Page 22

Although heavy on facts about the Revolutionary War, Thomas Edison, and the wreck of the Hindenburg , the textbooks employed in the New Jersey school system of Colly’s childhood had painted the history of Texas with a very broad brush. What knowledge she’d acquired on the subject had come through a middle-school history project she’d once helped Victoria complete. West Texas had always seemed to Colly like a dreary, arid wasteland—but it had seen its share of action and atrocity.

At the outbreak of the Civil War, federal soldiers had abandoned the forts guarding the old Butterfield Overland stagecoach route and hurried east to fight, leaving the Texas frontier largely unprotected. The Comanche, displaced by the government decades earlier, seized the opportunity to push southward from the Indian Territories and reclaim vast swathes of the stony scrubland that comprised their ancestral Comancheria.

After the war, General Philip H. Sheridan was charged with expelling the tribe once again from West Texas. Lacking the troops to accomplish the task militarily, he decided to starve the Comanche into submission. Federally authorized and munitioned hide hunters slaughtered the great herds of buffalo by the millions, skinning the humps and leaving the carcasses to rot in the sun.

The tactic was brutal but effective. The Comanche who survived the ensuing famine were driven off. And in the years that followed, white settlers lured to the area by the promise of cheap land were astonished to find it strewn so thickly with bleached buffalo skeletons that the ground seemed covered with snow. Homesteaders gathered up and sold the bones by the ton to fertilizer companies, who ground them into meal so that gardeners in the more “civilized” parts of the country could compost their vegetables with the evidence of a federally sanctioned genocide.

Every inch of this desert is soaked in blood , Colly thought, gazing absently out of the window as Avery navigated the squad car along the backroads of Coke County. And for what? Who’d want to live here, let alone kill for the privilege?

“Think we’ve gone too far?” Avery asked.

Startled out of her musings, Colly squinted at Jimmy Meggs’ crudely drawn map. “We’re supposed to ‘turn at the buffalo skull’—Meggs said we can’t miss it.”

“Jimmy couldn’t find his own ass with both hands and a flashlight.” Avery nodded towards the ominous blue-black cloudbank flickering like a paper lantern in the distance. “Hope that holds off till we’re back on asphalt.”

After a few more miles, they came to a dirt track that branched away from the road on their right, ducking beneath a rustic archway of cedar logs. A gigantic horned skull loomed over the passage, its blank round eye sockets gazing down at them from the arch’s crossbeam. Staring at it, Colly felt gooseflesh rise on her arms.

They followed the track down a slope and back up to the top of a shallow ridgeline, where it plunged into a forest of dark juniper dotted with stands of still-leafless mesquite.

“We should have an SUV for this,” Avery muttered as they lurched over deep, dried ruts. She glanced at Colly. “What’s the plan—just drive up to Hoyer’s camp and hope he doesn’t open fire?”

Colly was well-trained in urban tactics but had little wilderness experience. “I’m not sure. Any suggestions?”

“Visibility’s shit in here. I could approach in the car while you cover me on foot. With any luck, Jace wouldn’t see you.”

“Good idea—but I’ll take the car.”

“You’ll be more exposed.”

“I’ve been shot at before, but I don’t know the first thing about sneaking up on someone in the woods.”

Avery shrugged and stopped the car. “Give me the map.” She studied it carefully. “Jimmy says Jace likes to set up here.” She tapped on a large X in the upper corner. “Stupid of him, but good for us. That close to the creek, he won’t hear us coming.”

Tossing the map back to Colly, Avery eased the cruiser forward.

A few minutes later, she stopped again as they approached a blind curve. “Hoyer’s camp should be just ahead.”

They climbed out of the car, and Colly walked around to the driver’s side. Avery had drawn her service pistol and was checking the magazine.

“Handguns are no match for what Hoyer’s probably got, but they’re better than nothing.” She looked up. “I’ll follow on the left. Go slow or you’ll lose me.” Avery turned and stepped quietly into the forest.

Colly climbed behind the steering wheel. Unholstering her own gun, she laid it beside her, then shifted the car into gear. Around the bend, the track ran beside a narrow, swift-flowing stream that chuckled over moss-covered stones and fallen logs. The ground was damp here, and Colly spotted recent tire tracks. In her excitement, she accelerated for a few seconds before remembering herself. She stopped and waited for a minute, then continued at a crawl that she hoped would match the pace of someone on foot in the dense vegetation.

A hundred yards further on, the road curved again, following a bend in the streambed. Rounding the curve, Colly’s pulse quickened. In a grassy clearing ahead, Jace Hoyer’s pickup sat beside a lime-green pop-up tent. Hoyer was nowhere in sight. The door and windows of the tent were zipped closed, and the firepit beside it had not been recently used.

Colly shifted into park and quietly opened the car door. Outside, she understood Avery’s earlier comment about Jace’s choice of campsite. Whitebone Creek was surprisingly noisy for its size. It would easily obscure the sound of an engine or the crack of a twig.

Colly peered through the trees to her left. No sign of Avery. We should’ve arranged a signal , she thought.

Though in Houston she’d followed armed men down dark alleyways and into crack houses without hesitation, here Colly moved forward nervously, clutching her sidearm. She hadn’t gone three steps when a horrible baying erupted. Two enormous pit bulls scrambled from beneath Hoyer’s pickup and raced towards her. Colly stepped backwards, raising her gun. Her heel caught on an exposed tree root. She fell, landing hard on her back. The impact knocked the gun out of her hand. It flew beneath the squad car.

The dogs were almost on her. Colly instinctively flipped onto her belly to protect her throat and vital organs. As she scrambled for the pistol, a pair of massive jaws closed on her ankle. Even through her boot, the crushing pressure sent a shock of pain up her calf. The second dog went for the back of her neck but was hindered by her thick ponytail. It clamped down on a mouthful of hair, nearly ripping it from her scalp.

As Colly struggled to pull away, a voice shouted, “Tank, Trigger— heel .”

Immediately, the dogs released her. Colly rolled onto her back. Jace Hoyer stood blinking in front of the now-open tent flap, a double-barreled shotgun in his hands. His mud-colored hair was disheveled, and he wore nothing but faded cutoffs and a pair of unlaced boots.

The dogs had run to stand beside him, but they stared at her, whining eagerly and ready to lunge on command.

Hoyer stepped forward. “How’d you find me? Jolene don’t even know about this place.”

Colly raised herself cautiously on her elbows. “Why’d you run off, Jace? It looks bad.”

He pointed the shotgun at her chest. “ I’m doing the asking. Don’t reckon you came out here alone. Where’s your sidekick?”

Great question , Colly thought, fighting the urge to glance towards the woods. There was no way to reach her pistol; even if she could, she’d never be able to get Hoyer and both dogs before they got her first. She could only stall for time and hope Avery turned up.

“Don’t do anything stupid, Jace. It’s not worth it.”

“I got nothin’ to lose—I’d rather get sent up for killing a cop than a kid.” Hoyer racked the shotgun.

Colly felt a bead of sweat roll between her shoulder blades. “So it’s true you killed Denny?”

“Truth’s got nothin’ to do with it. I’m being set up. There’s no fighting the Newlands—y’all get what you want.”

“No one’s setting you up, Jace.”

“Then why’d that purple-haired bitch take pictures of my truck yesterday?”

“Maybe the bitch wants to find out why you’re lying to us,” shouted a disembodied voice.

Hoyer wheeled around as the pit bulls lunged, snarling, towards the thicket across the road. Seizing the unexpected opportunity, Colly groped beneath the squad car for her pistol. As her hand closed on it, she heard two sharp gunshots and a chorus of terrified yelps.

She scrambled to her feet. The dogs were racing back towards their owner with their tails tucked. Two puffs of dust rose from the center of the dirt track, where the bullets had struck.

“Next shots won’t miss,” said the voice from the trees.

“Kill my dogs and I’ll gut you,” Hoyer screamed, waving his shotgun wildly at the dense wall of juniper.

Colly aimed at his back. “Drop it or I’ll shoot, Jace.”

Hoyer froze. The muscles in his arms and shoulders tensed.

Colly’s hands were sweaty on the gun grip. “Don’t do it, don’t do it,” she murmured. To her relief, after several seconds, Hoyer put down the shotgun.

Avery stepped out of the thicket. Her uniform was filthy, her hair mussed. A deep, bleeding scratch cut across the white scar on her cheek.

She trained her pistol on Hoyer. “Kick the gun away.”

He obeyed, and Avery moved closer. “Now, put those dogs inside your truck—slow, or I shoot them.”

Glowering, Hoyer seized the pit bulls by their collars and towed them towards the door of the pickup.

“Sorry I’m late to the party,” Avery said a few moments later as she snapped the handcuffs on Hoyer. “Terrain’s rougher than I thought.”

“Worked out okay.” Colly holstered her gun. “Sit him down.”

Avery jerked Hoyer to his feet and pushed him onto the tailgate of his pickup. Above their heads, they heard the low rumble of approaching thunder.

“What do you want from me? I ain’t done nothin’,” Hoyer grumbled.

“We want to know why you lied,” Avery snapped. “You weren’t watching basketball Monday night. We’ve got you on security footage creeping around the ranch.”

Hoyer swallowed, his prominent Adam’s apple rising and falling beneath the leathery skin. “Ain’t no cameras out there.”

“They were installed a few weeks ago, jackass.”

Hoyer stiffened defiantly. “Gimme a lawyer.”

“Have it your way.”

Colly sighed and nodded to Avery, who shrugged and said, “Jace Hoyer, I’m arresting you on the charge of criminal mischief, and on—”

“Criminal mischief? What the—”

“You did a lot of damage inside Brenda Newland’s minivan,” Colly said.

“The hell I did. I wasn’t even—”

“Save it for the judge. We can’t take your statement once you’ve lawyered up. You’re also being arrested for aggravated assault, threatening police with a deadly weapon.” Colly nodded to Avery. “Read him his rights and put him in the car.”

“What about my dogs, goddammit?” Hoyer’s voice held a sudden edge of panic.

Colly shook her head. “They attacked me. We’ll send Animal Control to pick them up. They’ll be euthanized.”

“You ain’t hurt. Lemme call Jolene to come get ’em.”

“Jolene’s in the hospital in Abilene.” Avery tugged Hoyer towards the squad car as the thunder rumbled again, louder this time. “You have the right to remain—”

“The hospital? What the hell happened?”

“She tried to off herself,” Avery said coldly.

The color drained from Hoyer’s face, and his knees buckled. Colly jumped forward and grabbed his other arm.

He jerked away. “You done this, snooping around, stirring things up. Jolene ain’t—”

“She did it because you left her. According to Carmen, anyway,” Colly said.

She opened the car’s rear door, and Hoyer sank onto the seat, his face gray. “I gotta get to Abilene. I gotta get to Abilene.”

“Put your feet inside, before I slam the door on them.”

“Please, I’ll tell you whatever.”

“Are you saying you withdraw your request for an attorney?” Colly asked.

Hoyer looked up. “Yeah, sure. I’ll tell you everything. Just let me go.”

Colly glanced at Avery, who was shaking her head furiously. “No way.”

Colly shut Hoyer inside the car. “Let’s clear the tent.”

They found three more long guns, a pistol, and a cache of ammunition. As they were putting them in the cruiser’s trunk, Colly whispered, “He knows something, and right now, he’s motivated. We won’t get another chance.”

“He’ll just make up a bunch of crap,” Avery hissed. “Cut him loose, and we’ll never see him again.”

As she spoke, another crack of thunder, much louder this time, sounded directly overhead. A sudden gust of cold wind blew through the juniper, sending dirt and dried leaves skittering. A few fat raindrops struck the hood of the cruiser, and the women dove inside the car as the sprinkling became a driving downpour.

In the front passenger seat, Colly swept the damp hair out of her eyes. “You’re under arrest, Hoyer. We can’t let you go. But give us your statement on the way back—the truth, this time—and we can discuss getting you to Abilene.”

“What about my dogs?”

“They’ll be fine where they are for a couple hours. We’ll have your truck towed back to town.”

“They’re gonna go nuts. They’re scared of thunder.”

Avery laughed and started the car.

Colly turned to look at the sullen prisoner. “Poor babies, that’s a shame. Now fasten your seatbelt, and start talking.”