2:12
DAWN COULDN'T LIE IN the alders and wait until the mail plane came in. She'd freeze to death and if El was planning on murdering the pilot—and Dawn was certain now that he was—then she wouldn't be able to stop him. Her only chance was to get a message to the outside and to do that she had to go back into the store.
She wasn't afraid so much of crossing the thirty yards of open ground. She had heard the four-wheeler shutting off clear over at Micky's place. It would take El at least three or four minutes to get back. As soon as she heard the motor crank up again she could be back in the woods before he showed up.
But she didn't want to go back into the store.
She stood in the middle of the trail, gathering her courage and at the same time bracing against the shots that she expected to hear from Micky's place any second. The bullets would crack through the woods like whips snapping. She could feel them in the middle of her back even though they'd be aimed at Micky and not her. Guilt had stung her as she stood watching El murder her mother. The frustration at not being able to help Micky was like a knife in her chest.
She shuffled hesitantly down the trail.
When she reached the center of the clearing, she felt completely exposed. Then she ran. The faster she ran, the more exposed she felt, until she hit the side of the log building hard, stopping herself with spread arms, her heart pounding madly. Sweat was icy on her forehead and her legs quivered. She stared at the sliding door, then shook her head.
Instead she walked up the front stoop, tossing frightened glances over her shoulder in the direction that El had gone, but there was no sound of the four-wheeler and no shot. It occurred to her then that he might just leave the fourwheeler at Micky's and hike back. Then she'd have no way of hearing him. But at least it would take him longer to return. Dawn estimated five or six minutes. She didn't have much time. She needed to get in and get out.
She opened the front door and stood staring into the gloom.
El had put out all but one of the mantel lamps. It sat in the middle of the counter, throwing weird shadows around the crowded store, mixing them with the shadows cast by the last of the light from outside. The sun wasn't due to set for another four hours. But it looked as though it already had. The wind made eerie whistling noises through the eaves and Dawn found it harder and harder to take that first step into the interior of the building where two corpses waited.
She stepped silently inside and put her back against the door.
The store was a mess.
Boxes had been pulled from all the shelves and lay in scattered heaps along the walls and on top of the counter. The glass cases had been smashed and the items inside were thrown here and there.
Even the woodstove had not escaped El's rampage. The cast-iron door was off its hinges, lying on the floor. Dawn couldn't decide whether El had been looking for something inside the stove or if he was trying to cover up something on the floor.
Rita's body was gone.
Dawn noticed that there were ashes around her feet and she was making tracks in them.
Her footprints were a death warrant if El returned. She glanced around and saw Rita's broom, leaning behind the counter. She brushed away her tracks, careful now where she stood.
The trail of ashes led from the door, along the far wall and into the glassed-in phone room. It looked as though El had taken a shovel and scooped ashes from the stove and then shaken them in a wide path through the store. Dawn knew then what the ashes were for. El was soaking up the blood. He'd dragged Rita's body into the phone room and then covered the bloody trail of her body with ashes.
Dawn stared at the little room.
It was about six feet square, sitting in the rear corner of the store, there was no ceiling in the phone room, and the walls didn't reach the high-beamed roof; they gave privacy to whoever was on the phone, but the bottom of the walls were pine-sided only as high as Dawn's waist. The rest was glass. The telephone rested in its cradle on the table. There was nothing else in the cubicle but a couple of chairs.
Dawn had used the phone a couple of times. She'd spoken to her aunt in California and to her best friend in Anchorage. It suddenly occurred to Dawn that she had made a stupid mistake because she had no idea how the radio connection was made. Clive had always done that from the back room.
But she knew that that just was an excuse.
She had to at least try to contact someone.
How hard can it be to make a connection on the phone?
It's probably just a switch.
She glanced around the counter at the door to the workshed, remembering El dragging Clive in through the side door. But the outside door was closed now and it looked even darker in there than before.
She eased around the counter, then stopped. There was cardboard and broken glass on the floor, covered with what appeared to be flour, and El had scattered the contents of a large can of coffee over the mess. One of the shelves had broken in half. It looked as though El might have tried to climb it. Big jars that had been on the shelf lay shattered. One lid was overturned with a jagged crown of glass still centered in it. It sat in the middle of the floor like some kind of deadly trap.
She stepped gingerly, careful not to tread on coffee or flour and leave footprints. She reached the door to the workshed and peered into the room. The tiny window admitted almost no light. Somewhere in that darkness lay Clive's body and she had the weirdest sensation that he was watching her with dead, empty eyes.
She backed up to the counter and picked up the lantern, holding it in front of her with both hands. It threw a steady golden glow but it also lightened the things in front of her and blinded her completely to things on the periphery. The room closed in around her. Whenever she glanced to the right or left there was only lurking, silent darkness. Now she had a corpse behind her in the gloom and one somewhere ahead, yet to be discovered.
She knew that she had nothing to fear from either Rita's or Clive's bodies. They had been friends in life. Surely they wouldn't harm her in death. But a childish, unreasoning part of her mind questioned that assumption.
Who knew what happened to people after they died?
What if they were controlled by El now?
What if they were like zombies, under El's spell?
Or some kind of vampires?
She wanted to scream at her own mind to stop, to leave her alone and quit coming up with bullshit horror stories. But the more she denied them, the more they tormented her, the more her palms grew clammy and her skin crawled. The more the wind creaked and the building squeaked and shifted, as though people she could not see were moving about in the shadows.
She stepped into the shed, lantern first, and spotted Clive immediately.
She screamed.
The noise shattered the silence like glass and Dawn nearly dropped the lantern.
Clive was staring at her.
But he had no eyes.
Two gouged sockets oozed blood onto his cheeks.
Dawn spun away and vomited.
Did El do that to Rita too?
To Howard and her mother?
Dawn was suddenly terrified that Rita had sneaked up behind her and was about to grab her. Dawn jerked to the side and glanced back into the gloomy store. But there was no one there.
One way or the other she was doomed to have a corpse behind her. If she faced the store she would be terribly close to Clive and if she watched Clive then something could sneak up behind her from the store. She wiped her mouth on her shirtsleeve but the sickly-sweet taste would not go away.
Clive leaned against the far wall, sitting upright, his hands resting on the floor between his legs. A small puddle of blood pooled around his butt. Dawn slipped past him and set the lantern on the worktable, lifting the big latch again and pushing the sliding door half-open. A dull gray light seeped in and so did frigid air and fluttering flakes. It felt more like February than early May. But the weather was funny in the mountains. It could thaw in December and Daw
n had seen a freak snowstorm in late June. This might be just a cold front blowing in for a day or so or they might soon be buried.
Now, with more light, she studied the telephone-equipment room. There was a heavy handmade door, like all the doors in McRay, with a smaller AT&T logo on it and a doormat in front of it. Clive had always wiped his feet before going in. That struck Dawn as stupid, since no one else ever went in the room. But then, maybe the AT&T people came down to work on the equipment now and then and Clive was the type of person to run a neat place.
There was a heavy padlock on a big steel hasp. The lock was nearly the size of her fist and there were no exposed hinges on the door. The door swung inward. She thought about finding a pry bar or some other tool but when she glanced around the room, the only tools she could see were saws and wrenches. So she grabbed a large crescent wrench off the worktable, sidling around Clive and glancing once more into the dark store, but all the wrench did was twist the lock around. The bolt of the lock was almost as thick as the steel handle of the wrench. No way she was breaking in.
Where would the key be?
Suddenly her anger at El and the world in general mixed with her frustration at not being able to get into the radio room. Without thinking, she flung the wrench across the shed, praying even as it left her grasp that she didn't hit Clive.
The wrench clattered along the concrete floor and out the door.
Where was the damn key?
There were only three places Dawn could think of that Clive would have put the key.
She crept back out into the store.
She searched the money box beneath the counter, surprised that El didn't seem to have disturbed it. But then he wasn't after money. He was after the whole town.
There was no key.
The other place would be on a key ring attached to the four-wheeler. She tried to remember if she'd ever seen other keys hanging from the starter on Clive's Honda, but couldn't.
That left only one place. She stood in the doorway, trying not to look at Clive's empty sockets and chewing her lower lip.
2:20
CLIVE'S FOUR-WHEELER WAS parked in front of Micky's stoop and her front door was open. The wind stung her face and whipped noisily through the trees. Large white flakes gusted in thickening flurries.
As soon as she reached the end of the trail and saw the Honda she had wanted to shout at Clive.
But why was he here now?
No way it had taken him this long to come by for the glass piece.
She thought of the popping noises she'd heard and the gunsmoke she could now smell coming from the direction of the store and fear gripped her.
Micky slid quickly behind a big spruce just as El stepped out onto her porch. Her heart pounded and her throat tightened. El had Clive's short carbine in his left hand. He glanced around the clearing, as though he had heard or seen her, but of course that was impossible.
But Micky knew from experience that in situations such as this senses were heightened. She remembered knowing what the gunman was doing on the other side of the door in the bar.
Did El sense that she was here?
After a moment he turned and went back into the cabin and, thankfully, he closed the door behind him.
But what is he doing in there and how did he get Clive's four-wheeler and gun?
Clive wouldn't have given either of them up willingly.
El might have taken it at gunpoint and left. But what were the popping noises?
Was El destroying all the ammunition at the store?
Or was the store itself on fire?
Could the shells exploding sound that loud, inside the store?
Micky didn't think so.
But none of that proved that Clive and Rita were dead. Micky clutched at that straw of hope. The last thing she wanted to consider was that she was going to be left alone and weaponless in McRay with an armed madman.
If El was destroying guns and ammo, he would have found the Glock in her cabin immediately. But he had to be certain that it was her only gun. He was probably ransacking her house.
She glanced at the four-wheeler and considered making a getaway. She was pretty sure she could start the machine, but driving it was another matter. And anyway, by the time she got the motor kicked over and figured out how to get it into gear, El would have come outside and blown her brains out.
But the Honda still held her attention.
She studied the small VHF radio strapped under the gas tank.
There was a matching radio beneath the counter in the store. Clive kept both of them charged and Rita turned on the radio whenever Clive left, so that if he needed to get a message to her he could. That radio was the quickest way that Micky could think of to find out if everyone was okay at the store, and to let them know what had happened to Aaron.
The only problem was getting it.
The four-wheeler was fifteen yards away and completely exposed. The cabin door was closed but she would be seen easily through the window if El happened to glance in her direction. He could shoot her right through the glass. She'd never even hear the bullet that killed her. She stared at the little black box in its leather holster and gauged her need against her chances.
She had to find out if anyone was alive at the store but the presence of the four-wheeler here at her cabin argued against that. Realistically she didn't see Clive giving it up or, alternatively, El overpowering Clive and Rita and leaving them alive. Not after what she'd seen at Aaron's. El wasn't tying people up.
He was murdering them.
Still, the radio called to her. She didn't have access to a gun now. Communication with another sane human being might be her only means of saving her own life. And if she stayed low, El would have to be right up close to the window to see her.
Dropping to her hands and knees, she watched the door, trying to estimate how long he'd stay inside searching her house. He might come out at any second. But she had to chance it.
She did a fast low crawl to the four-wheeler, curling up tight behind the rear wheel. Her fingers fumbled at the snap of the radio holster. She was shaking from cold and fear but she managed to get the radio into the pocket of her jacket just as the door creaked.
She froze.
The door opened just a crack.
Did the wind do that?
Or was El peeking out through the slit, waiting?
The wind could open her door. The latch didn't always hold unless the sliding bolt was secured in place from inside.
But it was just as possible that El had heard it blow open and was now glancing through it at the clearing.
Which was it?
A million scattered snowflakes twisted and twirled in the wind.
But not enough to obscure the view from her door or the window.
A giant spruce behind the cabin grated against another tree.
She couldn't stay where she was.
She rolled over onto her side and skittered back down the way she had come, into the protection of the woods below. But she didn't stop there. She burrowed into the brush and found a spot where she could pull branches aside to afford a narrow view of her cabin and the clearing around it.
No gunfire erupted.
So El hadn't been watching.
But now the front door swayed back and forth, with the changing pressure of the wind.
Something tickled the back of her spine. Foreboding swept over her and she glanced in mounting horror at the four-wheeler.
She had forgotten to close the snap on the radio holster. It hung limply, advertising the missing radio.
Damn!
It seemed like hours, but in fact it was less than a minute before El came back out. He hurried down her steps and climbed back on the Honda. He fastened the carbine on the handlebars and was about to press the starter when he stopped. He leaned over and glanced down.
Micky knew that he was staring at the empty radio holder.
She stiffened.
El's hands dropped from t
he handlebars to his sides and he ever so slowly surveyed the entire clearing and cabin area. Three hundred and sixty degrees. When the reflective lenses of his glasses passed over her it was all that she could do not to leap up and start running. That old feeling of utter helplessness gripped her.
If she let it grow, it would overpower her. She had to do something to help herself or she was going to end up cowering here, waiting until El found her.
It occurred to her that that might not be such a bad idea. Hiding right here, until help arrived.
El had already murdered Aaron and probably Terry and Dawn, Rita and Clive.
Micky knew now that the shots she had heard earlier, across the creek, had been El. The scream she didn't want to think about. But it kept replaying itself in her head. The cry she had written off as the noise of a jay sounded exactly like her mother's death scream. Like Terry or Dawn Glorianus crying their lungs out. Why hadn't she recognized it for what it was?
She had ample excuse for finding a good hiding place and simply waiting for someone to rescue her.
That's what she'd done last time.
And the time before that.
And she'd survived.
She'd hidden and she'd lived.
The mail plane was due in a few hours. And of course Anchorage would start wondering why there was no weather report coming in, and if Clive didn't answer the phone, AT&T would send someone to investigate. Pretty soon the troopers would be on the scene.
But she knew in her heart that El would kill everyone else left alive in town if she didn't warn them. There were no Houston cops outside and El wasn't likely to give up and wander away the way the kid that murdered her parents had.
If she didn't do something, a lot more innocent people were going to die.
Nonchalantly, El reached down and resnapped the radio case. He cranked up the motor and made a wide circle across Micky's front lawn, coming within ten feet of her hiding place as he passed. She watched his face as he rode by and involuntarily, she sucked in her breath.
Her mind was playing tricks on her.
But in that instant, as she saw his hair whipping in the wind, and the dull light reflected in his glasses, she was certain that he was the same man who had murdered her parents, the same man who had returned years later to murder Wade. And now he was here, in McRay, still looking for her.
Cold Heart Page 13
