Free Crazy Cool by Tara Janzen Page A

an engine approaching. He rose silently to his feet. It wasn’t a plane engine. It was a truck.
    He was drunk all right, but there was a part of his brain that was lucid, and it was in complete control as he slipped across the bar to the door. The night was pitch-black, and Rosalia was quiet, except for the approaching vehicle.
    A flash of light to his right brought his head around. Headlights were cutting through the trees, following the curve of the road leading into the village. There was no way to know who was coming, friend or enemy, so Kid waited, his body angled close to the door frame, the SAW ready.
    The vehicle’s speed was a bad sign. It wasn’t slowing down. When somebody opened fire before the truck even completed the last turn into the two-bit town, Kid automatically dove out the door and off the side of the porch. The thatched building was no protection from bullets.
    He hit the ground hard and rolling as a fusillade of automatic gunfire cracked and spat from the back of the truck in one long continuous burst, all of it aimed at the cantina. The flames of homemade incendiary grenades followed, arcs of flame flying through the air and landing with the crash of gasoline-filled soft-drink bottles—Molotov cocktails, South American style.
    His finger had tightened on the trigger, and the SAW was blazing in his hands. The fight was over in seconds, the truck careening out of Rosalia.
    Shit.
    His mind was clear now, crystal clear, the blood and adrenaline pumping through his veins, his heart pounding. Flat on his belly, staying absolutely still, he stared at the two lumps lying in the road, waiting to see if one of them moved. Off to his side, the cantina had gone up in a whoosh of flames, the thatch catching fire like tinder and engulfing the whole building in seconds.
    He wasn’t moving to save the drunk, who probably hadn’t survived the hundreds of rounds of automatic- weapon fire that had gone into the cantina—and he wasn’t moving to retrieve J.T.’s body. Hell, no. It was way too late to save his brother. He was going to let the fire be what it was: a funeral pyre.
    He took a breath, forcing himself to concentrate. The rush of instant fear and instant instinct was over, and the rotgut was flowing back into his brain. He took another breath and waited.
    They might come back.
    Hell, they
would
come back. He was getting the picture loud and clear. No more gringos were going to leave Rosalia alive, if the NRF rebels had their way.
    For two long minutes, Kid continued to lie absolutely still, hidden in the undergrowth of the jungle. Heat from the fire bellowed up with a slight breeze, nearly scorching him on one side, but he could take the heat. Bottles snapped and exploded inside, their contents adding fuel to the flames.
    One by one, the residents of the village appeared from out of the darkness, fearful, whispering. No attempt was made to save the cantina. It was already gone.
    When neither of the men in the road moved, he carefully got to his feet, swaying slightly. A throbbing pain at the side of his head brought his hand up to check it out. His fingers came away smeared with blood.
    Measuring every step, he pulled his sidearm from the holster on his hip and started forward. They looked dead, but Kid had been trained well, trained not to take chances. And it was training, rote and religious, that made him fire a single round into each man’s head.
    He stood there in the middle of the muddy track, his chest heaving, his heart breaking. Behind him, flames lit the night sky. J.T. was gone, completely gone. His warrior spirit purified in the flames of one last battle.
    It was over. Everything was over.
    Kid checked his watch. Dawn was only a few hours away. If he survived the rest of the night, Miguel would come and pick him up at dawn—and then he could go home. Home to Nikki.
    All he had to do was survive the rest of the night.
    W ELL
, Hawkins’s driving hasn’t changed at all,
Katya thought. Most