“That’s not a bad idea—” Reuben began.
Before he could go on, a pickup pulled through the rows of parked vehicles ahead of them and accelerated with a screech of rubber, going the wrong way in a one-way lane. That wasn’t unusual—some people didn’t seem to have any concept of why arrows were painted on the pavement—but this pickup was shooting along so recklessly that several people had to scurry to get out of the way, including a young mother who had to drag her kids to safety.
“Look at that idiot!” Antonio said.
Alarm bells went off inside Reuben’s head. He reached for his friend, intending to grab Antonio and throw both of them between the parked cars beside them, but he was too late.
The snout of an automatic weapon poked out the open passenger-side window in the pickup and began to chatter as flame spurted from its muzzle.
CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR
The high-powered rounds stitched across Antonio’s chest, their impact making his entire body shudder. Reuben dropped his bags and tackled Antonio around the waist to drive him to the ground, out of the line of fire. They fell to the pavement side by side, between two cars.
The pickup roared past and kept going. More shots blasted. People began to scream.
Reuben’s eyes widened with horror as he looked at his friend. Blood welled from at least half a dozen bullet holes in Antonio’s chest. Antonio’s eyes were wide open, too, and filled with pain and shock and disbelief. He opened his mouth to try to say something. Nothing came out except a strangled sound and a spout of blood. Antonio lifted a shaking hand and clutched at the sleeve of Reuben’s shirt.
“Hang on, man, hang on!” Reuben said desperately. “I’ll get help—”
But there was no help to get. Antonio said, “Madre—” and then his head fell back. His eyes were still open, but there was no life in them.
Reuben heard tires screaming again, but this time the sound was fading. The killers were fleeing, putting as much distance as they could between themselves and the scene of their brutal crime.
Reuben squeezed his eyes shut to keep tears from coming out. He pushed himself to his feet and looked around. There was nothing he could do for Antonio now, but maybe somebody else needed help.
He broke into a stumbling run and followed the screaming he heard. Broken glass that had sprayed from shattered windshields crunched under his boots. A moment later he found a screaming woman crouched behind a car. He didn’t see any blood on her clothes, but he asked, “Ma’am? Ma’am, are you all right?”
“Don’t shoot me!” she cried as he reached for her.
“I’m not going to shoot you.” Reuben kept his voice as calm and level as he could, but it wasn’t easy. “The shooters are gone. They left. Nobody’s going to hurt you. Are you injured?”
She looked up at him and blinked wet eyes. A hard swallow, and then she shook her head.
“I . . . I don’t think so. But there were all those shots, and bullets hitting the cars. . . .”
She was all right, Reuben decided, other than being scared out of her wits. He left her there and hurried along the aisle in the parking lot. From the looks of the vehicles, the gunner in the pickup had hosed them down in a pretty indiscriminate fashion.
In the distance, sirens wailed. Nobody came out of the store. The shoppers in there had heard the shooting and the screams, and they were staying put where they hoped they would be safe. Reuben couldn’t blame them for that.
He found plenty of damage to cars, pickups, and SUVs, but no more bleeding people except for a couple who had been cut by flying glass. He was standing in the middle of the aisle where the devastation had taken place when police cars careened into the parking lot and screeched to a stop several yards away from him. Cops popped out of the cars and covered him with their pistols. Reuben made sure his empty hands were in plain sight.
“Get down!” one of the uniformed officers yelled at him. “Down on the ground!”
“There’s too much broken glass, man,” Reuben told the cop. “And the guys who did this are long gone. They were in a gray F-150, maybe five years old. License plate starts with DF. That’s all I got.”
He was a little surprised he’d been able to dredge that much out of his memory, considering how quickly everything had happened.
“You need to get an ambulance here, too,” he went on. “There’s a man down.” He didn’t add that it was too late for an ambulance to do Antonio any good.
“What the hell happened here?” one of the other cops asked. “Was this some sort of random shooting?”
Reuben didn’t answer. They could try to figure it out for themselves.
But he had seen it all, and he knew this shooting wasn’t random. The man with the gun had had a definite target, and the rest was just bloodthirsty exuberance and collateral damage.
That target had been Antonio Gomez.
When Stark answered the knock on his door, he found Henry Torres standing on the front deck with a stricken look on his face.
“Henry, what’s wrong?” Stark asked. “You look like you’ve heard some mighty bad news.”
“I have, John Howard,” Henry replied. “I just got a call from Reuben. He’s in Devil’s Pass. He and Antonio went into town a little while ago.”
“They get into some sort of trouble?” Stark didn’t like to think that Dennis Feasco would order his cops to harass people from Shady Hills, but the way things had been going the past few weeks Stark wouldn’t rule anything out anymore.
Henry shook his head and said, “No, they were in the parking lot of the MegaMart when they were . . . when they were attacked. Somebody opened fire on them . . . with an automatic weapon.” Henry swallowed hard. “Reuben’s all right, but Antonio was killed.”
Even before those words came out of Henry’s mouth, Stark had gone cold all the way down to the core of his soul. He had known someone was dead. The fact that Reuben had survived the attack was some small consolation, but it didn’t make the grief Stark felt over Antonio’s brutal murder any less.
“Was anybody else hurt?” he asked in a flat, hard voice.
“Not seriously. They shot up a bunch of cars and even the MegaMart sign, but that’s all. According to Reuben, they were after Antonio.”
Stark nodded.
“The cartel,” he said. “Has to be.”
“That’s what I thought, too.” Henry’s face twisted in anger and sorrow. “The first time the boy sets foot out of here in weeks, and he’s killed an hour later. Who else could it be but that damned cartel?”
Stark took a deep breath and wearily rubbed a hand over his face.
“Do Fred and Aurelia know?”
“Not unless the cops already called them, and Reuben didn’t think they had. They’ve been questioning him, but they took a break and he called me because he thought it might be better if somebody who knew the Gomezes broke the news to them.”
Stark nodded and said, “That’s a good idea. Come with me, Henry?”
“Sure. Although I’d give anything in the world not to have to.”
“So would I, amigo,” Stark said. “So would I.”
The next few minutes were every bit as bad as Stark had expected them to be. Aurelia broke down, wailing and sobbing in her grief. Fred turned so ashen that for a second Stark wondered if he was having a heart attack. Fred had a lot of strength, despite his mild-mannered appearance, and he was able to pull himself together and ask Stark and Henry what happened. Henry filled in what few details he knew.
Fred cursed in Spanish and said, “Those drug smugglers. Those . . . those animals he ran with! If we’d just been able to keep him away from them . . . !”
“Don’t blame yourself,” Stark told him firmly. “I know you think of him as a boy because he’s your grandson, but Antonio was a grown man. He made his own decisions. And when it finally came down to choosing between good and evil, he at least tried to choose good. That’s no comfort now, but maybe someday it will be.”
Stark
and Henry were still standing on the front porch of the Gomez mobile home when a Devil’s Pass police car pulled up at the curb. Chief Feasco himself got out and paused in surprise when he saw Stark.
“You’ve already heard the bad news, haven’t you?” Feasco asked as he came across the yard toward the porch.
“Reuben Torres called me,” Henry said. “I’m his father.”
Feasco nodded.
“All right,” he said. “I suppose there’s no harm done, although things like this are really the job of the police.”
“The real harm was done in that parking lot,” Stark said. “You have any leads on the shooters, Chief?”
“Torres gave us a description of their vehicle, including a partial plate. We haven’t turned up anything yet, though. Chances are the pickup was stolen and so were the license plates, but at different places.”
Stark thought that was pretty likely, too. There was a good chance somebody would find the pickup out in the desert during the next few days, burned to a hulk so that no evidence would be left inside it.
“You know who’s responsible for this, Chief,” Fred said as he pushed forward between Stark and Henry. Aurelia was still wailing in the living room. “It was the cartel! You have to go after them! They have to pay for this! And if you don’t make them pay, I will!”
Stark took hold of Fred’s arm and felt how his friend was shaking with rage. He said quietly, “Aurelia needs you right now, Fred. You’d better go inside and do what you can for her.”
Fred looked like he wanted to argue, but Stark’s firm, compassionate words must have gotten through to him. He nodded and turned to go back into the mobile home.
Stark went down the steps and faced Feasco.
“You know he’s right, Chief,” Stark said in a voice that wouldn’t carry into the house. “The cartel’s to blame for this.”
“There won’t be any proof of that. If we ever do find the shooters, chances are they’ll be dead, killed so they can’t talk.”
Stark nodded and said, “Yeah, probably. But you’ve got to try.”
Feasco bristled.
“I never said we wouldn’t try,” he snapped. “We already have an APB out with the pickup’s description, and I’ve spread it all over this part of Texas. And that’s a pretty big part. In the meantime . . . you people out here already have a reputation as vigilantes. You’d better not try to add to it.”
“By going after the cartel ourselves?”
“Mr. Gomez was pretty upset.”
“Of course he’s upset,” Stark said. “But he’s not a fool. He’s not going after the cartel by himself.”
“That’s not what I said. What about you, Mr. Stark? Just how big a fool are you?”
Right now, that was a question Stark couldn’t answer.
CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE
Almost the entire population of Shady Hills went en masse to Antonio’s funeral, packing the church in Devil’s Pass. In this time of sorrow, the upcoming election had been forgotten for the most part, although Janis Albert, who had worked as a city secretary before her retirement, had volunteered to fill the same post in Shady Hills and went to the community center every day in case anyone wanted to file to run. Stark, Nick Medford, and the other candidates had already turned in their paperwork to be on the ballot come September 28.
As Stark expected, a Border Patrol helicopter spotted the burned-out pickup in a desolate area about twenty miles up the Rio Grande. There was nothing left in it to provide a clue to the identities of the men who’d killed Antonio Gomez.
For now, the protesters and the media were gone from Shady Hills. Stark fully expected that they would be back before the election, but considering the somber mood that gripped the park these days, he was glad for the break from that annoyance.
Then one day Janis called him and said, “You’ve got some competition for the job of mayor, Mr. Stark. Someone’s just filed to run against you.”
That came as no surprise to Stark. From the beginning, he had expected someone to run against him. He asked Janis, “Who is it?”
“Mitchell Larson.”
The name meant nothing to Stark.
“Does he live here in the park?”
“No, he’s from one of those housing developments down by the high school.” Janis sounded a little tentative, as if she might have done something wrong, as she went on, “I Googled him. He has a real estate agency in Devil’s Pass.”
“Well, I guess now that he’s a citizen of Shady Hills, he wants to do his civic duty.”
“Maybe,” Janis said. “But I’ve got a funny feeling about him, Mr. Stark.”
Stark didn’t know Janis well enough to have any idea whether one of her “funny feelings” meant anything at all, so he said, “I’m sure we’ll get to know a lot more about him during the campaign.”
“Maybe.”
“What about the council positions? Anybody file for them?”
“Not yet. Those candidates are still running unopposed.”
Stark thanked Janis and hung up the phone.
That night, someone drove by on the highway and fired random shots into the park. No one was injured, but that was pure, blind luck. One of the bullets shattered a window and came within a few feet of an elderly woman watching TV in her living room. More windows were broken out, and slugs punched holes in walls.
The volunteer guards at the gate didn’t get a good look at the vehicle involved, although they were able to send a few shots after it as it sped off; they knew only that it was an SUV. Since Shady Hills didn’t have a police force yet, the sheriff’s department responded to the 911 call, but the deputies weren’t able to do anything except take some reports.
“We’d better get used to it,” Stark told his friends when they got together the next day to discuss the matter. “The cartel laid low for a while, but they’re back now. Killing Antonio was likely just the first blow in a campaign of terror.”
“You think they want us out of here?” Jack Kasek asked.
Stark nodded and said, “That’s what it’s starting to look like. Have you had anybody else tell you that they’re moving out?”
“I got three calls this morning,” Jack said grimly. “People are willing to break their leases and take the loss just to get out of here.”
Alton Duncan said, “Bullets flying around tend to make people worry less about money. If John Howard is right and this is just the start . . . if this keeps up every night . . . Shady Hills will be a ghost town before too long.”
“We can’t let that happen,” Stark said. “Tonight we’ll post guards all along the fence. If anybody comes along and starts shooting, they’ll get some hot lead in return.”
“I like that idea,” Jack said. “I’ll spread the word. I don’t think we’ll have any shortage of volunteers.”
They didn’t. As night fell, two dozen armed men were posted in the shadows behind the wooden fence. They were armed with shotguns, deer rifles, and .22s, and they were ready to fight back if the park was attacked.
Nothing happened. The cartel thugs were too smart to make a move two nights in a row. They planned to keep the park residents nervous and off-balance instead. But it didn’t matter how long they waited before striking again. There were enough volunteers to man the positions along the fence every night from now until the election.
Two nights later, traffic on the highway was light in the hours after midnight. The moon was only a tiny sliver providing a faint glow. Because of that, nobody saw the car running without lights until it was roaring alongside the fence. Flame jetted from the shadows inside the vehicle as automatic weapons stuttered. Then, with a whoosh of fire, a rocket of some sort exploded from the backseat. The volunteers on the other side of the fence had already started returning the fire, but several of them had to leap frantically for cover as the rocket zoomed between them. A second later it slammed into a mobile home and detonated. The concussion shook the ground and shocked the defenders so much that their shots
dwindled away to nothing as the attackers sped off into the darkness.
Flames leaped high from the burning mobile home.
Reuben Torres was among the volunteers near the site of the explosion. He dropped the rifle he had borrowed from his father for this duty and ran to the front door of the mobile home. A kick shattered the lock and sent the door flying open.
Thick black smoke boiled out. Reuben drew back for a moment, tore a large piece of cloth off the T-shirt he was wearing, and pressed it over his mouth and nose as he plunged forward again. The smoke stung his eyes and blinded him for a few seconds, but then it began to clear and the leaping flames provided enough nightmarish light for him to see where he was going.
He was in the living room of the home. He spotted an elderly man lying motionless on the floor, with a woman about the same age trying futilely to pick him up and drag him. Reuben ran to her and caught hold of her arm.
“Ma’am, you’ve got to get out of here!” he shouted over the crackling roar of the inferno that was leaping toward them. “I’ll get your husband!”
For a second the woman fought him; then she seemed to realize what he’d said. She turned and stumbled toward the door, coughing heavily. Reuben bent, got his arms around the unconscious man, and heaved him up.
At least, Reuben hoped the old man was only unconscious.
He turned and hurried toward the door. The rush of superheated air from the house was pulling the fire along with it. Reuben felt the heat pounding against the back of his head almost like a fist and knew better than to look back. He cradled the old man, who probably didn’t weigh more than a hundred and thirty pounds, against his chest and made a run for it.
Flames practically exploded out the door behind him as he emerged from the mobile home. He dived off the porch and twisted in midair so he would take the brunt of the impact when he and his unconscious cargo hit the ground.
The Bleeding Edge Page 21