Blood Mountain by Alisa Lynn Valdes

Author:Alisa Lynn Valdes [Valdés, Alisa Lynn]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2024-04-16T00:00:00+00:00

20

THE KINGDOM OF RIGHTEOUSNESS

After a quick landline call to Becky, placed from their suite at the lodge, Jodi and Mila set off to talk to Doña Lavato about granting Camilo access to her easement. Jodi considered telling her daughter about the brewing drama with the Evans family, but she didn’t want Mila to think she was trying to pollute her mind against Sterling, who, as far as Jodi could tell, was faultless in the shenanigans of the adults in his life. None of us chose our families.

The truck’s snow chains rattled reassuringly as the tires churned over the newly cleared road without too much trouble. The snow was letting up a bit, but the edges of the sky were dark, nearly black, with more incoming clouds. Jodi did her best to make good time in order to hopefully get back to the lodge before lunchtime and, if the weather didn’t get too much worse, take the group out to get an elk or two. She prayed the clouds would blow away from the lodge and give everyone a much-needed break.

About a half mile from Doña Lavato’s place, Jodi saw the old woman’s shit-can turquoise Chevy truck parked sideways across the road, as though it had been set there as a barricade. White smoke billowed from the tailpipe, but Jodi didn’t see anyone inside the cab. She slowed her own truck, maintaining about a fifty-foot distance.

“Stay here, and stay low,” she told Mila.

“I am not a dog,” said her daughter. “You don’t need to give me orders like that.”

“Kind of wishing we’d brought Juana on this trip right now,” said Jodi. “Be right back.”

“Be careful, Mom,” said Mila.

Jodi got out of her vehicle and carefully approached the other truck on foot, with her weapon at the ready.

“Doña Lavato?” she yelled. “It’s Jodi Luna, Walter and Gloria’s daughter. Father Oscar Luna’s sister. We had a nice chat yesterday. I just want to have a word with you.”

Jodi heard the rough wooden arrow singing through the air before she saw it land a few inches from her left foot. Realizing she was under fire, she immediately dove for the ground and rolled toward the snow embankment on the shoulder of the road, created by Camilo’s earlier plowing. She dove over this while yelling for Mila to get down. She saw Lourdes Lavato coming around the backside of the Chevy, crouched and with a crazed look on her face, taking aim. Another arrow zipped through the air and narrowly missed Jodi before planting itself in the snowbank.

“‘The soothing tongue is the tree of life, but a perverse tongue crushes the spirit!’” the old woman shouted.

“Put the bow down,” shouted Jodi. With her bum knee screaming in pain, she knelt, using the snow as a shield, and aimed her duty Glock at the truck. “Come out from behind the truck, with your hands up! Do not make me shoot you. Drop your weapon. Now!”

“‘For since death came through a man, the resurrection of the death also comes through a man!’” shouted Lavato.

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