Page 158 of Maddy's Justice

“She got loose and they’re searching for her. If she got her hands on any firearms, they could regret finding her,” Carvelli said.

“I gotta meet this woman,” Roy said.

Without another word, Carvelli and Sorenson went back to working on the fence. Only this time, they doubled their effort. Within two minutes, they were through it.

Before they went through the hole, Carvelli stopped Paxton. “Last chance. I’d really like it if you’d wait here.”

“That’s sweet,” she condescendingly said. “Now get out of my way. I have training, remember.”

“Yeah, I know. It’s just, well, I’d rather you sympathetically visit me in the hospital than me visit you.”

“How considerate,” Paxton said. “Tell you what. If I don’t get hurt, I’ll shoot you okay?”

“Hospital, sympathy sex,” Carvelli said. “Okay, you got a deal.

Everyone got a tension relief laugh with that until Paxton replied, “Maybe not. Depends on where I shoot you.”

“Ouch,” Sorenson said.

FIFTY-TWO

When Maddy and the twins saw several men, at least eight or ten, each with a flashlight, searching the area where the jet skis had been, they picked up the pace. Maddy and the girls were almost three hundred yards down the shoreline when the men first appeared. Two of the men also had a German shepherd on a leash. The dogs searched for the girl’s scent but were stymied by the water.

Seeing this, Maddy knelt down onto the sandy bottom. The girls did as well. They were now almost neck deep in the lake and almost invisible. Holding the firearms up, they watched, barely breathing.

They saw Evan appear and could hear him barking orders but could not make out what he said. Most of the men and the dogs went back toward the buildings. Three of them untied a boat from the dock and started across the lake.

When she was certain they were all gone, Maddy whispered, “Come on,” as she stood up. They waded ashore and went into the trees, wet and cold. The ambient light from the moon and stars was quite sufficient to make walking easy. After hiking about a hundred yards, they came across a trail. It was obviously used for motor vehicles and, to their right, the trail appeared to lead back to the compound.

Slightly to their left, the path made a right-hand turn toward the east. They followed it for another hundred yards or so where it ended. Parked between a pair of tall cottonwood trees, was a small, John Deere backhoe. It was quite new which eliminated the possibility that it had been abandoned.

“What is it?” Abia asked.

“It’s called a backhoe,” Maddy whispered. “It’s used for digging holes. Odd,” she continued looking around through the trees, “what did they use it for here?”

“We should keep going,” Salma said. “I am getting cold standing here.”

“You’re right, let’s go,” Maddy said.

They continued walking in an easterly direction, or at least Maddy hoped it was easterly. They were barely twenty yards from the backhoe when Salma tripped over a mound of dirt and went down.

Maddy and Abia both helped her up when Maddy noticed it. The mound of dirt Salma tripped over appeared to be about three feet wide and six or seven feet long. Maddy knelt down and scanned the ground and noticed at least another dozen of these mounds close by.

“What the hell?” she quietly said to herself. Then, the light in her head went on telling her what they were.

“They’re graves,” she whispered in horror. “What else could they be?”

By now the twins had joined her and they were also kneeling and surveying the area.

“Yes, they are graves,” Abia said.

“How did you come to be here?” Maddy asked.

The girls looked at each other than Salma told her a short version of their story. They were on their way to America when their parents died from a strange fever. A man befriended them, but he eventually had them kidnapped. They were held in Mexico then sold at auction from a secret location.

“You were sold into slavery?” Maddy asked, not as surprised as she should be.

“Yes. Many others, too,” Abia said. “Taken as we were and sold at auction.”

---