Barnburner, page 16
He had me turn left at the intersection with the Stone Road and I suddenly knew where this was going to end.
"What'm I supposed to be doing down at the quarry this time of night?" I asked, and was surprised to find my voice almost conversational.
Craig shrugged. "I don't know, Jenny. Maybe you meet your girlfriend there, huh? Or maybe you just felt like seeing how good this baby hugs the road, and lost it on the last curve like that kid, couple weeks ago."
"Yeah," I breathed, which was about all I could manage, with my chest tight as it was. I was going to end up at the bottom of the quarry, sticky blood pudding coating rocks and the sharded metal of what had once been a car. And Merry was going to wind up there, too—or someplace else just as permanent.
Beside me, Craig reached up, pushing roughly at the catch for the sunroof.
"Be careful! That comes off," I snapped, like he was a roughneck kid instead of a very scary man holding a gun.
Craig laughed, yanked the catch and straightened his arm with a shove. I heard the crack as the snap-hinge gave; saw the Plexiglas sheet tumble away in a corner of the rear-view mirror.
"Bastard," I said and Craig laughed again, settling back into his corner.
"Pretty night," he observed. "Pick it up a little, Jenny. I want to see your hair blowing in the breeze."
My heart stopped. My lungs locked. My brain went dead. From within an icy internal silence, I turned my head and stared at him.
He smiled, moved the gun. "Open up a couple buttons. I want to see what I'm going to be getting into." The smile went away. "Do it."
I did it, fingers fumbling on the slick plastic. Somewhere during that exercise my brain came back on-line, coolly running a checklist.
Driver belted?
Check.
Passenger unbelted?
Check.
Forward velocity sufficient?
I eased down on the gas, belatedly obeying Craig's other instruction. The wind of our passage ran skeleton fingers into my hair, lifting it away from my face. I glanced at the speedometer: thirty-five miles per hour.
Check.
The landscape through which the Stone Road passes is lunar in nature. Boulders cluster in vari-sized groups, throwing weird shadows on the scant meadow grass beneath the influence of the high half-moon. The nearer one gets to the quarry, the more numerous the rocks become, shouldering each other up out of the meadow, to lower and loom at the verge of the road.
The high-beams picked up the edge of a big one on the right, seemingly perched on the road itself. I glanced at Craig, his back against the door, the gun alert in his hand. The breeze from the hole in the roof ruffled his hair. He intercepted my glance and smiled.
I brought my eyes back to the road. On my right, the big rock loomed. Mica glittered along its surface, wakened by the caress of the headlights. The speedometer showed steady at thirty-eight miles per hour.
I twisted the wheel to the right.
***
I DON'T REMEMBER actually hitting the boulder. Maybe I blacked out for a couple seconds. Or maybe terror wiped the memory, like a computer wiping an unneeded file.
The next thing I do remember is thinking the engine sounded wrong, and reaching out blind to turn the key. I seemed to be at a very peculiar angle, too—listing hard to the right, though the belt held me tight—too tight—to the driver's seat.
I opened my eyes, looking out through the shattered windshield at a landscape of rock, gray and black in the light of the waning moon.
Cautiously, I turned my head, looking down at the passenger's door, where Craig was sprawled.
Heart pounding, I reached to the instrument panel and spun on the inside lights.
There was blood in the golden hair. Blood masked the left side of the scraped and battered face. His right arm was twisted at a bad angle. From my vantage point, it didn't look like he was breathing.
I sagged against the straps, almost sobbing in relief, and sent up a brief prayer of thanksgiving to whatever god or goddess might have duty this evening.
Dead. Dead and done.
Which left only the tidy problem of how I was going to get out of here.
Clumsily, disoriented by the angle, I got a grip on the door latch, and worked it.
Nothing happened.
I swallowed against panic and tried again.
Nothing.
I closed my eyes, forcibly quelling panic. Take it easy, Jennifer. This is not Death Valley. A car hitting a stone wall makes a lot of noise. Somebody will be along, sooner or later.
Sure.
I opened my eyes and looked up, through the hole in the roof, seeing nothing but an army of boulders, marching away to the black treeline.
The Galen farm was half-a-mile or so away. They might well have heard the noise and were even now mounting a scouting party.
And if they were, I decided, there wasn't any harm in hurrying them along.
I hit the horn.
A hand snatched out of nowhere, grabbing my wrist with brutal force and yanking me back. I gasped, too terrified to scream.
"Stupid bitch," Craig snarled, twisting my wrist hard. I shrank back against the seat, and all I could think was that I was trapped, trapped—and the only thing I'd done was to make it easy for him....
"I'm going to kill you, Jenny. And this time I'll make sure it hurts." He shook my wrist, fingers cutting into flesh.
I blinked at him, stupid with terror. Blood was running hard from beneath the matted hair. The left side of his face was sheeted; blood dripped off his chin and onto his shirt.
Abruptly, he released me, and raised his hand to wipe at the blood-fouled eye. A breeze came up, danced through the hole in the roof and departed. Craig looked up. When he looked back to me, he was smiling.
"Ever see a car fire?" he asked, conversationally. "They go up real fast. Anybody trapped inside just—bakes alive." He eased back, shifting his position, glanced up at the hole again and nodded.
"You wait right here," he told me, and straightened, boots against the inside of the passenger's door.
He put his left arm through the hole, then his head. I watched, mesmerized, and barely took note of the first, very slight, rocking.
Craig twisted, got his bad arm and his shoulders into the space. Around me, the Camaro shifted, and I heard metal scraping rock, down below the passenger's door.
Beside me, Craig paused in his labors. I heard his fingers scrabbling along the roof, searching out a hold.
The Camaro rocked.
Craig gathered himself and suddenly pushed outward, through the hole, disturbing the car's precarious center of balance. He twisted, and was very nearly halfway out when the Camaro rocked once more, heavily, to the right.
And crashed flat onto its roof.
24
SO MY DAD WAS RIGHT, after all, and I wound up being cut out of a wreck.
Then Wimsy Rescue gave me a ride over to Waterville, where the emergency room doctor fussed over my bruises, drew a vial of blood and asked me three times if I knew how goddamned lucky I was that the goddamned seat belts had held.
I asked him if he thought hanging upside down for two hours while a couple of volunteer firemen used a giant can opener on your car was a picnic, and he told me I might have a mild concussion.
"It can only improve things," I said, and he snorted.
"Real attitude case, aren't you?"
"A lifelong affliction." I sat up on the gurney, which all my bruises insisted was a mistake, but I was damned if I was going to lie back down now that I was up. "Am I dismissed?"
He sighed. "Hang around 'til I get the stuff back from X-ray, okay? You notice anything funny—fuzzy vision, sudden pain in your head or eyes, tell the nurse. We'll get a chair and wheel you out to the lounge."
"I'd rather walk," I told him.
"I know."
***
THE AIDE WHEELED ME down the hall to the deserted lounge.
"There's a nurse's station right outside the door," she told me, like I hadn't seen it when we'd wheeled past. "If you start to feel bad, you just holler and she'll be right over, okay?"
I felt plenty bad already, but I didn't think she'd be interested, so I nodded as much as my wrenched neck would allow and said, "Okay."
She smiled and patted my hand and bustled importantly away.
I closed my eyes and tried very hard not to think, in which enterprise I was but marginally successful.
My brain would keep reviewing the calculations that had led to my deliberate run at the rock. The impact should have been enough to kill my passenger: there was no use pretending I hadn't meant to kill him, like there was no use pretending he hadn't deserved killing.
But it bothered me that the crash itself hadn't accounted for Craig. I remembered my uncle the state cop's dissertation on the subject very plainly—thirty-five miles an hour, you're belted and your passenger isn't—the surest way is to hit a tree. Impact will kill the passenger, nine times out of ten. You've got some bruises, maybe some bones broken—but you're alive. And that's the point.
That's the point.
My brain finally got tired of re-running its calculations and I sat there in the wheelchair, eyes closed against the fluorescent glare, blessedly without thought.
From the nurse's hall station came the muted clatter of keys, and her voice, muted also, holding brief one-way conversations.
Maybe I dozed.
The sound of my own name roused me.
"...Pierce?" A man's voice, light and very clear. Not a voice I recognized.
The nurse murmured; the man answered.
"David Foxwell. I—"
"Fox." The first try came out as a hoarse whisper. I tried again.
"Fox!"
He heard. I saw shadows shift in the hallway, then he came into the lounge, not hurrying, not dallying, and stood before me, hands in the pockets of his beat-up leather jacket.
He was one of those honey-skinned redheads; a shade too thin; nose too long; chin definitely pointed. His eyes were an extraordinary cobalt blue—almost black—surrounded by thick auburn lashes.
"Oh, but how those eyes could hate!" Jackie Stern's voice giggled in my back brain.
Right now, the eyes were concerned.
"Jennifer," he said, and it wasn't a question. "What happened?"
I swallowed. "Wrecked my car." I took a shaky breath. "Why are you here?"
One side of the firm mouth lifted—maybe a smile. "Marian. I got home and the sysop page was going off like the Fourth of July at the Alamo. She didn't let me type a word, just started yelling that you were here and that you needed me." He tipped his head, thin brows pulling together. "Do you need me?"
"Yes." I said and it felt like the truest word I'd ever spoken.
"All right," he said and glanced around. "What are you doing now?"
"Waiting for the X-rays." I swallowed, abruptly knowing what else I was waiting for. "And for the cops."
Fox nodded, shucked the jacket and tossed it across the back of the chair next to me before sitting there himself. He was wearing old jeans, old boots, and a flannel shirt so worn it showed nap like velvet. A pair of gold-rimmed glasses rode loose in the breast pocket. His hands were long-fingered. Ringless.
I looked at him and shook my head, which woke a million protesting neck muscles.
He raised an eyebrow.
"Osaka, Japan?" I asked.
"Air Force." He lifted a hand, ticking geographies off on long, lazy fingers. "Also Germany, Italy, England, Hawaii—" He inclined his head, mouth curving faintly upward. "And Texas."
I felt my own mouth move toward a smile. "Of course. What could be more natural?"
"Almost anything," Fox said seriously. "But the natives seem fond of it."
In the midst of becoming a laugh, the sound twisted. I gasped and tears started, blurring Fox into a tangle of auburn and honey.
"Jennifer?"
I gasped again, bit my lip, managed to blink back the tears, to push back the instant when I knew the car was going to go over the rest of the way—and got him clear in my sight.
"There's someone dead," I said, voice wobbling bad. "In the wreck. I killed him."
Pity flashed through those extraordinary eyes. He leaned forward, holding out a hand. "It was an accident, Jennifer."
"No," I said breathlessly. "No, I meant to—"
Shadows moved; the lights came up abruptly and it was Bruce Gagnon coming across the lounge, John Therriault at his side.
***
THEY PULLED A COUPLE chairs close and got themselves situated, notebooks at the ready. John looked up with his easy smile.
"Jenny. How're you feeling?"
I looked at him; decided that he really wanted to know. "Like I kissed a rock and rolled my car. The doctor's trying to sell me a concussion. He wants to look at the X-rays before he lets me go home, but nothing seems broken." I wrinkled my nose. "Just all over bruised."
He nodded. "I'd stay away from that concussion," he said, flipping open the notebook. "What I hear, the doc's overpriced."
"They're cheaper in Freeport," I agreed, and John smiled again before letting his eyes move to Fox.
"He's a friend," I said. John clicked his pen.
"Name," he didn't ask Fox.
"David Foxwell."
John wrote. "Address."
"I'm renting the carriage house on the Currier estate, off the Winding Road."
Simple as that. John made his note, then glanced up.
"We're going to be asking Jenny a couple questions, Mr. Foxwell. If you'd like to wait down the hall, we'll let you know when we're through."
Fox lifted an eyebrow, but otherwise stayed precisely put.
Across from me, Bruce Gagnon sighed. "Are you a lawyer, Mr. Foxwell?"
"I'm a friend, Jennifer said." Fox considered Bruce for a moment out of bland cobalt eyes, then turned to me. "Your lawyer should be here for this. These gentleman can wait while you make the call."
"I don't have a lawyer," I told him and looked to John. "Craig burned down the Ash's barn, and he was going to kill me. I ran into the rock deliberately."
John nodded, easy-going as always. "Crash kill him?"
I remembered not to shake my head. "No. He tried to climb out the sunroof and the—the car fell on top of him." I swallowed forcibly—this was no time to develop a queasy stomach.
John nodded again and made a note in his book. He glanced up, looking serious and friendly. "Want to tell me about it?"
No, I didn't. And Fox was right: I should make them wait while I somehow rustled up a lawyer. The effort of that loomed gargantuan. I wanted to go home. I wanted to lock the door and scream until I was hoarse, which, considering the state of my throat, would be all of thirty seconds.
I took a deep breath and met John's eyes.
"Sure," I said.
***
IT DIDN'T MAKE EASY telling, but I told it as straight as I knew how, from the time Craig walked into the kitchen to the moment I knew the Camaro was going to finish its roll. Around the almost-stop at the Ash's farm, I started shaking pretty bad—adrenaline. Fox put his hand out, no comment, and I held on for dear life while I told the telling down.
At the end of it, I stopped, gulping for air, and looked from Bruce to John.
"That's it," I said. "Do your worst."
Bruce glowered, but John smiled and shook his head.
"I went around to talk with the boy like I said I would, Jenny. Ran the ID. Got a phone call back on it late today. Turns out Rhode Island State troopers are real interested in that license number. Real interested in talking with Craig Thomas Henderson. Asked if I might point him out, should one of their fellas make the drive up." He nodded. "Found the gun. Might be Rhode Island's interested in that, too." He glanced at Bruce.
"Sheriff?"
"I question the connection with the murder investigation," Bruce said slowly. "The Reverend played the ponies wicked—whole town knew that. But the story that he owed gambling debts to the Mafia—"
"Is very likely true," Fox said placidly.
Both cops turned to stare at him.
"You were acquainted with Craig Henderson, Mr. Foxwell?" That was Bruce.
Fox shook his head. "No. But I have an—extensive—file on Hyannis Stern. My lawyer can bring it to you tomorrow, if you think it will move Scott Ash's release along more speedily."
Bruce looked a little dazed. "It might," he allowed. "Tell your lawyer I'll be glad to see him."
"Certainly."
John flipped his book closed.
"All right, Jenny, here's what we're going to do. I'm going to write you up for reckless driving—"
"Reckless driving?" I demanded. "There wasn't anything reckless about my driving!"
"Reckless driving," John repeated firmly, and Fox squeezed my hand. I subsided, though not without a certain feeling of ill-use.
"Might need to talk with you again," John continued. "Straighten out a few points. I'll call and let you know what we find out on that gun. In the meantime—" a glance at Bruce, who nodded. "In the meantime, I think your friend can take you home." He stood.
"Goodnight."
Bruce was up, too, and turning to go. He turned back. "Stuff for you," he said, "out at the front desk. From the car." He was gone before I could muster a thanks, John on his heels.
They were immediately succeeded by a perky little brunette wearing a nurse's uniform, though I swear she looked no older than twelve. She was, however, the bearer of joyful news.
"Ms. Pierce? Doctor Norris says you can go home—the X-rays are fine. If the bruises bother you, you can take up to three aspirin every four hours."
"Terrific." I stood up quick, before she hatched the notion of wheeling me down the hall, ignored the roaring in my ears and the stars spangling across my vision. Fox was up, too, pulling on his jacket.
"Let's go," I said.
25
WE STOPPED AT THE desk and I claimed my stuff—junk from the glove compartment, all jumbled together in a plastic bag, and the old umbrella I'd kept in the trunk.
"Hold it," said the receptionist. "You don't want to forget this." She ducked under the desk and came up with a roll of winterizing plastic in her arms, looking pleased as punch.
