Shattered Shell (39 page)

We ran past darkened park buildings, heading into the wildlife preserve, and with each step the pounding in my heart grew louder. Felix stopped as we reached a set of wooden boardwalks, and 1 said, "This isn't good, Felix, this isn't good at all."

"No shit."

"No, I mean this place. It's just sand dunes and beaches. No trees, no forests, nothing except sand, brush, and grass. Not a hell of a lot of hiding places."

From beyond the dark parking lot came the sounds of doors slamming and loud voices. I could just barely make out Felix's form in the dark. "Well, complaining's not going to do much tonight except waste air. You have any suggestions?"

"Yeah, let's get off the boardwalk, start going into the dunes."

"We just passed a sign that said stay on the boardwalks," he said, trying to make his voice sound light.

"We get any complaints, I'll take care of it."

"Deal."

We leaped from the boardwalk onto a nearby dune --- no use painting a picture for our pursuers ---and we scrambled up the sand and snow. The wind was starting to come up and I was breathing harshly as we climbed up the shifting sands. As we neared the crest I grabbed Felix's leg and said in a whisper, "Don't stand up as we get to the top. You'll be silhouetted from the moonlight. Hunch down and roll across."

He said nothing but did as I requested, and I joined him, rolling across the sands and snow. We went up two successive dunes like that, and then I grabbed his arm this time and said, "Quick rest break."

"You got it."

Felix lay next to me, his breathing slow and steady, while my own lungs were racing to keep up. The snow up here had been blown away by the constant winds, and the hardy dune grasses were still clinging to life. Felix shifted and then he had a night-vision scope in his hands, and I was flushed with embarrassment, knowing my own scope was left behind in the wrecked Camry.

"See anything?"

"Yeah, I do," he said, his voice slightly muffled. "At least eight or nine guys, and they're doing a pretty good job. They're moving in a skirmish line, beating their way here, taking their time. Damn it, this is one narrow island. They could practically hold hands and walk across."

He lowered the glasses. "You think we should split up?”

"No," I said instantly. "We'll be splitting up our firepower."

Felix paused. "Pretty bold words, Lewis. What have you got in mind?"

I tugged my bag free from my shoulder. "You're right, this is one damn narrow island. Eventually we're going to be at the south end, right on the beach with the ocean at our back, and this is no night for swimming."

The bag was free and I took the heavy FN 8mm rifle out, feeling the smoothness of the wooden stock. It's old, and when I had purchased it I made the excuse that I was investing in an antique. But it's also Belgian-made (Fabrique Nationale) and quite accurate, and on this cold and lonely night with the sand against my belly and the sound of the winds and waves about my head, I was thankful for its ten-round magazine.

"Lewis---" Felix began.

"So they're chasing us south," I said, putting the rifle up to my shoulder. "So let's slow them down. Let's put the fear of God into them for a change. I'll rip off a few rounds and then we'll scurry back to the next dune. We'll make them hesitate before going up every dune. Damn it, I'm tired of being a target. You got a problem with that?"

"Hell, no," Felix said. "I was just going to offer to be a spotter, that's all. Let's get to it."

Felix crawled up next to me, night-vision scope to his eyes, and said, "Off to the left, boardwalk. Maybe a hundred yards. Two guys, talking and pointing. Got them?"

The FN had no scope, just open iron sights, which was fine. I clicked the sights to one hundred meters --- being Belgian, it was metric --- and breathed in. The wooden boardwalk was clear enough in the starlight and the light from the new moon, and I saw to dark shapes Felix had mentioned, just before a set of smaller dunes. I had no great expectations of marksmanship this winter night. 1 only wanted to keep their heads down, slow their advance until Felix and I could think of something else.

I breathed in and out, and said, "They still there?"

"Sure are."

"Okay, here it goes," I said, and gently squeezed the trigger.

The first shot scared even me, the report quite loud and the muzzle flash looking like a tiny blowtorch in the night. I fired off three additional rounds, shifting my aim just a bit with each shot, the recoil no bother at all, and Felix slapped me on the back and said, "Let's go," and I moved down the slope of the dune with him, sand cascading around our feet, the smell of burnt gunpowder quite strong.

"Did you see anything?"

"They both dropped."

"But I probably missed."

"Probably," he said. "But they both dropped."

From the other side of the dunes came the sound of return gunfire, and a few yells, and the sounds made me smile. I felt good. We were fighting back.

Another two dunes, and we were on our bellies again. Felix had the scope back up. "The little bastards are more cautious," he said. "They're moving real slow."

"Can you see what they've got for weapons?" I asked.

"Pistols and shotguns, best I can tell," he said.

"Good," I said. "No distance. All right, off to the left. Any target out there? I don't want them outflanking us."

He sighted in and scanned for a moment, and said, "Looks like a wooden trail sign. Kind of big. Can you make it out?"

I looked down over the rifle's sights. "No. Give me more."

"Straight ahead and straight down. Catch the boardwalk. Move to the left. Some scrub brush, some sand, another chunk of the boardwalk, and the sign."

Square, dark shape. "Got it."

I fired off three more rounds, then Felix and I scrambled off to the right. The FN doesn't have a muzzle flash guard, and with every shot, we were showing them our positions. When we stopped again, breathing hard, I said, "Anything?"

"You dropped him," Felix said, his voice a bit peculiar.

"You mean he fell?"

"No, I think you shot him. He fell back pretty hard."

"Oh."

I suppose I should have felt remorse, some regret at what I had just done. But blame it on the cold and the night's wild ride, and my own terrible walk the other night in North Tyler after being shot at, for what I truly felt: I was glad no one was coming up our 1eft flank.

Felix kept moving the night scope back and forth, and said, 'Damn it, they're too quick now. By the time I tell you where they are, they've moved somewhere else."

"Just give me a general direction, that's all I need."

"That's not going to work for long."

"I know. But it'll give us time."

"Time for what?"

"Time for someone to hear the gunshots and call the cops," I said.

Felix looked around at the scrub brush, the hills and ravines and dunes and sand piles, and said, "Well, they must be tripping over themselves to get there, 'cause I don't see a single damn person, except for the bastards trying to get us."

"Fishermen come out here at night, do some surf fishing."

"In January? With this wind?"

I raised up my rifle. "Damn it, Felix, if you can't agree with me, at least give me some targets. Where to?"

He muttered something and said, "A bit off to my right. Down where two dunes look like they intersect. I saw a couple of heads poke up."

"Got it."

Another shot, and then another, and then a
click
. Magazine was empty. Time to reload.

Return fire, a bit closer this time, and that awful bone-chilling
wheee!
that comes when a copper-jacketed slug of lead goes zipping over your head at several hundred feet per second. Felix joined in this time, the gunfire from his pistol very loud.

"Fools are getting better," Felix said, as we tumbled down the slope of the dune, heading to another rise of sand.

"I can handle them getting better," I said. "I can't handle them getting good. That would be terrible."

Three more dunes, and two more reloads on my part. The last time Felix had surprised me by pulling out his pistol and firing a half dozen shots off to the right.

"Jesus!" he had said when he was done and we had scampered off to another wiling mass of sand. "That guy was good. He was coming right up the slope."

I didn't ask him the obvious question, if he had hit anything, I figured he'd tell me in his own good time. Right now I was on my stomach again, trying to keep my teeth from chattering. I would put one hand in my coat pocket to warm it up, and then repeat the process with the other. Hat and gloves were back in the Camry, along with the night scope. Sloppy. Felix had his pistol in one hand and the night scope up to his eyes.

"Anything?" I asked.

"Nothing. They're either hunkered down or they're making a wide sweep. That's what I would do. Get down to the beach on this side of the island, dog-trot down to the end, and then reverse and come back up on the dunes to the south of us."

"Nice thoughts."

"That's what they're probably doing."

"Well, they could be discussing how to surrender."

A short laugh. "Well, if that happens, you can be the gentlemen who handles the surrender terms. I'm getting too cold and cranky."

"It is getting cold."

"Too cold, and too tiring. How's your ammo?"

"One full magazine in the rifle, ten rounds," I said. "Haven't used any thing from my Beretta. How about you?"

"One magazine in the pistol. That's it."

I reached under my jacket and tugged at my shoulder holster.

There were two full clips of 9mm ammunition hanging there, which I pulled free and passed over to Felix, along with my own pistol.  “Here. Strip my ammo out and reload your clips."

"Lewis, you're going -- "

"Felix, I'm going to need you armed more than anything else. Do it and shut up."

He said nothing in return, but his hands got busy as he ripped the 9mm rounds from my full magazines and loaded up his empty Smith & Wesson magazines for his own pistol. I burrowed both hands in my coat and rolled over and looked up at the stars, listening to the soft
click-click
sounds as Felix worked. The stars were nice and bright and maybe it was the lateness of the hour, or my exhaustion or fear, but everything seemed to be a mishmash of lights in the sky, a random scattering that made no sense.

Sort of what we were in the middle of.

"Who are those guys?" I asked.

"Robert Redford and Paul Newman," Felix said.

"What?"

"Line from their movie, right? ‘Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.’ Halfway through the movie they're outnumbered and they're being chased, and one line they say, over and over again. Who are those guys?"

"All right, so I stole the line. You tell me. Who are those guys?"

Felix grunted and handed me back my now-empty magazines and empty pistol. It was a scary feeling, right there, knowing that I was almost out of ammunition.

"No, you tell me. We start out looking for someone who raped your friend Kara, and a couple of weeks later we end up out here being shot at and being chased. So you answer the question. Who are those guys?"

"Friends of Doug Miles, it seems."

"A good guess, as good as any others."

"Time for another chat with the young Doug Miles, don't you think?"

Felix laughed. "If you and I are on speaking terms tomorrow, we'll chat about that. Right now, let's see if we can get out of hero. Any more ideas? And don't tell me we're still relying on your phantom fishermen."

"Tell me what's going on down there."

He shifted and scanned the dunes below us. "Nothing."

"But they must be on the move."

"Sure. Circling around on the beaches. Half of them are also probably staying back, in case we double back."

"What's behind us? Any movements?"

Felix moved around on the dune, the sands shifting, making a comforting scraping sound. It reminded me of when I was impossibly young and innocent, and when a shovel and sand pail and being with my parents at old Tyler Beach could keep me happy for hours.

"Nothing. Just dunes and grass and scrub brush. And one utility pole."

"A utility pole?"

"Yep."

"Any streetlight on it?"

"Nope."

"You see any wires running to it?"

"Can't tell."

"Is there a junction box or something, about a third of the way up from the bottom?"

"Yeah, it looks like it."