Page 10 of Laying Low

He had his foot on the accelerator and was peeling out backward as everybody slammed their door and the first of the men rounded the corner, puffing badly because he was not fit in the least, and yanking at the mask over his face to suck in more oxygen.

The guy behind him had his gun—an AK-47—and Reg had a moment to think,I’m going to die and I have to pee!Before he saw the first man do a double take into the Hyundai.

“Oh shit,” Ilia said behind him, and the man doing the double take put his arm out to stop the other man from firing.

“Oh shit what?”Anthony demanded as Reg spun around and pressed Go.

“That wasn’t ICE,” Ilia said.“That was my uncle Lem.Reynaldo, why is my uncle Lem chasing you around with a gun?”

Reg hit a sharp corner, and they all rocked to the side of the car as he negotiated out the back way, which skirted the parking lot and the football field to emerge as a little-used side road onto the main thoroughfare that took people to I-5, the giant highway that pretty much stretched from Mexico to Canada.

“Do we see anybody?”he asked, taking a right when a left would have gotten them to I-5.

“No,” Anthony said, sounding distracted.“Where are you going?”

“Back road,” Reg muttered.“Ilia, is your uncle Lem a local?”

“No, Mr.Royal,” Ilia said, sounding miserable.“He lives in Nevada.He’s… well, he’s a bad man.He’s why my mom took us out into this pit—uhm, the middle of Bakersfield.”

Reg grimaced.Bakersfield wasn’t huge.It was, in essence, an overgrown farm town—and a hub for farmers and truckers and all the people meant to support a usually thriving industry.

But it wasn’t Las Vegas, where Reg suspected Uncle Lem lived.

“Reynaldo,” Reg said carefully, pleased when he turned into a line of traffic going about fifty miles an hour along the back road and saw no vehicles behind him.A simple enough ruse—a non-local would assume I-5 was the only way out of town.“Why is Ilia’s Bratva uncle?”

“You know about Bratva?”Ilia asked, absolutely mortified.

“Yeah,” Reg said, “but the question is, why have they heard about Reynaldo?”

“My father,” Reynaldo said, sounding as mortified as Ilia.“He’s sort of… well, have you heard of Gael Barerra?”

“Fucking Jesus,” Anthony said, sounding stunned.

“Oh dear God,” Reg said.“Reynaldo, why is the son of one of the biggest cartel kingpins south of Texasliving in Bakersfield?”

“Because I’m gay,” Reynaldo said in a small voice.“And Papa couldn’t keep me from being bullied.So he sent me here with his sister, who hates him.”

“But loves you,” Reg said, because he’d seen them together.

“Sí.” It was, to his knowledge, the only time the kid had so much admitted to speaking Spanish.“Mr.Royal, how do you know so much about Russian gangs and Mexican cartels?”

Reg grunted, and Anthony covered his eyes with his hand.

“Because they both tried to kill my brother this summer, and he barely got away alive.”

“Oh Jesus,” Anthony muttered.“Reg, we are so fucked.What are we going to do?”

“Well, first,” Reg said grimly, “we’re going to bring them to my parents’ house and stash them in the passageway with some food and a portajohn.Itoldyou guys that thing would come in handy.”

“You told me it was ajoke!”Anthony snapped.

“Well, I didn’t want you to worry!”Reg retorted.Because Reg worried.Reg worried alot.And he worried, and he planned, and he anticipated his worries, so just in case Romeo and Julian of Bakersfield, California, should come knocking down his door, he had a way to keep them safe.

“Well, I’m worriednow,” Anthony said, pulling out his phone.

“What are you doing?”

“I’m texting your brother,” Anthony told him, and Reg blinked.