Half Life

by Helen Cothran

  I looked down at Lacy with gratitude. Granted, she seemed determined to send me to the emergency room on a regular basis, but at least she didn’t judge me. She didn’t care if I were married with five kids or lived alone for the rest of my life. She just loved me, no questions asked, no strings attached, no expectations. No wonder people love dogs.

  I hugged her, she licked my face, and together we started back toward the car at an easy jog.

  .

  We had run about a quarter mile back when suddenly rifle shots cracked the air. I flinched mid-stride, nearly rupturing my Achilles tendon. Lacy sprang straight up, turned a half-circle, then slammed into me on her way down. We stood huddled together, gasping and shaking, looking at the empty desert around us. I felt the adrenaline subside, which cleared my head and allowed me to remember: Rifle shots are common in the desert. People like to line up the old cans and bottles that can be found virtually everywhere out here and blast them to smithereens. In fact, an unofficial rifle range has been constructed at the dump just to the west of us, which was undoubtedly where the shots were coming from. It made me think of Raul and his unofficial dump. It made me think of the proposed nuclear waste repository. Couldn’t people leave the poor desert alone?

  Lacy leaned against me, shivering. Her fear was contagious, and though I knew the shots were innocuous, I found myself starting to shiver, too. It was getting cold, and now that I had stopped running my body temperature dropped quickly. The gun shots reminded me of how far we had run, of how distant my car was. I suddenly felt isolated and vulnerable. I had spent the last three weeks asking unwelcome questions of people I thought capable of murder, and for some reason I thought it had been a good idea to find some remote trail and run as far away from civilization as I could. Not bright.

  “Come on, girl!” I chirped to Lacy, and we bounded off down the trail towards the car. The dog stuck to me like glue, barely giving me enough room to stride along. A couple of times we got tangled up and I nearly ate sand. Her ears were flat against her head, and she kept looking behind us as though we were being pursued by a pack of gun-toting outlaws. Her nervousness infiltrated me until I, too, felt the presence of some unknown pursuer.

  I ran so fast I started to get a stitch in my side. Slowing, I tried to breathe calmly. After a few minutes the side-ache subsided, but it still stabbed if I tried to pick up the pace. I ignored it as best I could, tried to breathe easily and rhythmically. Though we were retracing the steps we had taken up the canyon, nothing looked familiar now, and I panicked for a moment thinking we were on a different trail, running in the wrong direction. But I had lived in this desert long enough to know the landmarks. I could see Mt. Barton ahead of me to the west and the Mule Train Hills to the north, indicating that I was moving in a northwesterly direction, exactly as I should have been to find my car along the dirt road known as Little Rattlesnake Trail. Still, I felt that we should have come to the car by now.

  Then, finally, we came around a bend in the trail and I saw the Corolla parked along the edge of the dirt road about fifty yards from me, exactly as I had left it. Except for one thing.

  All its tires were flat.

  33

  A quick inspection revealed a single hole in each tire. I thought of the rifle shots.

  Damn it! Someone shot out my tires.

  I kicked the right front tire and nearly broke my toe. How could someone do this to me? Damn them! This was not funny. I was miles from town, there was zero cell phone reception in these canyons, and I was cold and tired.

  I pulled my cell phone out of my running pack and tried calling the first number I thought of: Eddie’s. Nothing happened, of course, the phone just blanked on me. This place was too hemmed in by hills.

  An awful awareness crept into my brain. This was no practical joke. Someone wanted me dead in the water. My whole body recoiled as the realization dawned that I was being watched, had been watched ever since I drove out here. And probably before that, I realized, because whoever shot my tires had to have followed me from home. Of course, this could be nothing but a coincidence, some guy roaming the foothills who thought it would be a hoot to shoot my tires out. But the minute I thought it, I knew it wasn’t true. It was too far-fetched. As I had told Trent, I don’t believe in coincidences.

  Occam’s Razor says that the simplest explanation is the most probable one. For three weeks I’d been asking unwelcome questions of people I suspected were capable of murder. Raul, Matthew, Faith, Angel, Cornwell—except that Cornwell was dead, maybe killed because of my questions. Whoever killed Cornwell, and possibly Pete, was sending me a message: Back off. Shut up. Or else.

  And there I was, miles from town, miles from the nearest road, alone with a disabled car and unusable cell phone. I felt vulnerability hit me like a blast of cold air. Shivers of fear tingled through my nervous system as the feeling of being watched overwhelmed me. I’m sorry to report that I actually dropped to the ground on my hands and knees behind the driver’s side of the car as if the killer had me in the crosshairs at that very moment.

  Lacy padded over and licked my ear.

  What a moron, Sam. If the shooter wanted to kill me, I’d already be dead. I had been running the trails for an hour and a half, totally exposed. I had been standing like a doofus beside my car now for at least five minutes, the perfect target. No, the killer didn’t want me dead, he—or she, or they—just wanted to scare me. To send a message: Keep nosing around and you’re toast.

  But why not kill me now? Why I was I being warned, while Cornwell and Pete had been killed? What was one more body? I must not be perceived as much of a threat, just a small one, easy enough to scare away. Why take the risk of killing me when I posed no significant threat? I was just a pesky little gnat, an inconvenience.

  I felt dissed.

  Well, that’s brilliant, Sam. I was actually pissed off that the shooter hadn’t tried to kill me.

  I kicked the tire again.

  Lacy looked up at me, head tilted to the side as she tried to make sense of my bizarre behavior. She kept glancing at me, then at the passenger door, then back at me. Why weren’t we getting in the car? Why hadn’t I retrieved the water bottle and doggie bowl from the car and given her a drink? Why was I standing there kicking tires when we could be driving off down the road toward home and food?

  Go figure, the dog was more practical than I was. Of course we both needed water, and water I had. After a drink maybe I could drive the car slowly on the rims until I hit the highway. That would put us only a couple of miles from home, easily walkable. At some point my cell phone would start working again, and I could call Connor and ask for a ride home.

  I opened the unlocked car door (why lock it when you’re out in the middle of nowhere?) and reached over to the cup holder to get the water bottle.

  It wasn’t there.

  I swore I put it there when we got in the car to come out here. I always carry water in the car, especially when I’m driving to a trailhead to run or hike. I looked on the floorboards and under the seats, but no bottle. I popped the trunk. No water.

  Then I realized: Whoever shot my tires had also ransacked my car, taking anything that might help me. So, the tires hadn’t been shot at a distance as I had thought.

  The shooter had been standing right here, right where I was.

  Fear tingled again, and I felt a bad thought taking form in my mind.

  To test my suspicion, I climbed into the driver’s seat and tried starting the car. Nothing. The blown tires were just for effect. The real damage was beneath the hood of the car. The shooter wanted me stranded for real, wanted me to have to walk back into town, a distance of around ten miles. And I had already run about eight. And I had no more water.

  Shit. I was in a lot of trouble.

  34

  Decisions are easy when you have only one choice. We walked. I felt bad for Lacy. This was my fault, me with my questions and bravado and righteousness. This wasn’t the first time my efforts to right wrong
s had gotten me into trouble. But Lacy had done nothing to deserve this. She was thirsty and tired. She had run twice as far as I had because time and again she had chased jackrabbits and then run back to me. I looked at her plodding along in front of me, head down, tongue out, no interest now in the jackrabbits that scurried off into the brush as we passed. Fortunately, it was springtime, cool and overcast. Had this been August, our goose would have been cooked.

  We had trudged along for only a mile when it began to rain. Great, it rains like four times a year in this desert and it had to be now. At least it wasn’t the torrential rains of August. This was a fine mist, simply a big wet cloud descending to earth. The mist collected on my bare legs and long-sleeved running top, and I could feel my body temperature drop. I hate to be cold, and I cursed the nemesis who had put me in this predicament. Despite my fatigue I picked up the pace to generate more body heat. Besides, the quicker I got down, the sooner I could make a call and get help. I found myself dreaming of a hot bath and a warm glass of Glen Livet, followed by a big bowl of hot chili. Lacy, I imagined, dreamed of a big bowl of water and a thick T-bone steak. By God, when we got home I’d give her one.

  Every quarter mile or so I pulled out my cell and tried it, but it was no good. Cripe, what was up with this place, was I in outer Siberia or what? My throat was dry as dust, I was hungry, and goose bumps covered my arms and legs despite the fast pace I was setting. My legs felt like wood, and my lower back was killing me. I checked the phone again and noticed my fingertips had gone numb. If I didn’t get reception soon, my hands would be too frozen to use the cell.

  Lacy plodded more slowly with every mile and at one point dropped to the ground and lay there, looking up at me with big brown eyes. Oh, the guilt! The poor dog did not understand why we were on this forced march. But when I bent down to stroke her head, she licked my hand all the same, no anger or blame, just acceptance and trust. When I stood, she stood, and together we continued down the trail toward home.

  I was exhausted. I had run around eight miles, and I had been walking at a good clip now for an hour, which means I had probably done four more miles. I reckoned that it wouldn’t be long before I came to a point where I could get cell phone reception, but such thoughts made me even more impatient, made the walk seem even longer than it was. I was cold now, too. The mist had worked its way down through the fabric of my running clothes, and my skin was wet all over. My legs were bright pink, and my nose dripped constantly. My toes ached in my wet running shoes.

  I had to think about something else besides my misery or I’d give up and die a laughable death in a gentle mist four miles from the highway. I could just hear Vanessa tsk tsk, saying my lame death had embarrassed the family. Connor would be thrilled that another Larkin had finally outdone him in the stupid antics department. Eddie would—No, I would not think of Eddie.

  Now Lacy trudged behind me, clearly exhausted. When I looked back I noticed she was hobbling, her paws not used to so much use. For once she had no goopy strands of saliva hanging from her jowls, and with a jolt I realized that it was because she was too thirsty, her mouth was bone dry.

  Damn it! I was furious at whoever had done this, all of it, shooting my tires, disabling my vehicle, forcing us to walk miles into town. But this was nothing compared to what this person—or people—had already done. Pete had been murdered, his body disposed of so no one would ever find it, denying his family any hope of burying him and finding closure, as cold a comfort as that would be. Pete hadn’t done anything to deserve this.

  Had Bernard Cornwell deserved his fate? I had a hard time feeling as bad for him as I did for Pete because I despised the work Cornwell did. Still, no human being deserves to be murdered in cold blood. Cornwell had obviously crossed somebody. Had he killed Pete and then been punished for it? Or had he known who Pete’s killer was and been silenced? Trent thought that his death had to do with drugs, but I didn’t buy it. A hypothesis about these murders was taking shape in my mind, and today’s events supported it. I hadn’t worked out all the details yet, but I felt increasingly certain that I was right.

  If today’s antics were intended to scare me off—and I was sure they were—they had had the opposite effect. I was pissed and more determined than ever. Every damn mile I walked in the cold rain with my poor thirsty dog made me madder. I would not be frightened away by such a stupid prank. If I was meant to be gotten rid of, I should have been shot like an old tin can out at the rifle range. I had worked for no pay for weeks investigating these murders. I had worked this case when I should have been working at my real job, which put my livelihood in jeopardy. I was too far in, and I was not going away that easily. It was time to take it up a notch.

  A half mile from the highway I finally got reception.

  Connor relished saving my ass for once.

  35

  Enough was enough. Three weeks into the investigation I was fairly sure who had killed Pete and Cornwell. I just hadn’t been able to prove it to myself beyond a shadow of a doubt. Waiting around for some magic evidence to appear was clearly not going to get the job done. It was time to finish this. That this decision might result in grave bodily harm, I was well aware, yet strangely the unexpected trek in the desert yesterday caused me not to care. I had been dismissed as someone who could be scared off, and frankly it pissed me off.

  That was why I was at the First Baptist Church where Matthew Thornton worked. I knew my chat with him was going to set dangerous events in motion, but I felt steeled to it, even hungry for it. While I had come to the church by myself, I didn’t feel alone. Pete walked beside me up the church steps, my backup should I lose my nerve. I found his presence comforting and also damning, spurring me to action. Angel had warned about vengeance too long delayed. He was right. Pete was like the ghost of Hamlet’s father, urging me to avenge his death, to set the universe right. This was mine to do, and I had taken way too long.

  I opened the heavy wooden door and entered the church. Once my eyes became accustomed to the gloom, I looked around. The edifice looked churchy in the usual way, pews and pulpit and stained glass. It was cool and quiet and smelled of old hymnals. Dust motes bobbed in the colored sunlight slanting in through the stained glass windows. I was not a churchgoer myself, but I could feel the attraction of this place. The sepulchral quiet and supernatural light made me feel otherworldly, like I existed beyond time. The people who attended services here must feel that the church and its rituals brought them closer to God. Alas, I did not believe, as I had discovered when I had nearly died alone in a wind turbine out in the middle of nowhere. If such an experience did not reveal a belief in divine deliverance, I don’t know what would. I envied the believers. It would be comforting to think of some all-powerful being watching out for me. Then I thought about why I was here. I was trying to catch a murderer. Where was God when Pete was killed? A believer would say we can’t know God, that we can’t understand why he does what he does. But the question haunted me. A young man, scared and alone, murdered, his body hidden. I suppose these are the tragedies that test people’s faith.

  I began the long walk up the aisle. My footfalls echoed softly in the cavernous space. I felt like I was in a parade as I walked toward the altar—me, Pete, the ghost of Hamlet’s father, and the universe, all striding purposefully in search of the truth. When I got to the sanctuary, the spell broke and I suddenly felt alone, vulnerable, and exposed. I took a deep breath and looked around, my eyes now fully adjusted to the dim light. I hadn’t seen Matthew in the church grounds, and the rectory and social hall had been locked. He had to be here in the church itself, working. Or praying.

  “Hello?” I ventured, my voice sounding small. It echoed off the high ceiling and came back to me.

  Then I saw a flash of light as the front door opened, and in walked Matthew. He didn’t see me at first, his eyes still adjusting to the gloom, and I watched him walk up the aisle toward me. This was his church, its teachings the reason he had submitted to Cornwell’s therapy. I
expected to see reverence on his face as he neared the front of the church, but Matthew mostly looked sad. His perfect features, many-hued in the light from the windows, looked drawn, sagging as if on a person much older than Matthew. He moved slowly, haltingly, his eyes focused on the cross above the pulpit, on Jesus’s tortured body. Matthew looked unsure of himself, like he didn’t belong here or was crossing some line. It was odd behavior for a man who worked in this church every day and attended its services religiously. In silence I watched him, felt his misery. He came within ten feet of me before he finally saw me standing by the organ in a splash of red light. He jumped and sucked in his breath.

  “Hello, Matthew.”

  He looked like he wanted to run, his face was suddenly tense and alert, you could feel the energy clenched in his muscles. It was like observing that moment right before the grazing zebra bursts into movement as the lion leaps. But instead of running, Matthew froze like a rabbit.

  I looked at him quietly. “I want to ask you a few more questions about Pete.”

  He glanced over his shoulder as if he expected someone to walk through the front door and save him. When no one came, he turned back to me, muttered, “We told you to leave us alone.”

  I noted the “we.” So the someone he had been hoping would save him was Faith.

  “Listen,” I said roughly, my voice proclaiming that I was so done with his shit, “I don’t believe anything you’ve told me about you and Pete. Come on, Matthew, tell the truth. You were seeing Pete, I know you were. Just tell me why you’ve been lying about it. Is it that you’re ashamed? Afraid?” I could hear my questions echo sharply in the quiet church.

  He stood there biting his lip, eyes flitting around as if he were looking for the right answers in the hymnals or the stained glass or in the figure of Jesus above us. I could see that he was shaking. After a minute Matthew put his hands up to his face and covered his eyes, and I could hear a choking sound at the back of his throat. “Why won’t you leave us alone?” he implored.