We had to get out of there, but I didn’t know where to go. Behind the building and beyond looked like flat, featureless farm land, at least in the cloudy dark. The moon was partly obscured behind a bank of clouds running west to east over us. At the west end of the lot was the steep railroad embankment for the tracks we’d crossed over in the car, and I didn’t know if the bleeding Cowboy could make it up it with enough alacrity that Ernesto Mondragón wouldn’t pick us off like slow moving ducks in a shooting gallery. That left hoofing it across bare, frozen fields, and I didn’t think Cowboy could do that, either. Ernesto made the decision for me as he moved, still in shadow, to the bare-fields end of the lot. He’d probably made the same conclusions that I had made, and he was going to herd us into the embankment where we’d be trapped in a shooting gallery for sure.
As Ernesto Mondragón continued ripping apart the crates with his bursts of gunfire, we had no choice but to move toward the embankment as we hid behind the shipping containers. As we scurried past Cowboy’s pickup parked beside a container that looked like it had partially burned, a woozy Cowboy muttered, “Wait. Gun. I have … a gun.”
“What? You’ve had a gun all this time, and are just now saying something?” I hissed.
“No. In the truck … under the seat. I couldn’t get to it … when that bastard hijacked me,” Cowboy panted.
I looked over the bed of the truck and saw Ernesto Mondragón with his back toward us, checking out the dark, windswept fields to the east. I crept down the truck’s side, quietly opened the cab door, and felt under the driver’s seat. I did indeed pull out cold steel, in the form of a Smith and Wesson six shooter. That fits, I thought.
“It’s loaded. Do you know how to shoot, girlie?” asked Cowboy.
I nodded, though I wasn’t too comforted by the fact there were only six rounds in the chamber, and Ernesto had an insane amount of rounds for his people-killer assault weapon. “Any more ammo?” I whispered.
Cowboy Binder shook his head. “Well, I’ll have to make this work,” I said. I’d never used an automatic anyway, so I was more comfortable with the revolver when it came right down to it. It felt heavy and powerful in my hand, and I knew that a .45 bullet could do a lot of damage.
“Louie, you’ve gotta help Cowboy while I try to hold Ernesto off. Get him over to that pile of junk over there by the embankment. I’ll cover you,” I said, though, even in that situation, I felt a little foolish saying those words.
Unfortunately, they applied. “I’ll follow you, and we’ll get Cowboy up that embankment and over the tracks to the other side. We’ve gotta do it so Ernesto doesn’t see us! Maybe there’s something on the other side. At least it’ll buy us time.” I helped her put Cowboy’s arm over her shoulders for support. “Wait until I give you the signal to go.” As if to punctuate my decision, I could hear a train in the distance.
Ernesto Mondragón finished blasting another crate. He was four containers from us when he called out irritably, “Come, on, bitch! Face it, you’re done. You have no place to go. Besides, it going to be light soon, and then you’ll have no place to hide. If you come out now, I promise that I’ll kill the other two quickly instead of torturing them in front of you. I’m cold! I’m tired of playing this game!”
After silence on my part, he pouted, “Time’s up! You die!”
“Stay back! I have a gun!” I yelled from behind the crate.
“What? You think I’m stupid? If you had a gun you would have used it!” he yelled. I could hear the gravel crunch under his feet as he started toward us.
I took the chance to peer around the crate, cocked, and fired one shot that hit the ground in front of him, just missing his foot. I gave the signal to Louie to move. Ernesto jumped back in surprised rage, and hid behind a crate. He spewed off another burst of fire, but I didn’t hear it hitting any place close to us. I waited until I saw him peep his head around the corner and I fired again, splintering the crate next to where his now-vanished face had been. My aim was getting better, and Ernesto screamed his fury. I ran to join Louie and Cowboy behind the junk pile in the dark, and in the near distance I could hear the train pounding toward us.
Ernesto shot up the next container, and I knew he was going to be able to spot us if he got any closer. I quickly fired another shot towards him, scaring him back behind a hiding place. But with that shot I knew he was going to be able to pinpoint where we were in the dark, so it was time to move.
“Let’s go! Louie, no matter what, just keep going up that slope. We gotta get up and over!” I panted as I grabbed Cowboy’s arm.
“But there’s a train coming!” Louie said in a terrified voice, but she put Cowboy’s other arm over her shoulder, and we started up the hill.
The train was getting closer, and I was almost blinded by the three-beam headlights harshly spotlighting the tracks above us. I still thought we could make it. Cowboy Binder helped us as much as he could, but he was heavy and seemed to stumble on every stub of grass. I kept turning around to watch for Ernesto because now that we were on the slope, we were exposed, and I couldn’t give him a chance to pick us off. I was panting so hard I couldn’t keep my hands steady, but I turned and fired another round toward the direction of his hiding place, and kept going.
When I turned, I saw, in the far distance, tiny blips of lights, strung out on the county road, coming our way. The cavalry, I powerfully hoped. But they were a long way away, and I feared that they wouldn’t get to us in time for a rescue; Ernesto Mondragón could kill us all and be gone in a few minutes. The train whistle now blasted a shrill warning that deafened me.
I turned again, and saw Ernesto standing in the gravel yard beside the last crate, swinging his gun upwards toward us. I fired another wild shot at him, but could do no more as we had but seconds to get across the tracks in front of the train, now pounding at eighty miles an hour towards us. Louie and I pushed and pulled Cowboy Binder to the other side just as the train thundered past us and its rush of air and power knocked the three of us down the other side. The piercing whistle doppelgangered past us.
With the train roaring above us we gingerly checked for injuries, and then Louie and I helped Cowboy over to the side of a tall metal signal box. I thought we could hide there until I spotted something better. I looked around for neighboring farmsteads, but only saw security lights miles away. I sat back against the cold metal. I had one bullet left, and that one was for Ernesto Mondragón. When the train went past and he saw we were no longer near the embankment, he’d follow us over it. When he found us, I was determined to have a final stand. I’d let him get close, and then I’d shoot the bastard and I would kill him. I seethed with so much hatred for him that I could barely catch my breath. I knew I needed to concentrate on the present moment and bring my attention to that instead, so I tried to calm down my racing heart.
We sat in the cold dark listening to the train. Louie Burzachiello leaned into me and half shouted, “That was some shootin’, Lily! Where’d you learn how to do that?”
“At camp!” I yelled back. “Girls’ camp in Minnesota … in high school.” I half smiled. “I even qualified for the NRA’s Marksman First Class.”
“You’re a member of the NRA?” Louie Burzachiello cried incredulously, ready to argue.
“Save it, Louie, please! No, I’m not a member of the NRA. Had to join way back then to get a rating, that’s all. Sometimes I used to target shoot with my brother and his handguns, too.” Cowboy Binder had perked up at the mention of the NRA and guns, but soon went back to his own disturbed reverie.
It was a very long coal train out of Wyoming. Hopper car after car went past us, and I could just see the rounded loads of the filled cars. Sitting there, I could faintly smell horse manure, even in the cold. Thinking maybe there was a corral nearby, I crawled around the signal box, and peered in the dark, barely picking out the darker shapes of a few horses about fifty feet away on the other side of a barbed wire fence. Could we use the horses to transport the injured Cowboy, and ourselves, ou
t of there?
Louie had crawled around the box with me, and I turned to her in the cold dark. “Do you think we could get Cowboy up on a horse? We’d have to push him up; he’s pretty weak.”
“Yeah, but horses? How are we gonna catch ‘em? Or ride ‘em? Do they even have those things around their necks, those things you need to guide them?”
“Bridles.”
“Yeah, bridles. Or saddles. How we gonna do that?” she asked.
Louie did have points, but they seemed moot, since even with a huge struggle we couldn’t get the dead weight of the semiconscious Cowboy Binder off the ground, much less up on a horse. As Louie and I leaned back against the cold metal of the signal box, trying to catch our breath, I told her that she should go, and get help. We’d catch a horse, I’d make a bridle kind of thing out of my jacket, and she could take off towards one of the farmstead lights we saw in the far distance. I’d stay with Cowboy, and wait for Ernesto. At first, Louie had all sorts of reasons that I should go, but then she stopped herself, and shook her head.
“I’ll do it,” she said, even as I could hear her voice tremble in fear. “You gotta catch it for me, but I’ll do it. I’ll go for help. How do I—” The loud clatter of the train suddenly diminished, and then was gone.
We’d run out of time.
There wasn’t time for more talk, so Louie and I tucked ourselves behind the signal box with Cowboy Binder, and I double checked the revolver. One more round. I strained my eyes in the dark, so I could spot the scumbag Ernesto Mondragón the second he came over the hill to kill us.
As my ears adjusted to the absence of the train, I began to hear sounds on the other side of the embankment. I heard a range of noises that sounded like it was from a number of people and vehicles, so I climbed up and peeked over the top of the embankment.
Yessiree, thank you all that is good in the world, it was the cavalry. In fact, it was Henry Wade, who I could see with a bullhorn, standing beside a vehicle with flashing lights, and directing men from a dozen cars. Henry spotted me waving from the embankment, and soon cars and rescue vehicles were on our side of the tracks, tending to our physical wounds. As Cowboy Binder and Louie were being helped, I quickly found Henry in the mass of rescue workers and told him about Ernesto’s threats to my niece Haley and Betty Huckleston’s family, and that Ernesto sent Eddie to kill my dogs, and maybe Carol Griffin and Marjo Catanya.
“Eddie knows where I live, Henry, and I’m afraid he’s had time to get into town! Please, send somebody to stop him!” The heavy burden of guilt that I was responsible for all of it, all the misery Ernesto promised, bore down on me. Henry Wade miked something official sounding into his walkie-talkie, and then assured me that an officer in town was on the way. All I could do was wait.
Liz Burzachiello had been picked up in the mountains hours before, and would soon be there in a squad car. Though I was still worried about everything else, that news made me feel truly grateful and happy.
As we sat in the back of the ambulance and the EMT worked on Cowboy Binder’s leg wound, Cowboy reached out to shake hands with Henry Wade. “Good job gettin’ here when you did, Agent Wade. That bastard was goin’ to kill us.” I could tell Cowboy Binder wanted to focus on Ernesto Mondragón rather than the deeds of, and betrayal by, his own son.
Henry smiled and said, “Well, Lily had a lot to do with that.” Cowboy looked confused and Henry continued, “After we got the 911 call from Liz about Lily and Louie being kidnapped, we tracked them here by the GPS on Lily’s phone. We lost positioning once you got in one of these no-reception areas here, but from our research on Binder facilities, we knew there were a couple of old warehouses out here, not used for decades. Since you were in the vicinity, seemed probable that you were headed toward one of ‘em. I sent units to the other ones, too, just in case I guessed wrong.” Henry Wade looked like he didn’t guess wrong on many occasions.
Henry turned to me. “We found Correda inside. Dead. Who else was there besides Phil Binder, and I’ll bet, Mondragón? There’s nobody on the premises now.” I briefly told him what had happened, knowing that he’d get a much more detailed version from all of us later. I remembered that my cell phone was still in the building, and that I hoped that it had recorded at least some of Ernesto’s hideous and boastful admissions to murder and mayhem before the battery had worn down. Henry nodded and turned to tell one of his guys to double check the floors of the building for the phone. Louie Burzachiello looked at me with her mouth open, speechless for once.
Cowboy’s pickup was gone, so it was clear how Ernesto Mondragón took off before the cops could get there. Henry said there was an APB out for him, now with a description the truck. It seemed that Ernesto Mondragón’s feral instinct had allowed him to slip away into the darkness—even as the cops were bearing down on him—moments away from being caught.
Cowboy Binder, Louie Burzachiello, and I sat bundled in blankets in the back of the ambulance when a state patrol car skidded up with Liz in the back seat. Louie jumped out of the ambulance and ran toward her sister, her blanket dropping to the ground as she joyously hugged her twin. Liz picked up the blanket and tenderly pulled it around Louie’s shoulders as she hustled her back to the shelter of the patrol car. Liz turned to wave at me and gave a thumbs-up, which I returned with a big smile.
As Cowboy and I sat quietly talking in the ambulance, Henry returned with a smile on his face and said, “The dogs are okay!” I started crying in my sense of relief.
He continued, with a grin on his face, “Turns out they didn’t need us.”
I looked at him, not having a clue to what he meant.
“I just got the report back. The perp, Eddie Johnson, has already spilled the whole thing to Officer Ryan in town. Johnson did get to your house, but he was stupid. Of course he was stupid; he’s a con! He thought he’d be smart, though, and sneak over the fence. He started climbing it, but the Little One, I guess she was outside the fence, snuck up behind him and bit him.” Because Patsy was impatient, she’d dug out, and was waiting for me. “Your Chow showed up on the other side of the fence, and the perp was stuck between them, high and dry. He’d dropped his weapon when Little One took a bite outta his butt.”
Henry Wade was enjoying himself telling the tale. “The dogs were barking like they were defending Fort Knox, and your neighbor, the night watchman at the feed store, heard them. After calling for reinforcements, he went over to your place with another neighbor, who showed up with a shotgun. That’s about when Officer Ryan arrived on the scene—because of the neighbor’s 911 call—and got the situation under control. I guess the perp was beggin’ Ryan to keep the dogs away from him, ‘cause Little One was still trying to get at him. Wish I could of seen it!”
He smiled at me and said, “Guess the officer had a time trying to keep your neighbor Vicki Sinclair from shooting Eddie Johnson. She claimed she’d just nick him in his privates. Guess she’s a feisty little firebrand!” Henry Wade smiled again, as did I, knowing how lucky I was to have all my friends.
I felt like I could relax, finally—it was over. Ernesto Mondragón had vanished, but I was sure Henry Wade was not far behind on his trail. I was just really bone tired, and my injured arm hurt; I’d also wrenched my knee sliding down the train embankment. I felt my age, and beat up, raked over. The EMT had given me a pain killer that was just beginning to take effect.
It was a long time before things were wrapped up enough at the scene that we could go. Henry offered to drive me home, and I dozed most of the way; we arrived around dawn, a fiery winter sunrise brightening the eastern sky. To my surprise, my whole house was lit up. When we drove up into the drive, Isabelle McWilliams and other friends were on the front porch to meet me. I felt a wave of love for all of them.
Vicki Sinclair was sitting on the steps with Marjo Catanya, smoking a cigarette, and she stood to give me a hug when I got out of the car. I thanked her for her rescue of the dogs, and she nodded, her eyes filled with tears. “I wanted to be here
when you got home. Just wanted to make sure that you were all right, hon.”
Perry Davis and Denise Robicheaux helped me in and onto the couch as Isabelle fussed around me, offering every kind of food and drink imaginable. She said Liz had called her on her way down from the mountains, and told her everything that had happened. Isabelle had called Carol and Marjo, and Marjo had called Perry, and Perry had called others. They were all there to help, and in the hours they had spent waiting for me, they’d baked and cooked, done laundry, put fresh sheets on the bed, played with Patsy and Pecos.
Denise opened the back door and in rushed the joyous dogs, looking happy at being the center of attention, and having me home again. I buried my face in their scruffs and murmured my thankfulness that they were okay. Patsy allowed herself to be fussed over by the group regaling each other with tales of her cunning and bravery. Pecos stayed close by my side, content with just my affection.
Jacked up on coffee, the whole group eagerly wanted to discuss the night’s happenings, but even as numerous theories and guesses were being bandied about, it was soon time for the detectives to go home. I promised the gang that after a few days, and perhaps a chance to talk to Henry Wade, that I’d have them all back over for the wrap-up, the big reveal. I didn’t know if there was going to be a wrap-up or not from Henry, but I needed some rest, and had to suggest that the group reconvene later.
“I thought maybe I’d stay, and help you out, Lily,” Isabelle said as an aside to me. “What do you think?” Some of the others had already started milling around picking up glasses and cups, putting on coats, and wishing each other good-bye.
My mouth ran before my mind, and I said quietly, “Sure! I could—”
Marjo, still at the kitchen sink rinsing dishes, called over her shoulder, “Oh, mija, you do need someone to stay here with you!” The woman must have the hearing of a bat. “With all that’s happened? I think I should stay, too. You’re pretty bunged up; you can barely walk. Isabelle will need help, don’t you think, Isa?” she asked, turning to Isabelle.
Carol chimed in, “Let us help you out, Lily. I’d feel better if we stayed. Somebody’s going to need to go to the store for you, and—“
“Darlin’, should we stay, too? We could if yall need us.” Denise stopped putting on her faux fur coat, and Perry paused at the front door.
“Who’s stayin’?” asked Vicki, popping her head back inside. “I could run over to the Ham and bring you guys back some breakfast, if you’d like.”
This was going to be circus. What was I thinking? “Thanks so much—everybody—but you all don’t need to stay. I really appreciate your offers to help, but only—”
“Oh, don’t get all tough and brave on us, Lily! I think Isabelle and I should stay and help you, and that’s all there is to it. Carol, honey, you have to go home to check on the trough heaters in the barn. The rest of you can go home, too. Isa and I can handle it,” Marjo Catanya said as she stood drying her hands on a kitchen towel.
Isabelle McWilliams gave me a whisper of a glance, and then said to Marjo, “You’re right. Lily can’t walk with her knee messed up, at least not tonight. I’ll need help.”
I felt a pang of disappointment, but the moment had passed. I smiled gamely at Marjo Catanya. “Yes, my sweet. Isa will need your help. Stay.”
Marjo helped Carol on with her coat. “You don’t have to worry about anything, mija,” she said to me. “You’re home now.”