Chapter 18
Hunter figured they were about twenty miles due south of the Rio Grande, and on a bone-jarring trail through a ranch pasture of boulders, potholes, washes and draws that caused her vision to blur for a moment when she hit them too fast. Her upper back and neck were as tight as iron rods from driving and steering, and from the two arrows of dust showing behind them. Two vehicles coming like racecars toward her and Adan.
When she spotted another trail of dust in the sky, coming toward them from the west, she knew these men came for blood. Adan was large-eyed as he watched the vehicles behind them. He said, “Do you have any plans?”
“I’m thinking.”
“Maybe you can think fast? They are approaching muy rápido, very fast, all of them.”
She thought of the country in her head and mentally pictured it like a topographic map. There was a desperate route she could take, and she was sure about most of it. There were other parts of the map she thought might stop them, or crash them.
Adan talked as if he read her mind. “We must take your path, even if it is peligroso. We have no other choice.”
> “Okay, pull your seat belt tight.” Man, she liked this kid.
Hunter waited until they were passing the low line of rocky hills and ridges on the east side of the pasture, then turned a hard right behind the last one and gunned the engine.
It surprised the pursuers. That allowed Hunter to put some ground between them as she rocketed across the flatter areas and bounced crazily over the others. Several shallow washouts crossed their path and when the front wheels hit them, it tossed the pickup into the air, nose down at a fifty-degree angle. The impact coming down knocked the air out of Adan and made Hunter yelp when they hit.
The pickup landed on all four wheels in a cloud of dust and flying debris to continue across the almost barren landscape, going east and south into even more desolate, rugged terrain. She looked far ahead to try and figure out the route to take, and glanced back to see the first pickup come around the hill after her.
They were too close. She pushed the pedal down and sent their pickup flying across the flats, the wheels bouncing every five seconds or so into the air to come down hard and keep going. She spotted something odd in the distance, a dark spot in the direction she drove. On a hunch, she swung slightly to the left and made a long slender banana-shaped turn back on the original path, but beyond the dark area.
The move allowed the pursuing pickup and men to close the gap, and the driver, realizing he could drive straight and be right on Hunter’s bumper, accelerated.
Hunter watched in the mirror as he hit the dark spot, which was an area of dead, rotten brush and sand nestled in a hard-sided ditch. The pickup flew into the air as if a bomb exploded underneath it, somersaulting the vehicle frontward, end over end. A man flew out of the passenger side when the door snapped open. He slapped hard into a pile of boulders and didn’t move.
The pickup finally landed upside down before sliding hard into another boulder and crumpling like an accordian to half its size. Adan said, “The driver is dead. I see his top half hanging out of a hole in the windshield.”
“What about the other two trucks?”
“One is stopping at the wreck, the other is coming on, but far behind us.”
“Let’s see if we can’t lose them.” She drove into a more undulating terrain, with many small hills and ridges, and more vegetation, including ocotillo, cactus and cedar, with some mesquite as well. She maneuvered through it, often turning sharp left or sharp right, and it seemed to pay off. Two hours later, there was no pursuit.
She slowed a bit, but not much, and worked her way across the country, occasionally finding primitive roads, but more often than not, she followed game trails.
One game trail led to a more improved road, and from that, an hour later, to an even better road. Hunter stayed on it, and they began to see evidence of cattle and large ranches.
They came to a small village of about twenty homes, with the small sign naming it Providencia, and Hunter talked to one wary woman on the street near a small store who said it was cartel country, and everyone was either afraid, or employed by the bad ones. Hunter told her they had no money, but were in need. The woman gave them two cokes and a package of cheese crackers. She also gave vague directions to a pass through the mountains that would lead to the Rio Grande. When Hunter asked her exactly where on the Rio Grande, the woman shrugged and said she had never been through the pass.
Hunter took the road. They drove through the mountains and down the decline to the far area. Hunter thought they were somewhere below the old Woodson’s fishing camp, but she wasn’t exactly sure where. She continued on the road for want of another plan, and it turned more west and north, creeping closer to the river border.
She spotted several green fields of peppers in the distance that signaled water, and felt her heart buoyed by the sight. Hunter knew that would be the small village of Benito Juarez, and beyond it on the other side of the border was the Castolón Road and Cottonwood Campground situated close to the river.
The road had been recently re-graded with a maintainer, so was smooth compared to the rough pasture roads. She made good time and drove to a location a quarter-mile west of the campground. The campground was located behind and above the thick brush-line on the riverbank and showed the leafy canopies of the cottonwoods that gave the location its name.
Adan suddenly yelled, “They’re here!” It startled Hunter, and she jerked her head around to see the gunmen in the pickup fifty yards behind them. It was Ben Zambrano and Anselmo Ancira, coming fast.
She cut the steering wheel to do a fast turn and speed down to the river bank, where sand and fine gravel spun from under her rear tires. She wallowed a bit, but the pickup lined out with her steering.
A bullet hit the left front fender and bounced off, leaving a finger-long groove of shiny metal. She glanced back, and saw the men coming at a reckless speed, closing the gap.
Hunter’s eyes moved to the path, the river, the opposite bank, and behind her, all in rapid succession as she thought about her next move, which depended on the one place on the river bank she watched come into view.
“Hold on,” She said. She worked the brakes as she cut the wheel to send the pickup into the jade green river, sending up a spray of water. The pickup floated forward and downstream, steadily but slowly sinking. Hunter kept the wheels spinning for whatever traction they could do to push the vehicle across the narrow river.
The men behind her hit the water too fast and at too pitched an angle, sending their pickup on its side and rolling over so the wheels were up and the cab down as it floated into the water and began sinking. Adan and Hunter spotted one man’s hand break the surface as he struggled to reach air before the hand went under with the sinking vehicle.