The Mexico Run Read Online Free PDF Page A

have time to get it. I wouldn't have more than a split second to do anything before he would recover.
        He wasn't the kind of man you could stop for long with a kick in the balls and a gut punch.
        I hated the thought of wasting good bourbon, but my right hand reached the neck of the Jack Daniels bottle, and I swung it full arc. It took him on the side of the head and shattered. If it hadn't, it probably would have fractured his skull and killed him. As it was, it dropped him cold.
        I turned to Sharon.
        "If this ape is your husband," I said, "I have just given you an instant divorce. I figure you've got about five minutes. Go in and pack your bag and meet me at my car. Make it fast."
        She got up without a word, not looking at him as she stepped over his fallen, prone body, and went out the door.
        I didn't look at him, either, as I got my things together.
        I wasn't thinking of him. I wasn't even thinking of the girl, Sharon. All I was thinking of was that I was a complete horse's ass to get myself in a situation like this at a time like this. I was also thinking that the sooner I got away from the Happy Hours Lodge and the further I got away, the better it would be for all concerned.
        

3
        
        The scene at the Happy Hours Lodge acted like a shot of adrenalin. Pulling away and cutting onto Route 5, heading south, with the girl beside me and her bag nestled against mine in the back of the car, I forgot how exhausted I really was. The exhaustion, however, had been replaced with something that was infinitely more uncomfortable.
        She had told me he was a deputy sheriff. That meant it was a county office, and I knew that this particular county extended all the way to the border. My first inclination had been to cut back north and go into San Diego and drop her off there. On second thought, however, I didn't relish the idea of coming back down this road. I didn't know quite how much pull he might have with the state police, and I was pretty sure that the blow on the head wouldn't keep him quiet for very long.
        I figured the border was less than ten miles away. It would take about eight minutes to reach it, another five to stop at one of the all-night insurance offices and pick up the insurance papers which would be necessary after
        I crossed into Mexico proper. I hoped we would have time to make it before he had an opportunity to stop us.
        I turned to Sharon, who was slumped in the seat beside me. She had not spoken a word since getting into the car.
        "You have any money?"
        "About six dollars."
        Great, I thought. I had not only slugged an officer of the law, but now I'm stuck with an eighteen-year-old girl, who is broke.
        "You have a family somewhere? Any place you can go?"
        She didn't answer, so I took a quick look at her out of the corner of my eye, and she was shaking her head.
        There was only one thing to do. I could hardly dump her at the side of the road, and there would be no particular risk in crossing the border with her. They don't ask questions going into Mexico. They only ask them on your return.
        I figured we could cross the border, go into Tijuana, and I'd find her a room at a hotel and give her a few dollars. In the morning, she could recross the border, take a bus up to San Diego, Los Angeles, or wherever the hell she wanted to go. Or she could stay in Mexico and pick up a job as a waitress in some dive, or she could sell her ass on the turf, as far as I was concerned.
        Whatever she did, it probably would be no worse than what she had just left.
        I stopped at the first all-night insurance office, and it only took a minute or two to buy the policy which would keep me out of jail if I were unlucky enough to have some minor car accident once I was on the other side. You can buy those policies for twenty-four hours, or up to any length of time