Macready scrutinized Grant as if sizing him up, gauging his strengths and weaknesses. The man in black looking to hire a new hand. Veiled eyes noticing everything. Instead of answering, he asked a question of his own. “I understand you ran into a little trouble near the border.”
“Down that way. Yeah.”
“But not with the border guards.”
“It was a long way from the border.”
“Involving Mexicans though. Right?”
Grant didn’t answer, waiting to see where Macready was going with this.
“Friends of Eduardo Cruz?”
Grant noticed a change in tone. Harder. He shrugged as he answered.
“Acquaintances of a patient.”
“Husband of a battered wife is what I heard.”
The head cook stepped back from the barbecue and held up a metal triangle and a stick. He rattled the stick around the frame, signalling that dinner was served. The men across the yard finished what they were doing and began to drift towards the tables. Grant was aware of the approaching menace, but the men seemed more interested in the food than in Grant. He turned back to Macready.
“I can’t abide a wife beater. A man or a sleeveless vest.”
Macready ignored Grant’s answer.
“Three men with guns. You were unarmed.”
Grant almost said that he used to patrol West Yorkshire with nothing but a stab vest and a baton but stopped himself just in time. Admitting to being a cop didn’t seem like the way to go here.
“Just me and the hearse.”
“You acquitted yourself well. You and the hearse. Caused a fair bit of damage though. No burgers and ice cream on the 170 for a while.”
“Maybe they can come here.”
Macready waved a hand towards the barbecue pit. “We don’t flip burgers here. We eat real meat.”
Then he pointed at the hearse parked in the shadows. “I don’t think Hunter Athey will be too happy with you.”
Torch flames reflected off the windows, highlighting the one that was missing and the bullet holes punched in the bodywork. Grant looked at the damage, then turned back towards Macready. “I filled it up, though.”
Macready’s smile didn’t reach his eyes. “I heard about that too. Petrol fumes and coffee stains just follow you around.”
That wasn’t a question so Grant didn’t answer. Macready stopped smiling. “You and other people’s vehicles don’t mix either.”
“It’s not me. Other folk seem to have a problem with that.”
Macready stuck his hands in his pockets and studied Grant. He let out a sigh and appeared to make a decision. The smile was back on his face.
“That’s as maybe, but it relates directly to what I propose. If I was to offer you a seat at my table. And gainful employment.”
Grant waited for the proposal.
Macready let the moment stretch a beat before continuing.
“You ain’t too good with foreign cars and hearses, that’s a fact. What are you like driving a truck?”
Texas claimed its steaks were the best in the world. Grant had heard that claim before. In Adelaide they considered Australian beef to be the best. He’d had a steak in Denver once, and they reckoned Colorado beef was the best. Whatever the truth, one thing was for certain: Texas steaks were the biggest he’d ever eaten. Thick and wide and melt-in-your-mouth gorgeous. Throw in a few fries and a side of coleslaw and this could almost be the perfect meal.
Apart from the company.
There wasn’t much small talk, and nobody got too friendly. There was none of that laughing and joking associated with most dinner parties, and nobody drank too much. The beer cooler was there for everyone, or wine if that was their choice. The men surrounding Grant drank one or the other but only one drink each. Nobody was going to get drunk on the eve of combat. These guys might be mercenaries, but they were observing military discipline. Polite in the presence of strangers. Not too friendly with the new man. He remembered that from his army days. Replacements died early. Nobody wanted to get too friendly with them. Grant wondered who he was replacing. Not the cat, he hoped.
Music played in the background, some middle-of-the-road, easy listening stuff. Knives and forks clattered on plates. Ice clinked in glasses of water, served as a side order with the beer and the food. People talked in small groups. There was some backslapping and a few raised voices but nothing too energetic. It was a scene Grant had seen many times during his military career and not too infrequently in the Westerns he’d watched growing up. If this were a spaghetti Western, Clint Eastwood would be sitting quietly while the Italians roared with laughter and badly lip-synced dialogue. The head villain would bring out a suit of armor and use it for target practice while the Man with No Name pretended to get drunk.
Macready didn’t bring out a suit of armor. Grant didn’t pretend to get drunk. Nobody was getting drunk tonight. There was work to be done. Trouble was, apart from knowing he was going to be driving a truck, Grant didn’t know what that work would be. It involved heavily armed men and big lorries and the cover of darkness. That was all he knew.
Melted wax ran down the sides of the candles like blood and pooled across the table. The flames flickered in the still night air. The wall-mounted torches did the same. One by one the soldiers finished their last supper and pushed empty plates away. They drained their beers and swilled it down with iced water. Even the music became quieter. Preparations were almost over.
Macready waved a hand.
Waitresses cleared the tables.
Grant took a drink of water and slid his glass across the table. Light reflected off the flat, calm surface like a puddle in a footprint. A low, dull noise began to compete with the music, as if the bass was turned up too loud. The smooth, calm surface in Grant’s glass broke up as vibration shook the ground. Concentric circles in the confines of the glass. The noise grew louder. A noise that seemed to be coming from everywhere and yet from no direction in particular. It changed from an aimless muttering into something more solid. The sound of big, throaty engines coming from outside the compound walls.
Macready stood and everyone fell silent.
“Grab your gear, boys. Time to saddle up.”
The mercenaries collected their equipment and moved towards a dried-out wooden door in the compound’s side wall. Grant followed, awaiting instructions. The door led to the outside near the abandoned athletics track. There were no streetlamps. The Christmas Mountains in the distance were picked out by moonlight and starshine. The trucks parked in line along the finishing straight were thrown into silhouette. Big desert-camouflaged military trucks, their unit insignia standing out in the cold blue light. They weren’t army surplus. They were still in service. This was an army-approved operation.
twenty-two
The trucks rumbled through Absolution in the dead of night. Column of five. A big noisy military convoy plus the two army jeeps from Sixto’s, one up ahead and one bringing up the rear. The town was dark and silent. Nobody turned their lights on to see what was happening. Nobody wanted to see who was passing through in the middle of the night. Absolution turned a blind eye to what it didn’t want to know.
Grant was driving the third truck. Middle of the convoy. The navigator in the passenger seat was largely redundant since all Grant had to do was follow the truck in front. There was no small talk in the cab. The truck bounced over uneven ground as it left the two-lane blacktop and headed south on the same road Grant had taken in Sarah Hellstrom’s little foreign car. Dust formed a cloud trail in the darkness that a blind man could have followed. In Absolution even the blind men weren’t looking.
Headlights scythed through the dark, a string of lights picking out the winding road and dry creek bed on the way to Adobe Flats. Absolution fell away in the distance, and pretty soon the last few outlying dwellings disappeared too. The properties Macr
eady had bought so that he owned everything along the route towards Big Bend National Park. All except the hacienda at Adobe Flats that he’d burned out to clear his path. Where the path led was still in question since nobody had told Grant where they were going.
The truck churned up sand as it bounced out of the creek bed and back onto the road. It followed the winding contours of the landscape up from the arroyo, then crested the ridge between two crumbling buttes. The road continued down the final stretch before the foothills that marked the beginning of Big Bend. The small group of buildings at the bottom stood out in the moonlight. The burned-out hacienda and bunkhouse that used to be Eduardo Cruz’s home.
“How far we going?”
Grant focused on the taillights of the truck in front. There was no dust trail now that they were driving on rock and gravel. The convoy had driven straight past the turnaround for Cruz’s Alamo and followed the deep-rutted track into the foothills. The trucks were way beyond the foothills now, following a winding trail among the rocky outcrops and ledges of alien terrain. The right-hand wheels were close to the edge of a sheer drop, but there was no room to move left. The other drivers must have followed this route before because they drove faster than Grant felt comfortable with. He used soft hands and full concentration to keep the wheels on course and away from the edge.
Grant kept his eyes on the road, using peripheral vision to see the navigator. “Just so I know how long I’ve got to keep us from plunging to our deaths.”
The passenger spoke for the first time since they set off.
“You’re doing fine. Trust me, I’d let you know if you were gonna get us killed.”
Moonlight showed a deep valley to the right. Hard terrain of scrub and rock and a few straggly trees. A cliff wall was the only view to the left, twisting and turning along the hillside path. The convoy was still climbing, making the drop to the right even deeper.
“I wouldn’t want the US Army coming after me for denting the fender.”
The passenger unwound a touch. “That what the British Army would do?”
“The British Army would come after me if I scuffed a shoe.”
“Well, don’t worry about dinging this baby. So long as they get ’em back, the mechanics’ll spruce ’em up. Drop it off the cliff and we might have a few questions to answer.”
“They sound more understanding than Hertz, then.”
“They’re getting paid more than Hertz.”
Grant didn’t want to press the point. Who was hiring the vehicles out or how high up the ranks it went. He doubted the US military had a policy of letting mercenaries use their vehicles. That meant somebody in high places was doing a deal on the side. It didn’t explain where they were going, though.
“So how much further?”
The passenger turned to Grant. “How’s your Spanish?”
Grant nodded that he was impressed. “They let us cross the border?”
The navigator was almost becoming friendly because he laughed. “This is a military exercise. You think we don’t know where to cross?”
“A live fire exercise?”
“It’s the only kind. Gotta be careful with Mexicans.”
“Remember the Alamo. Right.”
The navigator nodded.
“Wouldn’t want anyone slipping away on the way back.”
Grant agreed even if he didn’t know what he was agreeing to. “Hell no.”
The road began to widen up ahead. It swung to the right, around a jagged outcrop, then curled back into the mountain. As Grant negotiated the curve, he eased off the gas, just in time to avoid the truck in front of him. The driver up ahead slewed to his left and slammed the brakes on. The back wheels skidded towards the sheer drop on the right. Brake lights turned the road bright red. Grant stopped the truck inches from a collision.
Air brakes hissed. Engines idled. Doors slammed up ahead. Some slammed behind Grant’s truck. He got out to see what the problem was. The navigator slid across to the driver’s seat because the cliff face blocked his door. Grant moved around the stricken truck, watching his footing near the edge. His silhouette went from blood red in the truck’s taillights to black in the darkness round the corner.
Three men were standing in the shadows. A fourth stepped from behind the truck’s brake lights like a demon in red. The cowboy hat was still pulled down over his eyes. Grant reckoned this was as close to hard work as Scott Macready had ever come. When he snapped his fingers two more men came up behind Grant and cocked their weapons. For effect, so that Grant knew they were serious. The three men in front did the same.
Scott Macready just smiled.
The trucks shuddered as their engines were turned off. Silence filled the void. Away from the headlights the world was dark and dangerous, picked out only slightly by a pale blue dusting of moonlight. Grant kept his body loose and his breathing even as he weighed his options. There weren’t many to choose from until he knew what Macready’s intentions were. So far the omens weren’t good.
Scott Macready stepped in front of his men, proving that he was as much a stranger to combat as he was to hard work. He had immediately negated two of the gunmen, and the third had as much chance of shooting the two behind Grant as hitting Grant himself. First rule of catching your enemy in crossfire is to angle your aim away from your colleagues on the opposite flank. That told Grant something about the mercenaries too, but it didn’t improve his situation.
The two blocked gunmen stepped to either side of Macready, opening up their angles across the killing zone and protecting the two behind Grant. So much for that idea. Macready wasn’t the threat; he was the catalyst. Whatever was going to happen would happen on his command. It would be better if he wasn’t calm, clear, and collected when he made that decision.
Grant decided to probe. “Does your dad know you’re out this late?”
Macready’s smile didn’t falter. “My father knows a lot of things. But he ain’t here.”
Grant took half a step to his right, careful not to get too close to the crumbling edge of the road. “I heard he wasn’t too happy when you got me arrested.”
Five gun barrels followed Grant’s movement.
Macready stayed in the middle. “There were some questions about that.”
“He give you a hard time, did he?”
“He gives everybody a hard time.”
“But not when you’re slapping Sarah around.”
Macready’s eyes blinked. A nervous tick began to twitch at one side of his mouth. He worked hard to calm the twitch down, but it still trembled at the corner of his lips. He tried for a steely glare and almost achieved it. It was the toughest he was ever going to look.
“Me and Sarah are none of your business.”
“It is if you touch her again.”
The glare disguised a hint of embarrassment. Macready didn’t want his dirty laundry being aired in front of the hired help. Grant didn’t want the hired help opening fire from a position of strength. He took another slow half step to his right. Dirt and gravel crumbled off the edge of the road and tumbled into the void. Grant listened to gauge how far it fell. It sounded like a long drop over uneven ground.
Macready slid a hand into his back pocket. “My father was wrong about you.”
Grant watched the hand and got ready to move. “How d’you figure that?”
Macready’s forearm tensed as the hand gripped something behind him. “He wanted you treated like gelignite on a bumpy road. In case you’d been sent from up north.”
“Business partners not happy with him, are they?”
“They’re happy with results.”
“But they don’t trust him, huh?”
“In this business nobody trusts anybody.”
“The party organizing business?”
The hand began to move from behind Macready’s back. “The
business we are partaking in tonight.”
Grant only had one place to go. He relaxed, ready to go there. “Armed men and lorries across the border?”
“Lorries?”
“Sorry. Trucks.”
Macready shook his head. “Armed men protecting trucks coming back across the border. Wouldn’t want any of the cargo wandering off.”
“No, you wouldn’t, would you?”
Macready brought his hand round. It was holding something small and black. “The old man thought you were a hit man sent to stir things up.”
He swung it out in front of him. “He needn’t have worried about his partners though, did he? ’Cause you ain’t no hit man.”
He opened Grant’s badge wallet.
“You’re a cop.”
The badge wasn’t going to save him, but the revelation did put a moment’s doubt in the mercenaries’ aim. Five gun barrels lowered briefly. Decision time. Stay here and die for certain or take the fall and maybe die on the way down. It was no decision. The gun barrels swung up again. Macready closed the wallet. And Grant stepped over the edge and into the abyss.
twenty-three
Pain and gunfire filled the night. The drop was steep and uneven. It was dotted with rocks and scrub and dry, twisted trees. The trees and bushes slowed his descent. The rocks broke bones and tore skin. Despite trying to keep his body limp, the pain forced him into reflex actions to protect his head and face. Grant tumbled like a rolling stone gathering no moss. What he did gather was pain and blood.
The side of his head slammed against a boulder. One arm snapped above the wrist. His knees were skinned and his back knocked so hard he felt paralyzed from the waist down. He flipped over, landing on his side before bouncing and rolling some more. He kept his mouth closed to protect his teeth and stop himself biting his tongue, but something mashed his lips and grazed the side of his face. Miraculously his nose avoided any damage.
Dust and rubble tumbled with him. Snapped-off tree branches snagged at his clothes. Pain filled his world. Pain and gunfire. He could hear it despite the sound of breaking bones and jarring concussion. He couldn’t see the muzzle flashes because his eyes were closed. Ricochets careened all around him.
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