J. Bertrand - Nothing to Hide

“I put it next to the gun,” I say, not taking my eyes off the target.

He mutters something under his breath, then rises. “I can see Ford. He’s-”

I pull the trigger. At the last moment I drop the muzzle and put the round in the scarred man’s leg. He drops his pistol and doubles over, clutching his thigh. The other two bolt back to the car, leaving him there. He staggers backward a few feet, then falls to the ground and emits a terrible wail.

Jeff puts his hand on my shoulder, making sure he has my attention. “Hold them off. I’m going after Ford.”

As he scuttles off into the night, I glance back after him. He’s heading toward the dim lights of a roadside settlement a quarter mile down the highway, just a concrete block wall with a sheet-metal gate and a couple of small shacks on the other side. An amber streetlight marks the entrance. Squinting, I realize it’s not the settlement he’s making for but an inky form limping toward it, trying to conceal itself in the shallow ditch running alongside the road. Ford.

A burst of gunfire erupts from the direction of the car. Dull, metal hailstone thuds rock the van, sending showers of glass onto the pavement. I put some distance between myself and the bulk of the van, still keeping the cover between us. I need a new firing position and my best option looks like the ditch, where I can hunker down and fire from around the front of the van while they’re looking for me to poke around the back.

The wounded man rolls on the ground, alternately clutching his leg and reaching for his dropped gun. He calls to his comrades for help.

“ ¡Cálmate! ” a voice shouts from behind the car, sounding annoyed at the distraction.

I can’t tell exactly where they’re standing, and they’ve stopped firing, so I aim in the direction of the sound.

A double tap: one, two .

Pause to let them look up. Then another two: tap, tap .

Before they can return fire, I’m on the move, running in a crouch, staying as low in the ditch as I can. By the time I draw level with the back of the van, they’re pouring fire on the front, so I just keep moving.

I don’t see Jeff anymore. Or Ford. The faster I move, the harder it is to see anything at all apart from the streetlight. Over my shoulder, the gunfire subsides long enough to hear the lead car doubling back. I can’t turn around. There’s no time.

They can race ahead on the highway, cutting me off, and if I lay down some fire to try and slow them down, my muzzle flash will give away my position. So far there’s no evidence they have anything but handguns, meaning that if I put enough distance between us, my carbine will have the advantage. Until then, I can’t count on keeping enough heads down with my unaimed fire to prevent one of them from drawing a bead on my position and dropping me.

My lungs swell with the effort of running, only I don’t feel winded. I don’t feel my age, either. The adrenaline is pumping through me, and while my mind may be clear, my body seems to exult in the challenge. No pain, no constraint even. I’m alive, so alive that I feel like laughing. Then they start shooting again and I have no time to feel anything. The engine roars and the tires squeal.

There’s no choice now but to drop. I hit the ground, swing the carbine around, and fire a string of rounds at the approaching car. It’s the lead car, the one the silver-haired man was in according to Jeff. The windshield shatters, the car dips to a halt, then reverses eagerly until it reaches the cover of the van. I get up and start running again, accompanied by the crack of handgun fire. They must not have spotted me, though, because none of the shots come close.

I can’t hug the road anymore; there’s not enough cover. So I sprint into the darkness, picking my way across a flat expanse, exposed, all aglow with moonlight. I cut through a hedge separating the empty lot from a kind of shantytown, where some brightly colored corrugated huts are concentrated. No one is there apart from a barking dog, which rushes toward me in the dark. For a moment I panic, holding the carbine in front of me like a baseball bat to ward off the dog. But a taut leash pulls him up short.

“Next time, amigo ,” I whisper, and keep running.

When I reach the walled enclosure where Ford was heading, and Jeff after him, I sink down and catch my breath. Back on the highway, the two cars are rolling forward slowly, bumper-to-bumper, with their headlights doused. Apart from the drivers, the men are crouched on the far side of the cars, using the ditch for cover. If I had more ammo, if Jeff were with me, we could make short work of the soft-skinned vehicles. Under the circumstances, this tactic makes a kind of sense, though they’d be better off taking to the darkness-or leaving the field of combat entirely. But who wouldn’t?

Some trouble you face out of necessity and other trouble you seek out. To see the one through without backing down is a sign of character. To persevere in the other, though, is nothing but pride, the stubborn arrogance that leads men to double down on disaster in the hope that everything will right itself in the end. They could run, then fight another day. But on the other hand, so could I. To risk my life, outnumbered and outgunned, for a cause no better than to keep Ford alive long enough to answer my questions, to preserve an outside chance of reaching César. . if that’s not the height of hubris, I don’t know what is. How did Gina Robb put it? “He waits and waits until everybody’s basically dead.” Somewhere in the night, she’s bringing new life into the world. And here I am.

If it were just me in this, maybe I’d vanish into the night. Probably not, but there’s always hope that in middle age, a man might still learn. There’s Jeff to think about, though. I can’t leave him in the lurch. With that thought to hold on to, I sling the carbine and find a handhold on the top of the wall, hoisting myself up.

This section of wall, well outside the reach of the anemic streetlamp, is bathed in relative darkness. There’s some crushed glass on the top of the cinder blocks in lieu of razor wire, but it’s scattered loose on the surface and easy to clear aside. The moment of risk is when I’m perched on the rim, silhouetted against the sky. No one shoots, and I manage to drop to the ground with a quiet thud.

There are four buildings inside the perimeter. Three little bungalows are situated around a dirt circle, two of them with bulbs burning over the front doors. No lights on inside, which means the occupants probably went to ground when the shooting started. The fourth building looks to be a kind of ribbed metal barn with a big louvered door up front large enough to accommodate a tractor. There’s a side door, too, which stands open and reveals nothing but darkness within.

I see no sign of Jeff. Maybe he didn’t make it this far. Maybe he caught up to Ford in the dark and they’re still out there somewhere. With my flanking run I could have circled them without realizing. Or they could be inside one of the buildings. Somehow I can’t bring myself to break cover just to knock on the door.

“ Jeff ?” I hiss.

Nothing. I can always call him. I slip my phone out, feeling ridiculous the whole time. The line rings, but he doesn’t answer. Of course not. Before I put it away, there’s another call I should make. It’s time. We’re holed up without much ammunition in country that is unfamiliar, with an unknown number of cartel shooters converging on us. If there was ever a time to phone the cavalry. .

I pick the number out of my recent calls, pressing down on the glass. Several rings, and then her voicemail picks up.

“For what it’s worth, just so somebody knows, I’m down in Mexico,” I say. “On the highway south of Matamoros. I left it too long to blow the horn. And maybe I’m a fool to trust you, but what choice do I have? Brandon Ford is here somewhere. And the ringleader, César. If nothing else, there’s a murder you could pin on him from 1986. There’s not going to be a paper trail, but. .” My throat tightens up. “Anyway. We’re about to get into something ugly. I guess I should’ve said something sooner. It’s up to you now, Bea.”