Ben nodded. “Thanks.”

  He wasn’t sure what was causing his daughter more trouble right now, the infection or the fact that she had just shot and killed a man. Either on its own was too much for her to bear, let alone both. That wasn’t what he wanted for his daughter. This way of living wasn’t what he wanted for any of them, but he was powerless to change anything.

  He’d known the day would come when his kids would have to do some unthinkable things to defend themselves and each other, but this was too soon. He wasn’t ready for this, and he knew Emma wasn’t either. With the right medicine from Rita’s daughter, Emma would recover from the infection. He wasn’t sure if she could recover from what had just happened.

  Chapter Eight

  Everyone chipped in with the fueling process for the last two vehicles, but few words were spoken as they all did their best to ignore the trail of blood leading into the woods. Sandy remained with Emma while the others did what they could to expedite their departure from this place. When the Toyota was topped off, Ben had Allie and Rita take a position out by the highway to keep an eye out for any more trouble. He also left one of the radios with them. They were all on high alert, and for good reason. The gunshots were likely to draw attention to their location, and if this guy Emma had shot was part of a group, they would surely come to investigate the noise.

  So far, they hadn’t seen anyone else. Even the vehicle that had been following them was nowhere to be seen, which made him even more nervous. The whole time they were being followed, he wished the mystery vehicle would go away. Now that it was gone, he found himself more suspicious than ever.

  “Come in. Over.” Allie’s voice crackled over the radio on the hood of the Blazer.

  Joel was closest and responded. “Go ahead. Over.”

  “Hey, tell your dad I have his rifle with us in the truck. Over.”

  “Roger that. Over.”

  Ben had forgotten all about the rifle he’d left lying in the grass by the highway. He stood upright and took a break from turning the pump handle long enough to wave in the direction of the Toyota. He saw Allie wave back and resumed pumping. The heat was starting to get to him. He couldn’t think of any other excuse for not retrieving the gun already. The day was only half over, but it already felt like they’d been on the road much longer. Just a little bit longer here, though, and they’d be on their way. For a while, he tried not to think about anything but the task at hand and the promise of moving air once they were back on the highway.

  He and the others hustled to get the Scout and Blazer filled while Brad continued calling out to Gunner. He still hadn’t returned from the woods, and Ben was starting to get worried. He was sure the bullet hadn’t hit Gunner, but the dog’s absence was making him second-guess what he’d seen. It wasn’t like Gunner to shy away from a fight, and he’d been around plenty of guns while hunting. Of course, none of those guns had ever been pointed at him, let alone fired in his direction.

  “Where do you think he is?” Brad was worried, too.

  “I don’t know. I’m sure he’s a little shook up from being shot at. Keep trying. He’ll come back.” Ben tried to sound encouraging, but this behavior was uncharacteristic of the dog. Unless Gunner had found an animal carcass. That wouldn’t have been a first. Ben kept cranking the handle as he thought about the time he and Joel had to go looking for Gunner back home. Ben had been working late at the store that night, and when he arrived home, Joel met him on the front porch, flashlight in hand. He knew something was wrong immediately. Gunner was just a pup then, about two, if Ben’s memory served him correctly. The dog had wandered off into the woods when Joel let him out to go to the bathroom.

  Ben feared the worst at the time and thought maybe coyotes were responsible. It wasn’t unheard of for a female coyote to lure a lone domestic dog into the scrub brush, where the rest of the pack would jump the unsuspecting animal. He and Joel searched the trails around their house for hours that night, armed with flashlights and a pistol. Eventually, they found Gunner standing guard over a mule deer carcass that had long since spoiled. Ben had to clip on Gunner’s leash to finally get him to follow them back to the house, and even then, it was a struggle to convince him to leave his big find. Gunner’s manners had improved a lot since those days, along with his obedience, and his refusal to come back to Brad’s call was odd.

  “Gunner, here, boy. Come here.” Joel’s call brought Ben back to the present.

  “Go help your brother. We got this.” Ben glanced at Martin. They only had the Scout to fuel up now. Martin was manning the filling end of the hose and hadn’t said the Blazer was full yet, but Ben had done this enough times to know the soreness in his arms from cranking the pump handle should have been adequate to yield a full tank in the Blazer soon.

  Joel hesitated. “You sure?”

  “Yes, go. This is all for nothing if we have to sit around waiting on your dog when we’re done.”

  “Oh, now he’s my dog.” Joel shook his head.

  Ben and Joel sometimes jokingly referred to Gunner as the other’s dog when Gunner was in trouble or misbehaving. And he was about to cause them a major headache if he didn’t get his furry butt back here soon.

  “I’m on it.” Joel started for the edge of the woods to join his brother, slinging his AR as he walked.

  “Hey, Joel.”

  “Yeah, Dad?” He stopped and turned.

  “Thanks.” Ben eyed the trail of blood that ran into the woods. He knew Joel had only moved the body because his sister could see it from the back of the Blazer. Joel nodded quickly and spun around to join the search for Gunner.

  “Yep, that should do it.” Martin checked the Blazer’s gas gauge before scurrying back to the hose and yanking it out, spilling some gas onto the pavement. The Scout was close enough so they didn’t have to move it in order to get the hose into the tank. They started filling the last vehicle instantly.

  Sandy approached. “She’s sleeping.”

  “Good, I guess,” Ben said.

  “She’s cooled down a little. Maybe the medicine is starting to work.”

  “Thanks for sitting with her.”

  “Of course.” Sandy shrugged. Martin finished stuffing the hose down into the Scout’s fuel tank so it would stay put on its own for the time being and came over to relieve Ben.

  “I can pump for a while,” he offered. Ben was more than happy to turn the chore over to him.

  “Hey, Dad?” Joel and Brad appeared from around the Scout. They both looked worried.

  Ben stood up. “What is it?”

  “We can’t find Gunner anywhere,” Joel said. Now Ben was worried, too.

  “Why don’t you help the boys? We all know Gunner listens to you best. I can help Martin finish. It’s not that hard to hold the hose in place.” Sandy walked over to the Scout and stood with her hand on the hose. Ben recognized the tone in her voice and knew it was her way of telling him this wasn’t up for debate. Besides, she was right. He could almost always achieve better results than the kids when it came to getting Gunner to listen.

  “Okay, I’ll take the radio if you need us.” Ben finished stretching out his arm as much as he dared without hurting something new and made his way to the back of the Blazer. He did his best to calm Sam and Bajer as he lowered the tailgate. The last thing he wanted to do was disturb Emma.

  He wasn’t sure what they would find in the woods while looking for Gunner. Hopefully nothing but a stubborn dog who was either too scared to come out of hiding or had found something more appealing than being remanded to the confines of the Jeep after such a short pit stop.

  But just in case things got more complicated, he didn’t want to make any more noise than they already had. Ben continued digging through the pile of weapons until he found what he was looking for: Jack’s AR-15, the one with the custom suppressor made from some old pipe. Ben had no idea how well the suppressor worked, but any dulling of the signature .223 crack would help. He also made sure to grab both twenty-round magazines of subsonic ammunition Jack had given them. At under 1100 feet per second, the low-velocity ammunition wouldn’t pack much punch, probably about as much as a .22 LR round. But what it lacked in power it would make up for in stealth.

  Ben pushed one magazine into the well and tucked the other into his back pocket before slowly closing the tailgate.

  “Easy, guys. Stay put,” he whispered to the dogs.

  Making his way around the Blazer, he took the radio from the hood. “Come in, Allie. The boys and I are going after Gunner. He still hasn’t come back. Let’s try to keep the communication to a minimum unless it’s an emergency. Over.” When he finished speaking, Ben clipped the radio to his belt and turned the volume to the lowest setting.

  “Copy that. We’ll be here. Over,” Allie answered. Ben thought about what she had said. God forbid finding Gunner took more than a few minutes, but if it did, Ben didn’t want the trucks sitting here, exposed to the highway.

  “If you guys happen to finish up before we get back, I think it would be best to wait in the vehicles somewhere else, somewhere less conspicuous.” He looked over at the remains of the store. There wasn’t enough structure left to hide the big, gaudy Scout, let alone three other vehicles. They could tuck in behind the parked semis, but he would prefer if they left this location altogether. Ben thought about it for a second while his eyes followed a small, two-lane country road running past the Pilot station. It had possibilities.

  Within a hundred yards of the main highway, the road disappeared around a sharp curve that was also slightly downhill from the Pilot station. And he could tell that the woods behind them followed a gully that most likely intersected with that secondary road at some point just beyond what he could see.

  Sandy read his mind. “We can go down the road until we’re out of sight and wait there on the shoulder.”

  “Yeah, that’s what I was thinking. With any luck, we’ll be back before you finish up here, but if not, let me know when you make the move.” Ben threaded the suppressor onto the muzzle and let the AR hang loosely on the single-point harness.

  “Okay, be careful,” Sandy said.

  “Always.” He nodded. “All right, boys. Let’s find Gunner.” Ben briefly placed a hand on each of his son’s shoulders as he walked between them and headed into the woods.

  Chapter Nine

  The woods were sparse for the most part, and both the colors and condition of the foliage reminded him more of fall than late June. Getting a close-up look at the devastation caused by the heat was amazing but also more than a little concerning. Most of the hardwoods were missing well over half their leaves, and the brown and yellow stragglers that remained would join the rest on the forest floor soon enough. The only relief from the penetrating rays of the sun came when they passed under one of the few tall pines that had somehow managed to retain a decent collection of green needles on its lower limbs. The only plants that seemed to be thriving were the large clusters of picker bushes that made navigating the otherwise barren woods difficult.

  He immediately thought about Durango. The area they called home was considered high desert and was already dry under normal conditions. If the weather there was the same as what they were experiencing on the road, a large-scale forest fire was inevitable this season. He forced the thought from his mind. It wouldn’t make a difference right now or help find Gunner.

  Joel followed a few feet behind, with Brad bringing up the rear a few feet farther back. Ben hoped he wasn’t making a mistake by allowing his youngest to come along. But he thought it would be a good opportunity to show Brad that he trusted him on what should be a relatively boring task.

  “Gunner, here. Gunner, come here.” Ben’s tone was firm, but he held back, resisting the urge to blow off a little steam by shouting at the troublesome dog. He loved that dog, but sometimes Gunner did some really frustrating stuff. This was one of those times, and with Emma sick and getting worse, plus an unknown car following them, Gunner couldn’t have picked a worse time to pull something like this. Ben was also reluctant to make a lot of noise, not knowing if they were the only ones around.

  The deeper they ventured into the woods, the harder it became to move freely. The overgrown thickets were as good at limiting their field of view as they were at preventing them from moving in the direction Ben really wanted to go. It was a struggle to see more than twenty yards, and farther than that was impossible. This place was a maze.

  The green clusters of thorny, tangled vines would dictate their path to the bottom of the ravine; there was no choice in the matter. They made their way along the less direct route as it wound through the trees until they stumbled upon a small footpath. The path could have been a game trail but looked suspiciously well-worn, considering the terrain.

  “Ouch.” Ben turned around to see Brad stuck to a vine. He’d wandered too close to one of the overgrown hazards, and it had a hold of his shirt. Every time he freed himself from one of the barbs, another took its place. Joel had to help him out before Brad was able to finally break free and they could continue. Ben was beginning to wonder how much longer they’d be able to use the path before the thicket of briars choked it off entirely.

  He wasn’t even sure they were going the right way. But he was hoping there was a water source at the bottom of this ravine. Maybe Gunner had found it after being shot at. In this heat, he could picture the big brown dog wallowing in some stinky mud hole he’d sniffed out.

  Ben held up his hand and stopped dead in his tracks. The trail was intersected by another, and where the two met was freshly turned earth. Someone had been through here recently, and it wasn’t Gunner. The disturbed earth was caused by human traffic. Ben could see a few remnants of a pattern left by the sole of a boot in some of the darker-colored soil that hadn’t dried out in the sun yet.

  Ben turned to the boys and pointed out the markings on the trail, then held his finger to his lips. He listened for a few seconds before continuing on as quietly as he could. The boys did the same, and Ben had to look back a few times to see that they weren’t falling too far behind. It was hard, fighting their way through the briars while trying not to make any noise so they could listen for Gunner or whoever had made the tracks.

  “We’re ready to go. Any luck? Over.” Sandy’s voice sounded loud in the silence of the overwhelming thicket, even with the radio’s volume turned all the way down.

  “Copy that. Still looking. Head to secondary road. Will meet you there. Can’t talk now. Over,” Ben whispered. Sandy didn’t answer, and he was glad. He wasn’t sure if the owners of those footprints were nearby, but the radio might as well have been a loudspeaker out here. The silence was eerie, not a bird or a squirrel to be heard. It was like the overgrown vegetation had choked the life out of the place.

  Ben was the next to fall victim to the long, sharp thorns that seemed to encroach on the trail from every direction. He freed his shirt sleeves from one of the inch-long spikes and watched as a trickle of blood ran down his arm. He began to wonder if Gunner had become tangled in this stuff somewhere. This was the nastiest underbrush he’d ever encountered.

  He began picking his way forward once more but stopped when he heard an unmistakable yelp. Ben glanced back at the boys. It was Gunner, and he was close. At least he sounded close. It was hard to tell in this maze. Ben shook his head as Brad cupped his hands around his mouth and prepared to call out. It was hard not to do that; calling out to reassure Gunner they were close was Ben’s first instinct as well. The next thing they heard was closer to a frantic snarl and ended with a sharp bark. Gunner was in trouble; Ben was sure of that much. But where and how? His frustration with the dog was immediately replaced with concern and a healthy dose of guilt.

  Ben motioned for the boys to follow, and he set off along the tight corridor of the trail as fast as he could without making much noise. As they neared the bottom of the ravine, the narrow path started to open up, and soon after, they heard voices mixed in with the whining and growls. Ben used the butt of the AR-15 to push aside a couple of branches and dropped to his knee. He motioned for the boys to stay put for the time being.

  There, up ahead through the thick brush, Ben could make out two figures standing upright. His heart sank when he spotted Gunner. The poor dog was caught in a large snare trap. Gunner was writhing franticly against the taut rope. It was snug around his neck, pulled tight by the sprung sapling to which the other end was tied. One of the men had a long stick he was using to try and read Gunner’s tag. The other man had what looked like some variant of an AK-47 and kept it loosely trained on the trapped dog, who struggled to choose between trying to escape the noose around his neck or fighting his captors. Ben couldn’t see the other guy as clearly, but there was no doubt he was armed as well.

  Ben felt his blood begin to boil. His first instinct was to open up on the two miscreants, but he didn’t have a clear shot. The low-velocity ammunition could miss the mark altogether if the bullet clipped a branch. He also wanted to make sure Gunner wasn’t in the line of fire. From this position higher up in the ravine, Ben and the boys were looking down on the scene, which put Gunner behind their shot from their perspective. They needed to work their way around and find a different angle.

  Ben saw a path that would allow them to flank the two men to the right. Pointing to a large tree along the route, he signaled for Joel and Brad to head for it. He had his eye on a large boulder just past the tree’s location. They all slowly made their way to the right. Ben couldn’t help but hear some of the men’s conversation as tormented Gunner.

  “Where are you from anyway, tough guy?” The man with the stick poked at the tags hanging from Gunner’s collar again. Gunner responded by lunging at him, teeth bared. Long tendrils of slobber hung from the poor dog’s mouth as he pulled against the rope until he choked against his own weight.