And, as they started off in the direction of the trucks, Morwood saw the sheriff smile to himself.

59

NORA SOON GOT into the rhythm of climbing, making one move at a time and then waiting. The cliff gradually got less sheer until at last she was able to scramble over the rim. Skip followed, crawling, and rolled on his back. “Son of a bitch,” he said, gasping.

“Where are we going?” Corrie asked. “We can’t just run away aimlessly.”

“The closest inhabited town has got to be San Antonio,” Nora said. “Forty miles, at least.”

“We can talk while we move,” said Skip, rising to his feet.

They set off, running along the ridgeline. It curved to the north, carrying them deeper into the mountains, which loomed up like black sawblades above them.

“Pretty soon the general’s going to unleash all sorts of shit on us,” said Corrie. “We can’t hide for long, even in the mountains. We’ve got to have a plan.”

“Agreed,” said Skip. “But what?”

Nobody answered. There was no plan, except to keep moving, Nora thought. Forty miles to San Antonio? That was absurd: they’d have to cross the Jornada del Muerto desert on foot to get there, one of the worst deserts in the country. They wouldn’t survive that without water, even if not being chased by drones. But where else could they go?

They continued along the ridge, as fast as they dared given the darkness. Within a quarter of an hour, Nora—glancing back—noticed lights begin to appear.

“See that?” she said.

“Let’s drop down into the next valley,” Skip said. He headed down a sloping hillside and the two women followed, trying to maintain their footing in the darkness and loose scree. They reached the bottom of the draw, a sandy wash lined with prickly scrub. Skip turned and headed downstream.

“We’re not that far from the old Gower Ranch house,” said Nora.

“Could we take refuge there?” Corrie asked, but then answered her own question. “No—too obvious.”

Nora glanced back again. The lights were maybe a half mile away.

“We’re not going to outrun them,” Corrie said.

“We keep moving,” said Skip. “And lose them. If we don’t, we’re dead.”

The narrow valley broadened into a small plain dotted with hills and piles of rock. The lights appeared behind them once again. Suddenly, Nora heard a zing! followed by the report of a rifle. They threw themselves down in the grass as more rounds snapped and whined around them.

“The bastards must have night vision scopes,” said Corrie. She ran at a crouch, and Nora and Skip followed. Another volley of rounds struck around them, but the distance was too great for an accurate shot. In a moment they had taken cover behind a hill, gasping for breath.

Nora looked up. With no light pollution and no moon, the sky was bedazzled with stars. From their vantage point she could see out over the Jornada del Muerto, a vast pool of blackness … with just one tiny cluster of lights off to one side, at the base of a mass of mountains.

“Hey—you see that? Those lights?” Nora asked, pointing.

“It looks like some sort of outpost,” said Skip.

“Outpost?” Nora repeated. “Way out here at the end of the Sierra Oscura? That has to be Abajo Peak. Even for a place like WSMR, that’s the middle of nowhere.”

Corrie stared. “Wait. What did you say?”

Nora frowned in confusion. “Huh?”

“Go over that geography again. Quickly.”

“Sierra Oscura. Abajo Peak—”

“That’s it. You remember I told you about that navy guy I met in a bar?”

“Yes,” said Nora.

“He said he worked at a small communications station inside White Sands, west of Abajo Peak.”

Nora squinted into the dark mass of mountains. “If so, that must be it.”

“A navy station?” Skip asked dubiously. “Here, in the desert?”

“They use it to communicate with nuclear subs. What did he call it? ELF station, or extremely low frequency. The radio waves go all the way through the Earth to subs even on the other side.”

“Wow,” said Skip. “You learn something every day.”

“Okay. That’s where we’ll go.” And Corrie gathered herself to run.

“And what will that get us?” Nora asked. “We’ll just be turning ourselves in.”

“They’re navy,” said Corrie. “On army land. The two don’t get along. If we can make it there, perhaps we can blow the whistle on the general.”

Nora shook her head. “Fat chance. You think the navy would believe us—over the commanding general of the whole damn place?”

“You got a better idea?”

Skip interrupted. “Look. It’s not like we have a choice. We go there, try to explain what’s going on. Take our chances. It’s better than having a drone turn us into wet spots on the desert floor.”

“Agreed,” said Corrie.

Nora shrugged. It was, she admitted, better than getting hunted down—if they could reach that little cluster of lights.

“This way,” Corrie said. She led them at a run toward a series of ravines coming down from the mountains. They entered a boulder field, a complicated braid of alluvial deposits and channels, which made for slow going but at least provided better cover. Looking back, Nora could no longer see the lights.