He looked for a minute like he’d fight me, then reluctantly gave me a thumbs-up. Clyde and I moved forward.
Two units down, a well car sat empty in the soft light of the western sun—there had been a change in the lading, or a shipment that hadn’t come through. The car looked like a gap in an otherwise full smile. As I drew closer, I saw another spatter of red along the car’s bright-yellow side.
Clyde and I walked fast down the line, my eyes on Clyde for signs that we had company. His skin shuddered with the death fear. At the edge of the last intermodal container before the empty car, I signaled him to stop and peered around the immense box.
Veronica Stern was tied to a pair of wooden crossbeams, her arms and legs spread-eagled on the giant X. Roman had leaned the crossbeams at a steep angle against the containers sitting on the next car so that Stern’s death looked like a crucifixion. Her head sagged against her chest, but I could see that her throat had been slashed—the amount of blood precluded any hope she was still alive. That, and the ruined flesh of her abdomen. Roman Quinn had made sure his half sibling would never enter the world.
I closed my eyes for just a moment, my hand to my heart.
Clyde stiffened. At the sound of footsteps behind me, I whirled, gun up.
Albers, looking sheepish.
“Can’t cover you from two cars down,” he said. He looked past me, caught a glimpse of Stern, and pulled back.
“Son of a bitch,” he said in a harsh whisper. “Son of a motherfucking bitch.”
Knowing there was nothing we could do for Stern, I hurried us back in the direction of my truck.
“Shouldn’t we, like, stay with her or something?” Albers whispered.
In the far distance, sirens shrieked.
“She won’t be alone for long,” I said.
We were still far from the truck when I heard a thin, high crack, and a hole appeared in the side of the nearest container.
“Get on the other side!” I shouted to Albers as a second shot rang out. “Go!”
Albers gave a soft grunt, but he moved fast.
The container cars sat too low on the tracks for us to crawl under them. Albers scrabbled over the drawbar as Clyde hopped up onto the narrow platform at the end of the car and I clamored after him. Vaguely, I registered the screeching of startled birds. We dropped down on the other side as a third shot echoed around the yard, and metal pinged nearby.
Then the world fell silent again save for Albers’s harsh panting. I crouched and peered around the edge of the container. On the far side of the yard, just outside the fence, a flock of starlings was resettling on the limbs of a cottonwood tree.
“Damn,” Albers said.
I dropped back down. “You okay?”
“Jackass got me,” he said.
I looked over. He had a hand pressed to his shoulder. Blood leaked through his fingers.
“Let me see,” I said, relieved that we’d already called for an ambulance.
“I’ll be fine.” At my look, he added, “He only clipped me. Find the shooter before he circles around.”
“Stay down,” I said. “I’ll be right back.”
I signaled Clyde to stay. Then, hoping Roman still had his sights on the drawbar we’d crawled over, I ran past four cars, my gun tight in my hand. At the fifth car, I stopped and leaned around the edge of the container.
No one tried to shoot my head off. I stretched on my stomach across the foot-wide platform next to the drawbar and surveyed the yard, trying to pinpoint where the shot had come from, looking first in the direction of the cottonwood tree.
Nothing moved.
We were near the south end of the yard. On my left, Albers’s train stretched into the distance. To my right, in the direction the shots had come from, the yard lay flat across empty tracks. Far to the west, past the end of the intermodal train, was a line of lift trucks with their attached cranes. And beyond that rose an eight-foot-high chain-link fence.
On the other side of the fence, just visible in the distance, a wilderness of scrub oak and pine trees marked the end of DPC property.
Roman Quinn would have had to enter the yard on foot. Which meant there were only two places he could have parked his car that were within half a mile of the yard. Figuring he would have wanted to get as close as possible to the train with a struggling or unconscious Stern, I placed my bet on the nearer street, Carmen Avenue, a quiet stretch of road on the other side of the small woodland. With the approaching sirens, my guess was that he was either headed in that direction now, or still waiting near the lift trucks, hoping to take one last shot if we popped into view.
I returned to Clyde and Albers and crouched next to them. Albers was pale, his shirt soaked with blood. He was breathing like he’d run a marathon. But he was awake and alert, his gun on his lap. For a moment, I wanted to stop everything. Rewind the hour, the day. Squeeze my eyes shut, hunker down, and hide.
I shook it off.
“You doing okay?” I asked him.
To the east, the police cars were now visible as flashes of red and blue.
“I’m going to hurt the asshole who nailed me,” he said.
I smiled. “Wait here,” I told him. “I’m guessing the killer parked on Carmen Avenue. I’m heading that way. Tell the cops when they get here.”
“I’m coming with.”
“The hell you are. Stay here and let the cops know where I’ve gone.”
An angry look flitted across his face, but then he grimaced and his hand went to his shoulder. “Yes’m, boss lady.”
Clyde and I went west at a fast, crouching run, keeping the train between us and Roman. For Roman to make his way from the lift trucks to the fence, he’d have to go a longer distance than I would. I hoped I could head him off. If I was ahead of him, I’d have to decide whether to wait for him near the street or to circle back around to the line of lift trucks.
Briefly, I thought about the wolf dog, then pushed the image away. Clyde would let me know.
At the end of the train, Clyde and I halted and I peered around the last car, my gun up in both hands.
More silence.
The chain-link fence was several hundred yards ahead of us. Beyond was the stretch of trees, and somewhere beyond that, Carmen Avenue. With shadows thickening toward night, much of the yard lay in shadow. I strained my eyes for a glimpse of motion, first among the trees, then around the lift trucks.
There! A form slipped along the line of trucks, heading west, barely visible as night descended.
From far behind me came the sound of car doors slamming and the shouts of men. Roman had heard them, too. He was moving fast. I watched for any other motion in the yard, but he appeared to be alone. Whatever his relationship with the wolf dog, the animal didn’t seem to be with him now.