Primal Threat - Earl Emerson [64]
Muldaur scampered away in a crouch toward their camp. Zak thought about following him and getting his bike, but he couldn’t see riding out onto the road and exposing himself to rifle fire until he had a better idea of what the Jeep camp would do next.
Zak saw movement below, a man running in a squat across the road, only to disappear behind a large knob on the side of the hill, another man darting up the hillside toward them, throwing himself behind a log forty feet in front of the first. Both had rifles. One of them fired, and Zak heard a bullet ricochet off a nearby rock and whir into the distance.
“Good God,” said Stephens. “They’re shooting at us.”
“We could shoot back, except we don’t have a gun,” said Giancarlo, sarcastically.
Just then Muldaur returned and knelt in the weeds behind them. Zak heard a zipping sound, as if a match had been struck, and then a fizzing and a loud pop that made them all jump. Muldaur was setting off firecrackers, big ones. In quick succession he produced four loud pops.
“What the hell are you doing?” Stephens asked.
Below, the two riflemen turned around and sprinted past Morse’s body and then vanished along the spur road.
“They don’t quite sound the same as gunshots,” said Giancarlo. “At least not to the trained ear, but I don’t think we have any trained ears down there.”
“Where’d you get the firecrackers?” asked Zak.
“I always have a couple in my backpack when I’m in the mountains. I got chased by a bear once.”
“Now they think we’re shooting at them,” said Stephens. “This is only making things, I mean…This is worse than…We’re never going to be able to talk sense to them now.”
“In case you haven’t noticed, people who talk sense to them tend to have accidents,” said Zak.
“I’m inclined to get the hell out of here right this minute,” said Giancarlo. “This might be our only opportunity.”
“Scooter must have them all convinced we murdered their friend,” said Zak.
Muldaur looked at Stephens. “You want to sit here and wait for the sun to come around the mountain so you can work on your tan, fine, but I’m outta here.”
“Me, too,” said Zak.
“Ditto,” said Giancarlo.
28
“What the heck are we supposed to do now?” Roger Bloomquist yelled. “Those were shots. They’ve got more guns.”
Even though Fred and Scooter had been right on his heels after the shots erupted, Kasey was embarrassed over how quickly he’d scurried across the road to hide behind the trucks. He wasn’t sure if he’d incited the flight or if the others would have fled anyway, but he could still feel the adrenaline coursing through his veins, as if he just drank a whole bottle of Jolt. Standing behind the Ford in various postures of readiness, guns cocked, trying to pretend they weren’t embarrassed about their mad flight, the three of them avoided one another’s eyes. Kasey was angry that the cyclists had fired on him but even angrier over how frightened he’d become. Before today, he never imagined that sort of instant fear existed anywhere.
Adding to the tension, the dog was barking at a regular clip like a broken cog on a motor. “Shut up,” said Fred, who was breathing more heavily than the others. “Shut your mouth, Dozer!”
The dog ceased yapping but continued to strain against his chain.
“What happened?” Jennifer asked Scooter.
“They’re shooting at us.”
“Two or three shots,” said Fred. “I lost count.”
Scooter corrected him. “More like four or five. One of the bullets hit right near my head. I know why, too. I’m the witness they need to get rid of first.”
“There were three pops,” Kasey countered. “But I don’t know, they sounded kind of like firecrackers. And I didn’t hear any bullets hitting.”
“Firecrackers?” Scooter was livid. “If they were firecrackers, why did you run?”
“’Cause you ran.”
“You ran first.”
“No, you ran first.”
“Settle down,” said Fred. “You hear shots, you run. It’s common sense. And maybe they were firecrackers, but who’s going to take the chance?”
“We know they have guns,” said Scooter. “We already saw one. We don’t have any evidence they