Depth of Winter

by Craig Johnson

  I trailed behind the corral and inched toward the plane, which still sat there, the interior lights flicking on as more than a few people scrambled out of the fuselage door down the abbreviated stairs.

  Just to add a little confusion, I screamed in my best Spanish accent, “Policía! Policía!” And then sprayed the sky with a few rounds just to reinforce the ruse. The two men running from the house threw themselves to the ground when I fired, and I drifted another series of rounds across the yard, stitching the terrain with small geysers of dirt and rock.

  Somebody else fired, but I was pretty sure the shots were coming from the other side of the ranch house, so I continued around the wide tail assembly and came up on the door. Slowly rising, I saw a man I didn’t know on the other side, kneeling on something wrapped in a blanket. He was holding a strange-colored Glock 9mm and looking out the window.

  Ducking back down, I figured I’d try at least one trick to see if I could save my daughter the anguish of watching him get sprayed across the interior of the Beechcraft. Standing just to the side of the door, I shouted inside. “Fuego, fuego amigo!”

  Evidently, he was only waiting for an excuse to vacate the plane, because he came barreling out with the 9mm held high and was met with all the force I could put into the butt end of the M16. He dropped, and if he had any nose left, I really couldn’t see any evidence of it.

  Snatching his sidearm and stuffing it in my jeans, I raised the M16 up to a firing position, stepped on the stairs, and checking to make sure there weren’t any other gunmen on the plane, lodged myself in the doorway. I stood there for a few seconds, still not taking my weapon from him as he lay there on the floor unmoving, when I heard a small voice from somewhere inside.

  “Daddy?”

  Charging down the aisle, I swiveled my head in search of her, finally stopping at the row of seats where the gunman had been kneeling and where I could see a mop of reddish-blond hair and a set of nickel-plated eyes peering up at me.

  “Oh, God . . .” She was crying, pushing off the seat and climbing up to me as I grabbed hold of her with the firm intention of never letting her go again.

  “Are you all right?”

  She sobbed and nodded her head. “Yes, yes I’m fine, but where did—”

  “We’ve got to get out of here.” I scooped her up with one arm and checked each window before climbing down through the doorway with the barrel of the automatic rifle leading the way.

  The gunman hadn’t moved, and I stepped out and turned back to her, noticing for the first time that she was wearing Bianca’s flamenco dress and was barefoot. “You don’t have any shoes?”

  She swiped her fist to clear the tears, and her eyes glinted. “Don’t worry about it—you lead, and I’ll follow.”

  Swinging down the fuselage and around the tail section, I could see that the barn was a full-blown inferno, the dry hay in the loft swirling flames into a massive bonfire with orange sparks carried away in the vortex of its own heat.

  “C’mon.” I half carried her across the roadway toward the vehicles just as I saw some of the men moving back toward the house and another one running toward the front of the plane. “We haven’t got much time . . .”

  Cutting through the corral, we climbed the rails on the other side, and I ushered her toward the old bus. “Get in there with the others, but if I get this Caddy going, everybody needs to pile in it posthaste, got it?”

  Glancing around at the moldering mode of mass transit, she sighed. “You’ve got to be kidding.”

  Bianca reached down and took her arm, pulling her in. “That’s what I said.”

  Threading my way around the front of the SUV, I reached the driver’s-side door and yanked on the handle, which did not give. I pulled again, but it was, indeed, locked. “Who the hell locks a car door out here in the middle of the damn desert?” Rearing back, I slammed the butt of the M16 into the glass and watched it bounce off.

  Hell.

  I was running out of time, so I headed back to the bus and leapt onto the sprung seat. I handed Cady the rifle, and she stood with Bianca where Adan lay on the floor. Glancing back at more than a dozen eyes, I focused on Alexia. “If all the saints of heaven ever answered collective prayers, you need to beg that this hunk of junk starts.”

  Pushing in the clutch and pumping the gas pedal for all I was worth, I hit the starter and listened as the motor gave out with a herniated grinding that lasted only a few seconds—and then nothing.

  I hit it again—nothing.

  Slowly becoming aware of a skinny boy speaking in Spanish standing beside me, I glanced back at Alexia, who translated. “He says the flywheel a few teeth is missing, but if you keep pumping and grinding she will catch.”

  I did as the waif said, and on the fourth try the old V-8 sputtered to life and finally roared through a truncated exhaust, and I was ready to believe in saints. Reaching over, I grabbed the handle for the door and came face to face with the guard I thought I’d knocked out on the plane.

  He stood there in the doorway with a mashed nose, the blood covering his face as he smiled and spat and raised an AK, having rearmed himself.

  Figuring Cady wouldn’t be fast enough and unsure if she even knew how to operate the M16, my hopes lay with the Glock in my waistband, and those hopes didn’t shine too brightly.

  He raised the Kalashnikov, aiming it directly at my face. I watched as, smiling a bloody grin in the half-light, he tightened his finger on the trigger. I’d just about made my peace with all those saints when the right side of his head exploded like a pumpkin, the fine red spray of his blood shooting out and coating the glass pane in the bifold door. He dropped like a sack of rocks, the AK fire ripping up through the roof of the old bus as I dove to the side for cover. Catching my breath, I glanced back where everyone still stood in an unmoving tableau. “Sit down and hang on!”

  Sawing the wheel, I popped the clutch, lurching the bus forward only to stop for a moment and reach back for the M16 in Cady’s hands. “Give me the rifle!” She did as I asked, and I leveled the thing one-handed through the open doorway at the Escalade, opening fire while dropping the clutch again.

  Sparks flew off the sides of the Cadillac as we lurched forward around the corral and lumbered back toward the main road that led toward Torero, but not before I careened across the opening long enough to throw a dozen rounds into the back of the Beechcraft as a few shots flew our way along with a lot of yelling.

  I turned the wheel to the right, and we bumped over the berm and took a lesser road heading northwest as I fumbled to find the light switch. I finally did, and a feeble, yellowish glow emitted from the front of the old bus as I hit second, wallowing the decrepit four-by-four down the washed-out sand flats like a johnboat slipping off a high wake.

  Turning back, I yelled to be heard over the engine. “Everybody all right?”

  They looked around at each other with Bianca translating for me, and then the collective heads nodded, and we were on our way.

  I looked back but couldn’t see any approaching headlights, so maybe I’d done enough of a job on the Escalade to knock it out of the game. I was also pretty sure they wouldn’t risk taking off in the bullet-riddled Beechcraft in the dark, at least I knew I wouldn’t.

  I’d just hit third gear when I thought I saw something to my right, something bounding through the stunted junipers and cactus like a pronghorn in full gallop.

  Cripes, the old Mercury couldn’t even outrun an antelope.

  Finally making out the familiar figure who was holding pace with the bus unlike anything human, I slowed and watched as he matched my speed and moved closer, finally leaping onto the landing and grabbing the rail, the M1 Garand pointed back down the road toward our would-be antagonists.

  He climbed up the steps as I flipped the safety on the M16, handing it to my daughter again who sat behind me. I gestured toward the wild-loo
king individual in the ratty cotton poncho. “This is Isidro; he’s not much for conversation, but boy can he shoot.”

  Fortunately, the gas gauge on the bus read half full—unfortunately, we’d been bumping over the washboard road for at least an hour before I saw the old abandoned armored car where I’d rested.

  I knew the bodies of my friends were out there, but there was no way I could take the time to pick them up. Turning right at the fork, I headed in the direction of Adan’s ranch, figuring that if we got that far there would be reinforcements enough to allow us to escape north.

  Cady slipped forward, flipping down a jump seat near the door and attempting to steady herself by grabbing the chrome bar and the dash. “Not that I’m ungrateful, but what the hell?”

  I cocked my head and raised an eyebrow. “All according to plan.”

  “And what was that plan?”

  “Saving you. Henry, Vic, and the rest of the posse are tied up in legalities, so I jumped the gun and decided to go freelance on this one.”

  She glanced back through the bus. “You’re liberating orphanages, too?”

  “Only as a sideline.”

  Cady chin-pointed toward Bianca and Adan still lying on the floor. “And who are they?”

  “My medical staff.”

  Her eyes became more thoughtful, and she was silent for a bit. “I thought I was dead and gone, Dad.”

  I glanced in the oversized rearview mirror that gave a panoramic view of the bus’s interior where I could see Isidro at the back aiming through one of the busted-out corner windows. “I would never let that happen, Punk.”

  She breathed a laugh, reaching over and touching my arm as she gazed out the windows at the black desert. “Well, you’ve got to admit that this is a little outside your usual line of work.”

  We rode quietly for a while, and I noticed that most of the children were stretched out, attempting to sleep on the bench seats.

  “The Texan, the one who kidnapped me?”

  I turned and looked at her. “Culpepper.”

  “Yeah . . .” Her eyes stayed out there in the darkness. “He said he was the one who killed Michael.”

  I watched the road.

  She looked at me again, and I could see that she was crying. “I want him dead. That’s horrible, isn’t it?”

  “No, honey, it’s not. It’s only natural.”

  “Do you want him dead?”

  I thought about it, trying to find the truth in my next statement, but settled for a formula instead. “I could’ve killed him earlier, and maybe I should’ve.”

  “He kept calling us—the two of us—weak. He said that’s why they always win, because we show kindness when we shouldn’t. Do you think that’s true?”

  “I think it’s twisted.” I tried to explain as best I could. “There are so many things worth living and dying for, but only a few things worth killing for, and maybe the two are intertwined—I don’t know. I can almost forgive Culpepper—he’s just a killing animal—but Bidarte made it personal by going after my family and friends.” I glanced at her. “All I know is that I’m not going to let him kill anyone else important to me.”

  “Headlights!”

  I looked in the rearview mirror and could see that Bianca was standing in the center of the bus. She was looking out the back where a set of modern LED headlights bounded over the road, gaining on us fast.

  16

  Trying to keep the top-heavy Mercury in the wallows of the rutted desert road, I turned to my daughter who had learned to drive on my grandfather’s 1948 8N tractor and shouted, “Can you drive this thing?”

  She nodded. “If I have to!”

  Allowing the old bus to slow a bit, I stepped out of the seat and gave her room to jump in and take the wheel. “Just keep her steady and stay on the road.”

  She mashed the gas and leaned forward, staring through the dusty windshield. “What road?”

  I staggered, snatched up the M16 from the front bench seat, stepped over Adan, and worked my way back past the terrified children to Bianca and Alexia, who made room for me so that I could sit across the aisle from Isidro and gauge the situation. They were gaining on us like we were parked. They were a good quarter of a mile away, but they would be right behind us in no time.

  “It’s them?”

  I turned to look at Bianca. “Move the children forward.”

  She and Alexia did as I requested. Isidro, who had taken off his poncho and folded it on the sill of the missing window, leveled the .30-06 on the approaching headlights. “If we need to, can you hit them from far out?”

  He shrugged a shoulder as we bumped along.

  “How many rounds do you have?”

  He held up two fingers.

  Boy, I wished I had those three rounds in Culpepper’s pocket.

  Sitting in the last bench seat on the opposite corner, I disengaged the magazine on the M16, counted the rounds at around fourteen, and slapped it home. “This Armalite is not going to have the punch that that thirty-ought-six has, so I’m going to have you shoot the front of that SUV when it gets up here.”

  He glanced at me.

  “I know it’s not your specialty, but we don’t know how many of them there are in that thing, and the easiest way to stop all of them is by killing the car either by shooting the radiator or the engine.”

  He studied me, and I wasn’t sure my logic had convinced him.

  I gestured with the automatic rifle in my hands. “After you fire your two rounds, believe me, you can have this one.”

  He turned back to the advancing target, and I assumed we’d reached terms.

  The Cadillac was gaining even faster now that we’d hit a straightaway, but although the road was straight, its condition was even rougher, which actually gave us a bit of an advantage as the Mercury bus was so antiquated it had a higher clearance and a longer wheelbase.

  Even so, the Escalade was only about a hundred yards away. It surged forward, and Isidro fired, the battered wood stock kicking against his shoulder like it had grown there.

  We both peered into the oncoming headlights but couldn’t see that the bullet had had any effect. “Throw another one into it.” Isidro took aim and fired again.

  Nothing. The big SUV roared forward, gaining considerable ground, and slammed into the back of the bus with tremendous force; the Mercury swerved in the ruts.

  We scrambled to get back into position. I shouted to Cady. “Are you all right?”

  “I’m okay!” She corrected the drift in the slippery sand and then recorrected, keeping the bus at a straightforward speed of about fifty, which appeared to be its limit.

  When I turned back, the SUV was making another run at us, and even more alarming, the sunroof was opening and someone was attempting to get through it with what looked to be another Kalashnikov rifle.

  Gesturing toward the hard-charging Escalade, I took the Garand from Isidro and handed him the M16. “Do what you do best.”

  Staring at me for a second, he studied the automatic rifle as if it were an Atlas rocket and then threw it onto his shoulder in time to level it at the individual clamoring out of the roof just as it slammed into the rear of us again.

  The force of the impact caused the bus to swerve sideways, this time clipping the tops of the ruts before Cady could turn the wheel, and I could feel the Mercury leaning up on one side in an attempt to roll over. Steering into the drift, Cady got the thing back under control, but we’d slowed to the point that the Cadillac was only a few feet behind us. I could even see that Culpepper was in the passenger seat, grinning as he fired at us with my Colt that he held out the window.

  I looked back at the roof, where the gunman had repositioned himself and was raising the assault rifle to his shoulder. I glanced at Isidro, but he was already aimed up and had his finger on the trigger. He squeezed, but nothin
g happened.

  AK fire ripped across the back of the bus, and we all dove for whatever cover there was. I yelled at Bianca and Alexia, doing my best to be heard above the general mayhem. “Get those kids further in the front of the bus!”

  They scrambled to do as I said, and I turned to look at Isidro, who held the rifle out to me with a confused look. Reaching across the aisle, I flipped the safety off just as another volley ripped through the sheet metal, and we threw ourselves to the floor again.

  The bus swayed but not as bad this time, and both Isidro and I scrambled to get back to the window, whereupon he leveled the M16 over the edge and took careful aim.

  Looking through the cracked glass of the other corner, I pulled the Glock from my belt and watched as the turret gunner in the Cadillac attempted to keep the front sight of the assault rifle on us while at the same time battling the swales in the desert road himself.

  We’d just found a sweet spot of a straightaway when he lifted the Kalashnikov, only to be answered by a brief burst from Isidro, the M16 fire climbing like an antiaircraft gun, a standard mistake by those unfamiliar with automatic weapons.

  Even so, the sunroof shooter’s head snapped back with the first round, and he tumbled into the Escalade only to be quickly replaced by another shooter with another AK, along with the driver, who was hanging a pistol from the side window.

  Stuffing the semiautomatic back in my jeans, I reached across, taking the M16 from Isidro and crowding him to one side. “My turn.”

  Taking quick aim and switching to single-shot as they swerved and rushed forward, I fired into the windshield, watching it shatter as the SUV leapt forward again, hitting us even harder than before, the replacement gunman in the sunroof slamming forward, throwing a few rounds up at us before losing his gun as it slid onto the hood and then over the side.

  The Mercury lurched again, this time the extended period of two-wheeled travel seeming to last forever as Cady tried to correct the oversteer and then climbed the berm only to crash back onto all four wheels, swerve again, and climb the other side, sliding to a sickening stop, most likely high-centered.