Roll to a stop and get out. Set off across the desert. No food, no water. A day or two, then his pain would be over. His dead buddies in Iran, his dead family: all forgotten. What about the other refugees? They could go to hell. He’d carried them too long. His brother, Teddy, had fallen in a riot before they could escape Vegas. Trampled to death when the aid truck ran out of bread before it ran out of starving people. A week later, Teddy’s wife was kidnapped and raped by roving teenagers on the outskirts of the city, then left for dead. She shot herself, leaving two kids. Then, a few days outside the city, Kemp’s two nephews—ages six and eight—caught some sort of intestinal bug. The boys died three days later, literally crapping themselves to death. The bug took five other children from the caravan, plus one elderly black lady by the name of Janine. A few days of quiet followed that before bandits attacked the caravan near the Nevada/Utah border.
