Wolfrunner's eyes were steady, unblinking. Your your face said it that first night. And a man who lives alone in the desert five years does not do so because he likes the quiet. He does so because something took everything else away from him first. Wade set down the bucket he'd been holding.
His hands had gone cold despite the heat. "My wife," he said finally, the words coming out rougher than he meant them to. "Everybody said Apache Raid. I believed it. Never once questioned it.
Not properly. Not the way I should have. And now, now I've got a piece of metal that says otherwise. And I don't know what in God's name to do with that." Wolfrunner held the fragment out.
Then we find out together. I know a man at the trading post, Dobs. He deals gun, ammunition, information, whatever pays. If this piece has a story, he will know part of it. Even if he does not know he knows it, they rode out the next morning, just the two of them. three hours to the trading post through heat that hadn't let up once in five days.
Dobs looked up from behind his counter when the bell over the door rang, and his easy smile faltered just slightly at the sight of Wolfrunner standing in his doorway. Wade, he said carefully. Didn't expect you back so soon. And didn't expect company. He's with me, Wade said.
Got a question for you, Dobs. Need you to look at something. He set the fragment on the counter. Dobs picked it up, turned it over, and something crossed his face quick. Gone almost before Wade caught it, but not quite fast enough.
Where'd you come by this? Dobs asked, too casual by half. Found it out past the East Canyon. You recognize the make? Can't say that I do.
Except Wade had known this man three years, traded with him a dozen times, and he knew the way you know weather changing in your own bones exactly what a lying face looked like on Dobs. Because Dobs never once in 3 years failed to identify a piece of metal that crossed his counter. Man made his living knowing exactly that. Dobs, Wade said, quiet, dangerous in a way his own voice surprised him with. I've known you three years.
Never once seen you not know a gun part on sight. Try again. Dobs set the fragment down slow. Looked between Wade and Wolfrunner, weighing something behind his eyes that Wade didn't much care for the shape of. There's a group, Dobs said finally.
Voice dropped low even though the store was empty. Been through here twice this year. Ex-military most of them. Buy rifles, ammunition, pay in cash. Nobody asks too many questions about.
Man who leads them calls himself colonel. Never gives a full name. Asks a lot of questions about water out this way. Springs, streams, where the tribes are settling and why. Wade's blood went cold, then hot, then cold again.