Burning Bright (Peter Ash #2)(21)

“Stay up there,” Peter called to him. “Don’t come any closer.”

“No way, buddy,” the truck driver said, stumping over the rocks. He had arms like Popeye. “I was a EMT for ten years. I seen more wrecks than you seen cars.”

The moaning got louder.

“These guys tried to kill us,” said Peter. “They’re armed.”

“Well, hell,” the truck driver said, patting what Peter now realized was a holster at his belt. “I’m armed, too. What are they, dopers?”

Just what we need, thought Peter. A good Samaritan with a gun.

A string of mumbled curses came from the Tahoe. A grunt, a cry of pain.

“Shit, you can’t just stand there, somebody’s hurt,” said the truck driver. He walked to the undercarriage and saw the arm. “Sweet mother of God,” he said, his face turned pale. But it only spurred him on. He swarmed up the steaming chassis like a circus performer. “I’m coming,” he called out. “Hold on, buddy, we gonna get you outta there and all fixed up. You want to be healthy when you meet the judge.”

He was kneeling on the passenger-side door, looking down through the window, when Peter heard the gunshots. Takatak, takatak. The truck driver’s body jerked and his knees slipped and the weight of his legs pulled him to the ground.

Peter limped quickly to where the engine would provide the most cover and fired the .38 through the windshield opening five times, the gun bucking in his hand until it was empty. Then he limped back to where the truck driver lay on the rocks, his white T-shirt now bright red in growing patches.

“The Lord is mah shepherd,” he said. “The Lord is mah shepherd.” His voice sounded wet. His shirt was saturated with blood. He coughed once, and was gone.

“I’m sorry,” Peter said quietly, closed the man’s eyes with his hand, then unsnapped the holster on the man’s belt.

The pistol was a big Colt Python .357 Magnum with a six-inch barrel. Not exactly a concealed carry weapon, but perfect for shooting buffalo or small elephants. Still, it was clean and, more important, loaded, with one behind the hammer. So he had six rounds.

Peter limped around to the back of the truck, trying to be quiet. It wouldn’t be easy for the man inside to reorient a long gun in that enclosed space, especially with the seats. He hoped his shots from the front had hit the fucker.

He kicked in the back door’s shattered glass, stuck the barrel of his pistol through the hole, and fired quickly into the back seat, four shots in a decent grouping. If he’d had a grenade, he’d have used that.

Then he climbed through the window.

Two men lay in a rumpled heap in the back seat, one with an arrow through his chest. Both were spotted with gore from multiple gunshot wounds, and the smell of blood and spent powder was thick in the enclosed space. The man with the arrow didn’t seem to be breathing. The other man clutched a Heckler & Koch assault rifle with a grimace on his face, lying halfway into the front seat. It looked like he’d anticipated Peter’s maneuver and had turned to face the rear, but Peter had fired first. He reached up and tore the rifle from the man’s hands.

“Why?” said Peter. “Why did you do this?”

The man’s lips worked for a moment as if his mouth were dry. He took a breath and a soft sucking noise came from his chest, at least one lung punctured. When he spoke, it was just a whisper. “Killed me,” he said.

“No,” Peter lied, “the ambulance is coming. You’re going to be fine. But you have to tell me. Who sent you? Why?”

The man shook his head, and his grimace turned to a look of surprise. “Killed,” he said. “Me.” His voice the sound of dry leaves in an autumn wind, carried softly away. “Me,” he said again.

Then he died.

The white static rose up hard and Peter scrambled out of that tumbled tomb, the broken glass sharp under his palms and his knees, from the dense cloying stink of blood and death into the clean, resinous pine-scented air.

He struggled to his feet on the dry riverbed. He put his face up to the gray sky and felt the first drops of rain. He saw a big gray bird up in the lowest layer of clouds, circling.

He sucked in one breath, then another, and yet another.





9





JUNE



June sat in the car and watched as Peter walked to the body of the man who lay on the dirt. He stood looking down at the corpse for a long moment, then stooped to slide a phone from the dead man’s shirt pocket. He had to get down on one knee and roll the body to extract the wallet from his pants.

Man, she hoped he wasn’t just robbing the dead.

When the car left the road, she’d felt an immense rush of gratitude at the pressure of his arm against her chest, holding her body in the seat as the world rolled and rolled around her, the strength and safety of him beside her in that tumbling universe. He’d saved her life.

But that thing with the bow? The look on his face as he climbed out the sunroof, that pure distilled joy like riding the zip-line express, only he was singing a goddamn Waylon Jennings song and firing fucking arrows at that huge SUV while the bad guys tried to kill them with all their guns?

He’d saved her life, but she was afraid he might be crazy.

He’d helped her in the tree, protected her in the crash, and checked on her afterward, each time taking pains to make sure she was okay. But he’d also climbed out of her ruined car with utter calm and walked to the wrecked SUV with her dad’s gun in his hand and fired through the windows like he was shooting tin ducks at a carnival.