7
I sat with my back wedged into a corner, ears ringing, my hand cramping around the handle of the revolver. Time seemed to distort around me, speeding past, then slowing to a crawl.
There was a shuffling sound beside me. Bear had come around Quarles, and we were sitting shoulder to shoulder. He shifted his weight from paw to paw with an urgent whine.
Quarles was facedown with three bullet wounds in his back, one high and two low. Each one was a spot of black ringed by a circle of dark red. A pool of blood, the thickness of motor oil, had spread out underneath him, a misshapen circle stretching from his waist to his head.
I heaved violently, vomiting up acidic bile. After it passed, I stayed there on my knees, my stomach muscles clenching. I breathed deep until they stilled, then turned to the door. Quarles’s truck sat across the parking lot, a black splotch against the tan desert. How long had it been sitting there now? Minutes? Hours? I imagined the dogs going mad for food back in their kennels. How long until someone noticed? How long before they came looking?
I forced myself up onto legs as shaky as a fawn’s, then took a few steps before squatting down by the dead man’s shoulders. His face was turned toward me and his eyes were open wide, staring blankly. Their blue centers were surrounded by a maze of burst blood vessels.
I grabbed the edge of Quarles’s coat in my one good hand and threw myself toward the back hall. His body skidded a few inches, but the effort forced me to my knees, panting. There were at least five more feet between him and the narrow bathroom door.
Bear stood by the door, watching me, his front paws tapping anxiously against the tile.
I dug my heels into the floor and I pulled again, grunting, until his body moved. I got him another few inches, rested, and did it again and again until we were at the edge of the bathroom. I dropped his coat and collapsed against the wall.
Bear scurried across the store, giving the slick of blood a wide berth. He sat before me, making an impatient huffing sound. Somehow I got up again and pulled until I got Quarles into the bathroom.
His body ended up curled around the base of the filthy toilet, chin on his chest, arms limp at his sides. Looking down at him, numbness spread through me, and I felt like I was seeing him from high above. I suddenly realized how little I knew about him. Did he have a wife? Children?
I staggered out of the bathroom and shut the door.
Bear stayed close as I covered Quarles’s blood with whatever trash I could find. If someone was searching the store, they would figure out what happened pretty quick, but it might at least buy me some time.
But time to do what?
I didn’t breathe at the Cormorant checkpoint. My hand gripped the steering wheel as two sentries looked over the truck in front of me. I checked the rearview. Bear was lying on his side in one of the back cages. When I looked forward, one of the sentries was waving me up.
He took my tech operator’s dispensation papers and studied them. His sleek M4 hung on his chest, one hand never more than a few inches from the grip and trigger.
“This is Quarles’s rig?” he asked, looking down the length of the truck.
“Yes, sir,” I said. “He’s gone after a pack we found. He wanted me to drop this dog back in the kennels and come back for him tonight.”
“No one in or out until after prayers and supper.”
“Yes, sir,” I said. “No problem.”
He waved me on and I pulled the truck through the gate and up to the kennel. It was fully dark by the time I parked and got Bear out of his cage. Inside the kennel, the dogs were barking wildly, starved for the supper no one had given them. Bear shied away, trembling. He wouldn’t move, so I had to lift him awkwardly onto my shoulder with one hand and carry him down the aisle.
“It won’t be for long,” I said. “Promise.”
The other dogs threw themselves against the bars of their cages and snarled at the intruder in their midst. When I finally got Bear into a cage, he pressed himself up against the bars and whined.
“I’ll be back,” I said, reaching my fingers through the bars to scratch his ear.
Bear retreated to the far corner of his cage and cringed away from the other dogs. I hated leaving him there, but what could I do?
I left the kennel and then climbed the hill into camp just as the last of the crowds were moving into the Lighthouse. I caught sight of James at the rear of the pack and yanked him out of line.
“Cal? What are you—”
I put one finger to my lips and pulled him away, keeping us to the shadows as we made our way down to the barracks. Once we were inside, I lit a single lantern and shut the door.
“What are you doing?”
I took James’s backpack out of our footlocker and pushed it into his chest. “Fill it.”
“Why? Cal, what’s going on?”
“We have to go,” I said, turning my back to him and filling my pack with clothes, camping gear, maps.
“Go where? What are you — Why do you have blood on your clothes?”
I was leaning over my bunk, the straps of the backpack tight in my hand. Looking down, I saw that my pants, from cuffs to knee, were stained with Quarles’s blood.
“There was an accident,” I said quietly, my back still to James. “With Quarles.”
“Is he dead?”
The words stuck in my throat but I didn’t need to say anything. James could see. I pulled him down onto the bunk beside me.
“We need to leave,” I said. “Now.”
“Leave? What are you—”
“Quarles’s truck is out by the kennels. I told the sentries I’d be driving out again tonight to look for a pack of strays.”
“Where would we even go?”
“I don’t know. West maybe, cross into California. We’ll figure it out.”
“But—”
“If they find him, I’m dead.”
James went quiet, staring down at the concrete floor. The walls of the barracks ticked as the building settled into the desert night.
“James?”
“We’ll go to Monroe together,” he said slowly. “We’ll explain it to him. He was just about to make us both citizens. He’ll—”
“It was a lie. He’s going to keep you as his valet and send me away with Rhames to be a soldier.”
James looked up at me, his eyes sharp like he was searching out a lie. When he didn’t find one, his face went dark, shadowed in flickering lantern light.
“Remember when we used to talk about escaping?” I said. “We put it aside for too long, James. This is our chance. We have to take it. Are you listening to me? We need to—”
“I’ll get Milo,” he said. “He can get into the storage sheds and draw us some supplies.”
“There’s no time for that.”
“We need food,” he said. “And a tent. I’ll grab him on the way out of Lighthouse and meet you at the kennels.”
“James.”
“He won’t talk,” James said. “Don’t worry. I’ll be fast and we’ll be gone before anybody knows what happened.”
James rolled up off the cot and slung the pack from his shoulder.
“Everything is going to work out for the best,” he said. “You’ll see.”
Looking up at him, I felt a surge of astonishment. For years I thought he was the weak one, the sickly one. Turns out I didn’t know my brother at all.
