Authors: Jeff Shelby
“Is that Moreno's sister?” Carter asked, his voice edged with surprise.
“Yeah,” I said, the muscles at my neck coiling into knots as I slid my eye to the scope for a closer look.
Malia's eyes were wide, fear radiating from them. Dirt caked the sides of her face, held there by streams of tears. Blood leaked out of her nose and the corners of her mouth. She was wearing a tank top and one of the straps had been torn. She wasn't fighting Mo or the rope, her body sliding along the ground like a bag of sand.
“We gotta get closer,” I said, sliding back and rising to my knees.
Carter pushed away from the ledge and popped to his feet like he was riding his surfboard. “Work from opposite sides?”
I nodded, reaching for one of the rifles. “Try to stay just above them. I'll get to the ground and take the ones closest to her. You take the others. Try to herd them to their trucks and get them to run.”
He grabbed the remaining rifle, stuffed several of the extra magazines into his pockets, pivoted, and disappeared into the trees.
I took the rest of the magazines and moved quickly through the trees in the opposite direction and down the slope, staying close enough to the edge to monitor the campground.
Malia was near the fire ring now, the skinheads in a semicircle around her. She was attempting to move, rolling around like a wounded insect. Several of the skinheads moved toward her like they were going to kick her, then held up at the last second, laughing as she tried to roll out of reach. Mo dropped the rope and headed to the back of the crowd.
When I reached level ground, I was about twenty-five yards away from Malia and the assholes.
“Boys, check it out,” Lonnie said, standing near Malia's head. “Got ourselves a pretty little porch monkey here.”
Their cheers and jeers melded together, exploding into the air.
Lonnie squatted down. “And there's nothing I like better than putting a motherfucking little porch monkey out of her misery.”
I lay down behind a thick pine, my left shoulder pressed into the trunk, the pine needles sticking me in the elbows, and got the Ruger Mini-30 in position. I felt my chest heaving and took a couple of deep breaths to steady myself. We were outnumbered and I knew that even with both Carter and myself armed, we were going to have a hard time gaining control of the situation.
“Hey, Lonnie. We get a shot at her before we off her?” somebody asked from the group.
I checked the magazine.
“You know? Do her before we do her?” The guy stepped over Malia. He was tall and thin, black suspenders holding up his camouflage pants over his dirty white T-shirt. “Show the bitch what she's gonna miss?”
Lonnie stood up and laughed as the group screamed its approval.
I felt my breathing level out, my hands relaxing on the rifle.
Malia's body bucked in the dirt, the group roaring again at her movement, epithets ringing into the air.
The thin guy pulled his suspenders off his shoulders, straddled Malia, and dropped to his knees.
I adjusted my eye to the scope and brought the guy's torso into focus, and took a deep breath.
“What do you think, nigger?” he asked, his lips curled into an arrogant sneer. “Want a little of me?”
I exhaled and squeezed the trigger.
The thin guy jerked back, a small red puff popping out of his chest, and fell off Malia.
I took another deep breath, trying to get the action to slow down in front of me.
Two more fell to the ground near him, shots coming from the far side of the campground.
Panic set in. Some dove for the ground and some ran for their guns, screaming and yelling, their heads swiveling in both directions. Lonnie dropped to the ground, obscured by the fire ring. My shots skimmed over him.
The guns near the trucks came to life and fired toward Carter's side. I shifted to my left and fired in that direction and saw several of the shooters scatter farther into the cover of the pines.
We'd caught them unorganized and unprepared and it showed.
More yelling, then bullets whistling over my head and off to my right. My muscles tightened, involuntarily trying to make my body smaller. I wanted to move, but I would be too exposed.
The two that Carter shot were being dragged away, two guys firing pistols from near the trucks to cover themselves. The one I'd hit was still down next to Malia, not moving.
I couldn't see Lonnie.
Heavy gunfire erupted from near the trucks. Mo was kneeling just inside the tree line, firing what looked like an AK-47 in Carter's direction.
I fired twice at Mo. The first one missed, the second one caught him in the thigh.
It didn't faze him. He shifted to his left, got his body behind one of the trees, and kept firing.
More shots came from our original position up on the ledge, aimed at Mo. I jerked my head in that direction, surprised and confused. I couldn't make out anyone up on the plateau and wondered who in the hell might be helping us.
Mo moved to a crouch and returned the fire up on the ledge.
A shot boomed from near the fire ring, a large-caliber handgun burst, and Lonnie was up and running low toward the tree line. Mo rotated and fired at me, covering him. I tucked in tight behind the trunk of the pine, my forehead scraping against the bark. Bullets thudded into the trees around me, wood chips showering my neck and face.
The truck engines revved to life, drowning out the screams for the rest to hurry.
Mo waited for the last of his buddies to get into the tree line, then limped back quickly, still sweeping the entire outer edge of the campground with the AK-47. He disappeared into the trees.
Doors slammed, tires spewed rocks and dirt through the trees, and the trucks U-turned and headed out to wherever they'd come from.
The entire skirmish had taken maybe two minutes.
The quiet was overwhelming.
“You good?” Carter yelled from the other side of the circle.
I couldn't see him. “Yeah. You?”
“Yeah.”
I moved from my stomach to my knees, my throat aching and burning from the gun smoke and dirt.
Malia was still next to the fire ring, her would-be rapist beside her.
Carter emerged from the trees across from me. His rifle was aimed up at our original spot.
I rose to my feet and walked slowly toward the fire ring, holding the rifle at a ready position and watching the entire tree line.
“Who was our helper?” I asked, squinting up at the trees.
“Not sure. I saw somebody when the first shots came out of there.” He lowered his gun. “But they're gone now.”
We turned to the fire ring.
The skinhead was dead. The entire right side of his body was soaked in blood, an expression on his face that assured me my bullet had caught him by complete surprise.
I wanted to feel good about that, but I couldn't.
The first thing that had struck me about Malia Moreno when we'd met her at her home was the color of her eyes. They were the same unique amber shade as her brother's, the kind of eyes that stopped you in midstep.
Now, lying in the dirt, the right one still looked like that, still held on to that mesmerizing quality as she stared up at me.
But the left one was gone, taken by the bullet that had taken her life, replaced by a socket full of red, thick blood.
I'd called 911 and reported what happened. The local sheriff's department arrived quickly, took our guns, cuffed us, and questioned us about the four dead bodies on the ground.
Carter refused to say a word, staring aimlessly into the forest.
I told them who we were, that we'd followed Lonnie and Mo out here so that we could talk to them and had seen what was happening to Malia. We'd had no choice but to shoot. I told them to call Wellton. They probed further, but I gave them nothing else, preferring to wait on Wellton. They were annoyed by that and kept the handcuffs on us while we sat in the dirt.
Wellton emerged from the pines and walked toward us from the other side of the clearing.
“Oh, look,” Carter said. “A forest dwarf.”
Wellton was halfway across the circle when he whistled at one of the deputies and motioned for him to head toward us.
They reached us at the same time.
Wellton pointed at us. “Unhook 'em.”
The deputy looked uncertain. “Uh, I'm not sure if I'm supposed to do that.”
Wellton glared at him. “I didn't ask what you were supposed to do. Do it or you'll be wearing your own set.”
The deputy's cheeks reddened, but he produced a key and promptly unlocked both of us. He hurried away, taking the cuffs with him.
Wellton glared at me. “I said you could poke around. I didn't say you could go around killing people.”
“Hey, weâ” I started, but Wellton kept going.
“You drive out here and just start taking target practice?” he asked, his eyes flaring with anger. “I asked you to help me out. I didn't ask you to drag me into multiple murders. Which part didn't you understand?”
“I understood all of it, Wellton,” I said, irritated. “But we had no choice.”
“Yeah, you did,” Wellton fired back. “You could've put the guns away and called the cops
before
you started blowing people away.”
“They were going to rape her,” Carter said quietly as he stood up.
We let that hang in the air for a moment and it seemed to temporarily diffuse Wellton's fury.
“Who is she?” he asked.
“Malia Moreno. They brought her here,” I said, standing up, dusting off my shorts.
Wellton blinked quickly, chewing his bottom lip.
“Deacon Moreno's sister,” I said, answering the question he was trying to put together in his head. “Carter and I met her yesterday.”
Wellton turned around and watched the medical examiner's people cover both of the bodies.
He turned back to me, confusion tightening his features. “They killed the sister of a big-time gang leader? How'd she get here?”
“Lonnie and Mo. The two guys that put me in the hospital.”
“You saw them bring her here?” Wellton asked.
I recounted how it all went down.
Wellton looked at Carter. “Guns are yours?”
Carter nodded.
“Registered?”
Carter didn't move.
“We'll take them in to confirm ballistics and what Noah's told me,” Wellton said, his anger percolating again. “I'll see what I can do about getting them back to you. Maybe.”
Carter said nothing.
“There was another shooter,” I said.
Wellton didn't understand. “What do you mean, another shooter?”
“Somebody jumped in from where we were watching.” I pointed up to the spot. “Whoever it was was with us, though, not against us.”
Wellton looked up at the ledge. “They weren't shooting at you?”
“No.”
Wellton ran a hand through his short hair. “Either of you get a look at who was up there?”
We both shook our heads.
He exhaled, clearly puzzled. “Alright. We'll check for casings and anything else we can find up there.” He turned around and looked at Malia. “Tell me about her.”
“Lonnie shot her,” I said. “He was the only one near her at the end. I'd already put the other guy down.” I explained the rest of the chaotic scene, going back to when we'd arrived up until the sheriff's people got to the scene.
Wellton took a deep breath. “Peter Pluto hires you to find his brother, Linc. You find Lonnie and Mo at Peter Pluto's house. Pluto's dead and they nearly kill you. Then they come after you again.” He chewed on his bottom lip again for a moment. “You go looking for Deacon Moreno, talk to him and his little sister, and then she ends up here on the end of a rope pulled by one of the guys that killed your client. Which puts us back where we started.”
“It's not Noah's fault,” Carter said.
“I don't know why they went after her,” I said, thinking Wellton was insinuating the same thing.
“I didn't say you did,” Wellton said. “But it seems like your conversations with the Morenos might have triggered this.”
I didn't see how or why that was possible, but I could see the trail of his logic. I was positive, though, that we hadn't been followed into either Moreno's neighborhood or to the campground, so I found it hard to believe that this was a reaction to something Lonnie and Mo had witnessed.
“No way all of this is a coincidence, though,” Wellton said.
“Not a fucking chance,” I said, shaking my head.
“Then how does it all tie together?”
I shook my head again, frustrated at hearing it all laid out in front of me. I couldn't connect the dots. And I didn't know why Malia was brought here, but I knew that it couldn't have just been for random reasons.
The people from the medical examiner's office lifted Malia's covered body and placed her on a gurney. Clouds of dust rose up into the air as they rolled the gurney away and I felt an empty pain in my gut.
“There's one thing that seems to connect all of this,” I said, wondering how long the image of Malia's face would haunt my thoughts.
Wellton shoved his hands in his pockets. “What's that?”
“Linc Pluto,” I said.
“Who you haven't been able to find,” Wellton reminded.
“I'm gonna find him,” I said, surprised by the edge in my voice.
“We cleared his apartment, by the way,” Wellton added. “Found the weapons and brought them in.”
The medical examiner's people came back and picked up the body of the kid I'd shot. The image of him over Malia flashed in my head. I can't say I felt badly that he was dead.
“You find anything else there?” I asked.
Wellton shook his head, but I could tell he was thinking about something else.
“What?” I asked.
“I'm thinking about what happens when Moreno hears about this.”
Carter let out a low, long whistle.
“Yeah,” Wellton said, acknowledging Carter's whistle. “Moreno's gonna go off.” He paused. “And you two could be on his list.”
“Why?” I asked.
“Because you were here,” Wellton replied. “He'll find out one way or another. And he's gonna hold everybody who was here responsible.”
Carter shrugged. “We're on a lot of lists.”
Wellton shifted his gaze from Carter to me. “I know. Just watch your asses. I'll do what I can to put it out that you were the good guys here. But a guy like Moreno may not give a shit.”
At that moment, I didn't care about Deacon Moreno. He could do whatever he needed to do. I was concerned about only one person.
Linc Pluto.