by Lois Greiman
He remained exactly where he was, half sprawled on the chair, half slumped on the floor. I shuffled back another uncertain step. He didn’t move. Sangria-dark blood trickled onto the floor. But it was his eyes, wide and unblinking, that scared the bejesus out of me.
Chapter 13
If you think breaking a mirror causes a shitstorm, try wreckin’ a condom.
—Peter McMullen, whose daughter (as that bitch, karma, would have it) is just like him
“Shit!” I breathed the mild curse, but Remus remained exactly as he was, sprawled like a broken doll on the floor. A giant broken doll, limbs flung out in all directions.
Every wild instinct insisted that I run. But to where?
Before I could arrive at a satisfactory answer, footsteps fluttered up from behind.
I jerked toward the sound just as Big Bess appeared like a glowering troll in the doorway. Our gazes caught and fused. For one crazy-ass second I thought she might not notice her oversized son stretched out on the barn-wood floor, but finally her eyes lowered.
I held my breath as a hundred disclaimers whizzed through my mind. A thousand lies scrambled along on their heels, but none of them seemed satisfactory. “I’m sorry,” I rasped. She was already hurrying toward the possible corpse.
I held my breath and backed away, but she speared me with porcine eyes, pinning me in place. “What happened?”
“I…” Couldn’t seem to push out a plausible lie, but I had long ago learned the underwhelming usefulness of absolute honesty and knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that taking the blame caused herpes. “He…I think he hit his head.”
She snorted like a palsied hyena. “You mean he ain’t just sleepin’?”
For one irrational second, I actually hoped she was being earnest, but she stopped me before I could travel too far down Stupid Street.
“I know he hit his noggin, Einstein. What I wanna know is, how’d it happen?”
I was shaking my head, denying everything. “Maybe we should call an ambulance.”
She propped her meaty fists on good-sized hips. “A what?”
I blinked and motioned vaguely toward his leaking scalp. “Head injuries can be…” I felt sick to my stomach. I’m not overly fond of seeing blood, even my brothers’—and those fucktards deserved to lose it by the gallon. “Bad.”
“Well, don’t seem likely that they’d be good, does it?” She huffed another snort and bent. “Re! Remus.” She nudged him a little with the toe of her work boot. “Wake up.”
No reaction.
She glanced at me again, scowled, then dropped her gaze to my boobs. “You. Jezebel.” She motioned toward me like I was a cattle dog gone astray. “Bend down here.”
“Wh…what? Why?”
“Cuz I ain’t got no linguine in clam sauce handy. Come ’ere and bend over.”
I’m not sure why I did as told. Maybe because a girl can get a little discombobulated when she thinks she may have caused the death of another human being…or one suspected of being human. In any event, I bent, boobs dangling.
It was then that Hiro Danshov appeared beside me, face devoid of curiosity. It was also then that Remus sniffed, twitched like a dreaming terrier, and turned his head, nose pointing toward my cleavage. His extremities stirred. I stared in fascination.
“What do ya think yer doin’? Ya want to give him a heart attack? Get outta here,” she ordered, and I did, scuttling out of the restaurant and through the woods toward my Pepto Bismol refuge.
The next morning, I opened my bedroom door slowly and glanced in both directions. The hallway was blessedly empty, but when I stepped out of my room, I stumbled over something. A pile of clothes lay on the carpet. I bent down to discover men’s garments. Tighty whiteys, a flannel shirt, and a pair of camo pants. Eli’s clothes. Obviously, someone believed I should wear them. The thought was ludicrous. I’d look ridiculous. On the other hand, perhaps it was better than having men accost me every waking moment.
With that lovely thought burning a hole in my brain, I did a quick change. In a few minutes, I was examining myself in the full-length mirror tacked to the inside of the closet door. Sexy, I was not. In fact, if I slapped on a bird’s-nest beard and a headband I could probably be inducted into the Dynasty of the Ducks. Nevertheless, the lovely no-accosting fantasy convinced me to spend the day so attired.
I got more than a few double takes from the breakfast crowd. Romulus was testy. Remus didn’t show at all. Apparently, he was nursing a headache and trying to remember where things had gone awry; kitchen chairs weren’t usually so persnickety.
By noon, I was hot and grouchy and had seen a decided decrease in gratuities. But at least the men were leaving me alone. Even Gizzard Manks, the lazy-eyed mechanic who cleaned his teeth with a pocketknife, ignored me.
I popped the top button on my borrowed flannel shirt and carried on. The tips improved considerably.
When nine o’clock rolled around, my dogs were yipping like a sled team. Limping through the moonlight, I slipped behind the Jeep’s steering wheel and debated what to do next. I could walk to the nearest gas station, purchase fuel, then return here for Rivera’s vehicle. But I didn’t have a solid idea where that gas station was, how I would find it in the dark, or if my whining puppies would carry me that far.
So perhaps I should wait it out.
On the other hand, I wasn’t particularly fond of the idea of giving the Terrible Twins time to regroup. Although, I had to admit, Rom seemed to have given up. Or maybe he was just waiting for me to let down my guard.
I should probably go.
On the other other hand, I had promised Rivera I would remain in hiding until he contacted me. But how would he do that? I didn’t have a phone and he didn’t know my whereabouts. And maybe he was injured, or worse, despite the promises he had whispered in my erotic dream.
I should definitely go.
Then again, who was going to take care of Harley if I returned to L.A. and was dismembered by the Black Flames before ever reaching my front door?
With that thought in mind, Hillbilly Hell didn’t seem so bad.
Except, what about Laney? She had almost certainly tried to contact me by now. She was probably worried sick. What if she traveled to L.A. in an attempt to figure things out and was compromised because of me?
I had to go.
Mind made up, I reached up to flip on the overhead lights so as to count my money, but nothing happened: The Jeep’s battery was dead, probably due to the fact that I had left those very same lights on some nights before.
Anger and despair boiled inside me. I prepared to drop my head dramatically against the steering wheel, but a movement caught my eye.
Danshov was passing by in the darkness. A good-sized shadow traveled along beside him. A bear? A wolverine? Or just a dog. Probably a dog. I liked dogs, I reminded myself, and stepped out of the car.
“Wait!” My voice sounded more panicked than I had intended. He kept walking.
“Hey, if I get some gas, do you have jumper cables I could use?”
He didn’t even pause. My ire ratcheted up a notch. I hate being interrupted, getting shot isn’t on my entertainment short list, and if you tease me, the repercussions are likely to be swift and juvenile. But being ignored has always brought out the monkey in me. Still, in retrospect, it might have been a mistake to rush up behind him and grab his arm. Because there wasn’t a stuttering second between reaching out and finding my back yanked up against his chest. I couldn’t breathe, couldn’t move. His right arm, I realized with minimal clarity, was wrapped around my throat, while the thumb of his left hand seemed to be pressed against an extremely sensitive point in my neck that I had not formerly known existed.
“Holy hell!” The words were emitted in a rusty croak. I was certain I was going to die, which made me think that perhaps a more enlightened person would apologize at that juncture. But I had to assume that those progressive individuals had not been raised with siblings from the Pleistocene era. Si
blings whose never-ending practical jokes forced a thinking person to use her apologies judiciously, like when it was conclusively determined that I was, in fact, the one who’d stapled my brother’s detention notice to his forehead.
Danshov held me immobilized for three endless seconds before loosening his grip and pushing me roughly away. I stumbled, caught my balance, then turned shakily and rubbed my throat.
“Who are you?” The words sounded as if they had been scraped off the bottom of somebody’s boot. I just hoped my tone suggested more accusation than awe. Because I wasn’t awed. Awed would be stupid. I was angry.
Judging from Danshov’s expression, he wasn’t exactly euphoric himself. He stared at me from beneath beetled brows for another couple seconds, then turned with an economy of motion and strode away. The wolf-dog remained a second longer, growled a rumbled warning, and trotted up beside him.
The enlightened individual mentioned earlier would probably have thanked her lucky stars for her continued survival and went her merry way, preferably in the opposite direction. I, on the other hand, followed him. I can’t say why exactly. Maybe it was because despite the fact that he barely exceeded my own perfectly acceptable weight, he had disabled me without breaking a sweat or mussing his man bun.
“Teach me how you did that,” I said.
He didn’t even bother to refuse.
“Help me,” I demanded. “Or I’ll tell them the truth.”
He stopped, then pivoted slowly toward me. His expression wasn’t exactly terrified. In fact, he barely managed to appear conscious.
“And what…Miss O’Tara…is that truth?”
Okay, maybe it wasn’t the best alias I could have invented, but I met him eye to eye. “You’re a wanted man,” I said.
Seconds ticked away. His lips curled a little. The expression made him look as cuddly as a cobra. I swallowed but pressed on. Persistence—it’s one of the things that made me a pretty decent therapist…and an extremely irritating individual. “You’re wanted for…something.”
He lowered his head. For a moment, I was pretty sure he was going to kill me, but then he turned away. What a pleasant surprise. I felt it as a nice little tingle near my solar plexus. What was neither so surprising nor so pleasant was that I felt the burning, and perhaps somewhat suicidal, need to follow him.
“Listen, I don’t have to learn how to…you know…” Even I didn’t know what I was trying to say, but that had never stopped me before and failed to do so now. “You don’t have to teach me to kill anybody. Not that I think you have killed someone…” I tried a chuckle. Dear Baby Jesus, what was wrong with me? “I just want to know how to defend myself.”
He didn’t stop. Neither did I.
“Help me,” I said. I meant it to sound demanding and put upon, but in retrospect it might have come out whiny and a little ape-shit crazy.
“Why?”
Maybe the surprise caused by his response made me trip. Maybe it was that the trail was as dark as Satan’s sidewalk. Either way, I hit my knees, scrambled to my feet, and lurched after him. “Human kindness?” I guessed.
“Not my strength.” We had reached a steep hill. I stumbled up it, wheezing like an asthmatic chimpanzee.
“You don’t want me as an enemy.” I meant it as a warning. It probably sounded more like a dumb-ass joke; we’d only been climbing for about five seconds, but my heart was already in overdrive.
The trail dipped mercifully. Glancing down, I spotted what could have been the outline of a building set in a small clearing. It was small and dark, crouching like an evil gargoyle, seeming to suck in any glimmer of light from its surroundings.
It was spooky as hell, but I kept trudging, grunting when the trail ascended, stumbling when it roughened.
“Teach me that trick and I’ll leave you alone,” I promised, and winced as we entered the building’s shadow.
He breathed a truncated snort, stepped into the cabin, and slammed the door in my face.
For reasons not entirely clear to me, I couldn’t sleep that night. Maybe it was the heat. It was unseasonably warm, but I’d opened the window beside the twisted sycamore, and the northern breeze kept the temperature bearable. So maybe it was those pesky attacks on my person that were bothering me. But truth to tell, certain individuals have been trying to off me for most of my adult life and I generally sleep like an inebriated infant. Now, however, I lay in my popsicle-pink room and stared at the ceiling, missing my old life and wondering why the hell weird shit kept happening to me.
I had been minding my own business. Doing my job, working out, buying dog food. Doing all the mundane things that should ensure a long, if monumentally boring, existence. So why did people keep trying to kill me? I was a good person. Well, I was an okay person, if one’s standards weren’t too lofty…which, luckily, mine weren’t.
So why had I been chased out of my city of choice and forced to live on the lam with a gaggle of inbred Neanderthals? Neanderthals who eschewed technology. Neanderthals who didn’t have so much as an antiquated typewriter, for God’s sake.
But wait. Just because Bess disapproved of technology didn’t necessarily mean her sons shunned it. Apparently, she wasn’t a big fan of sex outside of marriage either, but I had a sneaking suspicion her offspring didn’t share that sentiment.
So if they had a computer, where would they hide—
The barn! The answer hit me like a blow from Thor’s mighty hammer. Ah, Thor…It wasn’t his massive muscles that appealed to me, of course. It was his determination, his devotion, the way he gazed at Natalie Portman with knee-weakening adoration. Although a couple straining biceps and an Aussie accent didn’t exactly shove him into the chopped-liver category. Okay, maybe fatigue was making me a little loopy. I struggled to wrangle my mind back on track: technology and the lack thereof.
Just a few days before, I thought I had seen a light shining from the barn’s loft. Had I imagined it? I sat up in bed, remembered the encounter that had involved pitchforks and a shrieking Thing, and lay back down. But the thoughts wouldn’t leave me alone. I knew a little something about animal husbandry from my childhood, when Laney and I had frequented (some said terrorized) nearby stables, stables where the hay had habitually been stored in lofts.
The twins’ fodder had been stacked in the aisle. Why? What was up above? Might it be an office of sorts? An office with a PC that could give me some insight into L.A.’s events?
I sat up again, then paused, perhaps waiting for sanity to find me. When that failed to occur, I swung my legs over the side of the bed. The floor felt cool against my bare feet. I slipped into the flannel shirt and camos I had discarded earlier, then pattered silently to my door. It opened almost soundlessly.
In a matter of moments, I was slithering down the hall, heart hammering like a gong in my chest. I stubbed my toe twice before reaching the stairs. The first one moaned like a tortured ghost when I stepped on it. The second one sounded a little less tormented. I speeded up. If Bess were going to hear me, it would probably be best if I didn’t act as if I planned to steal the family jewels.
I reached the main floor without incident. Once there, I stopped, held my breath, and waited to be dead. When my heart was still beating overtime fifteen seconds later, I considered myself lucky and thought about my next move. I had read somewhere (maybe in a cheap mystery novel written by someone who almost no one ever tried to kill) that when searching, one must do so methodically. Perhaps, then, I should begin in the house. It was, after all, closer than the barn, and I was, by nature, as lazy as a slug. But further consideration, and the terrifying idea of Big Bess sneaking through the dark on her giant powder-puff feet, disabused me of that idea.
The front door was unlocked. The path to the barn, as black as the devil’s codpiece.
I felt my way carefully through the darkness. In the pasture, Josephine cranked her gigantic ears toward me but remained silent. No light shone from the barn. I eased inside, bumped into the stack of hay bales, then shuffl
ed around them and forward. My knees felt a little unsteady, but I was nothing if not determined to an asinine degree. Eventually, my fingers touched a wooden rung. Heart pumping, I glanced up, but I could see next to nothing. Still, I slipped my foot onto the first step and thrust myself upward. By the time I reached the top of the ladder, I was breathless but strangely euphoric. Grappling my way onto the loft, I rose cautiously to my feet. The moon shone through a hole in the wall, illuminating my surroundings: more bales, a washing machine, a couple dozen items I couldn’t identify, and a door that led to a small room. I stumbled forward, surprised as hell that I had been right. Perhaps I was dreaming, as is often the case when I find myself to be correct—but just then I struck my elbow on what appeared to be a bass fiddle atop a motorcycle. Even in my dreams, I couldn’t make this crap up. I reached for the doorknob.
Inside, moonlight glowed through an open window, casting a gray glow. I slithered in, shut the door silently behind me, and glanced about. I had been right. Incredibly, entirely right. It was an office. An office where—
“Shhh!” The whisper was loud enough to wake the catatonic.
I froze.
Someone giggled.
“Wait a minute. Hold on, girl.”
Oh fuck, oh fuck, oh fuck. I could hear them, noisy as mating pachyderms, on the dirt floor below. But maybe they wouldn’t come up here. Maybe they were just planning to go for a midnight ride…together…on a donkey the size of a retriever.
“Not here! Not here,” rasped a labored voice. “I got me a little room up top.”
His words snapped me into action. I spurted across the floor, frantically searching the grayness for somewhere to hide. But it was impossible to see. Still, I thought I could make out a boxy piece of furniture not twelve feet away. I spurted forward and ricocheted off its corner. Pain radiated through my hip, temporarily stunning me, but a clambering noise from below catapulted me back into action. I managed to jam myself between the wall and a desk just as the pair stumbled past the open door.
