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“I don’t like being out of the loop,” he snarls. “I don’t like the way—”
“You know what I don’t like?” Carlos snaps. “Listening to you piss and moan about what you don’t like.”
I stifle a laugh.
“If you were in charge of this investigation,” Carlos says, “those bodies would still be underground, rotting in piss and shit. If you’d actually listened to me from the start, Parker Longbaugh might be in jail instead of making a run for it.”
Lightwood is stunned into silence.
“The only words I want to hear out of your mouth,” Carlos says, “are an apology. Are you going to apologize for letting a murderer slip through our fingers? Didn’t think so,” he adds, and he hangs up.
I stare at him in amazement.
“How did that feel?” I ask.
“Awesome,” he says, unable to stifle a grin.
“You know you could get in big trouble for that.”
He shrugs.
“Doesn’t matter,” he says. “If we catch Parker Longbaugh, we’re heroes. All is forgiven.”
“And if we don’t?” I ask.
“Our careers are probably over,” he says matter-of-factly.
“No pressure,” I joke and stare out the windshield as the grassy fields of Central Texas slowly dry up and are replaced by barren stretches of brown land peppered with sagebrush. Pump jacks lever up oil from the ground. The hazy layer of humidity on the horizon dissipates, and the sky grows bluer and bluer.
My body aches from the two-by-four-wielding thugs the other night, and fatigue threatens to pull me into sleep. But I tell myself I can’t crash yet. I have to see this through to the end.
Lieutenant Abrams calls me when we’re getting close.
“Captain Lightwood just filled me in on the latest,” he says solemnly.
I don’t say anything, expecting the kind of lecture Carlos just got. But Abrams surprises me.
“Anything I can do to help?”
“Not yet,” I say, relieved. “Thanks, Ty.”
He tells me that Border Patrol has been notified and all checkpoints into Mexico will be on the lookout for Parker. It’s nice to know Carlos and I have a safety net if we fail, but I bet Parker already thought of that and has his own contingency plan.
I just hope no one’s tipped him off and—if they have—they leaked the disinformation about us following a lead in Dallas.
When we’re getting close, Carlos exits the highway onto a neglected two-lane full of cracks and curves. He’s forced to slow down, but he still takes the bends as fast as the terrain will let him.
Far to the right, we can see a freight train—so long its cars stretch out of sight—riding near the top of a canyon. We can’t see the river from here, but we can tell the route it takes by the rocky lip of the gorge.
“You ready for this?” Carlos says, holding tight to the wheel with both hands.
Carlos and I have been through some serious situations together. He shouldn’t need to ask.
“I’m ready.”
“This is different than anything we’ve done before,” he says.
“What are you getting at?” I say as he swerves around a cluster of tumbleweeds blocking part of the road.
