Chapter 53
FIFTY-THREE
The sun was low, bleeding red across the horizon like an open wound. Long shadows stretched across the cracked parking lot of the motel.
Ryan leaned against the hood of the old pickup, one boot resting on the bumper, the other pressing into the dirt.
His PPK, loaded with the last of his ammunition, was back in his hip holster.
The truck coughed behind him, engine idling unevenly.
He’d found a jerry can of gas stashed beside a collapsed shed earlier that afternoon.
It was only half full and likely siphoned off a decade ago. It reeked, but it ran.
He’d stripped the truck of anything unnecessary: a rotted bench seat, a pair of fuzzy dice, a CB radio that hadn’t chirped in years. The tires held air. The brakes were spongy, but they worked. Noah sat curled in the cab, clutching a bottle of tepid water.
Ryan’s leg throbbed, a steady, radiating pain that pulsed with every heartbeat.
The stitches he’d put in earlier were already puckering.
He’d splinted the thigh with a piece of cabinet slat and some duct tape, but the wound was deep, and he was burning through his limited painkillers fast. They had to move.
As for where, he didn’t know. He had a set of tire tracks from the Phalanx SUV heading north and following them was about as good a plan he had. For now, anyway.
The tracker still sat in his palm. He turned it over once more; lips pressed into a line.
The idea of walking away burned. But maybe that was the only play he had left.
Gates might still be on his way. But he might not.
For all Ryan knew, Reyes had killed Gates, and taken Lucía halfway to Guatemala by now, and the dot in his boot was just a goddamn breadcrumb no one was ever going to follow.
Hell, maybe Gates had been part of the plan all along. Maybe this was just another layer in the con. Maybe he was, as he’d always been, on his own. He flicked the tracker into the dirt and crushed it under his heel. Then he reached for the driver’s door, muscles screaming with every movement.
And that’s when he saw it.
A shimmer on the horizon. Dust kicked up from a small vehicle speeding along the gravel road. The sun had dropped just enough to turn the oncoming shape into no more than a silhouette.
Ryan froze, fingers still resting on the truck door. He squinted into the distance. The vehicle crested the low ridge. It slowed as it approached the edge of the lot, tires crunching. As it came closer, Ryan could see it was an old Volkswagen Beetle, bright orange.
He slid his weapon from its holster.
The car stopped. Noah stirred behind him. “Ryan?”
“Stay in the truck,” Ryan murmured.
The driver’s side door of the car creaked open. A figure unfolded himself from the vehicle, his movements stiff. It would have been a comical sight—a big, broad-shouldered man climbing out of such a tiny car. But Ryan found it unfunny enough to keep a firm grip on his weapon.
“Jesus Christ,” he muttered as the man straightened.
“Miss me?” Gates rasped.
Ryan didn’t answer. He just stared at him.
The marshal limped toward the truck, sweat-streaked and unshaven. His shirt was torn down one side, caked with dust and what looked like dried blood.
“Where the hell have you been?” Ryan said finally.
Gates exhaled and rubbed at his jaw. “Cupboard.”
“What?”
“Reyes clocked me after I stepped out of the shower,” he said dryly. “Woke up zip-tied and stuffed inside a goddamn armoire. By the time I got free, you were gone. So was the boy. Took me a whole day to catch up.”
Ryan’s grip on the gun finally loosened. He holstered it, jaw tightening.
Gates shrugged and looked toward the pickup. His eyes landed on the boy in the window, and something shifted in his expression. “You have the kid.”
Ryan nodded. “You sure you’re not here to take him away again?”
“I didn’t take him last time.”
“No,” Ryan said flatly, “but we thought you did.”
Gates scrubbed a hand through his sweat-damp hair. “Can’t blame you. Kid okay?”
“He’s shaken. And hungry. But he’s alive.”
“What about your girlfriend?”
Ryan bit down on the inside of his cheek, hard. “They took her. Phalanx. A private security outfit. They wanted her alive.”
The expression on Gates’s face told him that he knew all about Phalanx. “For the ledger.”
Ryan nodded.
Gates said nothing for a long beat. Just looked at the horizon like he was weighing something in his mind. Finally, he looked back at Ryan. “Then we go get her.”
Ryan squinted at him. “Just like that?”
“Yep. Just like that.” He took a step forward, limping. “I know all about those yahoos. I know how they operate and where, too. There’s a place about half an hour from here, up north past the bad roads and into the real forgotten country. Name’s Santa Loma. Not even on half the maps.”
“And?”
“And it’s where Phalanx likes to move people when they don’t want them found. Old crop-duster runway turned covert ops zone. Secure perimeter, flat terrain, no local police to worry about. Last time we clocked it, they were running personnel drops and cold storage from there.”
Ryan’s jaw clenched. “You think that’s where they took her?”
“I’d bet my badge on it. While I still have it.”
“This is the part where you tell me you’ve got a plan?” Ryan asked.
Gates squinted into the light. “Something like that.”
Ryan gestured at the Beetle. “Was that all Avis had?”
Gates shrugged. “I, uh, borrowed it from an abuela on her way to Salina Cruz. It drives like a pissed-off goat, but it’ll get us there.”
“You stole it from an old lady?”
“I said I was resourceful, not proud.”
Ryan shook his head. “Then let’s go get her.” He turned to go get Noah from the pickup, but Gates called after him.
“One thing you should know about Santa Loma.”
“Yeah?”
“It’s not just guarded.”
Ryan looked back at him.
“It’s owned. Phalanx has muscle there. A lot of it. This won’t be a sneak-in kind of job.”
“Good. I’m tired of sneaking.”