His first need was money.Thankfully, it was now in the prime hours of dusk, and he found himself in a bad part of town.He summarily relieved three petty gangsters of their cash, leaving them with blinding headaches.He could have also taken a very nice 9mm, but wasn’t sure if it was a clean gun.
Del broke it down, wiped it, and left the parts in two separate dumpsters.A cab ride later, he found a small teriyaki shack unlikely to have surveillance cameras and put away three bowls of rice-and-chicken.He wanted to buy some ibuprofen because something monstrous was being torn from the center of his brain, but he didn’t have time.Hunger would slow him down, but he could live with pain for a while longer.
He made it out of the city with nearly four thousand dollars and a ride hitched in a DariMilk semi that was actually, according to the garrulous mutton-chopped man driving it, carrying grape mash for winemaking.
“Yeah, ain’t no money to be had in carrying fuckin’ milk,” the driver said as Del settled back in the seat and watched the asphalt slip away under the wheels.
“Guess not,” Del replied with a thin attempt at humor.
The driver was feeling chatty, and his rig reeked of cigarette smoke and old sweat.The initialpushto make him friendly hadn’t been hard.Larry the Truck Driver was a deeply lonely man, glad for someone to talk to.Del made the appropriate noises, one part of him monitoring the chatter from the CB radio and the patterns of traffic in front of and behind the semi.
He’d done the easy part.Now he had to find Rowan Price.
CHAPTER9
“This has gotto be the bleakest part of the country,” Rowan complained the next day, leaning against the trunk as Cath deftly smacked the gas pump nozzle in like a teat to a piglet’s mouth.“I mean,lookat this.”
Rolling, pleated semi-hills, covered with whatever grew on Oklahoma sod.The landscape stretched from horizon to horizon with nothing to break monotony but the highway’s dips.Deep blue sky was scored with the sun’s blazing eye, mercilessly beating down on humid black dirt and matted grass.The faraway shape of a water tower lifted like a pregnant elephant, another welcome break.Insects hummed in a fitful hot breeze and sweat lay like oil against Rowan’s forearms, between her breasts, against the curve of her lower back, behind her bare knees.She was glad of the shorts, even if she also had to wear a T-shirt instead of tank top because of the glaring chunk taken out of her right deltoid.It was an angry bright red and didn’t look like a normal wound should.
Cath glanced around.“Nothing but sod, huh?But the hills break it up a little.Not like Wyoming.You ain’t seen a whole lot of nothing until you see that.”She scratched at her cheek, the tails of her Dr.Who scarf stirring in the low, warm breeze.How she could wrap herself in that wool was beyond belief.
At least this wasn’t the cloying of the city; this heat was fractionally less muggy.
But the insects are worse.Rowan slapped at a bite on her forearm.The sky was a deep venomous blue, no trace of a cloud except in the south, where a thick band of black smudge promised thunderstorming later.Never thought I’d miss Saint City grey.Rain four days out of every five, until you grow mold between your toes.God.“How are you feeling, Cath?Want me to drive for a while?”
“We should make Amarillo late-late tonight, and we’ll stop for some real food and a real bed.We’ve made good time.Wish we didn’t have to go through New Mexico, even for a minute.How’s your arm?”
The sign proclaimingGas-Food-Icesquealed as the restless wind mouthed it.“My arm’s okay.”Rowan massaged her left shoulder, feeling only a slight twinge—probably psychological.“Wehavemade good time.I wish we could know how the others are doing.”
“They’re probably fine.Worry about us first.”Cath popped her wad of Juicy Fruit again as the gas pump clicked off.“I’m going to go get my change and some Doritos.You want anything?”
“A cold Coke, if they have it.That bathroom dried my mouth out.”Rowan grimaced.
Cath laughed as she strode away toward the ramshackle mini-mart.There was an actualDirty Harrymovie poster tacked to the window, Clint’s sneer turning yellow as the rest of him through dingy glass.Rowan waited, leaning against the car, blinking as the dust-laden wind rose again.The asthmatic ice machine on the store’s front porch wheezed, gave a cluttering thump.
It was nice to be out in the country, with precious few people emitting confusing bursts of thought and emotion.Instead, there was the sweep of south wind—full of chemical stink, probably from oil fields, but good enough.Rowan caught a flash of focused thought just as a hawk dove from deeply blue sky to catch some poor small bundle of fur.The bird’s satisfaction was a thread of gold spilled through the song of tough stubbled grass, weeds, and the ribbon of the highway.
Rowan closed her eyes, letting the air blow through her, hoping the space and sky would ease the creeping guilt chewing at her chest.And the nagging hole in her head, where Justin should be.
“I got us some Pop Tarts too,” Cath said at her elbow.Rowan nodded.There was no sense of peace to be found in the sky’s blue haze.“And a couple of Tiger Tails.Come on, we’re on a field trip, we might as well live a little dangerous.”
“If preservative-laced sugar isn’t dangerous, I don’t know what is,” Rowan muttered good-naturedly, and Cath stuck her tongue out.
“Says the woman who can eat a whole pound of bacon at one sitting.”
“Only if it’s crispy enough.”The wind was beginning to fall off, and she saw a distant flash among black clouds on the horizon.“You need me to drive?”
“Hell no.I need you to hand me my Tiger Tail when we cross the state line.Let’s go.”
They did indeed make Amarillo late, so late Cath had to shake Rowan awake, her violet eyes bloodshot.“Come on,” she said, yawning.“I’ve got us a room, and there’s a greasy-spoon diner.”
“Mrgh,” Rowan managed.“Christ, I’m sorry.”
“No problem, I’ll shoot you later.Help me carry the gear.”
Half an hour afterward, with the room clean and countermeasures in place, they crossed the weed-choked parking lot to a slightly better-lit, flat, cracked asphalt lot unrolling around what a buzzing neon sign proclaimed as Babe’s Blue Hole Café.Cath lit another cigarette and coughed, deep and racking.“Want one?”
“I’m trying to cut down,” Rowan returned, deadpan, rubbing at her left shoulder.Her hair felt greasy, her face leathery and dry, and her shoulder ached.Her entirebodyached after two days in the car, catching only broken sleep as Cath drove, Cath napping as Rowan piloted over the gray ribbon of highway after highway.“I’m dying for a club sandwich.And an apple.”
