Deceived

28

I will try to stop them from shredding your body…

That’s what I meant, which was the best I could do. A promise to a dead friend is still a promise and I was soon glad I had hedged because the unseen road wasn’t a road. It was a fire trail, possibly, rough, with lots of potholes. Spooner drove fast anyway, so I took a beating while I tried to untie myself. I bounced high off the floor several times; could hear the thunk of my friend’s head hammer against metal-an indignity worse than a strip mall cemetery.

But I kept at it.

If the pond had been farther from the main road, I might have had time, but the van crunched to a stop after only a couple hundred yards. I had freed my ankles and was using my teeth to loosen knots at my wrists when I heard Spooner tell Levi, “Get your ass out there and stand so I can see you in the mirror.”

A door opened and slammed shut. I felt the transmission clunk into reverse. Then the van began backing toward what I knew was the pond because Harris provided a running commentary. “Not there, goddamn it, the driver’s side! Find you a patch’a dry ground-yeah!-now closer to the water. Don’t let me sink them tires, Levi. Okay… okay… but, goddamn it, where I can see, dickweed! This bitch weighs a ton-plus!”

While the van continued backing, I worked faster, using my teeth to pull a series of half hitches free. The anchor line was short by most standards, used for shallow commercial fishing, I guessed, but maddeningly long for what I had to do. Each knot required that I extract several yards of rope through a loop before I could move on to the next knot, so my head fanned back and forth-bite the rope and pull… bite the rope and pull. Two or three more loops and I’d be able to part my hands. Once my hands were separated, and if I didn’t run into another bad knot, I would soon be free.

Then what?

I didn’t stop what I was doing, but my eyes shifted to the tools that had been sliding around in the back. It was too dark to identify much, but the shape of a spade-headed shovel is distinctive.

There was my answer-use the shovel to brain the first man who opened the sliding door, then run. Spooner was too old and fat to catch me. We weren’t far from the cemetery where my SUV was parked. If someone had taken my keys, there was also Birdy’s BMW.

Would that work?

No… I hadn’t thought it through. What if it was Levi I had to outrun? He was twice my size, all muscle, and the legs of a man named Walkin’ Levi would be in good shape.

There was something else wrong with the plan. Even if I managed to escape and bring back help, it wouldn’t be in time to spare Birdy Tupplemeyer’s body the obscenity of being spewed into a pond where alligators were waiting to feed. The thought was horrifying yet didn’t alter a more compelling fact: if I had no choice but to run, I would run. I wasn’t going to die to save a dead friend. But was there a better option?

Yes… a new scenario popped into my mind:

Hit the first man with the shovel, jump behind the wheel, and drive off!

I liked that. Just me and Birdy, towing a one-ton tire shredder in a vehicle that had a bad headlight so was just begging to be stopped by police. If a squad car didn’t appear, there was always the Hess station three miles down the road.

The van stopped. Spooner got out but left the engine running-maybe to supply power to the shredder.

Good. Easier for me to steal the thing!

A second later, though, my confidence was shaken when Spooner said to Levi, “Put this on-the hood and gloves, too, dumbass, unless you want blood ’n’ shit all over your clothes. You’ll have to use an axe or that auger will jam.”

Terrifying words to hear, but then I comforted myself with a detail that might buy me enough time: Spooner had told Joel, or Mr. Chatham, I’m not doing shit until you get here. Spooner had changed their meeting place, too, which would mean more delay, hopefully. Thus far, no headlights had pierced the van’s windows.

Don’t quit, I told myself. You’re almost there.

It was true. I had cleared the last half hitch, so could now separate my hands enough to work at the knots on my wrists. After that, all I had to do was deal with the jumbled bowline loop that Levi had used as a starter and I would be ready.

It almost happened. I had wormed my left hand almost free and was on my feet when the van’s back doors flew open. Instantly, I collapsed into a ball and tried to pretend I was still tied and unconscious. Thank god no dome light, but had Spooner or Levi seen me? I didn’t know which man had opened the doors and it didn’t matter. I lay there curled next to Birdy’s breathless body and tried not to breathe. My ears remained alert, however, and noted the clank of tools being moved as if the man was making a selection-looking for an axe, perhaps. Soon, I hoped, the doors would slam closed.

They didn’t. It was Harris Spooner, multitasking, talking on a phone, while he searched for the tool he needed. Attempting deference again, too, so it was Joel, or Mr. Chatham, on the other end who listened to him explain, “Done told you! The woman had enough drugs in her to drop a horse but tried to scratch my eyes out anyway-then kicked me in the nuts!” After a pause, Spooner sounded proud of himself when he added, “My knife, of course. The crazies would’a heard a gun.”

In my mind, I scooted closer to Birdy, but, in fact, I lacked the courage to move. What came next, though, was so infuriating, it was hard not to react. Spooner saying, “The doctor says she’ll sign a paper to prove the woman was crazy. You get a judge to postdate it, then folks’ll believe she run off and left all her shit where she lives.”

I had to run, too, I realized, and stop worrying about my friend’s body. And I would the first chance I got because Spooner was suddenly giving directions, saying, “Yeah, you’re at the right place. That fire grade’s rough, but ain’t too bad-only couple a hundred yards. You in the truck or your good car?”

Had Joel mentioned owning a truck? That’s what I was wondering but didn’t much care when Spooner yelled to Levi, “Fire up the shredder, dickweed! I can see his lights!”

Through my eyelids, I saw nothing but darkness. And I remained hidden in that darkness for another full minute before the approaching vehicle illuminated the van and Harris Spooner saw that something wasn’t quite right.

I felt his weight sink the floor beneath me as if taking a closer look. He was, and a moment later he hollered, “You messed up again, Levi! Mr. Chatham’s gonna have your-”

That’s all I heard before the tire shredder woofed, then shrieked into readiness. I was already lunging for the van’s side door.