or if he was still alive. But if he was alive, she knew he’d do everything possible to get to Las Vegas to find her. The notes would let him know that they were headed home.
Sleeping in the room overnight would’ve been more comfortable than sleeping in the car, but Lily hadn’t trusted it. Her backpack was at Zeke’s house and it had the keycard to their hotel room.
So there was a chance he could’ve paid them a visit while they slept. Or worse, Jax and his crew might’ve found out and busted their door down.
