Gathering Fallen Rocks Ch. 05

"Oh, did he go to see Santos?" Gail asked, thinking Howard's problems with Santos were over. "Did Pete arrest him?"

"No, he's investigating something else. He stopped to say we need to stay inside and lock up."

"Howard," Gail raised her voice, "What is going on? You're not telling me something. What's going on?"

"Damn, won't you let it rest? No, I guess you won't. Alright, some illegals were killed not far from here. An investigation team is coming to look at the area and there will be lots of law enforcement going through here. That's going to frighten any other illegals out there, you understand? Pete said we need to stay inside and not be a target. Now do you understand?"

"Alright. Okay. Then you can follow me out and when I'm on the highway, you can come back here or go to Frank's. Give me my keys. I just need to load my things and we can go."

Howard walked over to Gail, grabbed her upper arms, and gave her a little shake. "No, Gail, do you understand? No. You cannot unlock your truck and come inside for anything to carry out there. Someone could get into your truck and hide in your back seat or with the camping gear. If you try to drive out of here, they will stand in the road and you will stop rather than run over them. They will break your window and drag you out of the truck. They will rape you, slit your throat, cut you up, take your truck, and be in Iowa before anyone knows what happened. No, you cannot leave here, at least not until daylight. Do you understand?"

When she stood staring at him and did not respond, he shook her again. "Tell me you understand."

She nodded once, jerked out of his hands, and went to sit on the old rawhide bench, arms crossed against her chest, leaning back with her eyes closed.

Howard stood for a very long moment looking at Gail's stiff posture. He didn't know whether to go to her and try to reassure her, or leave her alone. Either way, he feared he wasn't going to be happy with the results. So he walked over and sat beside her. When she didn't even look at him, he moved over a little and put his arm around her shoulders.

"We're pretty good at yelling at each other, aren't we? Is that what your mother and father did?"

He was a little surprised to hear her chuckle, "Yeah, I guess so. I didn't understand then."

"I'm sorry, Gail. I shouldn't have said all those things. I guess I don't know enough about your life, but I want to know. I want to tell you about me, too."

Their attention was drawn to the sounds outside, of several cars or trucks going down the road, all of them rattling and creaking like vehicles customarily driven over rough and uneven ground. Passing by the house, the vehicles raised so much road dust it could be felt on their skin and tasted in the air.

They sat for a while longer, barely exchanging an occasional remark, then growing silent again until Howard said, "Come on, it's time to go to bed." He stood and offered his hand to Gail, led her to the big bed, and despite her objections that she should sleep on one of the narrow metal cots, Howard told her to take off her jeans and get under the covers. Then he walked across the room and turned off the lamp.

Gail stretched out, stiffly, taking deep breaths, waiting for the trembling to stop so she could relax and go to sleep. Just as she was growing drowsy, rolling over to her favorite sleeping position, someone outside began to pound on the door.

"Permítame en la casa." Then the same phrase was repeated again, "Permítame en su casa."

Gail sat up and whispered as quietly as she dared, "What does he want?" When Howard didn't immediately respond, she raised her voice, "Say something, what does he want?"

She heard the creak of the narrow metal cot as Howard got up to go to the door, raising his voice, "Váyase. Usted no puede entrar."

Gail was shaking. Her voice trembled as she asked Howard what they wanted, at the same time a second voice outside yelled,

She stumbled to the door, finding Howard in the darkness by his white boxer shorts. Gail grabbed Howard's arm and screamed, "Howard, what do they want?"

Howard put his hand over her mouth and said to the door, "Váyase, váyase."

He turned to Gail, and whispered, "They want me to let them in the house. The other one is yelling for me to open the door."

"What did you say? What did you tell them?"

"I told them to go away. I'm not going to let them in. Gail, go back to bed. They'll go away in a little while."

Gail grabbed Howard's arm trying to pull him across the room. "Get away from the door, they'll break it down."

"No," Howard whispered, a hint of laughter in his voice. "They won't break that door down. Even if they try, they'll never do it. The wood is four inches thick. They can't get in here. Too many of them and a bunch of Indians tried, for the past two hundred years. This is a fortress. Even if they break the kitchen window, it won't do any good, it's too small for anyone to get through."

He turned and put his arm around Gail, taking her to the corner, "Okay, in the bed."

"No." She pulled away from him as if to walk away. "I can't sleep, not with them out there. I'll ... I'll just go sit or something."

"Alright," he grabbed her hand, "Come on, I'll stay with you, just go to bed. Even if you can't sleep, at least you can rest."

He held the covers back and waited until she sat down and put her feet on the bed, but she didn't lie down. Howard walked to the other side and climbed in the bed, pulled her down, with her head on his shoulder.

"Okay, Sweetheart, it's okay, just try to relax, they're gone now. They're just looking for a place to hide. They'll go somewhere else."

"Howard, this is frightening. How do you stand it? Does Santos have anything to do with these people? Does he send them to harass you?"

"I don't know. It is possible Santos may know something about it, but he would have to be extremely careful. I know he has relatives, or perhaps they are only contacts, across the border. I don't know if he is involved in anything beyond bringing illegal immigrants into the United States and getting them away from the border. I believe he has some organization for doing it, trucks, drivers, and the like. If you can imagine that some of these people pay several thousand dollars for what they believe is safe, secure passage. It can be a pretty good cash business."

"Do you think he's involved in drugs?"

"Oh, I really don't know. I sort of doubt it," Howard answered. "He has good legal advice, we do know that much. There's never been any hint of Drug Enforcement people snooping around. At least that I know of. If any drug couriers go through his transportation business, they would have to be carrying very small amounts. He won't take anyone with baggage, not even a suitcase or a change of clothes. That's why you see so many clothes and backpacks around that big tree. They come over with two or three changes of clothes and take off whatever is dirty, trying to look clean and "American" when they get on the truck. I used to go out there every few months and pick up some of what they discard, but I'm not going to do that any more."

"Why not? I'd think you would want to get rid of the trash."

"Well, I don't have a way to get rid of it and every time I start a fire to burn it, some one calls it in as a brush fire. I don't have enough time either. I read something about the amount of trash that builds up in Arizona, its like eight pounds per person. But mostly, I'm getting worried about drug needles and disease from feces, baby diapers, or toilet paper. The trash includes hundreds of plastic water bottles, sweaters, jeans, shoes, razors, soap, food, even ropes and batteries, cell phones, radios, some pretty mean looking homemade weapons and on and on.

"We are getting worried about our livestock, because there are tons of over--the--counter medications out there. If some cow comes along and eats a bunch of pills, that would be a real sick animal. The trash also isn't good for wildlife. Birds get tangled up in it or eat it. Some ranchers make extra income from hunters, especially during white wing season, and they don't like it either.

"It's not often, but occasionally I'll find the trash in the stomach of an animal, like plastic bags and foil. I didn't used to look, but one of Billy's friends mentioned it and I've been opening stomachs, mostly out of curiosity, it's not fun to see a grass eater that swallowed a zip lock bag or wrapper from an energy bar.

"So, what do you do about it?"

Howard chuckled, "I could build a ten foot high brick wall, but they'd probably bring a ladder and then I'd have to add that to the trash pile."

"How do you stand it?"

"This is my land. I'm a little possessive about it. Come on, roll over, let's get a little sleep. I need to check on my cows tomorrow."

********

"Gail, oh Baby, don't do that. God, Baby, I'm trying to behave myself."

"Um-m-m," she responded sleepily, "I was dreaming. I could feel your hands."

Rolling her over, he was on top of her, resting his hardness against her heat. "See what you do to me." He moved against her. He was hard, so hard he hurt. He started kissing her and increased his exploration of her mouth when she responded, putting her arms around him, rubbing her hands up and down his back, reaching down as far as she could, pushing him tighter against her and lifting her hips.

She moved her hips up and down rubbing against him and mumbled, "Feels good."

He put his hand down between them, slipped his hand down inside her underwear, slid his finger between her labia and began to stimulate her, going around and around in a circle, as her breathing grew faster and faster. "Oh lord, you are so wet."