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  He said, “Toss the gun. Slow!”

  Both men tried to do as they were told, but Widow said, “Just Glock.”

  The leader left his in his pocket.

  Glock reached down with one hand and pulled the Sig out of a hip holster and tossed it on the sofa. Widow kept his eyes locked with Glock.

  The leader of the Jericho Men asked, “Now me?”

  Widow turned to him. “You the leader here?”

  The guy said, “He’s the boss.”

  “But you’re the leader of this militia?”

  The guy nodded.

  “What’s your purpose?”

  “What?”

  “What do you guys do here?”

  The guy swallowed and said, “Border security.”

  “That’s what the United States Border Patrol is for.”

  “Yeah, but they’re no good at it. Them spics come across the border all the time.”

  Widow asked, “So you capture them and turn them over?”

  The leader said nothing, but his eyes instinctively looked over Widow’s shoulder, toward the rotten-smelling kennel. Widow imagined they caught illegals and caged them in the dog kennel. What they did after that, he could only imagine.

  “What do you do with them?” he repeated.

  “They breaking the law.”

  “Do you kill them?”

  The guy repeated, “They breaking the law.”

  Widow shot him through the gut. The leader went flying backward, landing halfway through the doorway. He sprawled out across a doormat that read Welcome. Which Widow thought was ironic.

  He racked the lever again, twisting and pointing it at Glock in case he got any ideas.

  Glock said nothing. He didn’t move. He didn’t even flinch.

  Widow kept the leader in his view but circled to the left, slowly. He said, “Where is she?”

  “If I tell you that, you’ll kill me.”

  “Where is she? I won’t ask again.”

  “How do I know you won’t kill me?”

  “Is she alive?”

  Glock said nothing for a long moment but stared in Widow’s face. He said, “She is.”

  Widow started to lower the gun. He asked, “Is she here?”

  “Put the gun down, and I’ll tell you.”

  Widow thought for a moment and asked, “What? You want me to put my weapon down and we go at it like a couple of adversaries? Like in the movies?”

  Glock said, “Yeah. You want to know where she is, then you can beat it out of me. Or try.”

  Widow cocked his head and looked over Glock’s shoulder. The leader had his sidearm out, but he had lost too much blood to lift it. Widow saw him lift the gun and then drop it. His shirt was covered in blood. His jeans were covered in blood. He lay in a lake of black blood. In a way, Widow felt sorry for him because he knew a gut shot was a painful way to die, and really, Glock was the one who deserved it most.

  “Want us to duke it out? The winner gets to live?”

  “Yes,” Glock said in his lizard voice.

  Widow thought about it. There was something satisfying about the thought of tossing the rifle and pulling out the KA-BAR knife and jamming it into Glock’s neck, opposite side from his first stab wound. That thought lingered for a long moment.

  Glock said, “Let’s do it.”

  Widow said, “Tell me one thing first.”

  “What?”

  “What about Lucy? The wife? She alive?”

  “She’s alive, but not for long. I got a guy there. Of course, killing her won’t do much anyway. It’s really a mercy thing. I saw her. She’s not gonna live much longer.”

  “When’s your guy gonna act?”

  “What? You want to save her too?”

  Widow stayed quiet.

  “Tell ya what. You win. Then you can go save her too.”

  Widow raised the gun, stock in his shoulder, eyes down the sight, and fired. The muzzle flashed, and the gunshot boomed through the house.

  The bullet soared through the air—not shot, not flew, not whizzed, but soared. It hit Widow’s target and came out the other side. The target was Glock’s neck, which blew apart—completely. Red mist erupted, and heavy red blood shot out the back and painted the sofa and wall and the ceiling. It went in all directions. It splattered Widow’s face. He had to blink his eyes to clear the blood out of his vision.

  Glock’s head didn’t come off from the removal of his neck, not completely. It hung by a thread. He was dumped over on the floor.

  Widow said, “I win.”

  There were still five guys left out there, and Jemma was out there somewhere as well.

  Widow went to the window and looked out front. He saw two of the guys running back to the porch. They had heard the gunshots but hadn’t seen their boss’s dead body yet.

  Widow stepped back, muzzle two inches from the glass, and aimed. He shot the closest one first. Glass shattered and sprayed toward his face and chest. The bullet hit the guy right in the face, which was dead on because he saw that red mist again. Quickly, he racked the lever and aimed at the other guy, which he had thought he wouldn’t have time for, but the guy stopped dead in his tracks and stared at his dead friend.

  Widow stepped right, took aim, held his breath, and squeezed the trigger. The bullet rocketed out and hit the guy square in the chest. Widow levered the action again and walked out. He stepped over the leader, who was deader than anything. He held the Model 94 down by his side. He had hit the second guy in the chest, but he was still alive. The guy was panting like he was trying to breathe, trying to scream.

  Widow’s eyes automatically went to the horizon, in the direction of the other three guys and Leon. He scanned the heavy equipment, looked in between the bulldozers, the Caterpillars, the dead cement trucks, and the heavy pipes. He heard no shots and saw no one coming.

  He stopped walking just past the last guy who wore a Kevlar vest and was desperately trying to take it off. Widow kicked away the guy’s AR15 and squatted down. He jerked an M9 out of his hip holster and tossed it far away. He set the rifle stock down in the dirt and pointed the muzzle to the sky. He said, “Here, let me help.”

  He reached down and helped him pull off the vest.

  He recognized the guy as the one who had shot him with the tranquilizer dart that put him to sleep.

  The guy tried to breathe.

  “Just breathe. You’re okay,” Widow said. He looked in the direction from which he expected the last three guys to come running, but no one came.

  The guy tried to speak, but still had not caught his breath.

  Widow took out the KA-BAR and stabbed him in the chest, in his right breast, puncturing the lung.

  The guy got his breath back fast because he screamed.

  “Relax. You’re still alive.”

  The guy whimpered.

  “You want to live, right?”

  The guy nodded.

  “What’s your name?”

  “Pat.”

  “Okay, Pat. You tranqed me last night, right?”

  “No, sir. Not me.”

  Widow twisted the knife, but only slightly. Pat screamed again.

  “Don’t lie to me, Pat.”

  “Sorry. Sorry. Yeah, it was me.”

  “Good. Tell me that you tranqed that little girl too. Tell me she’s not dead.” Widow squeezed his hand tight on the Ka-Bar’s handle, letting Pat feel it. “Tell me she’s not making any noise right now because she’s heavily sedated.”

  “She’s not! I swear! I shot her with a dart. She’s alive.”

  “That’s good, Pat. That’s real good.” Widow peered up and scanned the horizon again. Still no one running toward him.

  “Is she in the attic?”

  “No. No, man. There’s no attic.”

  “What about one of these machines? She inside one of those?”

  “No, man.”

  “Pat, I’m starting to think you aren’t understanding this game.”

  “H
uh?”

  “Where is she?”

  Pat started to shiver, and Widow was afraid he was going to go into shock, which wouldn’t have been good. He calmed his voice and asked again, “Where is she?”

  “She’s out back. In the cages.”

  Widow said, “The dog kennel?”

  “Yeah. The cages.”

  Widow thought about killing the guy, but he didn’t. He jerked the knife out, and Pat screamed again.

  “Put pressure on it,” Widow said, grabbing his hand and putting it over the wound. Then he grabbed him by the collar and dragged him up to the porch and leaned him against the steps.

  “Pat?”

  Pat’s eyes shot up at Widow.

  “If I see you touch a gun, I’ll kill you.”

  Pat nodded, violently.

  Widow picked up the leader’s gun and tossed it into the living room. He locked the bottom lock and slammed the door shut, testing the knob. He walked over to the other dead guy, took both AR15s and sidearms and ejected the magazines and the chambered bullets, stuffed them into his pockets, and left Pat there.

  WIDOW WALKED along the other side of the house, toward the kennels. He started to run when he reached the backyard.

  He reached the dog kennels and saw what he already feared. The kennels weren’t for keeping dogs. They were for keeping humans. He walked the length of them, searching for any sign of Jemma. Instead, he saw dried blood stains on the fence wire. As he got farther, he gagged when he saw fingernails stuck into the baseboard and human feces, covered in flies. Someone had been there recently. He saw rusted handcuffs dangling from the fence wire. There were dozens of them. He saw piles of old, dirty clothes and used shoes.

  The trough was full of slop. There were flies circling it—thousands of them.

  He called out, “Jemma? Jemma?”

  No answer. He followed the kennel to the end and saw nothing. He backtracked in case he had missed something. Then he saw movement. One of the piles of clothes shifted slightly. He ran over to it and saw it move again.

  “Jemma?”

  No answer.

  He used the KA-BAR to start sawing through the fence, but it was taking too long. He stood back and took the rifle, aimed, and fired into the roof in the next pen. The wood was old and dried out, and it exploded and splintered. He racked the action again and fired once more. More wood splintered. He racked and fired, and racked and fired until he was out of bullets. A giant hole opened up in the roof, and he took the rifle, reversed it, and slammed the stock into the remaining pieces of the roof until it was a big enough hole. He dropped the rifle and grabbed the remains of the roof with both hands. He jerked and pulled at the opening, and after a long minute, the roof ripped off the nails. His hands were raw and full of splinters.

  He reached in and picked up the heap of clothes and found a little body inside. It was Jemma. She was alive like the guy had said and was fast asleep.

  Widow lifted her and carried her away from the kennels and the smell. He took her past a long area of dirt and a bulldozer that looked like it had been recently used to dig up the ground. He stopped and looked at the bulldozer and then back at the dirt, and a horrifying thought occurred to him. A thought that didn’t come from his imagination, but from years of being on the job. He’d bet anything that he was standing on top of a large mass grave. He’d bet they’d used the bulldozer to dig it up, dump bodies inside, and then cover them up.

  Widow winced at the thought. His first instinct was to get Jemma far away from there.

  He kept walking and carried her over to a clearing far beyond the heavy equipment and the vehicles and the dead bodies and the house. He squatted down in the dirt and laid her across his lap, propping her head up against his abdomen. She was breathing heavily and, he hoped, was dreaming peacefully.

  CHAPTER 29

  WIDOW CALLED LEON.

  Her phone rang only once. She picked up and said, “Widow, where are you?”

  “I’m at their house. Are you okay? Where’s the other guys?”

  “They shot at me.”

  “Yeah, I heard.”

  “I ran back to the truck. I jumped in and hit the sirens. They ran as soon as they saw the truck. It must’ve been because they recognized the Border Patrol symbols.”

  “I’m sure. They probably heard the gunshots back here and figured you were a part of a bigger operation. They ran.”

  Leon said, “Yeah. Probably.”

  “Where’d they go?”

  “They piled into a truck and took off. I started to chase after them, but I stopped because I figured you might need the help. This is a rescue after all and not about arrests. But I got their plates. I can visit them later.”

  “You can call them in. Get highway patrol out on them. I got the girl.”

  “That’s great news! Is everything done there?” she asked, but in a way that suggested she wasn’t sure how to ask if it was all clear.

  Widow said, “We’re fine here, but I’m not sure you should come in.”

  “Why not?”

  “You’ve done nothing wrong. There’s no evidence you were even here. No fingerprints. No tire tracks. I don’t think you should come to the scene.”

  “You going to carry the little girl out of there? Want me to pick you up?”

  “No. We got a ride. You’ve done great.”

  “I don’t understand. You’re ditching me?”

  “Sorry, Leon. There’s more to be done. And you can’t know about it. You’ve already put yourself on the line for me.”

  She stayed quiet.

  Widow said, “I need you to do me one favor.”

  “What?”

  “Stay out there. Radio in those plates. Get those other guys picked up. Wait twenty minutes and call in the location to your boss. Get the agents out here. Bring them in and tell them to look at the dog kennel in the backyard.”

  “Why? What’s there?”

  “Just do it. Tell them to dig up the land around it. Tell them to look near a bulldozer parked back there.”

  She was silent for a moment. She asked, “Widow, what are we going to find?”

  “My suspicion is that you’ll find graves.”

  “Graves?”

  “Yeah. These Jericho Men were up to no good.”

  “What about you? Don’t you want to stay? We can take the heat off of you. Clear your name.”

  Widow said, “Also, one of them is still alive. He’s in the front of the house. He’s unarmed. He might still be alive when you get here.”

  She ignored him and repeated her question. “What about you?”

  Widow said, “I’m not worried about my name. I’m sure that will get sorted out. I’m not much for sticking around. For paperwork and interviews and more paperwork. Not my style.”

  “What about the girl?”

  “I’m going to bring her back to her mother.”

  “How? You gonna commandeer one of their vehicles?”

  Widow paused, listened hard. He looked toward the skyline to the northeast. He waited a moment and then heard a distant sound.

  “Widow?” Leon asked.

  “Wait.”

  He waited another long moment, and then he saw it. A gray dot on the horizon, flying low, flying fast. It was a Bell 206 helicopter, painted gray with US Navy symbols and a serial number on it. The chopper yawed, and the blades thrashed. It was a Navy chopper, but it had flown out of Laughlin Air Force Base. Apparently, it was either on loan or had to make a special landing there for a reason Widow didn’t know about. Perhaps it had needed mechanical work. Which Widow didn’t want to think about. Whatever, it flew now.

  He had walked away from Leon earlier and asked Cameron to work her magic and send an airlift. He needed to get out of there fast. And Cameron had delivered.

  Leon said, “Is that for you?”

  “Yep. That’s my ride. Sorry, I can’t stay.”

  Leon said, “You didn’t trust me to tell me earlier?”

  “I d
idn’t want to put you in a position that could compromise your career.”

  “You could’ve trusted me. I brought you here.”

  “You’re right. I’m sorry. I’ll make it up to you.”

  “How? When?”

  “Someday.”

  There was silence between them, and the Bell 206 flew in closer. It stopped and hovered above the clearing near Widow. It started to come down for a landing. The rotor wash swooped up dirt and grime. Widow protected Jemma’s face from it as best he could. The blades’ WHOOP! WHOOP! sound came down louder and louder.

  Widow said, “Look, I can’t hear ya. I gotta go.”

  Leon said, “Good luck, Widow.”

  Widow smiled and hung up the phone. The chopper had a single pilot who wore a flight suit and had the sun visor from his helmet down over his eyes. He waved at Widow, who nodded back.

  Widow walked around the chopper to the side door. He cradled Jemma with one arm and reached out and slid the door open. He stepped up onto the landing skids and stepped into the cabin. He set Jemma down on a rear bench and buckled her in. Her head fell to the side onto her shoulder. She was out cold.

  Widow turned to the pilot, who handed him a headset. Widow put it on, and the pilot asked, “Where to, sir?”

  “Take us to the hospital in El Paso.”

  The pilot nodded and said, “Strap yourself in.”

  Widow nodded and said, “We need to get there in a hurry.”

  “I’ll do the best I can, sir.”

  All that sir stuff made Widow think that Cameron had told the pilot he was a special officer in the US Navy, which wasn’t completely untrue. He had once been an officer, technically.

  Widow turned to the open door and looked over the landscape one last time. Cameron had been right. It did look like a graveyard for dinosaur bones. The heavy equipment represented just about all the well-known types of dinosaurs. They looked like lifeless monsters.

  Widow looked in Leon’s direction and saw her sitting on the hood of the Tahoe. He slammed the door shut, and the chopper tilted and turned back north.