A Harvest of Blood - An Action Thriller Novel (Omega Series Book 5)

by Blake Banner

  The back office was bigger and afforded a view of the courtyard. It had an old wooden desk with a map on the wall behind it. There was a fire extinguisher and a large fire axe in the corner by an old steel safe. No doubt the gang’s wages were kept in there. I wondered briefly what the pay was these days for an assistant slave driver. I had the feeling that at one time, long ago, this had been a legitimate operation. Obviously it had closed down, somehow come into Al’s hands and, presumably, he had found a new vein of whatever it was they were mining.

  I had a fair idea of what that was, too.

  For a moment, I was startled by the sound of a siren. It sounded like a World War II air raid warning from the blitz. Then it dawned on me: it was lunch time. That made me stop and think. They’d be bringing them back to the dorms for lunch. I rested my ass on the desk and looked out the window at the courtyard. They were obviously keeping the parents and the children separate. That was how they controlled them. The kids lived in terror of what might happen to their parents, and the parents were perpetually in dread of what could happen to their children. All lived in hope that they would eventually be reunited and allowed to go home. Meanwhile, in that hope, they kept quiet and did as they were told.

  So the children would go to their dorm to eat, and presumably the parents would be taken to the long building opposite. There they would make their food, rest for however long they were allowed, and then go back to work.

  I wondered where the guards and Vasco would go. I wondered where Arnold was. The Audi Q7 was still parked out front. The answers were not long in coming.

  First, two trucks rolled into the courtyard and, supervised by the armed guards and the drivers, men and women started to climb down from the tailgates and file into the long building on the left. The sight was pathetic. Seen clearly, in the light of day, these were a hundred broken, hungry human beings who had made a bid for a better life and had walked straight into a nightmare that was beyond unimaginable: they were slaves, and every day they woke up to the unending terror of what might happen to their children. Children they only ever saw at a distance, abused and exploited, and unable to go to them and help them.

  When the last of those wretched people was inside, the doors were closed and locked with deadbolts, just like the one at the depot.

  The trucks withdrew and a couple minutes later, two more trucks rolled in. The drivers swung down from the cabs and three armed men jumped from the back. All told, they made up the seven men I had spotted earlier, keeping watch over the mining operation.

  After that, the kids started to pour from the back of the vehicles. If the parents had been pathetic, the kids were almost impossible to watch. But I forced myself, because I wanted to feed the rage. It was hard to keep count, but I figured my estimate of a hundred and fifty was about right. They all seemed to be aged between twelve and sixteen—too young to be independent, but old enough for hard labor. They were skinny, undernourished, drawn, and pasty. Their eyes looked hollow, their hair was matted and uncombed. They didn’t cry or wail. They didn’t even look toward the other building, where they must know their parents were. They had learned well all the things not to do. They moved with fear in their hearts, bowed, broken before they’d even lived, toward their dorm. After they’d filed in, two armed men went in with the parents and the rest followed the kids. Obviously they figured that as long as they controlled the kids, they owned the parents.

  I stayed a while, staring. The courtyard was silent and empty. I thought about what I was going to do. After two minutes, when I had just about made up my mind, the door to the kids’ dorm opened again and Vasco emerged, holding a girl by the arm. She was thirteen or fourteen, and pretty—or had been, before they’d beaten and starved her, exploited and abused her and crushed her spirit and her joy. He marched her toward the office building. She glanced anxiously across at where her parents were. She knew something was wrong. It was hard to imagine the terror she must be living through in that moment. I picked up one of the rifles and waited for them to arrive.

  Then the dorm door opened again and Al came out with one of his guards supporting Arnold. They proceeded slowly after Vasco.

  Vasco did not come to the offices. Instead he went to the Audi, opened the back door, and pushed the girl in. Then he stood waiting for Aloysius and his son. When they arrived, Arnold climbed in the back with the girl. Vasco slammed the door and exchanged a few words with Al. Then he and the guard went back toward the dorm, and Al climbed in behind the wheel. The Audi turned and drove away.

  I stood for another minute, thinking, trying to make sense of what I had seen. In the end, I decided I couldn’t. There was too much information missing. And besides, I had plenty to do right here, right now. I picked up the two rifles and slung them over my shoulder, took the axe from the corner, and made my way out of the office building and across the freezing yard toward the long outhouse where the parents were being held. I knew the odds were stacked hopelessly against me. I knew I didn’t stand an ice cube’s chance in a supernova of surviving. But there was a kind of madness in me. A rage against the kind of people who could do this to families, and above all to children. A rage against the evil that dwells in people’s hearts. A rage that had become so wild I could no longer contain it.

  And besides, I had always known that one day I would face a battle I could not win; I would have no choice but to fight that fight, and I had long ago decided that when that time came, I would not turn from the battle. I would unleash the demon within and go down wreaking unholy havoc. Maybe, I told myself as I approached the door, maybe this was that day, and that fight.

  I reached the entrance, slid back the deadbolts, put one rifle to my shoulder, and kicked open the door. I stepped in, took a second to locate the two guards. They were sitting at a table on their own, gawping at me. I put one round in one forehead, adjusted my position and put another round in the second forehead. Three seconds.

  The one hundred parents were staring at me. Somebody whispered, “Es el mismo…” It’s the same one…

  I put my finger to my lips, then made a gesture with both hands to wait, and said, “Sus hijos vienen, esperen aquí.” Your kids are coming, wait here.

  After that, I crossed the room to where the two corpses were lying face-down in their food. I went through their pockets till I found the keys to one of the ten-wheelers. Then I went outside into the freezing courtyard, leaving the door open. I made my way to one of the trucks I’d seen the parents arrive in. It was either this one or the one parked next to it. I guess I got lucky. I stuck the key in the ignition, turned it, and the engine roared into life. I put the transmission in reverse and floored the pedal, guiding it across the yard, straight toward the big wooden wall.

  The noise was horrific, bone-jarring and ear-splitting. The wall shattered, wood screeched and splintered, the roof groaned and sagged, snow cascaded over the windshield, and planks, pillars, and rafters fell all around me like rain. I shifted to first and pulled away, leaving a huge, gaping hole in the side of the building.

  I climbed down, taking the rifles and the axe with me. Inside, I could hear men shouting and a hundred and fifty kids screaming. My heart was pounding and my belly was on fire. I walked away from the hole and back toward the door they had gone in through. I wrenched it open and looked around. The kids were in the middle of the floor, standing, huddled together, screaming and crying. The nine men were closer, gathered around a long, wooden table perpendicular to the walls, maybe twenty or thirty feet away. Everybody was staring at the big, gaping wound in the side of the building. I aimed randomly into the group of men at the table and pulled the trigger. The shot was like thunder in the enclosed space. I saw a guy go down, but I didn’t care about that. The shot was to scare the kids out through the hole in the wall. I didn’t want them to witness what I was about to do. They’d had enough ugliness in their lives as it was.

  They started screaming again and I fired two more times into the group. I don’t know if I hit any
one, because by then I was roaring like a demented monster. The kids were running, streaming through the gap. I knew that their parents were out there waiting for them. That was all I cared about.

  Somehow, in that moment, I saw everything in slow motion. It happens sometimes. I hurled the rifle away from me, grabbed the fire axe and ran, screaming like I was possessed, toward the head of the table. The men seemed frozen, some gaping in shock, others reaching for their weapons. I saw two men on the floor, lying in large, oozing puddles. There were five more on my right, three standing, two sitting, one of those leaning behind him for his rifle. On my left there were two, both standing, the closest pulling a revolver from his holster. On the table there were plates of beef and beans, glasses of beer and bottles. Everything was stark and clear and frozen.

  The first swing of the axe tore through his forearms, ripping the revolver from his hand and sending it skidding across the concrete floor. He screamed and staggered back into his pal, staring at his bloody stumps. The second swing was the return back-hander that caved in the head of the nearest guy on my right.

  I kicked him in the chest as I readjusted my grip for an overhand. As he fell back, I stepped forward. The guy behind him was struggling under the weight of the dead body. I swung the axe up and over and brought the blade crashing down into his skull. It split open and his brains exploded, showering gore over the table. I wrenched the blade free, still roaring, and stepped forward and to my right. The guy who’d been reaching for his weapon had his arms up over his eyes, struggling to get out from under the man with the split skull. In one fluid motion I brought the axe up and under, shattering his jaw and tearing through his face. On his right there was another man, scrambling to run from the table. I brought the axe down and to my right and tore open his ribcage. Across the table, the gunman with no hands had collapsed unconscious. His pal, drenched from head to foot in blood, was holding his revolver in both hands, staring around him and saying over and over, “Oh God no… Oh God no…”

  I realized I was still making horrific, inhuman noise. I didn’t stop. I jumped up on the table, gave a huge swing right to left and tore his head clean off his shoulders. I looked around as it hit the concrete and rolled away. My lungs were going like bellows, my heart was pounding and my brain was roaring like it was on fire. There was somebody missing. Vasco was missing. He should have been at the table. I counted the bodies. There were eight. There should have been nine. I felt my abdomen clench like a fist and I bellowed, “Vasco! I am coming for you, you son of a bitch! Vasco!”

  I jumped down from the table, threw down the axe and looked at my hands. They were slick with blood. I wiped them on my jeans and picked up the revolver that had skidded across the floor. I walked to the gaping hole in the wall and stepped out. Across the yard, a group of men and women and children stared at me, uncomprehending, fearful, disgusted. I ignored them and looked toward the office building. Vasco was there, standing beside one of the Dodge trucks, staring back at me. I cocked the hammer and took aim.

  twenty

  He had pulled open the door and climbed in before I could get a bead on him. Next thing, he’d swung around and was accelerating across the courtyard toward the track that led back to the road.

  I took my time. I knew where he was going. Besides, there was only one stretch of road this side of the mountains that he could use, from the mine to Independence. Without a chopper, he was stuck here. I walked across the yard and went into the office. I picked up the old phone on the wooden desk. It was a landline and it worked. I got the number for the county sheriff in Lovelock and called.

  “County Sheriff’s Office. Deputy Beltran speaking.”

  “Do you know the Rochdale mine in the Humboldt Mountains?”

  There was a moment’s hesitation. “Can’t say I do. Who is this?”

  “That’s not important.” I looked at the map hanging on the wall. “About twelve miles from the I-80, as you cross the Humboldt range on the Independence Road, there’s a turnoff to your left. There’s a track that leads up to a mine…”

  “Well, that ain’t the Rochdale, that’s the old Henkle mine. That’s been closed since the nineteen eighties.”

  “Well, I have news for you, Deputy. The mine is operational and has been for a while, and they have been using slave labor.”

  “…say again? Slave labor? Is this some kind of…?”

  “There are about two hundred and fifty men, women, and children at the mine right now, starving and freezing. In my book, that does not constitute a joke, Deputy. You better get out here.”

  “But it’s gonna take hours in this. I can’t just…!”

  “I’m going to make them as comfortable as I can. But unless you want a hundred and fifty deaths on your conscience, you better make whatever phone calls you need to make and get here.”

  I hung up, went back over to the long barn, and went inside. The kids were in there with their parents. There was a lot of hugging and weeping going on. Maybe there was some healing, too. I wouldn’t know about that. A couple of women and a man came up to me. They kept pointing at my face and saying something, like it was a pity I had such an ugly one. I shook my head. “No comprende.”

  One of the women turned and called, “Becki! Becki! Venga, Cielo, venga acá!”

  Becki, a girl of about fourteen, detached herself from the group and approached.

  “Si, Tita.”

  Her mother rattled at her in Spanish, gesturing at me with both hands. The girl studied me with dark eyes, then spoke, “My mom says where is Maria, her daughter? The man took her away.”

  “Tell your aunt I’m going to get her and bring her back.”

  The woman listened to the translation, watching me with anxious eyes. Then she clung to me, saying, “Gracias! Gracias!” and rattled something else, pointing at my face.

  Becki told, “She says thank you, and you have blood on your face and your clothes. You should wash it off…”

  I shook my head. “Tell her thanks, but I’m not done yet. I called the county sheriff. They’re going to come and get you, but it’ll take hours. It may not be till tonight, or tomorrow. You need to go to the main building.” I pointed back toward the office. “You can make fires and stay warm in there. Those men won’t be coming back.”

  “What will happen to us?”

  I shook my head again. “I don’t know, Becki. They’ll probably send you home. But anything has got to be better than this, right?”

  I said goodbye and left. I went back to the scene of the slaughter and rummaged through several coats until I found the keys to a Dodge. Then I crossed the yard for the last time, pressing the unlock button until one of the trucks bleeped. I clambered in, fired her up, and spun the wheel, headed back toward the farm. As I left the complex, I could see them behind me, filing toward the office building in small family groups, hugging each other.

  The snow was holding off, but the sky was still dark and brooding, promising another blizzard that night. That would slow down the rescue party. They might get to them by the evening, but they wouldn’t get to Independence or the farm till the next day at the soonest. I smiled. It couldn’t have been a pleasant sight.

  I came out of the mountains and turned north through the stark, white wasteland. I was trying to figure out in my mind what Vasco would have done. He knew I was coming for him. So he would do two things. He’d try to find Primrose to use her as a bargaining chip, as well as Abi and Sean, and he would go back to the farm, where he had the support of Al and whatever men he had left behind there.

  My mind strayed to Primrose. I wondered where she was and what she had done. Had she gone to the church? Could the reverend be trusted? I had a hunch he and the doc were both good men—Primrose said they were. But I also had a hunch that in this town you couldn’t trust anybody—not even the good men.

  By the time I came to the intersection, I still hadn’t made up my mind. The road ahead was blocked by three feet of snow. The road to the left would take me
to Independence, the Pioneer Guesthouse, empty, cold, hung with the angry shrouds of death. And Primrose?

  I looked right. The white arch, the broken iron gate, the path. I could still see the red Toyota half buried in the drift. And beyond it, in the distance, the mock Georgian pile. There I knew what I would find. I would find Abi and Sean, and I would find Vasco, Karen, and Al.

  I spun the wheel and turned right, accelerating fast up the track. As I approached I saw, parked outside the front of the house, the truck Vasco had taken from the mine. I skidded to a halt just past the Toyota and drove the Dodge into the ditch, where it was half-concealed. Then I climbed out and made my way on foot toward the back of the house, wading knee-deep through the drifts with my feet freezing, numb and aching.

  Nobody seemed to have spotted me. I did something that should have been a smile, but was too ugly for that, and told myself there were not many people left to spot me. I came finally to the kitchen door. The glass panes were frosted over. I stood a moment, looking down at the mounds of snow, then stepped over, reached in to a frozen drift, and pulled out my kit bag. All that was left in it was my second Sig Sauer, a couple of boxes of ammunition, and my bow. I took the Sig, cocked it, and hesitated a moment. The house or the lodgings?

  I turned away from the house and made toward the lodgings. When I got to the door, I tried the handle. It was unlocked. I stepped through and found myself in a long room. On the far left was an open-plan kitchen with a table long enough to accommodate a dozen men. On the right was a lounge with a TV, a couple of sofas and maybe six or eight chairs.

  Separating the two sections was a staircase that rose up to a second floor. I figured that was where the bedrooms were. I could hear men laughing, and a woman crying out. I ran up the stairs and came to a landing. Two corridors branched off, one to the right and one to the left, leading to two rows of six rooms. Down to the left I could see light coming from an open room. I walked toward it and stepped in through the door.