Steven Havill - Bitter Recoil

“That’s what I mean. The darkness would be to our advantage. They’d never expect it.”

“For Christ’s sake,” I muttered and got out. I followed her into the house. “Think a little. Think about this: If Finn and Arajanian are guilty-and I say if -look at their track record. They managed to lure two healthy young toughs over the edge of Quebrada Mesa. We don’t know how the hell they did that, but it’s a fact. And then, cool as a snake, one or both break Grider’s neck. That’s cold-blooded and they did it under cover of darkness.”

Estelle raised an eyebrow as if to say, “So what?”

“And then, if they’re the guilty parties, they somehow managed to bushwhack the Lucero brothers…and neither one of those boys looked like your basic wimp. We don’t know when that happened, but it wouldn’t surprise me if it happened at night. And notice that seven shots were placed in a saucer-sized target at more than twenty yards…so fast that the victim didn’t have time to twist and vary the wound paths.

“And then, finally,” I held up a hand to stave off her rejoinder, “if he’s guilty, like you’re sure he is, Arajanian shot Kyle Osuna in the middle of San Estevan…at night, with a silencer-equipped handgun. Hit him pretty solidly, too. But no one can bat a thousand all the time. So the killer screws up just a tad. The bullet is an inch too low and wide. He doesn’t get a chance for another because Kyle Osuna is spooked into being jackrabbit-fast on his feet.”

“If we wait until dawn,” Estelle said with great patience, “then both you and I know that they’ll be gone. And Daisy will be gone right along with them.”

“We don’t know that. And I share your concern for the kid. But you’re letting your emotions rule. There’s nothing to be gained by rushing in half-cocked.”

“Sir,” she said as if I’d added two and two and gotten five. All the time I had been talking, Estelle had been buttoning on her bullet-proof vest.

“Arajanian knows the boy got away,” she said. “Now maybe he’s stupid enough to think Kyle Osuna crawled off into the bushes and died, but I don’t think so. It’s logical to assume that someone who is fit enough to jump up after being knocked flat by a bullet can maybe make it to help. It’s a good chance. Would you just sit up there in the woods, waiting for us to come and arrest you?”

“I might. If I knew there was no direct evidence against me, I might think that it was better to wait and keep my eyes and ears open for movement of the troops.”

“And all this time Daisy is up there. You know who she’s with, don’t you? She’s with two freaks who have managed to kill five people. I’m not about to wait a minute longer than I have to. If I’m wrong, then I’ll be the first to apologize to Finn and Arajanian, face to face.”

“No, Estelle. If you’re wrong, you’ll probably get us both killed. And maybe Daisy, too.” I snapped my lighter, touched the flame to the cigarette, and promptly coughed so hard my eyes swam with tears.

Estelle waited until the spasm passed before saying, “I’m not asking you to go up there with me, sir.”

“I’m charmed,” I managed to say, and when I caught my breath I held up a hand. “Will you at least grant me a condition or two?”

That stubborn eyebrow went up, saying, “Let me hear it first.”

“First, let’s be a little smart and have some backup. Call Garcia and Martinez. Leave Martinez with the vehicles in the campground so we’ve got radio communication with dispatch if we need it. We can reach Martinez with the hand-held.”

Estelle nodded. “And?”

“Listen to an old marine, Estelle. If Finn and Arajanian have done what we think they have, we’re going against two cold hands. Unless we can take them completely by surprise, it won’t work. Remember that ridge that runs along the creek, up above the campsite on the west side?”

“Sure.”

“All right. If we follow that instead of the creek bed, we’ll have some protection and the opportunity to see the camp before we approach it. We’re going to want to make damn sure that we know what’s what before we go in there.”

Estelle frowned. “That’s all?”

“All?” I said. “No.…Most important, we aren’t going there at all until dawn, with about thirty-five state police and deputies behind us…and maybe a helicopter or two.”

“The more people are involved, the more chance there is for Daisy to get hurt. Remember when we busted the gold diggers down in Posadas?”

I remembered that well. We’d been part of a grand night-time embarrassment that included, among other things, a customs agent holding a cocked magnum on his spread-eagled prisoner…and then finding out when someone swung a flashlight around that he was guarding nothing but an empty down jacket, crumpled around the base of a cactus. Everybody had been so nervous that if a trigger had been pulled, twenty lawmen would have been plugged by their own compadres.

“We can slip in and out and use the darkness as a cover,” Estelle said. “It’s safer at night with just a few of us.” She added, “I’ve got another vest at the office you can use.”

I stared at her in disbelief. “I suppose the other alternative is to handcuff you to the bedpost,” I said, and Estelle gave me that fetching smile that lighted her face.

“You could try, sir.” She could melt ice at absolute zero.

“You and your unborn child…who by the way has nothing to gain from any of this.” As I said that, Estelle’s smile faded and she regarded me evenly.

“I’m not helpless, sir.”

“I know you’re not. And sometimes I wish you goddamn were, that’s all.”

That earned me a fleeting grin, but she was determined. I could call Pat Tate and have him try to order some sense into her head, but her car would be kicking dust before the call was completed.

I took a deep breath. “That vest had better be size triple X,” I said. Hell, I couldn’t let her go alone. Paul Garcia was a rookie. Martinez had a wife, two kids, and another baby on the way, so he’d stay with the car…at least I could make damn sure of that.

We walked out to the patrol car. I made sure that the plastic ammo wallet I carried in my hip pocket had all eighteen rounds and that the magnum held its six. I got in, muttering all the while.

“What did you say, sir?”

“I said I don’t even work for this county. This is ridiculous.”

“Yes, sir.” Estelle backed out of the driveway and I tried one last card.

“If Francis hadn’t gone to Albuquerque with the ambulance, would he have let you do this?”

“Probably not, sir.”

“But you would have done it anyway.”

“Yes, sir.” Her jaw had that stubborn, resolute set. I knew that she intended to rescue little Daisy, just like in the fairy tales. I didn’t like the only ending I could imagine.

The moon was huge and bright. It shone into Steamboat Rock Canyon like a gigantic spotlight. When I stepped out of Estelle’s patrol car in the campground parking lot, I could see my shadow. Garcia and Martinez waited.

The moon-washed air was dead. I hitched my gun a little higher under the overhang of my gut. Not a stir through the pine needles, not a whisper down the halls of the canyon. Nothing. I sighed.

“They better be sound sleepers,” I muttered and watched Paul Garcia thumb five fat cartridges into his shotgun. He was nervous and that would keep him alert. Martinez fidgeted. He didn’t much like staying behind.

Except for the three vehicles and Al Martinez, the campground was deserted as we started up the trail through the silent forest. We reached the fork of the trail, and then we veered even farther to the north, cutting away from the trail and following the granite spine of the ridge that paralleled the creek. I tried to breathe quietly, but after a few yards I was rasping like an old steam engine. Estelle slowed some, and when we reached a rock outcropping fifty yards above the trail fork she stopped.