Gin Palace 02 - The Bone Orchard

sending a shell up into the chamber and making room for the sixth. I slid the sixth in and then lay the shotgun between us.
    I pulled the .45 from my waistband and switched off the safety. Augie and I lay on our backs. I peeked out around the side of the log and saw a hundred feet away an abandoned 1970 Firebird. That was most likely their cover. Before I leaned back I caught a glimpse of Augie’s cane on the ground. Beside it were a shovel and pick. That would be like Frank, I thought, to make a man dig his own grave.
    There was no time to wait. Maybe a minute had passed since I had slid into the ditch. The longer we lay there, entrenched, the more time they had to launch an assault, if they hadn’t launched one already. Augie and I had to mount one of our own, quickly. It was our only way out.
    I looked at Augie and pointed to my chest, then pointed upward with my index finger and made several circling motions. I ended the round of charades by pointing south, toward the bay. Augie nodded and positioned himself, getting ready to spring up and lay down more cover. I handed him my .45. He looked at me a moment, then took it, stuffing it in the waistband of his jeans at he small of his back. I picked up the shotgun, slid the safety off with my thumb, and worked my way around Augie to the right side of the ditch, the southern side, nearest to the bay. I crouched, ready, then looked back over my shoulder at Augie. He smiled then. I smiled back. Then I nodded once, sharply, and he sprung up and began to click off rounds.
    I rolled out of the ditch and down the bank toward the bay. When I was clear and had come to a stop, Augie dropped back down behind the tree. He had fired five rounds. He looked at me and nodded, as if to ask if I was okay. I nodded back, took one last look at him, and then crawled on my stomach till I was far enough down the bank that I was out of sight of the men behind the abandoned Firebird.
    Once I was clear I got up and moved in a crouch along the edge of the bay. There was no cover here except for the bank, and I kept my eye on the ridge above and kept the shotgun ready. I expected at any minute to come face to face with one of Frank’s killers. I waited for it to the point where almost I wanted it to happen just to get it over with.
    The way I saw it now was that I had no choice but to make my way in a hurried rush around Frank and his men, to flank them and catch them by surprise and kill them if I could. There was no choice at all, and it was this that made me feel the most like an animal.
    I moved forward and kept my eye out for the any movement on the top of that ridge. Maybe two minutes had passed since I had caught up with Augie in his trench. All I could hear as I moved through the darkness was my short breathing. It and the lapping of the waves against the shore of the bay were the only sounds in the night. There was no gunfire now, there were no voices, no sounds of movement, nothing. Just the waves and my breathing, each out of sync with the other.
    As I moved forward the top of the bank began to sink, and gradually the Firebird came into my sight again. I could see two men crouching by the vehicle’s nose, along the left fender. I looked to see if there was any cover that would allow me a clear line to approach, but there was none. I had come as far as I could go.
    I turned and lay against what was left of the bank. My sweat soaked T-shirt sent a chill through my back. I laid the shotgun across my chest and waited. I closed my eyes. All I had wanted was to avoid bloodshed. Maybe two and a half minutes had passed since my arrival, and though I was lying on the bank to gather together what it would take, I could still feel the rushing of things around me, of the elements on the move over which I had no control. I knew nothing of what was going on behind that Firebird, and nothing of what was going on back in Augie’s ditch. I was alone out here. Alone with nothing but the thumping of my heart and a shotgun and the sound of a late November wind rushing past my ears.
    I opened my eyes and started to roll onto my stomach. Something told me to look up then. I did, fast, and directly above me on the top of that short bank stood a the shape of a man, his right arm raised and outstretched toward me. In his hand something glinted. I rose onto my knees and leaned back, raising the shotgun. Before I could level it at him the gun in his hand snapped and flashed blue sparks and a crack slapped