by James Gurley
He reached the path just ahead of the rush of water. As he sprinted up the steps, he knocked down one of Levi’s men seeking safety from the flood just as he was. The man tumbled into the water and was swallowed by the raging current. Men, trees, tents, his grandfather’s house, the animal pens, vehicles, Reed’s RV – all vanished in moments, swept away by the relentless flood and crushed against the stone wall. The wall bulged under the immense pressure as water cascaded over its top. It poured through the open gate seeking release, but there was too much water for the narrow opening. With a sound like a wooden board snapping in half, the wall collapsed at two points – the gate and the wash. The river erupted through the gaps and swept down the canyon, taking with it everything he had worked so hard to build.
He stood on the path and watched his past disappear like a bad dream. He doubted that the jeep could outrun the deluge, but for Jessica’s sake, he prayed she made it. The full brunt of his failure struck him like a hammer blow. For a moment, he stood on the edge of the path and contemplated leaping in, joining his past and ending his bleak future. A hand gripped his shoulder – Reed.
“Is she …?” he asked, unable to complete the question whose answer he dreaded.
Jake shook his head. “She and Levi escaped in the jeep.”
“Will they … will they make it.”
“I don’t know.” His legs gave way and he collapsed on the ledge. “I don’t know,” he repeated.
Below them, the water was receding, flowing back into the banks of the wash, no longer impeded by the stone wall across the canyon. In its wake, it left total destruction. Of the seventy-year-old former ranch house, nothing remained to show it had ever existed. The canyon floor was swept clean. As if the hand of a blind avenging angel had come down to aid him at the cost of all he held dear. Of the dozen or so men, there was no sign. They, too, had vanished, victims of his revenge.
“Let’s get out of this rain,” Reed suggested and began trudging back up the path toward the house.
Jake remained where he was, staring at the aftermath of his binge of destruction. He had certainly lived up to Jake’s Law #10 – Serve revenge in big doses, but he wasn’t as certain that he agreed with Jake’s Law #11 – Be willing to lose it all, not if all included Jessica.
* * * *
Jessica’s head still reeled from the blow that had sent to her to ground at Levi’s feet. She sat in passenger seat, too woozy to remove the seat belt and throw herself from the jeep to escape. The roar of the flood slowly receded behind them, only to increase in volume as the road threaded through the winding canyon. She could feel the ground trembling through the tires of the jeep as the wall of water rushed at them. She hoped it swallowed them.
Jake had come for her. She clung to that thought as the jeep bearing her and Levi plunged recklessly through the night. He might have only come for his ranch, but she preferred to think he had come for her, and for Reed. When she had seen him lying in the mud outside the tent, her heart had swelled with hope. Then, the dam broke. Jake had been willing to destroy everything he owned to free her. Or to kill Levi, another part of her acknowledged. She preferred the former.
Now, his ranch was gone, washed away by the flood. He might be dead as well. She had last seen him running from the flood. At least Reed was alive. He was the one on the ledge firing the machinegun, out of reach of the raging torrent.
Levi rounded one last corner and left the flood behind. He reached the river, a raging torrent, and drove through at full speed. The engine sputtered, as water poured into the cab, but didn’t die. Then they were through and were safely on the other side. She found no comfort in her newfound safety. She had lived so that Jake could find her. Now, he was gone and she was still Levi’s prisoner. She had no hope for her future. She would kill herself or force Levi to kill her. She only hoped she got one last opportunity to kill him.
“Your boyfriend’s dead,” Levi said, gloating.
“So’s your girlfriend,” she taunted. “I bet it hurts knowing she betrayed you.”
“Not as much as the knife blade sliding into her belly hurt her.”
“You’re a monster.”
“I’m alive. You’re alive. That’s a start.”
“He destroyed everything he owned to kill you. He would have, too, if you hadn’t run like a frightened rabbit.”
Her insult struck home. “I ran from the flood, not Blakely.”
“Yeah, keep telling yourself that. I bet you’ll have a hard time sleeping at night, wondering if Jake is alive.”
Levi slammed on the brakes. The jeep slewed sideways as it skidded in the mud, finally coming to rest facing the direction they had come. If the night had not been so dark, she knew she would be able to see veins popping out on his face and neck.
“If Blakely is alive, I’ll make certain he knows where I am. After all, I have something he wants. You’ll be my bait.”
“That’s big talk in the dark. Let’s see what you look like in the daytime when Jake comes for you.”
“Maybe you’ll get your chance.”
He slipped the jeep into gear and spun it in a circle on the road, pointing it toward San Manuel.
22
June 28, 2016 Galiuro Mountains, AZ –
Jake brushed broken glass from his favorite leather chair and sat down, a bottle of whiskey in his hand. He hadn’t bothered with a glass. Sipping wouldn’t wash away the pain. So far, half the bottle hadn’t either. He still had his house, although it was a bit shot up and worse for wear. And I’ve still got my health, he whispered to himself, chuckling at his sarcastic wit.
As he took a long drag from the bottle, he noticed Reed’s pained expression. He sat opposite Jake. Like Jake, he was thoroughly soaked and mud-streaked and uncharacteristically quiet. His glasses were gone, lost in the battle. At first, he thought Reed’s sour expression was for his benefit, a reminder of his bitter failure. Then he noticed the blood on Reed’s shirt.
“Are you hurt?”
“Just a scratch. I hardly felt it.”
Jake pushed himself up from his chair. “I’d better take a look at it. You’re bleeding like stuck pig. Take off your shirt.”
Reed winced as he removed his shirt. Jake gasped when he saw the wound in Reed’s stomach. “That’s no scratch.” He leaned Reed forward and searched his back. “The bullet’s still in you.” He stared at Reed. “It has to come out.”
Reed’s mouth dropped. “What do you mean?”
“I mean I have to operate.”
“You! You’re drunk.”
“Do you see anyone else? And I’m not drunk, not yet. Look, the bullet has to come out. Otherwise, you’ll bleed to death.”
“Have you ever removed a bullet before?”
“No.”
“Have you ever performed any surgery?”
“Still no.”
“Well, that sucks.”
Jake ignored him. “You’re filthy. Go take a shower. I’ll find my surgical kit.”
Reed stood with Jake’s help. He was unsteady on his feet. “If you kill me, I’ll haunt you.”
Jake winced at Reed’s threat. He had enough ghosts haunting him now. He didn’t need one more. “I’ll be careful,” he promised.
While Reed showered, Jake gathered the instruments and items he would need for the surgery. He had pieced together a small surgical kit from items looted from a veterinarian’s clinic. He was sure Reed wouldn’t mind that Fido may have been the previous patient on which the tools were used. Xylocaine was his only pain killer. He filled a syringe with the local anesthetic. He had nothing stronger with which to knock Reed out, nor the knowledge to use it if he had. Suture needle, thread, probe, forceps, hemostats, and scalpel – he had a limited kit, but it should suffice. If a large vein or artery had been nicked … He preferred to not to let his mind go there.
Reed entered wearing only a towel draped around his waist, his belly fat rolling over the edge. He was pale, forlorn, and frightened. He eyed the surg
ical tools warily. He held one hand over the wound, but blood still seeped between his fingers. “Where do you want to perform this miracle surgery?” A slight quavering in his voice betrayed the insouciance of his words.
Jake waved him toward the kitchen table, which he had cleared off. Reed shrugged and lay down on the table, which creaked and groaned in protest to his weight but held together.
“I can’t knock you out,” Jake warned, “but I can deaden the area with a local, xylocaine.”
“Just make it quick,” Reed replied.
“This may hurt a bit.”
Jake drove the needle home and injected the xylocaine just under the skin near the wound, which was still bleeding. Reed winced and clenched his fists but said nothing as the needle went in. While he waited for the area to numb, he explained to Reed what he was going to do. Reed listened attentively until he reached the part about extracting the bullet.
“What if it’s in too deep?”
Jake had worried about the possibility also. “If it was a small caliber slug. It shouldn’t be a problem. If it was a high velocity bullet … well, I’ll have to dig deeper.” The longer it took him to extract the bullet, the more likely the sedative would wear off before he finished. The pain would be excruciating. “Can you take it?”
“I don’t have much choice, do I?”
“No, not really. Are you ready?
Reed nodded. “Just try to make the scar small so it won’t show when I wear my Speedo.”
Jake understood that Reed’s attempt at humor masked his fear. He was almost as afraid as Reed. He took a deep breath to try to quell his own apprehension. He had slapped bandages over wounds in Afghanistan and splinted broken limbs, but other than removing the cactus thorns from Jessica, his surgical experience was limited to stitching up a goat that had nicked its side on barbed wire. He prodded the area with his gloved finger to test the numbness. Reed didn’t respond. He had to work quickly before the anesthetic wore off.
“Okay, here we go.”
He hesitated on his first pass with the scalpel and realized he had cut too shallowly through Reed’s excessive layer of fat, and made a second deeper pass. He wiped the blood spilling from the wound with a towel, wishing he had some suction to clear away the blood to see more clearly. The flow of blood didn’t increase dramatically, a sign that no major veins had been severed by the bullet’s passing or by his inexperience as a surgeon. Once the opening was large enough, he grasped the probe firmly with his blood-slick fingers, and gently pushed it into the wound and moved it around. Reed wriggled on the table. Jake hoped it was more from nervousness than from pain. The end of the probe encountered a hard object about three inches in. He hoped it was the bullet. He wished he had a retractor, as he held the wound open with one hand. He reminded himself of Jake’s Law #8 - Use the tools you’ve got. He slipped the forceps inside the open wound. He was working blindly. It took three attempts to locate the bullet with the forceps. Glancing at the clock, he cursed at the time. Almost twenty minutes had passed. Finally, he grasped the bullet with the forceps and tugged. Nothing happened. The bullet was lodged deep in the abdominal muscle.
Reed’s squirming became worse. “I can feel that,” he said. He had an edge of panic in his voice.
The anesthetic was wearing off. Jake snapped at him. “Stay still. This is hard enough without you crawling all over the table.”
“I, I can’t breathe,” Reed gasped.
At first, Jake dismissed Reed’s complaint as panic, but Reed’s breathing was becoming ragged. His body heaved as he fought for air. He had quickly read through the contraindications written on the xylocaine box and remembered that one allergic reaction was bronchial tightening. Since Reed already suffered from allergies his breathing could become worse. Jake couldn’t break away from his surgery to find Reed’s inhaler. He increased his pace.
There was no time for finesse or carefully cutting away the muscle to free the bullet. He resorted to brute force. He tugged and twisted the bullet, as Reed moaned and squirmed on the table. Jake worried that if he lost his grip on the bullet, he would never find it again or worse, push it deeper into the wound. Reed convulsed on the table, trying to sit up to ease his restricted breathing. Jake shoved him back down on the table, leaned his weight onto Reed’s stomach, and yanked as if he were pulling a rotten tooth. The bullet popped free. He quickly pushed a wad of gauze into the open wound to temporarily staunch the bleeding, hoping the bullet hadn’t splintered, and rushed to Reed’s discarded clothing. He found the inhaler in Reed’s pocket, and handed it to him. After three quick puffs, Reed settled down. His breathing was still ragged, but the inhaler acted as much as a placebo as a breathing aid, calming him.
Jake removed the gauze, pleased to see only a trickle of blood oozing out of the wound. He began suturing the wound, layer by layer, with dissolvable stitches. His handiwork with a needle would never earn him an embroidery prize, but he managed to stop the bleeding and close the wound. He set aside his instruments, removed and discarded his bloody gloves, and wiped the perspiration from his forehead. Only then did he allow himself to take a deep breath to calm his own nerves.
“I wrote my name with the stitches,” he said. “I hope you don’t mind.”
“Did you get it?” Reed’s voice was weak, but the panic in it was gone.
“Yeah.” He held out the bullet for Reed to inspect. “It looks like a .38 round. Another two inches and you would have been singing with the angels.”
“Thanks,” he said, as he lay back on the table; then winced. “I think the xylocaine is beginning to wear off.”
Jake suppressed a grin. “I’ve got some sedatives for the pain.”
Reed shook his head. “No. I’ll manage.”
Jake washed the area with soap and water, and then alcohol to disinfect it. He placed a gauze pad over the wound and wrapped a bandage tightly around Reed’s waist to hold it in place.
“If it doesn’t become infected, you’ll live.”
He helped Reed down from the table and to the bedroom. After Reed was tucked away beneath the covers, Jake said, “I’ll make some chicken soup.”
“You don’t have any chickens,” Reed reminded him.
“I’ve got Campbell’s. It’ll do.”
After placing the soup in a pot and setting it to simmer, he decided to take a shower to wash away Reed’s blood. It would have to be a quick one. He doubted anyone had bothered refilling the water tank during his absence. With the well being washed away or buried beneath tons of mud, what water they had would have to last. The hot water revived him. He longed to linger beneath the hot needle jets, let them massage away his problems and the soreness of his muscles, but the need for water to drink or cook with overcame the urge to drown his sorrows in the shower.
After drying off and dressing in clean clothes, he carried a bowl of soup to Reed, but found him sleeping. He set the soup and a glass of water beside the bed and closed the door behind him as he left. He looked at his face in the bathroom mirror. He looked thinner and older than he remembered. He hadn’t shaved in a week and several bruises glowed purple beneath the stubble. He made a fist with his hand. His fingers were swollen. He downed one of his Actos pills and a diuretic for the bloating. The window was still open from Jessica’s escape. The floor and towels were wet from rain water. He closed the window gently to avoid waking Reed. Grabbing the bottle of whiskey from the living room, he strode out onto the balcony to bear witness to the destruction of his domain.
Darkness had hidden the true measure of destruction from him. By dawn’s light, he could see that it was all gone. The flood had scoured the canyon clean like a bulldozer through a rain forest. Everything he had built, everything his grandfather had built, was gone as if it had never existed. Seventy-three years of history vanished, like the numerous native tribes who had inhabited the area centuries before, leaving only bits and pieces of their existence and numerous unanswered questions. Nature’s fury had passed, but the echoes of th
e storm of gunfire still thundered in his ears. He took a swig from the bottle to silence them.
The single wash had become three separate channels, each bearing its load of silt-laden water down the canyon. As he watched, a fifteen-foot saguaro whose roots had been eaten away by the flood toppled into the stream and rushed away like a paper sailboat in a gutter. The wreckage of the RV was strewn about outside the tumbled wall, leaving a trail of breadcrumbs – a bumper here, a wheel there, a windshield glinting in the early morning sun. What appeared to be the front wheel and fork of a twisted Harley motorcycle projected from the mud, a mad artist’s sculpture draped with limbs from the cottonwood tree and coils of razor wire. Shattered tree trunks, piles of rock, and heaps of metal rose from the mud and puddles of water like small islands. He saw no sign of the jeep that Jessica and Levi had been in and sighed a breath of relief. Levi still had her, but she was alive.
To his astonishment, three figures trudged through the mud and water, the three women he had freed. They had survived the flood. He felt a moment of joy. At least he had saved someone. He yelled down to them.
“Come up here and dry off. You’re safe now.”
He went back inside to check on Reed. He was awake and eating the soup.
“You’re alive.”
“So far,” Reed replied.
“How’s the pain?”
He hesitated before replying, “Manageable.”
Jake was impressed at Reed’s composure. He wasn’t sure he could have put on such a brave face with such an injury. “Good. I have some questions for you.”
He sat down in a chair beside the bed. Seeing the stern look on Jake’s face, Reed set the bowl aside. “Shoot.”
