"No!" She convulsed, almost breaking out of his iron grip. "Not we! No more meetings with you in tow. No way. Never again. I will not allow you to ruin this for me! It's too important!"
"Jesus! I cannot get through to you, Erin! I am not reassured by the fact that Mueller didn't show. I was not impressed by Dobbs or Julian. And I was disgusted by the way they were jerking you around."
"Oh, God. Is that what you think of Mueller's offer?"
"Yeah. It is." The look on his face was a grim challenge.
She forced herself to stop struggling. "Please let me go, Connor," she said quietly. He let go, and she clambered off his lap and slid to the other end of the seat. "I would love to get jerked around like that more often," she said, straightening her clothing. "The chance to curate a collection like Mueller's, to bring in a donation of that size, to be responsible for a new wing. For where I am in my career, it would be an unbelievable coup."
"Yeah, exactly," he said. "Unbelievable."
His tone sent a chill through her. "You can't possibly still be thinking that he's Novak."
He shrugged. "It bugs me that he didn't show his face once he found out I was with you. Until I meet the guy in person, I'll continue to assume the worst."
She sagged down onto the seat, deflated. Her anger was draining away and her energy with it, as if a vortex had opened up beneath her, sucking it up. It felt horribly familiar. It was the same vortex that had been sucking everyone she cared about into its big black maw.
This was such an old struggle. In that moment, she had a dim, aching flash of just how old it was. She'd been fighting this vortex ever since she was a tiny child. By trying to be good, orderly, disciplined. Trying to make sense of the world. All her life. With all her strength.
It wasn't enough. It was taking her down, like it had taken Dad. Like it seemed to be taking Mom. Maybe Cindy, too, for all she knew. Nothing could stop it. Certainly not her feeble efforts.
She squeezed her eyes shut. "So it's all a vicious conspiracy? Everything I do, everything I try to build, it's all an ugly joke, and I'm the butt of it. I'm never going to crawl out of this godawful stinking hole, am I, Connor? Monsters are waiting around every corner."
"Erin, please—"
"It's like quicksand," she quavered. "The harder I try to climb out, the deeper I sink."
"Erin, please," Connor pleaded. "Don't freak out on me. I could be wrong. Hell, I probably am wrong. Maybe I'm a paranoid idiot, and if so, I give you permission to kick my ass, OK? Please, don't cry. Come here."
"No." She shrank against the door. "Please, just shut up and leave me alone."
He knocked his head against the steering wheel with a snarl of raw frustration. "Oh, Christ. What a mess," he muttered, starting up the car with a roar. "Put your seat belt on."
The car was ominously silent for the next couple of hours. Erin kept her face averted. Connor finally pulled over at a roadside restaurant and parked. "Let's get some food," he said.
"I'm not hungry," she told him. "But go right ahead."
He marched around the car, wrenched the door open, and yanked her out. "You need to eat."
She was too tired to fight. "Don't, Connor," she said. "I'm coming. Please calm down."
"Hah," he muttered.
She ordered a bowl of chicken soup rather than argue over food, and made a show of eating it while he devoured his cheeseburger. She stopped at the bank of pay phones in the restaurant lobby on their way out, and plugged all her change into one of the phones. Her last quarter slipped from her fingers, and the damned thing rolled everywhere, deliberately eluding her. Connor finally subdued it by stomping it under his boot. He plugged it into the slot for her.
She dialed. A recorded voice said that the money she'd deposited was insufficient for that call, and would she please deposit another—
"Goddamn this worthless piece of garbage!" she shrieked.
She started pounding on it. Connor grabbed her fists and held her fast. "Hey. Cool it before they call the cops on us, babe," he soothed. "The screaming is making the hostess nervous. What's the problem?"
"Do you have any goddamn quarters?" she demanded.
"Shhh. I've got better than that." He wrapped his arms around her tightly from behind, surrounding her with his warmth. "I've got a cell phone, and it's still charged up. Come on out to the car. You can make your call there, where it's private and quiet."
He flipped open the phone and handed it to her as soon as they got to the car. She dialed the cell phone number for Cindy. Nothing.
She dialed Mom's number, crossing her fingers. It was Monday evening. Mom should have gotten the phone turned back on by now.
It was still disconnected.
She snapped the phone shut, handed it back to him, and twisted her hands in her lap.
"Dead end?" he asked.
She nodded.
"Who were you trying to reach? Cindy?"
"And my mom," she whispered.
"What about your mom?" he prompted. "Is she OK?"
She let out a tight, hitching breath and shook her head.
"Tell me, Erin." There was no harsh note of command in his quiet voice this time.
She looked into her lap. "Mom's losing it," she said. "Most days she won't even get out of bed. She won't pay her bills. She didn't get her phone turned back on. She's going to lose the house. There's no money left to pay the mortgage. And now she's seeing things. In the TV Impossible things. The videos that Victor Lazar used to blackmail Dad. Of him, with his mistress. In bed." Her voice trailed off.
Connor made no comment. She looked up. His eyes were full of quiet comprehension. "I watched my dad fall apart," he said. "I know how it feels."
Her throat shook. "It's horrible. It's… it's like—"
"Like the earth opening up beneath your feet," he finished.
She started to cry, deep and wrenching sobs. He pulled her onto his lap, tucked her head beneath his chin, and rocked her tenderly. She let the storm rage through her, leaving her limp and exhausted, and so relaxed in the warm circle of his arms that she fell asleep.
The better part of an hour and a half went by. His bad leg was stiff and cramped beneath her warm weight, and they should have gotten right back on the road, but it was worth it, to hold such a fragrant, beautiful creature in his arms. He sneaked all the pins out of her hair and hid them in his jacket pocket, and her glossy bun had uncoiled and wrapped itself around his hand like a live thing before it lay quiet against her slender, graceful back. He pressed his cheek against her hair. So smooth and soft. Like nothing else on earth.
A car horn blared. She woke with a start. "What? Where are we?"
He stroked her back gently. "Same place we were before."
"But it's getting dark." She consulted her watch. "Good God, it's been over an hour. Why didn't you wake me?"
"I didn't want to disturb you," he said simply.
She scrambled off his lap. "We'd better get going," she murmured. "What happened to my hairpins?"
"Guess they fell out," he said, with a perfectly straight face.
He never would have thought he could be grateful for a woman's crying jag, but he was grateful for this one. It had drained away all their bitter tension. Erin yawned as he started up the car, and he reached out and touched the curve of her cheek. "Why don't you try and sleep some more?" he suggested. "It's been a hell of a day."
He waited until Erin's head was lolling against the seat, her rosy mouth slightly open, hair waving across her face like a feathery dark veil. He pulled out the phone and pushed the scrambler code for Sean.
"Hey," Sean said.
"So?"
"I can hardly hear you, dude," Sean complained. "Speak up."
"I'm on the road. Erin's sleeping, and I don't want to wake her. Tell me what you've got."
Sean grunted. "Well, I checked out the babe lair, and you know what? Most of them actually were pretty damn cute. They couldn't tell me much about Billy the Fuckhead, though, except
how loaded and hunkadelic he is, and that Jag just makes them all come. No surname, place of origin, occupation, or details of any kind. But I've spent the afternoon tracking down the Vicious Rumors, and—"
"The what?"
"Cindy's band," Sean explained. "She plays sax in an R&B bar band. She's a music major, you know. They tell me she's not half bad, either. Anyhow, I bought a pitcher of beer and a platter of wings for the lead guitarist and the drummer. They told me that this guy Billy got them some gigs in various roadhouses over the past couple of months. He's some kind of agent, or so he told them. He strung them along with big talk about record deals, national tours, and shit like that, but nothing ever came of it but a few sleazy gigs for thirty bucks a head in some roadhouse dives. Then he lost interest in them and sort of sucked Cindy up into his wake. She hasn't rehearsed with the Rumors for over a month. They're worried about her, too. They don't like the Fuckhead. And they want Cindy back."
"Surname? License number? Anything? If they worked for him they must have paperwork, right?"
"Nah. It was all cash under the table, and the cell phone number they had for him no longer works. He called himself Billy Vega, but Davy hasn't uncovered anything under that name yet. It's an alias."
"Shit," he muttered.
"But don't despair. They told me that the Vicious Rumors soundman had a big, sloppy crush on Cindy. Ever since she ran off, he's been hiding out in his parents' basement, nursing his broken heart watching his X-Files videos and drinking Jolt."
"Ouch." Connor winced. "That's bad."
"Yeah, love hurts. I'm on my way right now to roust the sound man out of his basement. We'll see if jealousy made him notice anything special about this guy. And I've got a list of all the roadhouses where Billy got gigs for the Rumors. That's my plan for the evening. Country music, cheap beer, and secondhand smoke. What a glittering life I lead."
"Great. Carry on. And thanks. I owe you one, Sean."
"You're gonna pay up, too. When we get this business straightened out, you're gonna make me some of your special chili, like you used to. Maybe not just once. This counts for three times."
Connor hesitated. "Uh, it's been two years. I don't even know if I remember how."
"Tough shit. Start practicing, because that's my fee. You do the chili, I bring the beer, the chips, and the pepper jack cheese."
Connor grinned into the dark. "Deal. I'll dig out my chili recipe. And Sean? You know what? You're a good guy."
Sean snorted. "Tell that to some of my ex-girlfriends. Oh, and speaking of which. Did you get laid last night?"
Connor let several seconds tick by. "You cannot even imagine how off-limits that is as a conversational topic," he said softly.
Sean gasped. "Really? Hot damn! So this is serious, huh?"
"Serious as death," Connor replied. "Don't touch it."
"Oh boy. I've got the shivers," Sean moaned. "What did she do to you, man? Did she—"
"I'll call you tomorrow, Sean."
He clicked the phone shut, dropped it into his pocket, and glanced over to make sure Erin was still asleep. Her eyelashes were dark fans against her cheek. Twilight had leached all the color out of the car, but he had already memorized her colors, the soft golden tints and faint blushes and glossy deep hues of eyes and hair. Her blouse had come untucked. Buttons gaped over her sweet, sexy tits, showing a tantalizing glimpse of the white cotton bra. He wanted to buy her expensive lingerie made out of sheer, fluttering silks and laces. Things that hung together with delicate straps and hooks and snaps. He wanted to watch her put them all on, scrap by diaphanous scrap.
Then he wanted to immediately rip them off her again.
A shiny black Ford Explorer passed him, not for the first time. A cold, tingling thrill of recognition raced through him. That Explorer had been one of the cars he had taken note of when they'd pulled into the restaurant parking lot, but he'd been so focused on Erin when they came out that he had forgotten to monitor the cars again.
They'd been in that restaurant for a half an hour. They'd sat in the parking lot for an hour and twenty minutes more. Any car that had been there when they arrived should have damn well moved on long before they left. His gut was cold, and his neck was prickling. He stepped on the gas, pulled up closer to the Explorer, and checked the plate.
Sure enough, it was the very one. Brand new, black and shiny as if it had just been licked clean. Just the driver, no passengers. He eased off the gas, let it pull ahead. There was an exit in a couple of miles. He put on his turn signal and got into the exit lane, to see how it behaved.
The Explorer swerved abruptly into the exit lane ahead of him. It slowed down until he was riding its bumper, then slowed down even more. Fifty-five… fifty… forty-five… thirty-eight… Jesus.
The Explorer swerved suddenly back to the other lane. Connor pulled up alongside, and glanced at it.
Georg Luksh was grinning in the passenger seat, like some death's-head jack-in-the-box. His long hair was cut off, but it was definitely him, still missing the four teeth that Connor had knocked out of his head last November. The window rolled down. He leveled a rifle at Connor, and fluttered his fingers in an effeminate wave.
The Cadillac shuddered as Connor jammed on the brakes. The Explorer surged ahead, picking up speed.
Erin jolted awake. "What? What happened? Connor?"
"I thought I saw—" He stopped when he heard the panic in his own voice. He could've sworn he had seen no one in that passenger seat at first.
"I can't believe it," he muttered.
"What can't you believe?"
His mind was too busy churning out possible explanations to answer her. Georg could have been crouched down, waiting for a chance to pop up and scare the shit out of him. But it sounded so improbable. So… paranoid.
"What? Please, Connor, what did you see?" Erin pleaded.
He pulled up closer to the Explorer. The passenger seat was empty. His stomach sank down to cold, new depths.
He took a deep breath. "I thought I saw Georg," he admitted.
Erin put her hand over her mouth. "Where?"
"In that black SUV ahead of us."
She studied the SUV "That's not Georg driving. That guy's too tall, and his head is too narrow."
"Not driving," he said. He already knew just how this was going to look and sound to her. His stomach was already clenching. A vague, sick feeling, like shame.
Erin stared at the SUV "There's nobody in that passenger seat."
"I see that," he said tightly. "Believe me. I noticed that weird, wacky detail already with no help from you."
"Connor?" Her voice was timid and small. "Maybe it's just… are you tired? I'd be happy to drive, if you need to rest, and I could—"
"No," he snarled. "I'm fine."
She turned her face away, so that all he could see was the graceful sweep of her hair.
"Shit," he muttered. "I'm sorry."
"It's OK," she whispered.
Oh Christ, the exit. He swerved at the last moment and pulled off the highway. He did not want to share that dark, empty road with a phantom nightmare SUV Not unless he could go after the bastards full out, run them to the ground, and grind them into paste.
Which was not an option tonight. Not with Erin in the car. He pulled out his cell phone and dialed Davy on the scrambled line.
Davy picked up instantly. "What's up? You in trouble?"
Davy could always smell the trouble his little brothers got into, even when he was oceans away. "You talked to Sean?" Connor asked.
"Yeah. He told me all about the quest to rescue Erin's little sister from the evil fuckhead. I'm working on it, too. You need something?"
"Run me a license plate number, please." He rattled it off.
"Got it. What's wrong, Con? What's special about the car?"
His stomach rolled. "Don't ask," he said. "I'll tell you later."
Davy waited, hoping for more, and grunted in annoyance when no more was forthcoming. "Take it easy,"
he said. The connection broke.
"Um, Connor? Where are we going?" Erin asked.
He hated her low, guarded tone. He'd used it himself while trying to reason with crazy people. "We're finding another road," he said. "I don't want to share the highway with that thing."
"It'll take us all night to get back to Seattle if we don't use I-5."
"Get the map out of the glove box," he ordered.
He'd forgotten shoving all the Mueller printouts into the glove box at the airport. They exploded out over her feet, a blizzard of paper. She gathered them up and peered at them in the dim dashboard light. "Are these the results of the check your brother ran on Mueller?"
"Yeah." He felt almost guilty, as if she'd discovered a dirty secret. "Get out the map."
She sounded as if she were going to say something else, but then thought better of it. Probably didn't want to push an unpredictable head case like him over the edge. Poor Erin, stuck in the middle of nowhere in the dark with a guy who saw things that weren't there.
His misery deepened and spread. Like a pool of blood, widening inexorably on cold concrete. She studied the map. It was terribly quiet.
His cell phone rang. He snatched it up. Davy. "Yeah?"
"That license plate is a 2002 Ford Explorer, color black, which belongs to a guy named Roy Fitz. A sixty-two-year-old divorced used car salesman in Coos Bay, Oregon. He has bad credit. Does that help?"
Connor let out a long, silent sigh of misery. "Uh, no. Not really. But I appreciate the help. Later, Davy."
"Goddammit, Con, what the hell is—"
"I can't talk about it right now," he snarled. "I'm sorry. Good-bye."
Great. Now he could feel bad about being rude to his brother, too.
Erin tidied the Mueller papers into a neat sheaf, folded them, and tucked them carefully into the glove box. The map rustled as she opened it up. She switched on the interior light and peered at it for a couple of minutes. "We can take this road up to Redstone Creek, and then connect with the Paulson Highway north until we reach Bonney. Then we'll make our decisions as we go. Sound good to you?"
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