First Family (Sean King & Michelle Maxwell 4)

“Yeah? Well, let’s hope we live through it. They almost got me the other night and I’m using up my nine lives at an alarming rate hanging around you.”

“Yeah, but it’s never dull either.”

“No, it’s never dull.”

CHAPTER 12

SAM QUARRY DROVE on rutted roads back to Atlee. The Patriot he’d used to kill Kurt sat on the truck seat next to him. He pulled up in front of his pre–Civil War pile of hand-formed bricks and local stone, as the Alabama dust swirled around the truck’s tires, looking more like simmering heat than dirt fists of the Deep South. He didn’t move for the longest time. He sat there, hands on the wheel, staring at the twenty-ounce Patriot with its firing pin safety mechanism. He finally flicked a thumb across one of its grip pads, trying to shove from his mind what he’d done, by touching the very instrument with which he’d done it.

He’d nearly crashed the Cessna on the flight back. He’d started shaking uncontrollably right after takeoff. Then at barely two hundred feet up he’d caught some wind shear and his wings had rotated nearly vertical. Later, he figured he’d come a few seconds from losing lift altogether before regaining control and soaring upward as the aircraft claimed its buoyancy.

He’d always kept Daryl close to him when his son was growing up. The boy had never been too special in the brains department, his father knew, but he loved him anyway. He was loyal, that boy was. Did whatever his daddy told him to. And what he lacked in intellect he more than made up with dogged determination and attention to detail; attributes he shared with his father. Those traits had worked well for him in the Army. He, Kurt, and Carlos had signed up and fought in Iraq and Afghanistan, earning eight combat medals among them and surviving the worst that the enemy could throw at them, including dozens of IEDs.

Then the trouble had started. Quarry had come down one morning to find the three men eating breakfast in the kitchen at Atlee.

“What you boys doing here?” Quarry had asked. “Thought you had orders to ship back out to the Middle East.”

“Got homesick,” Daryl mumbled, his mouth full of grits and fat bacon, while Kurt just nodded and grinned while he slurped Ruth Ann’s strong coffee. Carlos, always the quiet one, had just stared nervously down at his plate, pecking with his fork at the food.

Quarry slowly sat down in a chair across from them. “Let me ask a stupid question. Does the Army know about this?”

The three men snatched a glance before Daryl said, “Expect they will before too long.” He chuckled.

“So why’d you boys go AWOL?”

“Tired of fighting,” Kurt said.

“Hotter in I-raq than it is in Alabama. And then colder than the moon in winter,” added Daryl. “And we been there four times already. Shot al-Qaeda all the hell up. And the Taliban too.”

“Towelhead freaks,” added Carlos as he fingered his coffee cup.

“But they keep coming back,” said Kurt. “Like Whack-a-Mole. Smack one, nuther muther pops up.”

“Kids come up to you asking for candy and then blow themselves right up,” added Daryl.

“Damndest thing you ever seen, Mr. Quarry,” added Kurt. “Tired of it. That’s the God’s honest truth.”

Daryl had put his fork down and wiped his mouth with the back of his meaty hand. “So we all decided it was time to come on home to Alabama.”

“Sweet home Alabama,” added Kurt with a sly grin.

The MPs had shown up the next day.

“Haven’t seen’em,” Quarry told the stern-faced soldiers. They talked to Ruth Ann, Gabriel, and even Indian Fred. But they learned nothing from any of them. Family took care of family. He didn’t tell the MPs about the old mine, though, because that’s where Kurt, Carlos, and Daryl were hiding out. He’d flown the men up there the night before.

“It’s a federal crime to harbor AWOL soldiers,” the little Hispanic sergeant had told Quarry.

“I served my country in’Nam, Mr. Sergeant Man. Killed me more men than you ever will even in your dreams. And got me a couple Purple Hearts and not even a thank-you from Uncle Sam for my troubles. But I did get a kick in the ass from my country when I got home. No parades for the’Nammers. But if I see my son, I’ll sure do the right thing.” Quarry had given them a little salute and then shut the door in their faces.

That had been two years ago and the Army had come back twice in that time. But roads in and out of this area were few and Quarry always knew they were coming long before they got to Atlee. After that, the Army never came back. Apparently they had more things to worry about than three Alabama boys tired of fighting Arabs seven thousand miles from home, thought Quarry.

Kurt had been like a son to him, almost as much as Daryl. He’d known the boy since he’d been born. Taken him in when his family was wiped out in a fire. He and Daryl were a lot alike.

Carlos had just shown up on his doorstep one morning over a dozen years ago. He hadn’t been much older than Gabriel was now. No family, no money. Just a shirt, a pair of pants, no shoes, but a strong back and a work ethic that didn’t have quit in it. It seemed Quarry had spent his whole life picking up strays.

“Whatcha doing there, Mr. Sam?”

Quarry left his thoughts behind and looked out the truck window. Gabriel was watching him from the front steps. The boy had on his usual faded Wranglers, white T-shirt, and no shoes. He had on an old Atlanta Falcons ball cap Quarry had given him. He wore it backward so his neck wouldn’t get sunburned, or so he’d informed Quarry one day when he’d asked.