Degüello

by Billy Kring

  The other children crowded around Ramona and Ike as if they couldn’t get close enough. When Hunter emerged from the brush, she and Ramona locked eyes and both nodded. Ramona silently mouthed, I owe you.

  Ike and Ramona hustled the children inside the Lincoln, rearranging them like sardines. They had eight inside, with only Kelly and Consuela remaining.

  Consuela felt elated, they were escaping! She said to Kelly as she hugged her again before stepping closer to the open door, “We’re going to be best friends. We will meet every day and listen to music and watch movies. You will be like my sister.”

  Kelly’s smile was like sunrise. It was like a great weight lifted off her heart. “I want to, and we’ll never be apart again!”

  Suretta suddenly appeared in the road thirty yards in front of them and fired her pistol.

  Consuela cried out and collapsed. Kelly and Ike reached down for her, but already the blood on her chest seemed so large that Kelly felt sick.

  Chapter 14

  Suretta waited a beat, checking the results of her shot, and looking at Consuela on the ground, then she opened up with the Glock, spraying rounds at the car and the people standing by it. Bullets rang off the fenders and spider-webbed the front glass, with others hitting the open doors with a sound like striking hammers on metal.

  Hunter moved away from the car and pulled the pistol she’d taken from Carl just as other armed people joined Suretta. They hesitated, unsure if they were to shoot their cargo, until Suretta said, “Kill them.”

  Hunter emptied two full magazines of .45 ammo at them as fast as she could pull the trigger. That many rounds so fast made them scatter for cover, and Hunter still hit two of the men in the torsos. They collapsed, out of the fight. Suretta made it to the brush just as one of Hunter’s rounds clipped her forearm, making the woman drop her weapon.

  Hunter slipped in her third, and last magazine, looking for targets. Ike pulled and pushed Consuela’s limp body into the car and searched for Kelly, but she was gone.

  Hunter told Ike, “Go, get them out of here. I’ll find Kelly.”

  “I’ll go with you.”

  “No! Get the others to safety. You can come back for us.”

  She checked the dust on the road, spotted the young girl’s tennis shoe pattern, and followed it into the cedars and scrub brush beside the road, the pistol still in her hand.

  Ike told Ramona to drive, get them out of here. The kids were all crying, and Consuela’s blood was on everything as Ike held her in his arms.

  Anita cried the hardest, wanting to touch her friend, but Ramona wept and said, “No, my sweet, she is gone.”

  Ramona turned the car around, driving toward the gate two miles distant. She reached across the seat and took Ike’s hand. He squeezed it softly, then let it go, saying, “Use both to drive, mi vida, my life.” So there it was, out in the open, and Ike was glad.

  Suretta and the others hurried to the barn, where the pilot said, “Where’s the cargo? I need to get out of here if I’m gonna be on time.”

  “They will be here soon.” She pulled her phone and when the party answered, she said, “They’re coming.”

  She hung up and called again, “Jefe, Ramona was here.” She held the phone away from her ear as he yelled at her. The longer he talked, the madder she became. When he hung up, she put her phone away, took a deep breath, and said to Nadine, “He said to kill her if she interferes.”

  “That’s bad shit, huh?”

  “It won’t be our priority, just if she gets in the way again. The one I want is Hunter Kincaid. I want to tear that bitch apart.”

  “How’s your arm?”

  Suretta wiggled it, showing the bandage. “An inch lower, the bullet would have broken a bone.”

  “What do we do now?”

  “Let’s drive to the gate, see what happens when Ramona and those kids run into the people the boss sent. The timing should be just about right. When we bring them back, they go straight on the plane and out of our hair.”

  “What about Ike, and the Kincaid woman?”

  “If they surrender, they go with the kids on the plane and out of the country. Let somebody else deal with them. Otherwise, we can find a place and put them in a hole so nobody will discover them in a hundred years.”

  “That little girl you killed, too?”

  “That one, too.”

  “Okay.”

  “Right now, let’s find a high point and watch the gate, see what happens.”

  Hunter tracked Kelly down in less than three hundred yards, and when she reached the girl, the grief showing in her face brought tears to Hunter’s eyes. They stopped in the shade of a cedar clump below the crest of a hill. Hunter put her hand on the child’s shoulder and said, “I’m so sorry, Kelly.”

  Kelly wiped her eyes and said, “I know. It’s okay.”

  “It’s not okay, but we can’t do anything about it quite yet. We will, though.”

  Kelly said, “I didn’t know where I was going, I just ran.”

  “Nothing wrong with that. They were bad folks. I ran, too.”

  “That pistol you have, is it a machine gun pistol? It sounded like it, all those bullets so fast.”

  “It’s not. I was nervous and pulled the trigger fast because of that, I guess.”

  “Where can we go now?”

  “Let’s get up on a rise and see if we can spot our car.”

  “Okay.”

  Kelly wept again, and Hunter let her. “I really miss Consuela,” Kelly sobbed.

  Hunter nodded but didn’t speak, instead she let the girl get it out and recover. When Kelly tapered off on the crying, fading to weeping, Hunter stayed beside her, touching her small back. A few minutes after that, the crying became intermittent. She took a deep, shuddering breath, steadied herself and said, “Okay, I’m ready now.”

  She had dark circles under her red-rimmed eyes, and Hunter knew Kelly would sleep like a dead thing when they finally stopped for the night. Hunter pointed at a rocky ridgeline on the next hill and said, “Up there. We can see from that place pretty good.”

  They walked steady, side by side, and worked their way up the next slope to finally reach the rocks that resembled the bony-plated spine of a stegosaurus. They found many places to hide and look beyond the hill and not expose themselves. Hunter pointed in the distance, “There it is, almost to the gate on the highway.”

  They watched as a black Suburban rolled down the pavement and stopped at the gate. Hunter had an ominous feeling.

  A man hopped out and opened the gate to let the Suburban through, then he stood by the SUV as the Lincoln approached. “No, no,” Hunter said, “Don’t go up there.”

  Kelly looked at her with alarm, then both of them watched the two vehicles.

  The Lincoln stopped forty feet from the gate, and Ike exited.

  In a flash, a Suburban door opened and another man stepped to the road. He looked to be a twin of the first one, but Hunter couldn’t tell from this far off, even with her excellent vision. They put their rifles to their shoulders and motioned for Ike to come forward.

  Ramona made a motion with her hand to him. He hesitated, then dove into the passenger seat of the Lincoln as both men fired.

  The sound delay was a good three seconds before Hunter and Kelly heard the distant, hard, pow-pow-pow sounds mingled with the whacks of bullets striking metal fenders and rubber as they destroyed the tires.

  Ramona backed the car for fifty yards and spun the wheel, sending the Lincoln into a dusty slide so it faced the road to the barn. She floored it, sending dust and rocks flying from underneath as she made for the only shelter she could think of, and all the while the tires deflated and pieces of rubber flew off the rims.

  Hunter said, “Come on, we need to go and help them.”

  Kelly rose, then stopped and pointed at another hill not far away, “Look, it’s Suretta and Nadine.” Those two hadn’t spotted the former prisoners, intent as they were on the men at the gate.

>   Hunter thought about creeping up on them and shooting the two women, but decided it was too risky with Kelly at her side. “Let’s follow them.”

  Hunter kept to the far side of the ridges and kept Suretta and Nadine’s vehicle in sight, and they closed on the Lincoln where the tires flattened and shredded, leaving it unable to move over the rough road. They watched as Ramona, Ike, and the children were marched at gunpoint to her vehicle and crammed inside. The other suburban arrived from the gate. She motioned for them to follow her, and the two vehicles drove toward the barn.

  Kelly said, “If they put them on the plane, the girls are lost.” Her eyes pleaded with Hunter.

  “I know.” She said, “I have an idea, but we need to hurry and beat this group there. Can you run?”

  “Yes.”

  They ran at a steady trot, taking shortcuts through the hills rather than following the road that curved around them. Hunter and Kelly, conserving energy as they ran over the rocky ground and up and down the small hills. They ate up the distance, and did it without making much noise.

  When they reached the rise behind the barn, Hunter peeked over it and saw no one around. She said, “Stay here, I have to go do something, and it would be best if you don’t have to watch me.”

  “I know what you have to do, and it’s the only way. But I’ll stay here.”

  Hunter raised her eyebrows in surprise at Kelly’s words. This girl is no child in her thinking. “What do you believe I have to do?”

  Kelly looked straight at Hunter, “You have to shoot the pilot so they don’t have anyone to fly the plane.”

  Hunter nodded, “Yeah, and you don’t need to see something like that.”

  “If it will save my friends, shooting him is the right thing to do.” She thought about the pilot’s rough hands on her naked body, squeezing and rubbing, and all in front of a leering Carl. Her skin had goosebumps from the memory, and she felt queasy. She took a breath to clear her mind and push the thoughts away. “He’s not a nice man. I know you don’t feel right about shooting him, but it’s the only thing we can do. We can save my friends.”

  Hunter looked at her a long time, “I’ve changed my mind. Come with me, but stay close enough to hold the back of my belt in case there’s more than him down there.”

  Hunter led as they made the short way down the ravine to the rear of the barn, stopping under the pecan. She waited, listening, but heard nothing. As they eased around the corner and crept toward the front of the barn and the airplane, Kelly touched Hunter’s arm, “I hear cars.”

  Hunter stopped and listened. They were coming. “We have to hurry. Stay close.”

  Hunter went to the front and peeked at the DC-3. The stairs were in place, and the open door beckoned, but she didn’t see the pilot, Paul. “Too far back,” she said to Kelly, “Stay close.”

  They trotted across the yard toward the plane, with Hunter planning on going in, pistol ready, and shooting anybody inside.

  They were halfway to the stairs when the first shot kicked sand and gravel at their feet and Paul yelled, “You’re not hurtin’ my plane again!”

  He fired again and again, coming close but not hitting the running, weaving targets.

  Hunter spun around, pulling Kelly behind her like a skier behind a fast-turning boat. Kelly gripped the back of Hunter’s belt like a ski-rope as the momentum almost spun the eleven-year old off her feet.

  Hunter brought up Carl’s pistol, firing as soon as it came on target. She shot two lightning fast .45 rounds into Paul’s chest, hesitated a quarter-second, and put a third one centered in his forehead, blowing out the back of his head in a wet, red mist. Paul flopped to the ground just as Suretta and the others slid into the yard, their vehicles stirring up a large, reddish cloud like some Dust Bowl era storm.

  Hunter and Kelly made for the far side of the barn.

  Suretta and the others stepped out of the vehicles and Suretta had Ramona and Ike beside her. Two gunmen stood beside them holding their handguns, with one of them grasping Ike’s arm. Anita screamed and yelled and cried from inside the vehicle, saying, “Don’t hurt mi mami!” The small child fought with the ones trying to silence her.

  Suretta yelled over the child’s incessant crying, “Hunter Kincaid! Look at this! See all this trouble that’s your fault? Can you hear Anita? You’re causing that, too!”

  Hunter and Kelly slowed, then stopped. They turned to face the others.

  Anita’s cries grew louder, continuous, and more panicked.

  Suretta said, “Drop your pistol, bring the girl, and you’ll be all right. Take one step away and I’m going to kill these two.” She pointed her pistol at Ramona and Ike.

  Anita struggled and wailed so loud, Hunter worried she would rupture her vocal chords.

  Hunter gripped her pistol as her jaws ached from the tension.

  Kelly saw it. She glanced at Hunter, then ran towards Suretta, yelling at Suretta, “Don’t shoot them!”

  Hunter grabbed, but missed the girl. She watched with a sinking heart as the child ran to Suretta and stopped in front of her.

  Kelly said, “Don’t shoot them, please.”

  Suretta pulled Kelly close and held the back of her neck in a painful, claw-like grip. She said to Hunter, “Kincaid, drop your gun and come here. I’m not kiddin’.”

  Ike turned his head and looked at Ramona, holding his gaze with hers. He patted his chest twice, saying in silence that he loved her, then he caught Hunter’s eye and nodded.

  Hunter’s eyes widened and she said, “Nooo!”

  Ike twisted from the man holding him and leapt at Suretta.

  He was quick, and almost had his hands on her when Suretta shot him through the throat.

  Ike flopped to the dirt. Ramona screamed. Kelly and Anita did, too.

  Hunter lifted her pistol and fired until it was empty. The two men grunted as they dropped with chest wounds, and Suretta jerked as a round smashed into her pistol when she brought it in front of her body to shoot at Hunter.

  She dropped it, threw Kelly toward the car where Nadine pushed her inside.

  Suretta pulled her hideout pistol from the ankle holster and used it to fire at Hunter as she ran, dodging left and right, like a jackrabbit, until making it behind the barn.

  Suretta leaned down and grabbed Ramona’s hair, pulling her from Ike’s body. “You want to walk, or you want me to drag you?”

  Ramona rose, tears streaming. Suretta saw the hate in her eyes, and laughed. “Get in the vehicle. And shut up your damn daughter.”

  Hunter circled the barn, coming to the pecan tree and peeking around the edge of the building to watch them.

  The hole in the barn loft was still open, so she climbed the tree and slipped inside the barn, going fast to the front barn door so close to the cars.

  Listening, she heard Suretta tell Ramona to make Anita shut up. Then Suretta said, “Nadine, we need to hurry out of here. Head for the house in San Angelo.”

  Nadine said, “The one by Goodfellow?”

  Suretta looked disgusted, “How many others you know about?”

  Nadine nodded, “Okay. I’ll take Paco with me, and we’ll get ‘em inside. You going to take care of the bodies?”

  “Not now. We’ll come back and do that, after the boss tells us what to do next. He may send another pilot, for all I know.”

  Hunter thought, that plane won’t be flying when I get through with it.

  “But either way, he’ll tell us the new plan. I know he’s desperate to get these kids sold and out of the states as soon as possible. He’s about broke and enemies are all around him.”

  Nadine nodded. She started the Suburban and drove away. Suretta glanced around, but didn’t see anything. She looked down at Ike, “Should have stayed close to your boss, not that damned Border Patrol woman.” She checked the men on the ground that Hunter had killed, then walked to the second vehicle and drove away, trailing a rooster tail of dust as she left.

  Chapter 15

 
Hunter opened the barn door and stepped into the yard, looking at Ike. She sat beside him and put her hand on his chest, feeling horrible because she had let everyone down: Ike, Anita, Kelly, Consuela, and the others who would now be sent to the middle east. She was a failure and she knew it.

  Ike coughed.

  Hunter’s hand moved with his cough and she felt the hairs on her neck prickle. She scooted closer to him, checking his pulse. Ike was alive. She felt thrilled and scared as she looked at his wound. It was a small hole above the collarbone, a half-inch to the left of the hollow in his throat. But blood pooled behind his head, and it seemed to be spreading.

  She had to move him, to look at the back of his neck. Ike groaned, but she got him on his side and pulled his collar out of the way. Another small hole leaked blood down his back and drenched his shirt. Ike groaned again, and Hunter said, “I’m going to find some things to doctor your wound. I’ll be back.” She put him down and went inside the barn, checking everywhere for bandages, and medicines. All she found was a roll of gray duct tape. Hunter grabbed it and trotted back to Ike, whose eyes focused on her.

  “Hey,” she said.

  “How am I?”

  “Your voice sounds like someone used a cheese grater on your vocal chords.” Ike frowned, and Hunter said, “I thought you were dead for sure, but damn, you’re tough, really tough. I’ve got some duct tape for the wound, but nothing else.”

  “Tape’s fine. We used it in Afghanistan a couple times. It’s taking it off that hurts.”

  “I bet.” She knelt beside him again, “Can you move your arms, your legs?”

  Ike moved them, but Hunter saw it took an effort. He said, “That’s about it.”

  “All you need to do right now.” She watched him look around. She said, “I let everybody down. They drove off with the kids.”

  “Looks like you got a few.”

  Hunter looked at the bodies of the two dead men and Paul the pilot, lying where she shot them. “I didn’t get Suretta, though. I shot and hit her pistol. It was my last bullet, too.”