The Rising Dead by Stella Green Read Free Book Online

made a human-sounding squeal when both men stepped onto it. They waited to see if itwould collapse before continuing. Matt was glad the place was deserted, because they certainly would have given themselves away.
    The Stranger moved forward, opened the door, and stepped inside, letting the door bang shut behind him. As the door closed in his face, Matt shook his head. He didn’t expect anyone to hold doors for him, but the Stranger had developed some bad manners. When Matt entered, he sensed something was off. The Stranger had stopped a couple of feet inside the door. They weren’t alone in this hovel, but they couldn’t see well enough to figure out who else was there. Matt gestured for the Stranger to go to the right while Matt moved to the left.
    A girl shrieked.
    “Damn it. She’s got a knife and she stuck it in my arm.” The Stranger sounded more angry than hurt.
    The girl yelled in a language that sounded like Spanish.
    The Stranger answered her calmly. They spoke for a few minutes. Then Matt heard her moving. She lit a match followed by several candles.
    The candlelight lit up her pretty face. In her hands she had a rough-looking little steak knife that she must have found in the shack. It was so dull and rusty that Matt was surprised she could break the skin on the Stranger’s arm with it. The girl was dressed in jeans and an embroidered blouse, with a red and yellow scarf around her neck. There was no rot, but she did look as fierce as a cute teenager could look. Matt had no doubt that she’d try to put that nasty old knife right through him if she thought it was needed.
    “Did you tell her we’re not going to hurt her?”
    “Yep. This is Maria. She thought we were coyotes. Still not completely convinced we aren’t.” The Stranger knelt down and pulled a scarf out of his rucksack.
    Matt thought he was going to wrap his wound, but instead the Stranger ignored his bleeding cut and held it out to the girl.
    When he reached towards her, Maria yelled, “Stay there,” in English.
    He hung the scarf on the end of his walking stick and extended it so she could take the cloth. The Stranger easily could have knocked the knife out of her hand, but the girl didn’t seem to know that. She pulled the fabric close, spreading it out in her fingers like she was reading it in the candlelight. Matt could see symbols on it, and he hoped that they were friendly.
    Instead of calming her, the scarf seemed to frighten her. She staggered backwards, staring at the Stranger and shaking her head in disbelief before dropping to her knees with her face buried in the cloth. When she looked up, her cheeks were covered with tears. “You are the White Jaguar. I prayed for help and the saints have sent you.”
    “I’m not the White Jaguar. That’s a myth.”
    “You speak Mayan. You have the walking stick, and”—she held up the scarf—“you have this. We tell our stories in our weaving. Why would you give me this and then deny it?”
    The Stranger spoke to her in Mayan again, but she just shook her head and asked, “Have you forgotten us?”
    The girl, still on her knees, turned to Matt. “You must make him save my sister. My family paid five thousand dollars to have me and my sister taken into California, but now the coyotes want more. They said if our family didn’t pay they would sell us asprostitutes. I ran away, but my sister is still there. Please! My family has no more money to send.”
    “Did they use a white truck with the name Top Star Moving and Storage on it?”
    “They made us ride in that truck.”
    Matt realized that the men who’d taken Maria and her sister must be the same ones who’d taken Cheryl. He had heard about teenagers and even little girls being sold as sex slaves by Mexican gangs. He’d already seen Americans doing the same to American girls. Taking down the ring of sex traffickers in Breckenridge had felt great. Things had gotten bloodier than he would have liked, but with the police and the