The Day After Never - Purgatory Road (Post-Apocalyptic Dystopian Thriller - Book 2) (21 page)

“Look, I have no beef with you. I came to talk to Cano.”

“Oh. Sure. Sort of like, ‘Take me to your leader.’ Except by some hayseed shit-kicker.” The Loco flipped off his weapon’s safety. “Now tell us where she is, punkass. I’m running low on patience.”

Slim shook his head. “I want to see Cano.”

The Loco looked to his companion. “Take his guns. We’ll do this the hard way.”

Realization of the situation he’d gotten himself into struck Slim with the force of a blow, and he tried to turn his horse, but the cartel thug was already reaching for the bridle. The exhausted stallion panicked as the gunman tried to grab it and reared on its back legs, lashing out with its front hooves and striking the Loco, knocking him to the ground, one of the hooves caving in his skull like a porcelain doll.

Slim fought to bring the horse under control as the remaining Loco raised his gun. Slim reached for his to protect himself, and the Loco’s AKM barked on full auto, stitching Slim’s torso with rounds and blowing the horse’s brains all over him in a shower of blood and bone shards.

Rider and horse collapsed, the stallion dead before he hit the ground, and Slim’s life ebbing as his dreams of riches seeped from ragged holes in his chest, the flashes of searing pain replaced by a cold so profound it took his final breath away.

Chapter 32

Two days into the ride to Lubbock, Lucas was questioning the wisdom of his decision. It had seemed like the only alternative when he’d awakened to the idea, vivid as a kiss on the lips, but now, with the reality of over fifty miles a day of sunbaked slog across barren plains where decrepit oil pumps loomed like petrified giants on a lunar landscape, he wasn’t so sure. Maybe he should have waited another day or two to see whether Ruby or Bruce could pull a rabbit out of their hat?

He’d camped west of the city of Lovington on the first night, staying clear of the town’s bonfire glow, not wanting to invite questions or attack. He wasn’t sure where the Crew’s territory began, but he was taking no chances and was operating under the assumption that anyone he encountered would be a threat. He’d slept uneasily under the stars, unwilling to risk even a small fire for fear of drawing hostiles, the song of distant coyotes his lullaby as the night’s chill descended like arctic breath.

The next morning he’d pressed Tango until Lovington’s skyline was a speck on the horizon behind him, and then settled into a steady walk across the flat expanse, the big horse soldiering on without complaint. As he approached a rusting yellow sign announcing the New Mexico-Texas border, he calculated that he would have one more long day’s ride before he arrived in Lubbock. With a hundred miles under his belt, he was dog tired, and his heart went out to Tango, who was grazing without complaint near a rural well as Lucas sized up the location’s viability for a campsite. Situated at the end of a dirt road near the bones of a farm, the area was deserted, and as the wind blew from the east, carrying with it an all-pervasive red dust that invaded every crevice and cranny, he decided to make camp there. He again avoided a fire, dining on smoked jerky and water.

Lucas inspected the bullet wound on his arm and was relieved to see that it had healed. The new skin was pink and tender as a baby’s, but there was no sign of infection. He flexed his bicep and didn’t feel any pain, so that was one concern he could check off his list. Going into enemy territory on a suicide mission, he had plenty on his plate to mull over without his body betraying him. He waited until it was completely dark and then used the well water and a soiled shirt to clean the worst of the sweat and road dust from his body, his naked form pale as a ghost in the light of the rising moon.

The wind strengthened to a howl as the night wore on. Lucas snatched sleep when he could, but was awakened multiple times by tumbleweeds blowing by and the moan of sustained gusts through the bones of the farmhouse. When he packed his bedroll away just before sunrise, fatigue still wore heavily on him, and he again was overcome by a wave of misgiving. He’d chosen to put his life on the line based on a slim chance of success, violating every precept that had kept him alive through the post-collapse anarchy. In the crisp predawn luminescence, he shook his head in a kind of wonder at how crazy his actions were. Maybe it was a delayed response to Hal’s passing, or the loss of the ranch, or the death of an entire town’s good people, but if he kept making poor decisions, he’d join them in eternity sooner than later – and he wasn’t ready to shed his mortal coil quite yet.

The truth was that the idea of Shangri-La, of a sanctuary where the madness of the outside world was held at bay, had infected him, corroding his pragmatism and leaving something far more dangerous in its stead: hope. For years he’d avoided thinking of anything but the present, living day to day, never expecting to wake up the next. But now there was a chance of a better future than one of mere existence, and he’d drunk the Kool-Aid like it contained the antidote.

And since he was being completely honest with himself, there was also Sierra and Eve. The little girl had touched something he’d thought dead in his core, and for better or worse, he felt an unusual bond with her. As to Sierra, he understood that she was cunning in the way a survivor had to be, but she was also the first woman he’d seen in forever that had stirred his interest – and reached a part of him he’d believed had vanished forever with his wife’s death.

“I’m a weak man,” he whispered to Tango, who passed judgment with inscrutable eyes. “Ready for another day in hell?”

The horse stood motionless as Lucas climbed into the saddle, and by the time the sun rose, they were miles along the trail that stretched east to Lubbock, where he would hopefully find the answer to questions that he’d never known existed until a few days earlier.

Toward midday, as he was crossing a vast oil field dotted with rusting pumps, he spied a dust cloud straight ahead. He raised his binoculars and scanned the horizon until he could make out the source: a group of six horsemen, all heavily armed. Their plate carriers, assault rifles, and facial tattoos alerted Lucas that he was now in Crew country.

“Come on, Tango, let’s make tracks,” he said, dropping the glasses back against his chest and wheeling the horse around to the north. Lucas wasn’t interested in discovering how the Crew treated new arrivals into its territory – Sierra’s account had convinced him that was a pleasure best skipped. He urged the horse to a trot, just fast enough to put some distance between himself and the patrol but at a moderate enough pace that no dust was stirred up. After half an hour, the dust cloud passed behind him, the group riding hard for some unknown destination.

Lucas stopped and allowed Tango to take a breather. He watched the unending fields with his spyglasses until the dust was out of sight, and when he remounted the horse, any fatigue was gone, replaced by an adrenaline buzz from the near miss. If there were regular patrols from here on out, it would be slower going, and he’d need to be extra vigilant the remainder of the way to avoid discovery.

The dry scrub turned greener as he neared Lubbock, and he paused regularly so Tango could munch grass for ten minutes at a time while he relieved himself and stretched his legs. He began seeing signs of life as he drew closer to the city: smoke rising from chimneys and the occasional boom of a small-gauge shotgun as hunters bagged dinner. In one section, the sky was thick with partridges, and his mouth watered as he debated risking shooting one himself so he could dine on fare other than jerky. Ultimately, the risk wasn’t worth it, and he discarded the idea and continued on, stomach rumbling in protest.

Twilight arrived with swarms of flies and mosquitoes, and he spent the final half hour of daylight swatting at them like a man possessed. When darkness fell, the high plain glowed in the distance from the lights of Lubbock, and he recalled Sierra’s description of the wind farms the Crew had harnessed for power.

Because of the town’s size, it was unlikely the entire perimeter was guarded, so to enter the city, he’d just need to avoid the obvious outposts and find a way in someplace secluded. Once there he would find the hospital; and then the difficult part of the operation would begin. He’d reconnoiter the grounds and get a sense of what he was up against – how alert the guards were, where they were stationed – and then search for Jacob after midnight, when most would be asleep.

What he would do if the man’s quarters were empty was another matter; one that had haunted him on the journey east. If the scientist had been killed, they had no options – they’d be destined to run from constant pursuit until the inevitable day their luck ran out. The thought made his stomach muscles tighten to the point where they were sore, and he willed himself calm. He patted Tango, preferring to focus on the immediate future rather than speculate on what would soon be obvious.

“We can do this, boy,” he said, unsure whether he was talking to Tango or himself. He gazed through his binoculars at the amber radiance, faint silhouettes of buildings framed against the glow, and then coaxed the horse on, the final five or so miles likely to be the most treacherous.

Chapter 33

Cano studied the stucco walls of the hotel room where he was convalescing. The stained surface had bubbled in places where water had leaked through the roof in one of the area’s infrequent storms, forming patterns strangely similar to a collage of stylized human faces. He blinked away the vision, his good eye roaming the baseboards that rodents had chewed much of away. He could hear them at night, their tiny feet scrambling across the linoleum floor, and for the first few days he’d been unable to sleep for more than a few minutes at a time, the conviction that they were going to dine on him while he was defenseless consuming his thoughts.

He was better now; his wounds had scabbed over, and his strength was returning by the day. He’d avoided reporting his state to Magnus for fear of his injuries being interpreted as an early failure on his part. Cano knew the price for disappointing the great one, and he’d seen no reason to give Houston an update, preferring to allow them to think he was still in the field, on the quarry’s tail.

The doctor had warned him not to push it, and Cano had reluctantly obeyed the instruction, there being no obvious trail to follow. He’d sent out a party to circle the crest from which he’d been ambushed and look for tracks, but had little hope that they would find anything significant. With him out of commission for almost a week, the trail would have gone cold, and the woman could easily be in Canada by now.

The thought wasn’t a pleasant one. Magnus wouldn’t be pleased, and he wouldn’t care about the details. He’d made that clear.

Cano’s plan was to recuperate another few days and then get back into the saddle and resume the hunt. His head was now clear, and he’d grown accustomed to the blindness on his left side. Physically he was healing remarkably fast, but mentally he was still shaken, and he gave the wall another sidelong glance, from where the faces seemed to be mocking him.

“Another couple of days,” he muttered.

The worst part of his self-imposed bed rest was that he was going stir-crazy. Cano was a man of action, and he didn’t do well on his back, waiting. He had a strong urge to suit up in his plate carrier and ride out despite the doctor’s warning, but he resisted it, there being no place to go. He closed his eye and willed himself to rest, knowing that every hour of recuperation would pay dividends later.

Outside, his men were playing cards, laughing and swearing as the level of their bottles sank and their luck changed. Inertia was also bad for them, Cano knew – left to their own devices, they would quickly lose their edge, and soon the fights would start.

He needed to get back into the field.

“Soon,” he whispered. “Soon.”

~ ~ ~

Duke spied motion in the darkness and hit the switch for the floodlights, his AR-15 in hand as the compound’s periphery lit up for two hundred yards in all directions. Doug was approaching on the main trail and waved to signal his presence. Duke looked through the telescope and then leaned back to take a swig of water and extinguish the lights, the rider identified.

Doug waited outside as Duke opened the gate. He dismounted and walked his horse through, and after tying him to a hitching post by the water trough, gave Duke an abridged report on his recruiting effort.

“Not many able-bodied men around in a mind to leave what they got to come to work, Duke. Word’s spread about Loving and Pecos, and it’s got people on edge.”

“There’s got to be somebody. Don’t want to keep having to do four-hour stretches. Like death by a thousand cuts, once you get to be my age.”

“I hear you. Maybe we’ll have more luck tomorrow.” Doug hesitated. “I did stop by Slim’s place. They ain’t seen him.”

Duke set his rifle down. “Kind of weird, dontcha think?”

“He was glad to be rid of the ranch. Can’t see him excited to return.”

“Wonder where he went off to?”

“No tellin’. Boy always had a restless streak, long as I known him. A real mustang when he got it in his head.”

“Not many places to get to, though, are there?”

“Sometimes even nowhere’s better than where you are.”

“And he didn’t mention anything to you about wanting to leave before he skedaddled?”

“Not a word.”

“Go on in and grab some chow. Aaron caught some fish. Still on the stove.”

“Don’t mind if I do.”

Duke watched him make his way to the main building, and his brow creased with mounting worry. Was it possible Slim had gone to the Locos and sold them out? He hadn’t seemed like the type, but what did Duke really know about him? And where else could he have gone? It wasn’t like West Texas was a hotbed of opportunity waiting for a young man with big expectations to come along.

He followed the thought through to its conclusion: if Slim had done as he feared, the trading post was toast. It would just be a matter of time before the cartel rode in and flattened it for lying to them about the woman – and worse yet, not alerting them when there was still time to catch her.