“We’ve got to stay down and out of sight right here and ambush him, Vicky. It’s our only chance. If we try to move now, he’ll see us, and even if we get away, he’ll find us if he was able to follow our trail this far.”
“You want to ambush and shoot him? With the revolver?”
“Yes. It’s all we can do. But we’ve got to wait until he gets in close, because if I miss, we’ll be screwed. It looks like he’s got more firepower than the .45-70 he took from us. That’s an AK he’s carrying now.”
The wait seemed to take forever, as the man was moving slowly and deliberately, studying the ground here and there and stopping often to scan his surroundings. As he got closer, less than a hundred yards away, he stopped and stared straight in their direction each time he found more of their tracks, and Jonathan broke out into a cold sweat. Had the man already spotted them hiding there, and they just didn’t know it? If he opened up on them with that rifle, they wouldn’t have a chance. Jonathan knew he couldn’t afford to wait. He slowly eased the revolver forward from where he was stretched out prone behind a rock. He steadied it with both hands, but the long barrel was still shaking, and he knew if he didn’t control it, his first bullet would go wild, and with it the element of surprise that was their only chance. Vicky was right behind him, looking over his shoulder in silence as they waited.
“Just a little closer,” Jonathan whispered, knowing he needed to let the man close half the distance between them before he had a solid chance of hitting him. He was coming, but it was taking forever. When the man came into their camp in the dark, it had been freezing cold and he was wearing a heavy coat with a hood pulled down over most of his head, and had his face covered with a bandana. He and Vicky hadn’t been able to see anything of his features, but now his head and face were uncovered, and Jonathan could see that he had long raven-colored hair that hung past his shoulders. The stranger looked Native American or possibly Hispanic, but seeing his skill at tracking, Jonathan imagined the former was more likely, and the ease with which he carried the AK and handled the horses made him seem all the more dangerous. Jonathan knew he couldn’t afford to mess this up. Everything rested on his ability to make that first shot. His finger was taking up the slack in the trigger when the man stopped and stared directly at him again, as if he could somehow see him hidden among the rocks up there. It was disconcerting enough to cause Jonathan to waste a precious second or two, and in those seconds the man dropped the leads of the horses and dove for cover before he could squeeze off a shot. When he did actually pull the trigger, Jonathan was shooting at nothing; his target had seemingly melted into the scant brush surrounding him. Jonathan fired two more rounds at the area where he’d seen him vanish and then stopped, realizing there were only three left in the cylinder and that he was facing an adversary armed with an AK-47 and a 30-round magazine.
Eighteen
UNTIL SHE WOKE FROM her nap and saw they were being followed, Vicky had been feeling pretty good about things that second afternoon because Jonathan was still able to make progress, despite that they were both tired and weak, and their food was running out. Before they stopped to rest on the hillside overlooking the meadow, they had already talked about camping nearby and trying to shoot another rabbit or whatever game animal they could find before moving on again the next day. When she woke from her nap, the first thing she thought of was that she should take the revolver and try her luck. They’d seen deer tracks down there in the meadow earlier, so when she sat up, she glanced that way to see if she could see anything moving. But what she saw shattered her illusions that they were somehow okay.
When the horse thief had left without harming them and had even gone so far as to leave their revolver behind, Vicky had assumed he might really be a good person at heart, despite what she’d said about him. She knew a lot of people were being driven to desperation by the present circumstances in this crazy new reality, and many of them were resorting to looting and robbery in order to survive. But seeing him there now, apparently tracking them down, changed everything. It made no sense for him to follow them here, especially at the slow pace they were traveling, when he seemed in such a hurry that night he robbed them. But whatever he’d told them about needing to get back to his family was obviously a lie. And besides, he had two more horses besides Tucker, but wasn’t riding any of them because he was walking slowly instead, stopping to study the ground for their footprints. When she quietly woke Jonathan, the fear in her voice was impossible to hide.
Jonathan was as shocked as she was when he saw the man coming, and she knew he was right when he said they had to turn the tables on him and ambush him before he knew they were aware he was tracking them. With only one weapon between them though, all she could do was keep her fingers crossed and hope he wouldn’t miss as Jonathan prepared to take the shot. But when their stalker seemed to see them at the last minute, right before Jonathan pulled the trigger, Vicky saw him drop to the ground and then it was almost as if the earth swallowed him up. She knew he was still there somewhere though, and she fully expected that she and Jonathan would be cut to pieces by incoming fire from his AK at any moment. Jonathan wanted her to run for it while she could, but there was no way Vicky was leaving him now. Even if she could get away by doing so, she knew she wouldn’t want to live, knowing he was killed because of her. She’d only known the guy such a short time that it probably didn’t make sense to feel that way, but Vicky suspected she was falling in love whether she wanted to or not.
“Maybe you hit him after all,” she whispered when the silence lingered on long minutes after the echoes of the .44 Magnum died away.
“No, I don’t think so. I think he was completely out of my line of sight before I pulled the trigger.”
“Maybe…” Vicky’s next thought was cut short by a sudden shout from the direction where the man had vanished.
“If you’re through shooting at me, perhaps we can talk?” It was him, but Vicky still couldn’t see him out there among the grass and low bushes where he was hiding. “You are Jonathan and Vicky, is that right?” He continued.
How in the hell could he possibly know that? Vicky wondered. Jonathan looked back at her with the same question written on his face.
“I’ve been following your trail all the way from the cabin where you were staying. I came there with Eric Branson to get you two and his wife, Shauna!”
Vicky had heard enough to think that this was completely crazy, but she had to respond: “Then why did you sneak up on our camp the night before last and rob us? Why did you steal our stuff and my horse, Tucker?”
There was a long silence before the still-hidden man replied. “I didn’t steal any horses, but I did run into a fellow riding yours. I knew when I saw it that it was the animal I was tracking by the gait, and by the description Eric gave me. That man claimed he found the horse wandering in the mountains, but I could tell he was lying by the look in his eyes. Now he is the one wandering, and with no horse and no guns!”
“I think he’s for real, Vicky!” Jonathan said. “He wouldn’t know about Eric if he wasn’t!” Jonathan shouted back to the man: “If you’re serious, then show yourself, but keep your hands where I can see them!”
The man suddenly stood, and when he did, he was much closer to them than Vicky would have thought. How he did that, she had no idea, but his hands were empty and out to his side, indicating he was putting all his faith in Jonathan.
“Take it easy kid! Eric told me you could get nervous sometimes, but I’m not here to hurt you! When we found your trail and then the burned cabin and your note, Eric and the others went on to look for Shauna. They sent me to track you down and take you back to the reservation. Megan and Aaron are already there; waiting.”
“Megan and Aaron made it to the reservation?” Vicky had to hear it again.
“Yes, they are both there now. It will be easier to talk about all this if we sit down together and put away our guns. Eric Branson is my friend, so if you are friends of his,
then you are friends of mine.”
“Sure,” Jonathan said. “I’m sorry I fired at you.”
“You didn’t know who I was, and I didn’t see you until the last minute, although I had a bad feeling something wasn’t right, like I was being watched. I didn’t figure it out for sure until I saw a reflection on that stainless-steel revolver you were pointing at me. If not for that, I guess you’d have blown my head off!”
“Well, I’m glad I didn’t make that mistake, man, I really am! But what I want to know is how you disappeared like that so fast! That was some crazy shit, dude!”
“Old Apache trick! Maybe I will teach you, someday. They call me Wolf, by the way.”
“It’s good to meet you, Wolf. I’ve never met an Apache Indian before! Dude, I’m sure glad me and Vicky aren’t your enemies. We wouldn’t have a chance, the way you tracked us down!”
“Following a trail is easy if you know what to look for. I could show you that too and you could do it pretty well with a little practice.”
“But what about Shauna?” Vicky asked. “I’m surprised Eric didn’t want you to try and track her instead? Or did Eric find my note and decide it was impossible because the men that took her drove away with her after they got her to their vehicles?”
“No, it’s never impossible, and Eric did go after her. Our best tracker, Luke, is with him. If anyone can figure out where they went after they left that place, it is Luke.”
Vicky had walked over to Tucker’s side by this time and was whispering to him and telling him how happy she was to see him again, when she’d thought she never would.
“We can all ride now,” Wolf said. “I brought the extra horse with me because I knew you only had one. But I guess it was just luck that I ran into that guy who stole yours. He was headed back in the direction from which you came.” Wolf showed them the guns he’d taken from the man too; there were two of them, and Jonathan confirmed they were Bart’s .45-70 and his .22 Magnum he had stashed in his cache. “I wish I’d had a chance to meet the old man,” Wolf said when Vicky described the cache and Jonathan told him a couple of Bob’s stories. “It sounds like he had the true spirit of the wilderness, a man at home in the mountains.”
They were soon to find out that Wolf was quite at home out there too. He had a little food with him from what he’d packed when the group left the reservation, but since they found the cabin burned and the supplies gone, the restocking they’d planned on hadn’t happened. But in addition to his AK-47 that he carried as his fighting weapon, Wolf had his trusty Winchester .30-.30, and with that he went out hunting after they decided to stay where they were for the night. When he returned, he had a small doe lashed behind his saddle. “It’s cold enough that most of the meat won’t spoil, so I figured it wouldn’t hurt to take a deer, even if it’s more than we can eat on this journey. You never know what delays we may run into, but even if there are none, it’s still a long ride back to the reservation.
That night Vicky sat close to Jonathan on one side of the fire as Wolf sat opposite, answering their questions about the Jicarilla and the reservation and telling them about growing up there and then joining the Marines with several of his buddies, some of whom were with Eric now. Wolf was honest with them and said that despite what he’d said earlier about how it was never impossible to follow a trail, things didn’t look good for Shauna. This wasn’t anything Vicky and Jonathan didn’t already know, but Wolf assured them that his Apache friends that accompanied Eric would stick with him, and not give up the search until he made that decision for himself. He told them what he knew of the cartels that were operating in the area, and how he expected it was only going to get worse unless something was done quickly to discourage the incursions. He said that Nantan and the others on the security force were ready and willing to do so, but there were only so many of them, and that even though they’d gone with Eric to learn what they could of the situation, they would avoid unnecessary confrontations that far from home, as protecting their people there was the top priority.
Vicky could tell that Jonathan was fascinated with Wolf the way Shauna had said he was with Bob Barham. Jonathan had never met anyone remotely like either of them growing up in south Florida, but he was an outdoorsman at heart and could really look up to men such as these that had skills and knowledge far beyond his own. Wolf’s arrival meant their immediate worries about survival could be put aside. The man had complete confidence that he could get them safely to the reservation, and Vicky fully trusted him already. She knew she would sleep well that night, although with Wolf nearby, she and Jonathan would have to be more discreet about their newfound intimacy. She wasn’t bothered by that at all though, as she felt that her time of getting to know him was just beginning. Whatever the future held for them, she hoped they would be together, even if it meant following him to Louisiana. Whether he would go there or not was dependent upon what happened with Eric. Jonathan said that if Eric didn’t find Shauna soon, he had no idea what it might mean for his plans to take Megan back to the boat he had waiting there.
“I think he’ll eventually go,” Jonathan said, when Vicky brought it up as they lay there whispering after Wolf fell asleep. “I mean, Megan’s the reason he came back, not Shauna. I know he’ll do everything he can to try and find her, but if he can’t, Megan will be his priority.”
“There’s no way she’s going to agree to go though, and leave her mom missing out here. I know her pretty well. I can’t see her doing it. And, we don’t exactly know what’s up with her and Aaron either. I mean, she left with him when she broke up with Gareth. They may be pretty tight by now, you never know. If they are, she’s not gonna want to leave him here. And since he’s pretty into his heritage and tribal stuff and all that, he may not be willing to leave that behind to go off sailing across the ocean.”
“Yeah, I can see that. It’s kind of gotten complicated for Eric. His whole plan in the beginning was so simple. He told me all about it, how he thought he would just sneak right in to the coast in his kayak and find Megan and her mom there at their house on a nearby canal. But of course, they were gone because of the hurricane, and then he met me and that was the beginning of his complications, taking me with him.”
“I don’t imagine he saw it that way. Look how much you’ve helped him since.”
“Maybe, but I know I was a pain in his ass in the beginning. And then when we finally got to his dad’s place and found Shauna there, her new husband was the next problem. He was an even bigger pain in the ass and complication!”
“From the way I saw her looking at Eric just the few days I was around them, I don’t think she’s thinking about her husband much. She sure didn’t talk about him to me.”
“Probably because she never really wanted to divorce Eric in the first place. I think she tried and tried to make it work with him, and finally gave up. It literally took a war back here at home to get his attention, but I know he regrets the way he neglected his family before. He told me that several times. He’s probably really feeling like shit about now, with Shauna missing after the way he left us all in that cabin. He’s blaming himself, and he’s super pissed at those guys that came there and took her. I almost feel sorry for any of those poor bastards he finds. He’s going to take it all out on them. He really is!”
* * *
By the time Eric, Shauna and Luke hiked back to the road and then rode with Nantan and the others back to the work station compound where they’d left the horses, it was nearly midnight. The chief didn’t really kill his man, Wilson, like he said he was going to do, but the two of them didn’t seem to be on speaking terms when Eric and Nantan unlocked the supply room and led them out.
“You’ll find out why he talked soon enough,” Nantan told him, “because you will do the same when it is your turn.”
They had already made up their minds to take the chief back to the reservation with them; first so that Nantan and the security council could interrogate him about all the operations he might know o
f in the region that affected Jicarilla land. And after they were done with him, Eric figured he could leverage delivering him to the Army for his crimes in exchange for help with the transportation problem he was facing in getting his family to Louisiana. That would all come later though, of course. At the moment, Eric was under pressure from Shauna to get back to that reservation ASAP so that she could see with her own eyes that Megan was there and safe.
“There’s plenty of fuel here in the storage tanks,” Tommy assured him when Eric questioned the feasibility of just driving there. Returning by horseback was the safest and surest bet, but it would take much longer and since they didn’t have a specific reason to go back through the high country in the vicinity of the cabin, there was no point in subjecting Shauna to such a journey after all she’d recently been through. Nantan and the others agreed. They had enough firepower to fight their way out of most situations they might encounter, and the chief and Wilson would be additional insurance.
“They will both understand what will happen to them if they steer us into a C.R.I. checkpoint or some other trap. I will make the consequences very clear to them, and Wilson is already a believer!” Nantan said.
Luke and Tommy volunteered to take the long way back, riding the horses, so with that decided, Eric wanted to go ahead and roll out that very night, saying it was riskier to stay there at the compound than to be on the road, considering how they could be trapped there at the end of a dead-end.
“We’ll take the two best trucks and all of the weapons and ammo we can find here, in addition to what we already have. I’ll drive one of them and Shauna will ride shotgun with me. Nantan, you or Red can drive the other. We’ll secure the prisoners and put them in the back of yours, and I’ll follow behind.”
Shauna, of course, was delighted with this arrangement, as she wanted nothing more to do with that compound and had no interest in staying put anywhere until she saw Megan. Another night without sleep would make little difference now, and she was so wired and excited about the prospect of seeing her daughter that she told Eric she would be wide awake that night anyway as they got into the truck to leave.
Feral Nation Series Box Set 2 [Books 4-6] Page 51