The Last Hard Men - Brian Garfield [58]
Portugee was breathing fast. His urgent need showed in his trousers. Gant, hot in the face, walked up and dropped his trousers and stood staring at Susan. Gant held his erection in his hand.
Susan sat frozen with dread, sweating, quivering in every rigid limb.
Quesada shouldered past Shelby and went up the slope after them. “I want a piece of this.”
Menendez looked on with sneering contempt. Taco Riva refused to watch: he turned his back and began savagely currying one of the horses. Shelby stood rooted, drenched in sweat and rage.
Will Gant said, “You first, Portugee. I want to watch.”
Portugee didn’t even take down his pants. He just opened his fly and dropped to his knees. He put his hand on Susan’s breast and smiled.
Susan closed her eyes. She sagged to the ground, drawn up like a sick, aged wreck. Shelby couldn’t even tell if she was conscious.
Provo wasn’t even watching them. Provo was watching Shelby. The gun was rock steady in Provo’s hands. Shelby’s fingernails cut into his palms.
Portugee ripped Susan’s shirt open and kneaded her breasts brutally. He was going to take her roughly, as if to reassure himself he was the equal of any other man. He shoved her back against the earth and Shelby heard him say, “Spread her legs out and hold her feet down.” Quesada did it.
Suddenly the girl moved. She made a grab for the knife in Portugee’s belt scabbard. She got it out and whipped it toward his belly.
The tip drew blood. Portugee snapped both hands around her wrist and twisted in opposite directions. The knife fell from her hand and Shelby heard her suck wind in through her teeth. Her head rocked back and her eyes rolled back in her head. Shelby saw her go limp and knew she had lost consciousness.
It didn’t stop them.
Ten
Burgade lay on the ground stunned. His head thundered with pain. He opened his eyes to slits. Light streamed down through the trees, its color very rich.
He saw Hal fingering the field glasses in his lap. They trembled in Hal’s hands. Breath hissed and sawed in and out of him. “I can’t look, either,” Hal said. His face was a twisted ugly mask of anguish and fury.
Burgade wiped his sleeve across his eyes. He rolled over and made a grab for the rifle.
Hal planted his foot on Burgade’s wrist. “No, sir. I don’t want to hit you again.”
“You should have let me shoot.”
“You might have hit Susan. At this range you can’t—”
“Then let me get closer! In God’s name, man—”
“There’s no God,” Hal said. “Not out there.”
Burgade struggled to free his wrist. Hal reached out and picked up the rifle. “No. There’s seven of them.”
“Leave me alone!”
“Sir,” Hal said, his voice shaking, “that’s what they want.”
“Then let them have it!” He jerked his arm free and rolled over.
Hal jumped him, pinned him to the ground. “Get hold of yourself. They haven’t killed her.”
Burgade lay with his face pinned against the ground. A twig dug into his cheek. He heard the rasp of his own, breathing. The pulse thudded in his throat. Hal said in a soft hiss, with calculated brutality, “Women have been fucked before. She can survive it if we can.”
Through the red haze of grief and unthinking total anger, Burgade felt a twinge of awe: that this young man, who loved her, could take it so coolly.
His eyes brimmed: he wept.”
“Are you all right now?”
“Yes.”
Hal let him up. He sat up and wiped dirt and leaves off himself numbly. “What are they doing now?”
“Nothing.”
“What about Susan?”
“She’s lying where they left her. I don’t think she knew what they were doing. I think she fainted. It’s just as well.”
Burgade reached for the field glasses. “Is she—”
“She’s got her clothes on, what’s left of them.