The heavy machine outside the wall grew louder.
“Because you two are challenging me, challenging my legacy.”
“No, we’re not. We only want to get away and live.”
“You, Kincaid, can’t keep your nose out of my business. You’ve caused Ellis untold trouble, not only recently but over the last two years with your interference.”
“What, smuggling people and drugs? You think that’s okay to do? You and Ellis are not above the law, you sick sonofabitch.”
Winston’s smile was thin, malicious. “Yet, here we are, with you and the little bastard soon to die, and me to continue as a successful businessman.”
The church shuddered. Plaster fell off the rear wall like broken eggshell. A blade of light came through the wall, low near the floor, and ran up in a jagged pattern. The big engine right outside the wall groaned with effort.
Winston stepped back as his attention went to the wall, and took out his iPhone. Hunter dropped to a squat and picked up several pieces of plaster. She rose and threw them sidearm at Winston’s face like she was skipping a stone across water.
Adan copied her, and both threw as fast as they could pick up material to toss.
Winston yelled and stepped further back, dropping the phone which Hunter snatched from the floor. Hart’s pistol was now used to ward off flying pieces of stucco from his face.
Hunter nailed him two good ones in the forehead and cheek, where one piece of stucco broke apart and shot grit into Winston’s eyes.
A groaning shudder went through the entire church and a door-sized portion of the rear wall behind them gave away, opening a hole to the outside. At the same time, gunfire became more intense with bullets hitting the church wall and the dozer. Hunter caught a glimpse of Raymond firing back and of another, older man driving the machine. Firing increased, and the dozer swung away, increasing its speed as it evaded the shooting, and disappearing from Hunter’s sight while it rumbled down the gentle slope toward the ghost town. Raymond fired his weapon, but it soon stopped, as did the firing from Ellis and his men.
Hunter pushed Adan out the opening and followed after him. Winston wiped his eyes and tried to clear them enough to shoot. By the time he could see, the two were gone.
As Adan passed through the rent in the wall, he saw the big boulder had also been toppled by the dozer’s blade. In the hole at its base was a small metal box. He picked it up and continued on as Hunter stayed behind him to guard the boy from bullets.
Hunter said, “Go to the town. We’ll try to join with Raymond.”
“Okay.” Adan trotted toward the abandoned buildings, keeping close to the tread tracks of the dozer. Hunter stayed at his rear and glanced back every few steps to look for pursuit.
When they reached the first abandoned building, Hunter said, “Stop here a minute. I want to watch our back-trail.”
She remained at the corner and peeked around it to check the rear of the church and in the terrain near it for any pursuit.
Adan opened the box in his hands. It was the size of a deck of cards, made of aluminum, and the lid opened and closed the way an aluminum lozenge box did. Inside it was a folded paper. It wasn’t writing paper, but fancier than that, he noted. Thick, with ornate filigree along the edge. When he had it open, Adan read. His heart stopped.
“What is it?” Hunter asked him.
He handed it to her because he couldn’t talk from the emotion of it.
Hunter glanced once more around the corner, then read the paper. After a moment, she said in a soft voice, “God-o-mighty, Adan.”
A voice came from the other end of the building, “Y’all hold it right there.” It was RL, holding a rifle on them.
Hunter slipped the paper to Adan and pushed him behind her, whispering, “escóndelo.” Adan did as she said, and hid the paper in his pants after refolding it, and doing so where RL couldn’t see him while he used Hunter’s body as a blind.
RL said, “I don’t want to shoot you, but you need to stand still till Ellis gets here. He’s coming.”
“You’d shoot me?” Hunter said.
“Wouldn’t want to, but yeah, I would. Then the kid.”
“I thought we were going to hook up soon.”
“I don’t think that’ll be possible now.”
“You sure?”