Page 3

Chapter Three

At the same time, two hundred and fifty-two miles to the north-northeast at the confluence of Buffalo Creek and Spring Creek within the steep red rock walls of Hole in the Wall Canyon, Nate Romanowski eased around a truck-sized boulder and peered up at his falcons in the sky. There were two of them, a prairie falcon hovering almost still in a thermal current and a peregrine hundreds of feet above it doing a slow rotation. Both were tiny specks within the massive light blue sky, although the high-flying peregrine occasionally intersected the wispy tail of a lone cirrus cloud.

Nate was in the act of hunting, but here he wasn’t the hunter. Although he was armed with his revolver in a shoulder holster and his falconry bag was looped over his shoulder, his role in this hunt was that of a human bird dog, whose sole purpose was to flush game birds and small creatures that hunkered within the jumble of broken rocks and tangled brush that covered the wide canyon floor.

That’s when he felt it: a tingle that washed through him from scalp to toes. Someone was coming.

He froze, squinted to sharpen his vision, and carefully scanned the length of the switchback trail that was cut into the side of the canyon wall to his right. The trail was wide enough to accommodate a hiker—or, in years past, outlaws on horseback—and it was the only approach from the top.

There was no movement on it at the moment. No interlopers.

But still, Nate had come to once again trust that feeling, the tingle. If someone wasn’t sneaking down the trail—and they weren’t—there was still a disturbance in the natural order of things. Maybe it was hunters or ranch hands on the surface above, and they’d back off.

Or maybe not.

The only sounds were the tinkling of the icy stream through the river rocks and the murmur of a slight wind that blew east to west across the opening mouth of the canyon four hundred feet above him. Those sounds, and the sudden loud grumble of his stomach.

He was hungry, and so were his birds. Interloper or not, they had to eat.

Nate checked the loads of his handgun and slid the weapon back into its holster. Then, with a quick scan along the trail to confirm that he hadn’t missed anything or anyone, he continued the hunt.

—

Nate Romanowski’s mouth was obscured by months of an untrimmed mustache. He sported a beard bound by a leather string. A dirty-blond ponytail, streaked with silver, hung down from the back of his neck like a horse’s tail. Both his beard and his ponytail contained feathers knotted in place by strands of hair.

His clothing—a faded green canvas long-sleeved shirt and Carhartt carpenter jeans—had been ripped and repaired so many times that only a few stretches of fabric remained that didn’t show stitches. The soles of his boots had been worn paper-thin, so he’d replaced them with moccasins fashioned from elk hide that laced up to just below his knees.

Even his shoulder holster had been replaced because the old one had become waterlogged at one point and had stiffened into the texture of wood. The holster he’d thought out and constructed was of both mule deer and elk hide, and it was beaded and fringed. His .454 Casull fit snugly into the new version.

Nate had not had a conversation with another human being for months. In his mind and in the state he was in, that hadn’t been long enough to get to where he needed to be.

—

If he was stalking game himself, Nate never would have taken the route along the right bank of Spring Creek. Instead of moving quietly from boulder to boulder and stopping often to listen for the footfalls or snorts of deer, bighorn sheep, pronghorn antelope, or elk, he deliberately stepped on dry twigs and loudly kicked his way through piles of loose rocks. His loud approach was intended to drive and then flush out game, even though he had yet to see any signs of life. Although his falcons appeared oblivious to his presence, he knew both were carefully observing him and were aware of his noisy progress down the canyon floor.

When he shouldered around the thick reddish-brown trunk of an ancient ponderosa pine, he could see the confluence of the creeks ahead of him. The two streams met in a crux of a V and flowed north, doubling the flow of Buffalo Creek. The grass was ankle-high and thick and studded with skull-like river rocks that protruded from it. As he neared the V, he could detect a shimmering in the grass ahead of him and he smiled.

“Get ready,” he said to his falcons as much as to himself.

The covey of chukars busted out of the grass at the point of the confluence because they couldn’t run ahead of him any longer and not go into the water. They lifted off in a percussive flurry of flapping wings. At least a dozen of them, he thought, shooting through the air like errant fireworks all launched at once in different directions.

The chukars—sometimes called “devil birds” due to their speed and the zigzagging ascent that made them extremely difficult to hit with a shotgun—never saw what was coming from the sky. The prairie falcon intercepted the highest-flying chukar and sent it tumbling to the ground in a puff of feathers. The peregrine descended like a missile between the canyon walls and hit two additional chukars in rapid succession and clipped a third. The two lifeless targets thumped to the surface next to the creek, and the third chukar spiraled down like a crippled fighter plane and smacked headfirst into the top of a boulder behind Nate before bouncing to the ground.

The peregrine continued its dive through the covey until it did a graceful U-turn several feet from the stream. Nate watched the prairie falcon pursue a chukar that was skimming along the creek. His raptor dipped down and grasped the target in its talons, driving it down to the ground in a death grip that killed the prey on contact.

Then it was over and Nate whispered his thanks to his falcons, to his luck, and to God for providing a meal for them all.

—

Nate collected the downed chukars into a pouch he formed from the loose front tails of his shirt. The birds were still warm and he could feel them through the fabric on his skin. Chukars were beautiful birds, he thought. They were the size of a large partridge or small chickens, with small heads and plump bodies lined with creamy gray feathers. Their beaks were blood-red and a bold black stripe that looked like sloppy eyeliner extended across their faces and curled to their breasts.

While holding the bounty of birds in place with his left hand, he pulled on a thick leather glove with an extended cuff over his right hand and secured it by gripping the end of the cuff in his teeth. Then he whistled and extended his right arm. The peregrine landed on it gracefully with a flare of its wings.

“Here you go,” he said, lowering the bird and giving it one of the chukars. After eyeing him for a second, the falcon pinned the carcass to the ground and dipped its head and tore out the throat of the chukar and proceeded to eat it, feathers, bones, and all.

Although he would have preferred the prairie falcon come to him the way the peregrine had—through the air—he found the smaller falcon thirty yards down the stream consuming the bird it had chased and driven to the ground. Its beak was bloody red and covered with downy feathers.

“You get a pass this time,” he said to the less-experienced prairie falcon. “Good hunting.”

Nate noted the metallic smell of spilled blood that wafted through the canyon.

He loved it.

—

When his birds were sated and lethargic and happy, he placed them on top of his shoulders for his hike back to his dwelling, which was a deep cave in the side of a sandstone canyon wall. The peregrine rode on his right shoulder and the prairie falcon rode on his left.

On the footpath that serpentined up from the floor through boulders and heavy brush, Nate stopped suddenly and didn’t move. He again sensed a presence in the area.

When it materialized, he’d be ready.

—

That evening, while two chukars roasted on a stick over an open firepit at the mouth of his cave on the eastern wall of the canyon, Nate peered into the darkness beyond and waited. Drips of fat from the birds sizzled and flamed on the coals and the orange light from the fire danced on the walls of the cave and the caragana brush just outside the opening.

Nate was reminded once again that the natural advantage of the outlaw caves within the canyon was their location in relation to the footpath on the opposite wall. The caves afforded a clear view of the length of the trail, but from the trail itself, the limestone formations were shrouded with brush that concealed their mouths. Butch Cassidy, the Sundance Kid, and the rest of the Wild Bunch had chosen well. A few of the best-hidden caves still had hitching posts for horses and Nate had found an ancient cast-iron frying pan in the back of his that he’d cleaned up for his own use. In fact, he’d used the pan to fry up six medium-sized brook trout that he kept warm by placing the skillet next to the hot rocks of the firepit.

Earlier, Nate had watched as a single form moved down the trail as the sun set. The man was too far away to see clearly, but he was large and moved with a graceful stealth. Nate assumed more men would follow, but they didn’t. He’d lost sight of the intruder when full darkness enveloped the canyon, but he could occasionally hear the click of rock on rock after the man forded the stream on the canyon floor and started his climb to Nate’s cave.

As the fire crackled and smoked and the skin of the chukars turned golden-brown, Nate slipped out of the cave and shinnied along a path to his left until he was behind a boulder that gave him a clear view of the opening. He held his revolver loose and at his right side, ready to raise it up and fire at any second.

“Nate? Did I find you?”

The voice was low, rumbling, and familiar.

“Nate? I saw the fire and came to the light. Is that you, buddy?”

Nate’s shoulders relaxed as he slipped his gun into its holster and he stepped out from behind the boulder.

“It’s Geronimo, man.”

And it was.

“Are you hungry?” Nate asked. His own voice sounded weak and unfamiliar to him, the result of not using it regularly.

Geronimo said, “You know me. Of course I’m hungry. And whatever you’re cooking smells damned good.”

—

Geronimo Jones squatted next to Nate in front of the fire and watched the skin blacken and crack on the outside of both chukars. They’d just completed a greeting where Nate had extended his hand and Geronimo had swept it aside so he could embrace Nate in a bear hug. Geronimo was six feet tall and 240 pounds, with ebony skin and heavy ropes of dreadlocks that extended to his shoulders. His hug was ferocious. Nate had winced. He wasn’t a hugger.

“What’s that? Chicken?” Geronimo asked.

“Chukar,” Nate said. “Fried trout on the side.”

“Sounds damned good. Looks damned good.”

“How did you find me?” Nate asked.

“A little bird told me.”

“Was this little bird named Joe Pickett?” Nate asked.

Geronimo smiled. “Nope.”

“Sheridan, then?”

Sheridan Pickett was Joe and Marybeth Pickett’s oldest daughter of three. She’d been Nate’s apprentice in falconry and had grown so skilled and mature that he’d left his falconry company to her to manage on her own. Not that she’d had any say in it.

“Sheridan said you used to hang out here before you went straight,” Geronimo said. “Back in the day.”

Nate smiled. Sheridan was smart.

“She said to tell you Kestrel is doing well,” Geronimo said. Kestrel was Nate’s three-year-old daughter. He’d left her with Marybeth because he knew she’d be safe and well taken care of.

“That’s good to hear.”

“I’ve been looking for you for a while,” Geronimo said. “You’re a hard man to find when you don’t want to be found.”

“That was the idea,” Nate said. “That’s why I shot my cell phone in the heart. But now you’ve screwed it all up.”

—

They sat back after they’d devoured the chukars and trout in silence and burned the bones in the fire. The temperature outside had dropped significantly and the stars had come out hard. The moon had not yet appeared in the opening between the walls of the canyon.

Like Nate, Geronimo was a dedicated master falconer with a Special Forces background. Unlike Nate, he was closely tied to like-minded loners throughout the country via encrypted apps and message boards. The network was composed of falconers who respected their calling and who’d pledged to follow their own unwritten code. Members respected each other’s territory—Nate was associated with northern Wyoming and Geronimo’s territory included the city of Denver and the nearby mountain towns—and they spread the word about falconers who encroached on their sense of order or demeaned their collective honor.

It was through this network that Geronimo had first heard of a man named Axel Soledad, and allied himself with a warrior named Romanowski and a game warden named Pickett to hunt him down. They thought they’d been successful in neutralizing him after a firefight that’d left Soledad bleeding out on the streets of Portland.

Unfortunately, they’d been wrong.

—

“I should have figured that an outlaw like you would chose an outlaw canyon,” Geronimo said.

Nate shrugged.

“I couldn’t help but notice that there aren’t a lot of Black folks around here.”

“Nope. There aren’t a lot of folks of any hue, in fact.”

Geronimo had soft brown eyes and they swept slowly over Nate, who was illuminated by the fire. “Damn, you look pretty raggedy-assed,” he said. “When’s the last time you shaved?”

“It’s been a while.”

“You look like you’ve lost weight.”

“Probably.”

“Maybe I should hole up in a cave and eat nothing but what I can catch or kill like you,” Geronimo said, patting his belly. “Jacinda is a hell of a cook and she keeps me fat and happy, unfortunately. And the little one, Pearl…”

Nate sharply looked away.

“Sorry,” Geronimo said. “I didn’t mean to bring back memories.”

—

The previous year, Nate had lost Liv when she’d been brutally murdered at their home in front of their daughter, Kestrel. He’d taken revenge on three of the four murderers, but Axel Soledad was still out there, his trail gone cold. It ate at him, his failure to track Soledad down.

God, he missed Liv.

—

Nate had realized too late that his years of normalcy on the grid with a wife, a daughter, and a successful business had dulled his primal instincts and abilities. Where he had once been able to intuit the direction of his quarry by entering into a state of what falconers referred to as yarak , he’d found himself lost and fumbling and feeling like a vagabond in a strange world instead of being part of it. His predatory nature had receded, to be replaced by guilt, regret, and anger at his own bad decisions the night Liv was murdered.

So he’d abandoned the hunt and retreated to Hole in the Wall, which was familiar territory.

There, with only his two falcons to keep him company, Nate had tried to strip himself down to his core—to once again tune in to the natural world around him and become a part of it, not an observer. To once again see, hear, smell, and touch with alarming sharpness.

This vision quest was designed to once again enter the state of yarak , where his actions were swift and brutal and amoral and instinctual.

He couldn’t bring Liv back or fix what had been taken. He felt nothing but shame when he realized recently that a day had gone by and he hadn’t thought of her. Was he healing or becoming even more self-absorbed?

Nate wasn’t sure. He wasn’t sure about anything anymore.

—

After a long, uncomfortable silence, Geronimo asked Nate how long he’d been living in the Hole in the Wall Canyon.

“Seven months, two days,” Nate said.

“Jesus, that’s a crazy long time to be off the grid.”

“Not long enough,” Nate said.

“You can’t stay much longer, I’d guess. Your Wyoming winter is coming. You’ve got your falcons to think about, even if you don’t think about your own welfare.”

Nate reluctantly agreed. As the days got shorter and the nights longer, he’d been thinking about that. Game in the canyon was getting harder to find, and soon the creek would freeze over. It had already snowed a couple of times.

“Will you go home?” Geronimo asked.

Nate shook his head. “I’m not ready yet. I may never be.”

“Why not?”

“I can’t be near anyone who could get hurt. Not again.”

Geronimo said, “If things were normal in my world, I’d offer to let you stay at my place in Colorado. You know we have a couple of guest rooms.”

“I remember,” Nate said.

“But my circumstances have changed.” As he said it, Geronimo’s expression darkened. “I’m on the run like you are, just for different reasons. That’s why I’m here.”

“What are the circumstances?” Nate asked.

“For one thing, I’ve heard through some friends that the FBI is looking into us. Some agent named Orr has been asking questions.”

“It wouldn’t be the first time,” Nate said. “But I’m not familiar with Agent Orr. What else made you go on the run?”

It was Geronimo’s turn to look away. “I’ll tell you all about it, but not right now. You need to shake free of all of this and come with me. I need you at your best.”

“What if I’m not there yet?” Nate asked.

“Then I’ll go it alone. But I’d rather not.”

—

When he’d arrived, Geronimo had unslung a shotgun and propped it against the cave wall behind him. Nate now eyed it and asked, “New shotgun?”

Geronimo’s previous weapon of choice had been a unique triple-barrel 12-gauge. He said, “It’s a Benelli M1014 semiauto. It’ll hold six in the tube and one more in the receiver with that extension on it.”

Nate raised his eyebrows.

“I figured I’d need more firepower for what comes next,” Geronimo said.

“What comes next?”

“That’s what I’m here to talk to you about,” Geronimo said.

“Axel?”

Geronimo nodded. “He came after me and my family, too. Or at least his goons did.”

Nate felt a sharp twinge of fear. “Is Jacinda…”

“She’s all right. I packed her and Pearl up and drove them to her mother’s house in Detroit. But it was a close call, and the only reason I’m here today is pure luck.”

“What happened?” Nate asked.

“I’ll tell you all about it,” Geronimo said. “We’ll have plenty of time together now that I’ve found you.”

Nate didn’t reply.

Geronimo glared at him. “So let’s get you off your skinny grieving ass and go after that son of a bitch and his pack of animals, since you missed him the last time.”