Suddenly, Ben didn’t want to move slowly and cautiously anymore, but he forced himself to stay the course. He also thought about Joel with the shotgun and second AR-15 slung around his shoulders. He’d be loud and make an easy target if he didn’t get to the Cadillac before he was spotted. Of course, he should already be there by now, and maybe he was. Ben tried to stop his imagination from running wild with bad scenarios. He needed to focus on the upcoming container and the next blind corner he was approaching. Between the lack of sleep and proper food and water, that was hard enough, and it was starting to take a toll on his body. If it wasn’t for the adrenaline coursing through his veins, he wouldn’t have been able to stand upright, let alone take on a camp full of moonshiners.
He tried hard to refocus. There was a very real chance the person he was tracking was just around the next corner. With all the gunfire and noise from the still blowing up and then the truck crash, they were most likely hiding and nursing their wound. But he wasn’t going to count on it. Ben readied the pistol as he sliced the corner and slowly cleared segments of space between the containers. Nothing there.
He started to make his way across the front of the next container, careful to stay low enough that he could slip under the upcoming window but froze when he heard the distant crack of what sounded like Joel’s AR-15. It was coming from the back of the compound, somewhere near the jail cell containers or the cars.
Screw it. Ben jumped to his feet and ran full tilt to rejoin the others. The situation was too dangerous to justify being separated from Sandy and the kids anymore. This was how mistakes were made, and they couldn’t afford that.
When Ben arrived, he was surprised to see Sandy standing there with an AR-15 at her shoulder. She was as still as a statue and kept the gun trained on the dead moonshiner some twenty yards away.
“It’s me, guys,” Ben announced before he dared get any closer. He didn’t want Sandy to turn the gun on him by mistake. He doubted she’d ever shot one, much less killed someone before, and that sort of thing had a way of briefly separating people from reality.
He approached slowly, putting his hand on the warm barrel and encouraging Sandy to lower the rifle.
“It’s okay. She’s down.” Ben could see the body a little better now and recognized the middle-aged woman as someone they’d seen at the chained roadblock. He moved past Sandy with his pistol ready and approached the body to confirm the kill. The woman had two gunshot wounds, the first of which was in her arm. Ben assumed it had been Joel’s doing.
With her blood-soaked T-shirt and jeans, it was clear where the blood trail had come from, and the belt wrapped around her arm explained why it had all but disappeared. The belt was a smart move on the woman’s part and had prolonged her life, at least until she took a round in the forehead from Sandy’s rifle. The .223-caliber bullet made a small entry hole, almost unnoticeable in the dark except for the growing trail of blood that trickled down her head and ran between her still-open eyes.
Ben noticed the kids coming over toward him, all except for Allie, who was standing by her mother’s side with her arm around her shoulders. Ben took the woman’s gun and rolled her head so it faced away from the kids. He’d barely gotten up off the ground and taken a step forward when Bradley and Emma wrapped their arms around him. Almost losing his balance, he was forced to pass off the woman’s shotgun to Joel in a hurry.
“See if it’s loaded,” Ben said. “Looks like another 20-gauge.”
Joel took the gun and started to inspect it. Ben was still holding the pistol but was able to use his free hand to grab onto the kids and get his balance. They embraced for a few seconds, and no one said a thing. Ben wished he could pick them up and carry them away from this place right now. But even if that was possible, they weren’t as small as they used to be and he wasn’t as strong as he once was. He could keep them safe, though, but in order to do that, they needed to keep moving. There was still work to do, and plenty of it, if they were going to get out of here.
Ben glanced at Joel as he got up, and Bradley and Emma loosened their hold on him.
“I was helping them and Allie out of the car. I didn’t even see her coming.” Joel kicked at an old can on the ground.
“It’s okay. We’re a team. We’ve got each other’s backs. That’s how it works.” Ben paused for a second, then turned to Sandy. “Thank you.”
Sandy didn’t respond, though, and instead remained almost motionless as she continued to stare at the body and resist Allie’s attempts to draw her away.
“Mom… Mom, you didn’t have a choice.”
“Allie’s right, you know. She would have killed all of you without batting an eye.” Ben hated to say that in front of the younger kids, but it was the truth. A truth they all knew but were reluctant to speak about sometimes. That was going to have to change. A long time ago, Ben had committed to being up front about everything with Joel and Allie, and it was
