No Immunity

through the brush, up out of the ravine, and ran in the opposite direction toward the low rise.
    She had figured the rise to be half a mile away. No such luck. Farther. She had to watch the ground, aiming around the scrub, leaping the strewn rocks. When she hit a flat spot, she half turned. Nothing seemed to move across the road, but she couldn’t stop and look long enough to be sure. Her breath was coming in gasps, each hot inhalation searing her throat. The rise ahead didn’t seem to be getting any closer.
    She turned again. Still no movement. She ran on, not bothering to check again, knowing it would make no difference. If Fox spotted her, he’d be in his car and on her tail.
    The rise that had looked fence-high from the road was taller than a second-story roof. Panting, she forced herself on till she was over the top. She skidded down the far side.
    In the distance she could see a dirt road. And a car, waiting.

CHAPTER 48

    “Get in, O’Shaughnessy,“ the driver called across the seat of the pickup as she fell onto the seat. She was panting too hard to speak. The passenger pulled her in, and the truck rolled sedately toward the interstate. When she looked up, it was into the face of the driver, Reston Adcock.
    Was this part of Fox’s setup? Adcock and Fox in this together? Fox couldn’t have guessed she would ditch the car and end up here. Maybe Fox had all possibilities covered, and Adcock was one player in a large cast. She leaned back against the seat, waiting till she could breathe normally. Adcock and Fox? And the guy next to Adcock?
    The truck was an old blue Chevy, the kind that looked like a duck’s head, and the bench was wide in both directions. Adcock was as well coiffed, well dressed in suitable outback garb, as the last time she’d seen him, giving orders no law-abiding private investigator would take. From the looks of him, he still worked out in a well-appointed health club. But the truck almost made her laugh. If Adcock were driving his own pickup, it would be a Mercedes, with leather seats. And he certainly wouldn’t have this guy next to him.
    The passenger was a decade older, and it looked to have been a hard ten years. Brown sports jacket, cheap, thin. Skin sallow and blotchy. He was the kind of street-smart guy who never intended to be in any vehicle off pavement.
    If the two men had been seated any farther apart when she arrived, they’d have been on the running boards.
    “So, O’Shaughnessy, what’d you find out from the navy?”
    Of course Adcock figured she was back on his payroll. She was desperate for any ally, why disabuse the man? Still, she needed time to decide how much to trade to a man she couldn’t trust. “Who’s this?” she asked, eyeing the little man between them.
    T he hard-decade man had scrunched his shoulders inward, and shifted his feet onto the hump over the drive shaft. Everything about him said, I’m just taking up space on the seat.
    “Forget him,” Adcock said.
    “Hardly.”
    “He’s hired help. Hired not-help’s more like it.”
    “Hey, Adcock, whadya want from me? I followed the doc up here, didn’t I? I spotted her Beemer. I found the motel.”
    “Button it, Weasel.”
    Weasel. How apt. “Adcock, how is it you’re right here waiting for me?”
    “I followed you and the sheriff till he turned off. Then I circled back here and parallelled your dust. Like tornado spotting. Did you see the boys? Are they in the desert brig over there?”
    “Slow down.”
    “What?”
    “If you could follow the dust, so can the sheriff. He’s over on the next road.” On this road it wouldn’t matter how fast they went. All the sheriff had to do was call ahead for a deputy to wait at the interstate. Adcock would have to cut overland somewhere. But she wasn’t ready to point that out. When he slowed the truck, she said, “I thought it was Grady Hummacher you were after. What made you shift your focus to the boys?”
    “Now that Grady’s dead, I’m responsible for them. I want to get them back to their own people.”
    The Weasel’s snort was so muted, it took Kiernan a moment to realize there hadn’t been merely a shift of weight in the truck. A retort was on her lips, but she kept quiet. When you’re in the only vehicle in sight in the middle of the desert and the United States Navy is gunning for you over the rise, it’s time for discretion. “How did you find out Grady was dead?”
    “Walked in and saw his body. So much blood around his