Chapter Two
Kelsey opened her eyes as the first rays of the coming day caressed her lashes. She rolled onto her back, looked up at ceiling’s plaster swirls, then recalled the vow she’d made herself, so she sat up, grabbed the phone and dialed the weather line. “Possible pop-up storms this afternoon with highs in the 90’s,” said the recording.
She laid the receiver on her nightstand. “There! Let’s see you get past the busy tone.” Kelsey hummed a little victory song as she hopped out of bed.
Every morning since he had come out of his coma, Ramsey had phoned before breakfast and started her day out with a dose of gloom. As she showered and dressed, minute-by-minute forecasts whispered from the receiver. For the first time since the accident, she applied eye shadow without fighting tears as he relived watching the life ebb from Abby and Jen.
She’d loved them, too. Had he ever considered her loss?
Her morning cup of herbal tea tasted exceptionally fine. The sky looked particularly blue. Kelsey hummed as she watered the potted ferns on her front porch, then she settled into her car and fastened her seatbelt. As she backed out of the driveway her cell phone rang. “Good morning,” she sang.
"There's something wrong with your land line,” Ramsey said. Kelsey pinched the bridge of her nose to forestall the sudden headache. “I called in a service report for you.” Ramsey’s bellyaching tone made Kelsey want to roll down the window and throw her phone into the surrounding woods. Instead, she made a sound of solace.
“I wanted to make the world better for Jenny.” Kelsey silently mouthed the words along with him. Did he realize that he said exactly the same thing every morning? She arrived at the busy intersection at the end of her road, stopped and glared at the heavy flow of traffic.
The election signs clustered around the stop sign caught her attention. Marvin Frederickson's sign had been placed directly underneath the stop sign. She grinned at the unconscious message. Maybe other drivers would catch the unintentional, but picture perfect meaning, too. Then, she noticed that Ramsey’s MacLennan for Senate sign tilted like Pisa’s tower and black tire marks marred the blue and white lettering. She shivered at how accurately its subliminal message mirrored Ramsey’s situation.
“He sabotaged my car,” Ramsey whined, “but I’ll never be able to prove it.” Was he right, or had he simply talked himself into believing it after so may repetitions? While she sympathized with his loss, every day, as she listened to his litany of misery, her compassion weakened. “You have no idea what it’s like to hand upside-down from your safety harness and watch-“
“You act like you’re the only one who ever loved Abby and Jenny,” she snapped.
“-your child go white as she bleeds to death,” he continued without missing a beat. “I’ve never felt so helpless.” Kelsey's mouth flattened. Before she did something she might regret, she placed the phone on the passenger seat. “Abby tried to reach her, but-“ Kelsey turned on the radio. “-she was too weak. You don’t know what it’s like to watch the people you love die.”
Kelsey grabbed the stadium blanket from the back seat. Before she could talk herself out of it, she buried the cell phone under the thick blue and black plaid, held her breath and listened. On her radio, the Temptations were crooning an old song about imagination. Traffic was rumbling. A distant bird was singing. With a sigh of relief, Kelsey stretched the tension out of her neck, leaned back in the seat and closed her eyes against the sight of morning traffic flowing bumper to bumper past her road and let the music transport her to a realm of relaxation.
ooo
Doran’s fingers drummed against his Suburban’s leather clad steering wheel as he watched rush hour traffic speeding through the morning haze past the verge where he waited, engine idling, for his quarry.
He glanced at the clock on the dashboard. Kelsey was four minutes behind her normal routine. He plucked the transceiver out of his shirt pocket, and pressed the on button, but then he paused. If he called Quinn once more, he’d either look like a green recruit or the infatuated fool Quinn had jokingly accused him of being. He preferred thinking of himself as paranoid rather than infatuated. Obsessions made a person blind to danger; suspicion kept the senses sharp. He gritted his teeth against the suspicion that Quinn knew which head he was really thinking with. Doran clicked his phone off and slipped it back into his pocket, where it settled against his pounding heart.
Doran took a deep, calming breath, popped a couple Tums and leaned back against the cool leather seats, grateful that the vehicle's air conditioner filtered out the humidity along with the stench of exhaust coupled with the scent of cedar; typical aromas of a September morning in the Piedmont. After his late-night encounter with Lancaster, he didn't need any reminders of how awful the blend of sweet and sour could be. But he sure as hell was looking forward to his next look at MacLennan. Once Wes’s plan got off the ground, they would get the evidence they needed to convict the entire lot of them.
"Dev, Trent – we're on our way." Over the radio, Quinn sounded like the confident man he had been before the bullet confined him to a life on wheels.
Finally! Doran touched the radio’s send button, through the black silk of his pocket. For an uneasy moment, he wondered when he’d lost Marnie’s photo. "Any reason for the delay?" Thankfully, his tone only conveyed casual curiosity.
"Normal routine, just behind schedule," Quinn said.
"Let's get this show on the road," Trent said. The receiver magnified the sounds of an engine being gunned and underscored Trent’s impatience.
Now that the time had come, Doran wanted to get past this necessary step. Doran adjusted his headset as he looked in the Suburban's rearview mirror. About a half mile behind his Suburban, Trent's battered blue pickup bulled its way onto the highway. Horns blared and brakes squealed. Doran winced and lowered the volume. A yellow corvette swerved around Trent’s old Ford and nearly had a head on with a white utility van. Trent’s pickup fishtailed, then stalled, blocking all oncoming traffic. Tires screeched, but sounds of tortured metal didn’t come. Instead, a discordant shriek of horns rose from the obstructed traffic.
"Good job,” Doran said. “You’ll get a bonus."
"Thanks, boss!" Trent said.
A breath later, the corvette rocketed past the Suburban.
Doran accelerated onto the road, then floored it to catch up with the Corvette. Over the headset, a faint voice shouted, "Git your damned rust bucket off'n the damned road. Git!" Trent, who enjoyed being the center of attention, even if it meant being the cause of hostility, started whistling a joyful tune.
Doran closed the gap between his Suburban and the yellow corvette. After he passed the intersection where Kelsey's mustang waited in front of Quinn's handicapped van, he slowed to fifteen below the speed limit and watched her mustang in his rearview mirror. Despite having an opening in traffic big enough for a convoy, the mustang stayed at the stop sign. What the hell? Dora took his foot off the accelerator and coasted, his attention on the motionless image in his rearview mirror.
Quinn’s handicapped van crept forward. The mustang didn’t move. "What’s gives?” Doran demanded. “Is she turning left or something?"
"Blinker says we're going right," Quinn said.
The suburban slowed to a crawl. "Trent, hold the traffic."
"Roger that." His whistling became even jauntier.
If this doesn’t work, I’ll nudge her,” Quinn said. The van’s horn wailed long and loud. Doran winced and held the phone at arm’s length. "That got her."
"Bummer, this was just starting to get fun," Trent said. The sound of an engine revving accompanied his remark.
"Trent, count to ten, before you let the traffic go," Doran said, "then keep it slow, like you’re still having engine problems."
"Roger that." The background honking ceased. “My motto for today is: to be a leader with a large following, go five under the speed limit on a winding, two-lane road.” Trent’s cheerful whistling resumed.
/> Doran chuckled. “You’re a regular contemporary Confucius.” He glanced in his rearview mirror. The reflection showed Kelsey's mustang closing fast with Quinn's van far enough back to stay out of the coming crash. He tightened his seatbelt.
"Dev," Quinn said, "she left a big pool of brake fluid back at the stop sign."
"Excellent." His tone conveyed confidence, but as he calculated the mustang’s speed, his heart thudded against his ribs and he held the steering wheel in a crushing grip as she raced toward him.
ooo
Behind her, a horn blared. Kelsey opened her eyes and saw an opening in traffic. She floored the accelerator. One of her tires squealed as she surged onto Dunkirk. The mustang made a slight fishtail, but she corrected it. Gotta check the tire pressure.
“I just can’t deal with this race without them,” Ramsey whined. Kelsey glanced to her right. The phone had slid out from under the blanket. “I quit.”
She snatched the phone as she floored the mustang to catch up with the big black vehicle in front of her. “I miss them, too," she screamed. "Stop acting like you were the only one who loved them.” Ramsey audibly gasped. Her fingers clenched as she fought the urge to crush the phone. Sam Cook sang his version of what it took to make a wonderful world. Kelsey wished life were as simple as the oldies made it sound. “How come you were only willing to make the world better for Jenny?” The unexpected question thrown into the middle of Ramsey's rant extended his silence. “What about all the other kids in our district?” She used a kinder tone as she pressed her point.
“It isn’t like that.” Ramsey’s contrite tone made her wince.
“Isn’t it?" Kelsey forced herself to use a clam pitch. ”Rams, think about that crash. You say you have proof that someone tampered with your car, but you’re the only one saying it.”
“That doesn’t mean it’s not true.”
“I know that. I also know that Marvin had a lot to gain without you in the race, but surely he isn’t the only one with a grudge against you.”
“You think everyone hates me?”
“Everyone? No, but you’re a district attorney. You put people away for years, if you win your cases and you don't exactly win friends even when you lose, because that means someone feels like you didn’t get them the justice they wanted. Face it, there are a lot of people who might want you dead.”
“I may not have the evidence, but I know who killed Abby and Jen. And without them, I quit.”
She lowered her tone, “If you’re right and you quit, you'd be rewarding Marvin for killing them. Do you want to give him the senate seat?”
Ramsey exhaled noisily. "It doesn’t matter any more. I’m quitting."
“You're ahead in the polls.”
“I don’t give a damn about that," he snapped. Then Ramsey's tone turned petulant. "You’re proud of the stats because you’re the one who’s been making the speeches."
“On your behalf.“ The black Suburban in front of her moved down the hill at a snail’s pace. Must be a granny behind the wheel. “Go,” Kelsey encouraged the driver. “Can’t you see it’s green?” The light turned yellow light and the black vehicle braked. “Floor it, then we can both get through.”
“What are you talking about?”
“There’s either an old granny in front of me or the driver is scared of the Dunkirk-Monroe intersection.”
“It’s one of the busiest in the state,” Ramsey reminded her. “No shame in being cautious.”
“The driver started braking on green, if you can believe that.”
“Nothing wrong with driving safely.” The light turned red and the disgustingly cautious driver slammed on the brakes. The tires left a trail of black and stopped several car lengths behind the white line. “Oh for crying out loud. Kelsey braked hard to avoid rear-ending the timid driver. Her foot slammed to the floor.
“Maybe I should have hired a grandma as my chauffeur, then maybe Abby and Jen would still be alive. Or at least I wouldn’t spend every waking moment reliving how I was the one driving and how my actions killed them. I can’t go on without them,” Ramsey whined.
Kelsey pumped the mustang’s brake pedal. Nothing happened. If she didn't get around the Suburban, she'd hit it. To her left, was a solid line of oncoming traffic, to her right, a curb, a metal guardrail, then a twenty-foot-drop into Dead Man's Gulch.
Kelsey looked for an opening in traffic.
There was none.
Had the black tire mark over Ramsey's campaign sign been an omen for her?
Kelsey dropped the phone, grasped the steering wheel in both hands, braced herself and stood on the brake with both feet. The pedal flopped lifelessly to the floor, while the car surged down the hill like a run away racer. The phone slid off the seat and Ramsey's complaining became distant.
The hair on the back of Kelsey’s neck stood on end. She laid on her horn and glared at the black Suburban. “Move. You have to move.” Even as she screamed at the driver, heavy east – west traffic starting across the intersection made that option impossible.
The idea of rear-ending a Chevy Suburban with a convertible seemed risky, possibly even deadly. “Stop, dammit,” she shrieked at her mustang. Kelsey yanked on the emergency brake. With a screech, the steering wheel jerked toward the gully. "Augh!" She fought to keep her car out of the deep, rocky ravine, which had claimed Abby and Jenny's lives.
The mustang continued too fast toward the black Suburban.
“Kelsey, what is it? What’s wrong?” Ramsey’s panicked screams spewed faintly from the phone. With a terrible pop, her car shuddered as if it had broken free of its fetters. “Oh, God, it’s your car! That’s how mine sounded! Oh, no! Oh, God! Get off that road! No, don’t! If you do, you’ll end up in the gulch. Oh, God, I can’t bear this. Oh, God, oh, God, it’s the nightmare all over, again.”
Desperately hoping that friction would reduce her momentum, Kelsey wrenched the wheel to the right; her front tire scraped against the curb. Ripping metal sounded like banshee screams. Kelsey screamed with it, as she hung onto the steer wheel and held the position.
A bang vibrated through the car and the front right corner dropped several inches and the speed slowed a bit. The steering wheel whipped out of her hands. Oh, no, she was heading toward the gully.
Sparks flew from the right front quadrant and sailed over the roof. Kelsey ducked, as if the embers could seer through the windscreen and threw every ounce of her strength into keeping the car next to the grinding curb without leaping into the fatal chasm.
Perspiration bathed her body and a red curl stuck to her forehead. “Please, please, please stop!”
Horrible thuds hammered the mustang’s underside. Her feet bounced on the floorboards and her teeth collided so hard that it sounded like a pile driver was working overtime in her mouth.
An eighteen-wheeler loaded with newly sawn wood lumbered across the intersection. When she hit the Suburban, she’d knock it beneath the semi's wheels and kill the little old driver. No, she couldn’t do that. She wrenched the steering wheel toward the gully and certain death. “Please God, let me be the only one hurt.” One tire jumped the curb. Then the front fender bounced off the metal guardrail and the wheel jerked from her hands.
Kelsey grabbed for the wheel while she yanked the shifter into park. Amid howling gears, the Mustang's rear whipped back to the right. Her forehead hit the steering wheel. Half conscious, she hoped her prayers had been answered. A split second later, she hit the Suburban. Her head whipped forward. The airbag billowed in her face and a terrible stench burst over her.
Her spine hit the seat with an explosion of pain.
Metal shrieked until her marrow reverberated. Squealing brakes joined the profane chorus and howling made her ears cringe.
Darkness swirled around her.
Horns blended their indignant voices in a bedlam of sound. Children screamed in terror and agony. Kelsey’s blood turned icy at the thought of hurting innocent children.
Over the clamor
of doom, Whitney Houston started singing about how love would save the day. Kelsey’s last thought before her world turned black was that love had never saved her days.
ooo
Doran slammed his suburban into park, and pulled on the emergency brake. Still, the momentum of her car pushed his heavier vehicle toward oncoming traffic. How fast had she been going? Horns blared. He gritted his teeth and prayed that he’d calculated the proper amount of space to stop both vehicles.
His tires screamed as the locked vehicles slid toward the thick white line.
Over it.
Toward the traffic.
The slide seemed to last a lifetime.
And then, mere inches from smashing into a heavy load of pine logs, he realized the movement had stopped.
Heart hammering, Doran slammed his suburban into park, vaulted out and sprinted back to her mustang. It’s engine roared as if she still had her accelerator floored. No wonder it had taken father to stop than he had calculated. He yanked her door open, reached across the steering column and turned off the ignition. “What the hell were you doing?" he shouted. "You sure as hell weren’t driving.” Then, he whipped out his knife and stabbed the airbag. “And are you insane to keep the damned car floored?” Kelsey lay collapsed against the tan leather seat, her left temple was covered with blood and her face looked impossibly pale. Dear God, was she dead?
He convulsed backward, as if she’s slapped him back to reality. “Ohfuckme." Doran screamed out his fears for her safety and horror at how horribly wrong the plan had gone, without thinking about what he was saying. Then, her lashes fluttered to reveal a leaf-green flash of color and a tear trailed down her aristocratic cheek.
What had he done?
What had he said?
Deadly Rumors Page 3
