Hawk—Otra Vez (Part 3 of 3 Parts)

markwildyr.com, Post #116

Complications, complications, complications. Last week, Hawk found Ramon and whisked him into hiding. Now what happens? Ramon is a fugitive now, so that places Hawk in danger, as well. How can this possibly end?

Next week, I’ll return to publishing every first and third Thursday.

*****

HAWK—OTRA VEZ

Part 3

The next day was merely routine patrol. Hawk, never as talkative as his buddy, kept his silence. Around midday, Grove glanced at Hawk and growled in exasperation. “Shit, you went looking for the Mexican kid last night, didn’t you? You musta looked all night because you’re asleep on your feet. Lean back and catch forty. I’ll keep my eyes peeled.”

Hawk did just that.

Hs kept delaying a decision over what to do about Ramon. At first, because the boy needed to recover from exposure and dehydration. Then he found other excuses to delay a decision. Ramon had been cooped up in Hawk’s house for almost a month when Grove pushed Hawk into a corner.

“Let’s go across the border and visit the cat house.”

“Man, I’m running short this month.”

“Yeah, me, too. Okay, tell you what. Let’s call Sheila and Berry for a couple of rounds at the Mesa and then take them back to your pad.”

Fearing a refusal would excite suspicion, Hawk agreed. They reported in and made ready to leave.

“Pick you up at your place in a few, bro!” Grove said on the way out the door.

Hawk had his mouth open protest when the boss called him inside the office to ask his opinion of two new applicants Amadeo had been interviewing. After Hawk put in his two cents, he worried about Grove showing up at his place before he got home. Using the phone on the desk he and Grove shared to dial his house, he let it ring once, hung up and dialed again. Ramon answered.

“Gotta talk fast. Got roped into going to the Blue Mesa with my partner this evening. Couldn’t get out of it. And  Grove wants bring the girls back to the house later. I hate to ask this, but when we pull up can you go to the barn and wait in that emergency hideaway we fixed up?”

“Sure. Ramon hide in barn while Hawk fuck puta.” Hurt and distaste laced the boy’s voice. “Sorry, Hawk. Ramon know you have to put up face for others. He hide.”

“Thanks. Grove is coming to the house to pick me up, but I oughta get there before he does, okay?”

Hawk hung up the phone and headed out the door to find the Dodge sitting at an odd angle. He’d picked up a nail somewhere on the way to work this morning. It took twenty minutes to change the tire. When Hawk pulled into his own driveway, Grove’s pickup was sitting at the curb. He got out and explained about the flat. Grove didn’t seem interested.

“You got company?”

“No, why?”

“Got the impression somebody’s in there.”

“Look, I’m a mess. I need to clean up. Why don’t you meet the girls, and I’ll be there as quick as I can. We can’t all ride in your pickup anyway.”

“Berry wants to show off her new Taurus. She’s picking us up here.”

Hawk mentally cursed as he stomped across the porch and made a show of unlocking the door. There was no sign of Ramon when he entered.

“Damn, you keep a clean place,” Grove commented, looking around the spotless living room and wandering the rest of the small house. No doubt he was checking the place out. Hawk was pulling on a clean set of jeans when the women arrived in a bright red Ford. He scrambled to get outside before they could come in.

Grove was his usual lively self, and it proved infectious. Hawk tried calling the house with his special ring a couple of times, but there was no answer. The party accelerated. The four of them stopped just short of being blasted but escaped the place without getting into a fight, although Grove almost managed it a couple of times. Hawk breathed a silent prayer of thanks when Berry took them to her apartment.

The girls dropped them off at Hawk’s place well after midnight. Grove asked to come inside and use the restroom, although normally he wouldn’t have been bashful about watering the azaleas, if there had been any azaleas. Probably wanted to see inside of the house again. Grove left the bathroom door open while he pissed, sounding like a garden hose filling a galvanized bucket.

After his friend left, Hawk found Ramon hiding in the barn, cold and unhappy.

“La Migra come for Ramon now?” the boy asked.

Hawk frowned. “No. INS isn’t coming. Why’d you ask that?”

“But Ramon have to go now.” The boy’s voice broke.

“Sooner or later you’ll have to, we both knew that,” Hawk said soothingly.

“Hawk no understand. Hawk compadre, he see Ramon.”

“What!”

“Ramon hear truck. He go to window, pull back cortinas, and look right at this Grove. He look back at Ramon.”

“Shit!” Hawk swore.

“Ramon sorry.” He paused. “He muy handsome, that Grove. Pretty like Hawk, but not so big. Hawk do things with him?”

“No.”

“But Hawk like to do it with him, no?” Ramon blurted, striking uncomfortably close to the truth.

“Ramon. I have a little savings. We can get you a place across the border. I’ll come be with you when I can.”

The look in the boy’s eyes went straight to Hawk’s heart. “Ramon no be Hawk’s puta.”

“Be reasonable, Ramon. Tomorrow Grove’s going to ask me about you. He thinks you’re an old girlfriend’s little brother. He’ll understand me helping you, but not living here indefinitely. It’s different now, kid. You’re a wanted fugitive. You escaped from custody. When they catch you, you’ll be sent to a federal prison. But if you’ll let me get you a place across the border—”

“No! Ramon no sit home and wait for Hawk. Ramon love Hawk. If no be in Hawk life, is better go back home to Durango.”

Hawk blinked as he saw something precious slipping away. “Look, we don’t have to do anything right away. Let’s think about it and do the rational thing.”

“Ramon leave while Hawk work tomorrow. Best.”

“Promise me you won’t do that. If you have to go back, I’ll take you myself. I don’t want you on that desert.” He tried to lighten the mood. “Let’s go to bed and talk again tomorrow.”

Grove was waiting for him in the parking lot the next morning. “You get rid of the Mexican kid?”

“Damn, Grove, I can’t just throw him to the wolves.”

“What’s the matter with you, Hawk? You’re jeopardizing your job, maybe even your freedom. Why didn’t you ask for my help? Don’t you trust me?”

Hawk stopped dead in his tracks. “That hurt, Grove. I didn’t to involve you because it might jeopardize your career? Helping Ramon is something I gotta do, but I can’t ask you to risk yourself.”

“That’s what friends are for. Anyway, you know you’ve got to do something, don’t you?”

Hawk sighed and accepted the reality of the situation. “I’ll take him back across tomorrow.”

“Better drive to California and take him across at Tijuana. Busier there. Nogales is too close. Word might get back to someone here.”

Hawk worked the day in what was just short of despair. Grove seemed to understand, because he kept talk to a minimum.

He was half-afraid Ramon would be gone when he got home that evening. Instead, the boy had cooked a good dinner, but Ramon’s eyes were puffy, and Hawk suspected he’d been crying.

Now, the kid tried to man-up. “When we go?”

“Early tomorrow. I’ll drive you to San Diego and we’ll cross at Tijuana. Where will you go, Ramon? What will you do?”

“Go home. Get job. Ramon damn good man, he find job.”

After dinner they cleaned the kitchen together and watched a little TV. Long before Hawk’s customary bedtime, Ramon looked over at him and put together a complete sentence in flawless English. “Will you make love to me?”

Without a word, Hawk led the youth to bed and mounted him gently, face-to-face, and with a smile his lips. Soon the joy of the occasion overtook the gravity of Ramon’s mood, and the boy returned the smile. The orgasm, when it came, was no less forceful because of the tender nature of their loving. Ramon stayed Hawk’s hand, keeping him from drawing the boy’s seed from his body. Ramon clasped him to his breast for a long time, neither speaking nor moving. At length, he released Hawk to go clean up.

While Hawk was in the shower, Ramon opened the curtain and stepped inside. Taking the soap from Hawk, he lathered his lover from pate to sole. He shyly asked Hawk to turn around and laved the deep cleft, soaping all the way to the sphincter. After he took a rag and rinsed away the soap, he spoke.

“Ramon never forget Hawk. He see bird high in air, he think of Hawk. He see falcon in tree, he ache for Hawk.”

Hawk leaned into the wall and parted his feet as Ramon hugged his back and thrust his groin at Hawk’s buns without penetrating them. The boy’s breath in his ear became ragged, his words unintelligible. Hawk understood his young lover was seeking a moment he could savor forever. Without thinking about it, he relaxed his muscles, parted his cheeks and endured the pain even as he savored the startled expression of disbelief and wonder escaping Ramon’s throat. Hawk sensed the boy becoming the man.

The beauty of Ramon’s parting gift bled Hawk’s strength away. Without warning, the boy exploded, shuddered, and withdrew. As Hawk turned to him, Ramon slid down the side of the shower all the way to the floor, his legs splayed in front of him, a look of utter joy on his face. Hawk joined him and held him close, allowing the spray of clean water to shower them anew.

Without understanding how, Hawk knew he’d made the future better for this beautiful Mexican youth. His mind centered on the boy’s name. Aguila… Eagle. This night, Ramon had become an Eagle for his Hawk.

*****

Heartbreaking but tender ending, and one that is safer for Ramon… and incidentally, Hawk, as well. They government really does put some return offenders in federal prisons for stays of six months or longer. And often, young ones like Ramon are used violently by their older and stronger fellow inmates.

But what about Grove? What in the world’s going to happen there? And can you imagine the impact when… and if… two strong men like Curtis Huntinghawk and Grover Whitedeer get together? Maybe one of these days I’ll get around to posting that story.

Please consider ordering Cut Hand and Johnny Two-Guns from Dreamspinner Press. I’d like to convince them to publish the rest of the Cut Hand Series, including the unpublished manuscript Wastelakapi… Beloved, It’ll take some help from readers to get Dreamspinner interested.

My contact information is provided below in case anyone wants to drop me a line:

Website and blog: markwildyr.com

Email: markwildyr@aol.com

Facebook: www.facebook.com/mark.wildyr

Twitter: @markwildyr

The following are buy links for CUT HAND:

DSP Publications: https://www.dsppublications.com/books/cut-hand-by-mark-wildyr-420-b

Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Cut-Hand-Mark-Wildyr-ebook/dp/B073D86RWV

iBooks: https://itunes.apple.com/book/cut-hand/id1256084273

Kobo: https://www.kobo.com/ca/en/ebook/cut-hand-2

And now my mantra: Keep on reading. Keep on writing. You have something to say, so say it!

Until next time.

Mark

New posts at 6:00 a.m. on the first and third Thursday of each month.

Hawk—Otra Vez (Part 2 of 3 Parts)

markwildyr.com, Post #115

  

Today, let’s find out if Hark can help Ramon, who was in the custody of La Migra the last time we saw him. And if he can, will it simplify his life or complicate it? Read on.

I’ll publish weekly until this story is finished.

*****

HAWK—OTRA VEZ

Part 2

The whole unit celebrated that evening. They’d caught five of the six breakaway drug runners. Only one had gotten safely across the border. And they’d scared up a bunch of illegals to boot. It was the “to boot” that was troubling Hawk. He walked out to his Dodge pickup to be alone and think, but Grove was right on his heels.

“Hey, bro, who were you looking at in that bunch of wetbacks this morning? Couldn’t be the woman, she looked like my old Aunt Martha. You see one of our drug guys?”

“A kid I knew.”

“Knew him how?”

“Brother of a woman I met when I first got here. She worked in one of the shops but went back before you’n me started running together.”

“Well, if she was as pretty as her brother, you shoulda held onto her.”

Damn, Grove didn’t miss a thing. His buddy knew exactly who he’d had been looking at. Hawk embellished his lie. “Looked just like him. That’s the only way I recognized the kid.”

“What’s his name?”

“Ramon Aguila.”

“Aguila, huh? Looked more like a cat dragged out of the river than an eagle.

Grove dropped it when they joined the others at the Blue Mesa where Amadeo was buying a round for his unit. Hawk left before the party degenerated into a riot and drove by the detention center where the INS held illegals while they checked them out. If Ramon had been caught in Colorado and deported, this would be his second deportation. They might end up giving him some jail time. At any rate, the kid wouldn’t be eligible to cross legally now. Despite the temptation, Hawk didn’t stop and make inquiries. Unusual curiosity would raise flags that wouldn’t do him or Ramon any good. He’d have to give this one some thought.

He did not sleep well that night. The sight of Ramon Aguila sitting in the dirt, his big, brown eyes following Hawk’s every move, voicing a silent plea for help played like a broken reel of film over and over in his head. The kid had grown some but was still as pretty as any girl Hawk had ever seen. Pretty, hell. He was fucking beautiful. Had to be around nineteen now.

Hawk dragged himself out of bed in time to greet the morning star, but he sipped his coffee like a zombie, failing to appreciate the Creator’s wonders this morning. He was uncharacteristically late pulling into the headquarters parking lot that morning. If there was one thing he had learned, it was the white man’s clock. The palefaces forgave a lot, but not for keeping them waiting. So he’d overcome his tendency to “Indian time” and become a slave to the minute hand. Grove met him at the door with their assignment for the day, so Hawk didn’t even get a second cup of coffee.

‘You hear?” Grove asked before they were out of the parking lot. “Seven of them got away.”

“Seven? We only caught six?”

“Seven of the illegals. Guess they walked in the front door of the detention center and right out the back door. Wonder if your friend was one?”

Hawk feigned disinterest. “Dunno. If he was, hope he makes it back to his sister.”

As they kept an eye on their section of the huge desert and the things that crossed it, Hawk had a moment of panic when they came upon two of the escaped illegals. He bit his tongue to keep from asking about Ramon, but Grove did it for him. The two wetbacks acknowledged that Ramon Aquila had run away with them. Hawk didn’t know of that was good news or bad. Although the Rezes’ commission was not for hunting illegals, they dropped the two escapees back at the detention center for fear they’d come to grief in the desert.

“You’re worried about the kid, aren’t you?” Grove asked as they checked in at Rez headquarters at the end of shift.

“Shit, Grove, I’m worried about all of them. A lot of wetbacks die out there.”

“But it’s different when it’s somebody you know. Want me to help you look for him?”

“Not much we can do for him now. Maybe one of the patrols will find him. Thanks, anyway.”

That evening Hawk cleaned up, ate some stew, and sat on the porch in the growing cold. A northern plains Indian, Hawk was continually amazed at how this place was a furnace by day and an icebox by night, but he liked it. He hadn’t realized his subconscious had been working on Ramon’s problem until he suddenly got up, grabbed a couple of coats and his rifle, and went to the Dodge. He drove as close as possible to The Dragon’s Back, a jumble of high rocks in the middle of nowhere. He closed the door to the cab quietly and approached the silent hills on foot. This was the highest spot anywhere close by, and it held an unmarked water source, a small spring known to only a few locals. It was also close to the spot where he first met Ramon and the place where Hawk had taken the boy for water. If Ramon didn’t make for Hawk’s place, he would try for the spring.

The rock saddle holding the water hole was deserted except for an aggressive javelina that wasn’t about to let some redskin cheat him out of his drink. Hawk looked around carefully since the viscous little pigs normally traveled in packs. This one seemed to be the exception and went off squealing and grunting to himself when Hawk wouldn’t abandon the place. He propped his back against a rock in the deep shadows and settled down to wait. He was good at waiting.

Hawk woke from a light sleep when he heard the boy… or at least some human. No self-respecting animal would announce his approach so loudly. By the light of the moonlight, he watched Ramon make his unsteady way up the high ground, slipping and sliding on loose rock. The boy fell on his belly and sucked loudly at the water in the small pool. Hawk let him have a good drink before he spoke the boy’s name quietly.

The youth whirled. ¿Quien es? Hawk? That you, Hawk?” the light baritone broke slightly.

“Hi, kid,” Hawk said, rising to his feet.

“Hawk! Thank Dios!” The boy rushed to him and threw his arms around him. “Oh, Hawk! ¡Mi amor!” The youth reached up and pulled Hawk’s lips down to his, wincing in pain. As the cracked, blistered lips pressed against his own, Hawk responded gently. The boy drew away. “Maybe Hawk don’t want—”

“I want,” Hawk answered quietly. “I want very much!”

Hawk pulled out his cache of emergency supplies he kept hidden in the rocks and made them comfortable. Ramon ate from the tins of food ravenously. Then he stripped naked and endured the cold night air and frigid waters to bathe in the small stream below the pool. When he walked to where Hawk sat on the blankets. Hawk covered his shivering body and held him close, lending his warmth. At length, Ramon looked up at him.

“You fuck me now, Halcón. I clean now.”

Hawk drew him down into the blankets and roved the boy’s long, lean frame, remembering the beautiful brown flesh, each mole and every scar. Finally, Ramon turned on his belly. As Hawk entered him slowly, Ramon stretched and purred with pleasure.

“Is long time, Hawk. Ramon miss you so much he hurt in his cojones some time.” He groaned pleasantly. “Ramon still love Hawk… much. Muy, muy much!”

Six months ago, Hawk would not have hesitated in declaring his feelings, but now a conflict raged within him. He had once loved the boy. Did he still? Certainly he was fond of him, wanted him, needed him. But thoughts of Grove intruded. At length, he murmured. “I love you too, Ramon.” It was true, but the nature of his love had changed.

The warmth of their lovemaking spread from Hawk’s groin into his torso, exciting and sensitizing his nipples, causing him to rub them against the boy’s smooth back. It spread to his legs as he pressed against Ramon’s thighs, seeking maximum contact. The boy hooked his lower legs over Hawk’s calves. Chemical and electrical impulses flooded his brain. Hawk’s loved with his entire body, his being. He gloried in the difference between this and casual sex of his recent trip to Phoenix. Hawk and Ramon enjoyed one another because they loved, each in his own way… Ramon without reservations; Hawk withholding some part of himself. Orgasm, when it came rocked him more than expected.

Ramon, shoved hard against the blanket with Hawk’s last thrust and gave a long, satisfied sigh.

“Is good, Hawk. More good than I remembered.” Almost instantly, the boy fell asleep in a pool of his own semen.

“I missed you, too,” Hawk whispered as he kissed a brown ear. Aware Ramon could no longer hear him, he continued. “More than I can tell you. I’m not very good at saying things, but that doesn’t mean I don’t feel them.”

In the middle of the night, Hawk roused an exhausted Ramon and half carried the boy to his pickup. The handsome youth fell asleep again the moment Hawk tucked him into bed in the spare room. Sometime later, Ramon crawled into bed with him to absorb warmth and comfort.

*****

Looks like Hawk didn’t get his little Eagle out of INS’ clutches. The kid did it himself. But now he’ll need Hawk’s help. Can Hawk provide it? Can he stop himself from trying? And where does Grover Whitedeer fit in now? Tune in next week for the answer to everything. Well, almost everything.

Please consider ordering Cut Hand and Johnny Two-Guns from Dreamspinner Press. I’d like to convince them to publish the rest of the Cut Hand Series, including the unpublished manuscript Wastelakapi… Beloved, It’ll take some help from readers to get Dreamspinner interested.

My contact information is provided below in case anyone wants to drop me a line:

Website and blog: markwildyr.com

Email: markwildyr@aol.com

Facebook: www.facebook.com/mark.wildyr

Twitter: @markwildyr

The following are buy links for CUT HAND:

DSP Publications: https://www.dsppublications.com/books/cut-hand-by-mark-wildyr-420-b

Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Cut-Hand-Mark-Wildyr-ebook/dp/B073D86RWV

iBooks: https://itunes.apple.com/book/cut-hand/id1256084273

Kobo: https://www.kobo.com/ca/en/ebook/cut-hand-2

And now my mantra: Keep on reading. Keep on writing. You have something to say, so say it!

Until next time.

Mark

New post at 6:00 a.m. on each Thursday of the month until this serialized story is completed..

Huntinghawk, a Short Story (Part 1 of 3 Parts)

markwildyr.com, Post #102

Courtesy of Wikipedia.com

Some of you have asked for more of Huntinghawk, so I’ve gone back to my series of stories featuring Curt Huntinghawk. There are six of them, so we might spend some time with the big Indian. Whenever you tire of him, let me know. Here we go with the first part of the first story I wrote about him.

*****

HUNTINGHAWK

          Curt Huntinghawk found the print in soft sand between fragments of tufa. He almost missed the mark left by a boot with a deep gash in the heel because it was in the shadow of a cholla spine. It was clear though. Almost too clear. He lifted his head and searched the ridge as the hair on the nape of his neck bristled. The Phantom, or El Espectro, as he was known by the rest of the group, was too canny for a mistake like this. Hawk had his own private name for the drug-runner… Wolverine, after the pugnacious, tenacious, tough beast of Hawk’s own north country.

           A member of a group of Native Americans—a term he detested since anyone born in America was one—Huntinghawk was employed by the Border Patrol to track smugglers along the Mexican border. Dubbed the “stragglers” or “slowpokes” by the locals because they followed along behind people they tracked, the unit adopted the name Rezagados Colorados… Red Stragglers.

          Hawk, as everyone dubbed him, considered the year he had been with them the most interesting and challenging in his life. Of course, prior to this, that had consisted mostly of some logging and warming the benches in various employment offices while he tried to stay out of trouble.

          Right now, Hawk figured he’d found new trouble. Wolverine would know someone was on his trail learning his habits and slowly closing in on him. As Wolverine was almost certainly a local, he could not permit this. Hawk scanned the flats of the Lower Sonoran desert. A smuggler’s road ran five miles to the north. A mile to the west was an unmarked water source located in some rocky hills called the Dragon’s Back. The Mexican border lay south, and ten miles to the east lay the closest town. It was mid-day, so town was not an option for the Wolverine. The print pointed north, but Hawk was betting on the water, a clear, pure spring that bubbled up in the hilly rocks and trickled through an arroyo a mile or so before evaporating beneath the hot Sonoran sun.

          The Rezagados were not peace officers; they carried government ID’s as protection instead of side arms. Most of them lugged a personal hunting rifle when tracking traficantes as a more substantial shield against harm… for snakes, they claimed when questioned.

          Hawk rested his Winchester in the crook of his arm, tugged his broad brimmed hat more firmly on his head and turned his steps westward, traveling fast. The closer to the waterhole he got, the more his hackles raised. In the grip of some internal alarm, Hawk suddenly dropped to the ground and wiggled his way to a small boulder that provided better than the thin cover of the surrounding mesquite and paloverde. Crawling around the rock he halted abruptly. Coiled in the shade of the rock was the granddaddy of all rattlesnakes. Obviously irritated by his presence, the snake struck with barely a warning rattle. Hawk threw himself backwards, snatching his hat from his head and throwing it straight into the dripping fangs. Something slammed him violently in the head, and he rolled unconscious into an arroyo.

           Noises penetrated his foggy brain, setting nerves on edge. Damn, can’t a man get some sleep? Sleep? He fought his eyes open and winced from the brilliance of the late afternoon sun. He was flat of his back on the floor of a shallow gulch. Standing almost at his feet, staring at him with bugged eyes, was a young man. When Hawk struggled to his elbows, the youth turned and fled down the wash. Shit! No wonder the kid ran. Hawk was as naked as the day he was born.

          “¡Ven!” he croaked. “¡Ven aqui! No estoy La Migra.” The kid was almost certainly an illegal, and Hawk tried to assure him he wasn’t looking for wetbacks.

          A cautious head appeared around a bend of the arroyo. Slowly, the kid stumbled forward, and Hawk saw the youth was in little better shape than he was.

          “¿Quien esta?” the boy asked. “¿Porque lo desnudo?”

          Hawk crawled uncertainly to his feet, too groggy to worry about his nakedness. “Sorry, don’t speak your lingo. Just a few words.”

          “Oh,” the boy said. “Who you are?” he asked in heavily accented English. “Why you no clothes?”

          “Bad guy shot me,” Hawk explained, not sure that was true. Maybe Wolverine got close enough to simply club him. “Stripped me and left me to die.”

          “Oh,” the youth said again, stepping closer and peering at Hawk’s forehead. The Indian put a hand to where the boy’s brown eyes were focused: it came away with dried blood.

          “Damn!” Hawk breathed. That was a close thing. He had been shot. The bullet must not have actually struck him, but passed close enough so that the concussion did the damage. He looked around and found a smoldering pile of ashes, all that remained of his clothing. There was no sign of his boots, but his billfold lay nearby, identification and credit cards intact. Half buried in sand behind a two-hundred-year-old saguaro, Hawk found the rifle Wolverine had not seen. He steadied himself by leaning on the barrel and tried to assess the situation. A finger tapping his broad chest brought his attention back to the boy.

          “¿Agua?” the boy asked, moving his finger to his dry lips. “Wa…ter?”

          Hawk pointed his chin to the west. “Over there. Not far. Half a mile. But it’ll be slow going.” He opened the breech to the rifle and blew out dirt. Satisfied, he levered in a cartridge and turned to find the boy studying him. Hawk was reminded of his nakedness, but there wasn’t much he could do about it until he got to the waterhole where he had emergency supplies stashed… if Wolverine hadn’t plundered them.

          Hawk led the way, going slowly to avoid prickly pear and thistles and sharp rocks… and that damned rattlesnake! Once the boy stumbled against him, and Hawk pulled him into the hollow of his arm for mutual support. It took over an hour to reach the spring. The boy fell to the side of the small pool and lapped greedily at the cool liquid. Hawk allowed him a decent drink before pulling him away.

          “Not too much, you’ll get sick. Wait a few minutes and then take another drink, okay? Understand? “¿Comprende?”

          “Y-yes,” the boy stammered. Hawk took a good look at him. He’d thought the kid was around fourteen or so because of the beardless cheeks, but now decided he was older.

          “My name’s Hawk,” he said, holding out his hand. The kid staggered to his feet and accepted it in a faltering grip.

          “Ramon. Ramon Aquila. You are indio… Indian, no?”

          “Yeah. I’m a redskin. You sneaking over the border all by yourself, Ramon?”

          “No, no! Six! But we see green truck and coyote, he run off. Ramon get separated. Think Ramon die here by himself until see smoke. When find el guapo in arroyo, I think we die together.

          Hawk started at the term. Trips across the border to visit some señoritas taught him guapo meant handsome. Reminded once again of his naked condition, he padded over to the place he’d buried his cache. It was still there. He drew out clothing, including a worn pair of boots, some dried and canned food, and a couple of blankets. They’d spend the night to rest his sore feet and allow the kid to get his strength back.

          Hawk stood in the thin stream of cold water below the pool and soaked his cut and bruised feet for fifteen minutes before soaping himself all over. The bath improved his outlook a thousand percent. He dressed and tended his cuts from the small first-aid kit in his stores. Deciding fresh air would be preferable to socks and boots at this point, he spread the blankets and put together something for them to eat while Ramon took his own bath. Hawk paused a moment to study the boy’s rangy body in the dying light. He had mocha skin like those girls Hawk sometimes visited. The boy went awkward when he saw he was being watched.

          Hawk didn’t speak until after they finished eating and the area was policed. “We’ll have to spend the night,” he explained, “but I want to move away from the pool because animals come here to drink at night. Don’t want to keep them from water. Tomorrow we’ll head for my truck.”

          “What… what happen to Ramon?” the boy asked uncertainly.

          “I’m not a man-hunter… not for illegals, anyway. I’ll take you to my place until we can figure out what to do, okay?”

          The boy nodded. “Okay,”

          “It’s going to get cold here tonight, Ramon. I only have two blankets, so we’ll have to sleep close together.” The boy nodded again.

          Hawk experienced a strange night. His head ached from the wound, but he didn’t think that what kept waking him. Some large animal slaking its thirst—maybe a panther down from the Sierras—pulled him from his sleep once, but something else was disturbing him. Finally, he decided it was the pressure of the boy’s sleeping form molded against him. He’d never slept with a man before except when he and some of his buddies piled into a single bed at the height of a drunk. By then they were more passed out than sleeping. A couple of times Ramon whimpered and pulled himself against Hawk as if seeking protection.

*****

So now Hawk and Ramon have found each other, and Hawk is experiencing some strange things. What will come of it. Let’s see next time.

Now a renewal of my tired plea for Cut Hand and Johnny Two-Guns. I also believe the STARbooks-published River Otter, Echoes of the Flute, and Medicine Hair are still up. I sure would like to get the final book in the Cut Hand Series, Wastelakapi… Beloved, published, but it’ll take some help from readers to get Dreamspinner interested.

My contact information is provided below in case anyone wants to drop me a line:

Website and blog: markwildyr.com

Email: markwildyr@aol.com

Facebook: www.facebook.com/mark.wildyr

Twitter: @markwildyr

The following are buy links for CUT HAND:

DSP Publications: https://www.dsppublications.com/books/cut-hand-by-mark-wildyr-420-b

Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Cut-Hand-Mark-Wildyr-ebook/dp/B073D86RWV

iBooks: https://itunes.apple.com/book/cut-hand/id1256084273

Kobo: https://www.kobo.com/ca/en/ebook/cut-hand-2

And now my mantra: Keep on reading. Keep on writing. You have something to say, so say it!

Until next time.

Mark

New posts at 6:00 a.m. on the first and third Thursdays of the month.