With her mind trying to wander off and pursue those thoughts again, she pushed harder. She wasn’t ready to stop pedaling yet. She needed to purge her demons. She needed to burn this feeling out of her body. Once it melted away from her, she would stop on the trail and call Ben. If he was still at the shop, maybe she’d ask him to meet her at one of the overpasses. He could take her home and they could talk. She could explain things. The very idea of what she was going to have to tell him made her angry again.
She lowered her head and cranked hard, starting the cycle over again.
48
From the car, the Death Merchant had difficulty locating the overpass. He was using his phone for guidance but the reception was spotty. Sometimes it lost the signal and couldn’t update his location. The first overpass he stopped at was just a bridge over a small creek. He stared into the darkness, trying to will his eyes to adjust, but he could not spot any trail there.
“Shit!” he roared, rushing to get back in his car and speeding away into the night.
He moved his eyes from the road to his phone, scared he might miss a curve from not paying attention. When he caught a pocket of signal, his GPS app updated and showed he had not yet reached the overpass he was looking for.
The next overpass was not the correct one either. It was a bridge spanning a narrow valley between hills and he could see no trail there. He was nearly in panic mode now, concerned he’d missed her entirely and he would not find her on this night. He couldn’t wait another full day. This ended tonight. The Death Merchant did not put things off. He did not stop before the mission was complete.
Back in the car, he drove a little too quickly on the narrow and unfamiliar road, his tire dropping off the shoulder several times.
“Slow down,” he warned himself.
At the next overpass, he was in luck. There was a brown sign indicating bike trail access. The Death Merchant smiled and pulled over into a cramped gravel lot. He killed his engine and ambled out in the darkness.
With no flashlight, he was reduced to stumbling around in what little ambient light there was. He couldn’t see any details, only enough shapes and generalities to find his way. He got his hand on a stone railing and followed it out to the center of the overpass and listened.
Dead silence.
Had she passed already or was he ahead of her? He had no idea how long it would take a bicyclist to reach this point. Then it occurred to him he had no plan for what he was going to do when she came along. How would he take her down? Was he going to leap onto her back like in the movies? Not likely.
He couldn’t see the exact distance but it looked like a significant drop from the overpass to the trail. No, he needed something he could drop on her. Something that would wreck and incapacitate her without killing her.
The Death Merchant returned to the car and flipped on the headlights. He studied the area illuminated by the lights for anything he might use as a missile. There was a green barrel being used as a trash can but when it tried to pick it up it was too heavy. He was certain he could roll it into position but it was heavy enough it would probably kill anyone it landed on. While it was certainly part of the plan that Amanda die tonight, he wanted it to be a more personal, intimate event.
He wanted to speak with her first. He wanted her to admit to what she’d done.
He spotted a tree limb just beyond the edge of the parking lot. It must have snapped off a tree and dropped into the parking lot before being shoved to the side. The Death Merchant was not a good estimate of size, but he thought the limb to be twice as tall as him. The largest end was as thick as his bicep. He picked it up and found it was something he could easily carry and toss off the overpass.
He heaved it up onto his shoulder, laying it on the hood of the car while he killed the headlights. This would be a shitty place to run down your battery, especially with a kidnapped girl in the back of the car. He was traipsing into position with his awkward load when he spotted the flicker of white light in the woods. He couldn’t see the trail but assumed it could be a headlight coming along the trail toward the overpass.
He smiled in the darkness. “I have a present for you CamaroChick19. Consider it a token of my friendship, of my utter fucking loathing for you. Let it serve as a reminder not to play with people’s feelings. We could have been good friends. I could have been anything you wanted.”
The headlight broke from the distant woods and he heard the steady sound of the tires rolling over fine gravel and cinders. The Death Merchant crouched and hid below the stone railing, not wanting to silhouette himself. He bobbed up occasionally, gauging the distance between himself and the rider.
He smiled. He couldn’t help it. He was tapped into an adventure such as he usually only experienced in his games.
When he felt the timing was right, he shot up and grabbed the limb in both hands. He dropped it, hoping his hurried calculations were correct.
They were.
Limb and rider met directly below him. There was a grunt, a curse, and the beam of the headlight skewed as the bike toppled over the shoulder of the trail.
“Yes!” the Death Merchant yelled, raising a fist in victory.
He ran for the end of the overpass, looped around the railing, and stumbled down the steep embankment to the trail. Several times his feet slid from beneath him and he sat down hard in the dirt. He didn’t care. He was nearly ecstatic at his success. It was perfectly executed.
From the trail he could see bike and rider tangled at the bottom of another embankment. After the limb had hit the rider and made her wreck, she’d rolled down a rock-strewn hill to where she lay now.
“That had to hurt,” he said. “Consider it the appetizer.”
He scrambled after her to the extent a four-hundred pound man could scramble. She was face down, moaning in pain but conscious. He flipped the bike over until the light shone in her direction. He flipped her over and staggered backward in shock.
It was not CamaroChick19.
The boy from the bike shop was bleeding, his mouth a rictus of pain. His eyes bore into the Death Merchant’s. “Why did you do that?”
The Death Merchant had no answer. He fell backward, then got to his feet and crawled up the embankment to the trail. He stopped there, breathing hard, and looked back at the kid. He didn’t know what to do with him but the more time he wasted there, the more likely it was the girl was going to escape.
He climbed the steep path back to his car. At the top, he was breathing hard and stumbling, his legs weak from the exertion. He sagged into the car seat and brought up the GPS app on his phone. He was pleased to find he had a signal, pleased for the one fucking thing that was going his way right now. He studied the map.
There was another overpass. Surely the girl had to be between that one and here. He had another shot if he could get there soon enough. He started the car and backed up. The car struck the green garbage barrel and there was a crunch of steel. It did not slow him. He stomped the gas and slewed out into the road.
“Let her be there,” he begged. “Let her be tired and slow and let her be there.”
49
Ben struggled to focus and maintain consciousness. He was lying in an awkward position and put his arm down to straighten himself. A bolt of searing pain shot through him and made him cry out. He was certain he’d broken his collarbone.
The pain brought clarity and he remembered something dropping on him. He’d lost control of the bike and shot over the embankment. He recalled laying there tangled in rocks and brush before he lost consciousness. Most vividly of all, he remembered seeing the hulking figure from the store, the man who had been behaving strangely toward Amanda.
Ben awkwardly worked his way to a sitting position, screaming and gritting his teeth at the pain. He struggled to his feet and his head spun, making him feel like he was going to black out. He lowered himself down to a rock and took deep breaths, trying to clear his head. His cell phone was still in his shirt pocket and he pulled it ou
t. He touched the screen to wake his phone but found he had no signal. With a broken collarbone there was no way he was riding out of there. He needed to find signal and get a call out now.
He struggled to climb the steep embankment, using his good arm to tug at roots and clumps of grass. The motion twisted his body, producing a scraping sound within the broken collarbone. When he was back on the rail bed trail, Ben fell to his knees and threw up. Waves of dizziness threatened to pull him back into unconsciousness. He forced himself back to his feet and checked for signal again.
Nothing.
A muddy embankment led from the bike trail to a stone overpass. It occurred to Ben this must have been where he was attacked from. The man had likely dropped something on him from the overpass. It made him hesitant to climb up there but he couldn’t see anyone. The man was probably gone. At least Ben hoped he was.
He attacked that embankment with the same vigor, losing his footing once and falling flat on his face. By instinct he threw his arms out in front of him in an attempt to stop his fall. By the time he realized his mistake, it was too late. When his hands hit the ground, the pain from his broken collarbone made him scream.
His eyes watered and he cursed. He balled up, cradling his arm and cursing.
“Gotta get up,” he grunted.
He pushed himself back to his knees and started climbing again. Once on the overpass, he sagged against the stone railing while he fumbled with his phone. Sweat rolled down his forehead and neck. He felt sick again.
He had two bars. It was enough for a call but in his confusion he wasn't immediately certain who to call. His mind hit a wall.
“Amanda,” he mumbled. “I need to warn her.”
He hit her contact icon and waited for the phone to ring. It took forever to connect, but when it finally started ringing there was no answer. She probably didn’t have a signal since there were only isolated pockets of connectivity once you got this far out of town. He thought of calling Amanda's dad to make him aware of what was going on but he did not have his number.
“Mom,” he whispered. “Call Mom.”
Perhaps it was pure instinct rather than a calculated decision but he hit the icon to call his mom just as he was hit with another wave of spinning and nausea. He leaned over the stone railing and spewed vomit into the gorge. Each contraction of his stomach made his head throb. He wondered if he had a concussion.
He was pondering that, thinking of laying down right where he stood, when he heard his mother’s tinny voice saying his name from the small speaker on his phone. He raised it to his ear.
“Are you okay?” his mother asked.
"Not really," Ben said, his voice quavering.
“What’s wrong, sweetie?” Her voice was urgent, her sixth sense kicking into gear, telling her that her son needed her help.
“That weird guy from the store. He jumped me on the trail. I think he thought I was Amanda."
"This doesn’t make any sense," his mom said. "Why are you on the trail at this time of night? You said you were following Amanda home. Did you lie to me?"
Too many questions. Too many words. Ben couldn’t make sense of them all. He had to keep talking and get out what he needed to say. He wanted to lay down. Wanted to close his eyes.
"Amanda had a call from her stepdad right at closing. She got upset. Took off on her bike. I went after her but I hadn't caught her yet. Was at Overpass One. Somebody dropped something on me. Wrecked."
"Are you okay?" she asked again.
Ben rolled his eyes. He surely didn’t sound okay. "No, not okay. Need you to listen right now."
“Okay, we’re listening."
We? She must have put him on speaker. It took him a second to realize the other half of the we must be his dad.
"I wrecked. I think my collarbone is broken. Head’s messed up too. Saw the guy who was in the store that day. The guy that was acting funny around Amanda. He came down on the trail and saw it was me. Took off running. Think he was hoping I was Amanda."
"Where is Amanda?"
"Ahead of me on the trail. I hadn't caught up with her yet. Can’t ride now. Think that guy was going after. Tried to call her. No answer. I need you to call her dad and need to call the police."
"Okay."
The voice was his dad’s and he sounded all business.
"Ben, I’m going to go make these calls on the house phone. I want you to stay on the phone with your mother while I do that."
"Okay, Dad."
"Listen, son, I want you to get out of sight of the road and wait until you see the flashing lights before you come back out. Don’t go too far off the road in case you pass out, but I want you out of sight in case this guy comes back."
“Yes, Dad,” Ben said with a deep sigh, pleased someone else was making the decisions now.
50
Cole was sitting on his front porch sipping a cold bottle of Modelo Especial beer. A night high in the mountains of North Carolina could go either way. Some nights the temperature dropped like a rock, but tonight was humid and buggy. Cole had air-conditioning but he worked outside in the heat all day and preferred his body stay acclimated to the natural temperature of things. He did not want to become addicted to air-conditioning like some office worker who could barely tolerate the walk between his house and car for fear he might perspire.
He had a lot going on in his head. The house they were building was progressing at a satisfying pace. He had no complaints. Part of him missed having Amanda on the job site. Still, he was proud of her for knowing what she needed in her life right now and for going out and finding it. She needed independence and a way to make friends. The job at the bike shop would offer that. He could not fault her. It was an adult decision, a sign she was growing up.
Though the mountains of western North Carolina were a generally calm and relatively crime-free area, he worried about her being out at night. That was what parents did. It wasn’t a reflection on her or the region, just a realistic awareness that bad things could happen to anybody at any time through no fault of their own. Sometimes the worst things in life came from being in the wrong place at the wrong time. From being subject to the utterly random will of the universe.
Cole had a microwave dinner earlier then had done some shooting at his backyard range. He’d already cleaned and oiled every gun he’d shot and put them all back in the gun safe except for the Smith & Wesson Shield he wore inside his waistband. Normally, about this time of day he would slip the holster out of his waistband and leave it on his dresser, ready for going to work tomorrow. He was so accustomed to wearing it that some days he carried it up until bedtime without even realizing it was there.
He took another sip of beer and thought about the conversation he had with Amanda recently. It had been weighing on his mind. She was full of questions about his ex-wife and how things had ended. That was a very dark period of Cole's life and it hurt him to revisit it. He’d considered coming clean and telling Amanda the whole sordid story but he harbored so much bitterness he wasn't sure he could do it without ranting, and he’d promised himself he would not do that. He’d made that promise long before his ex-wife died, and now that she was gone, it was even more important than ever to not tarnish her memory.
He wasn’t sure why he was so concerned about protecting Christina’s image. She’d apparently never been concerned at all about protecting his. It hurt him deeply to think his wife had made him out to be a horrible father who never wanted Amanda. That couldn’t have been farther from the truth. It was him from the very beginning of their marriage who wanted children. He’d practically begged her to carry his child. Then, for the entire pregnancy, she moaned and complained about how she was never doing it again. He had hoped she would forget the discomfort because he wanted more than one child.
When Amanda was born, it was him who made most of the bottles, who changed her and bathed her. It was him who got up in the middle of the night and rocked Amanda because his ex-wife did not want to.
; "You're the one who wanted this," she reminded him. “Get out of bed and deal with it.”
He was glad to do it because he wanted to make this easy enough that Chris would be willing to have another one. But as Amanda got older, his ex-wife became more adamant she was not having another baby. She complained about the effects on her body. She complained that motherhood and maternity leave had stalled her career because she had to miss work for doctor’s appointments and stay home when Amanda was sick.
Cole was never was able to change her mind. Like the divorce, it remained one of the landmark tragedies of his life. At nearly fifty years old he didn't see himself remarrying or fathering another child. Yet that longing for a large family never went away. There were times when he thought of remarrying and starting over but he couldn’t do it. It felt like a betrayal for some reason that was so complex and nonsensical he could never have explained it. So each morning, he shouldered his pain, got out of bed, and went on with his life. Amanda’s return made it impossible to suppress all of those feelings. One way or another, he was going to have to deal with them.
Cole drained his beer and with a faint clink set the empty on the table next to him. He settled back in his chair and listened to the chorus of night sounds. Most nights there were owls and sometimes coyotes. It was then he heard the scuff of feet on gravel and it was coming from his driveway.
His first reaction was anger. He assumed the sound meant Amanda had ridden her bike home on the bike trail despite him specifically telling her not to. That was fine. If that's the way she wanted to play, he would ground her and lock her bike up until she was ready to follow the rules. He did not want to talk to her while he was this angry. He took a deep breath and calmed himself. While he was doing that, he noticed it sounded like there was more than one person approaching the house.
Random Acts Page 28
