Ain't Talkin'

When Roche had put several miles between himself and the town of Stateline, he pulled Lucky to a walk and turned in his saddle to look back.

The 50 stretched back north and east to the city, and Tahoe lingered behind it like a smudge on a lens. There was at least seven miles between the walker and the city he’d just shot four coppers in, and Roche knew that it would be at least another fifty years before he could show his face in Stateline without someone recognizing him. It was why a hunter tried to get along with law enforcement, though not at the expense of the job.

If there was a hunter’s code it was a loose one, and being a walker besides made a lot of the ideals murkier than they ought to be.

Didn’t matter. Roche lived along the big scheme of things, and in that scheme most things weren’t of much consequence.

There was another city south of the dead lake. According to maps it had once had an original name of South Lake Tahoe, though the aftermath of the catastrophe had seen to it that all that remained of the city was a smoldering ribcage. The only folk who still lived there were wastelanders and the occasional roving band of highwaymen who’d roll into town with whatever they’d stolen and trade for women and booze and cigarettes. Drugs too, if there were any to be had.

The city was as ripe a place as any to make for with copper’s on his heels, and Roche didn’t kid himself with thinking that they’d just let four dead officers roll into the breeze without saying boo.

Lucky’s sides heaved. She’d done seven miles at nothing short of a gallop and a canter between wreckage and dunes of dust.

“Let’s get us that far tonight, girl. We’ll find you some water and bed down. That sound like a plan?”

Lucky blew out her lips at him and walked on.