Flesh

CHAPTER TWO

“Are you all right?”

“Do I look all right?”

She was sitting on the ground with her back to the road, her head turned to look up at him. Above her right eyebrow, the skin was scraped off to her hairline. The raw place was striped with beaded threads of blood. It was dirty, and a few bits of straw-colored weeds clung to the stickiness.

Jake sat down beside her on the edge of the ditch.

Both her knees and the front of her right thigh were in the same condition as her forehead. Her right arm hung between her legs, knuckles against the ground. She held the arm with her other hand while it shook. She didn’t appear to be trying to hold it still. The other hand seemed meant to soothe it the way someone might lay a hand on an injured pet.

“Do you think it’s broken?” Jake asked.

“I wouldn’t know.”

Jake took out a notepad. “Could I have your name?”

“Jamerson,” she said. The corner of her mouth twitched.

Jake wrote. “And your first name?”

“Celia.”

“Thanks.”

She turned her head to look at him again. “Shouldn’t you be doing something about that?” Her eyes shifted toward the blazing van fifty or sixty feet to her left.

“The fire truck’s on the way. My partner’s keeping an eye on things.”

“What about the…driver?”

“We can’t do much for him.”

“Is he dead?”

A shish kebab, Chuck had remarked when he saw the driver’s remains hanging out the windshield.

“Yes,” Jake said.

“He tried to hit me. I mean it. He had the whole road to himself. I’m over by the shoulder and I signal him to go around, and I look back and he’s actually swerving right at me. He’s grinning and he swerves right at me. Must’ve been going sixty.” Her face had a puzzled expression as if she were listening to a bizarre joke and waiting for Jake to feed her the punch line. “That guy meant to kill me,” she said. “He creamed my bike.”

She nodded toward it. The bike with its twisted wheels lay in the weeds on the far side of the ditch.

“What happened, I turned quick to get out of his way and it flipped on me. Just before he hit it, I guess. The van never touched me. Next thing I knew, I was landing in the ditch and there was this crash. Bastard. That’s what he gets, going around trying to…what’d I ever do to him?”

“Did you know him?” Jake asked.

“I’ve heard of these guys, they’ll run down dogs just for laughs. Hey, maybe he thought I was a dog.” She tried to laugh and came out with a harsh sobbing noise.

“Had you ever seen the man before?”

“No.”

“Did you do anything that might’ve angered him?”

“Sure, I flipped him the bird. What is this? Is it suddenly my fault?”

“Did you flip him off?”

“No, damn it. I didn’t even see him till he was about a foot off my tail.”

“As far as you’re concerned, then, his action was totally unprovoked?”

“That’s right.”

“You say that you heard the crash just after you landed in the ditch?”

“Maybe I hadn’t hit yet. I really don’t know.”

“What happened next?”

“I think I conked out. Yeah, I’m pretty sure I did. Then what happened, I heard your siren. That’s when I got up and…”

“Hey, Jake!”

Jake looked over his shoulder. Chuck, fire extinguisher in one hand, was standing by the open rear door of the flaming van and waving him over. “I’d better see what he wants. Sit tight, there should be an ambulance on the way.”

Celia nodded.

Jake stood up, brushed off his seat, and walked over to his partner.

“Take a look-see here,” Chuck said, pointing to the ground.

The pale dirt of the road’s shoulder was speckled with a few dark blotches. Jake crouched for a closer look.

“Looks like blood to me,” Chuck said.

“Yeah.”

“Was the girl over here?”

“Not according to what she told me.”

“We better find out for sure. Cause if she wasn’t…know what I mean?”

Jake heard a distant siren. He saw a smear of blood on the gray asphalt of the road. The fire truck or ambulance wasn’t in sight yet, so he rushed across both lanes. Chuck trotted along beside him, still hanging onto the fire extinguisher.

“How’d someone survive a crash like that?” Chuck said.

Jake shook his head. “Just lucky.”

“Yeah, I guess it can happen. You hear about folks making it through airline crashes. There.” He pointed.

“I see it.”

A slick of blood on a blade of crabgrass.

Jake stepped into the weeds. He scanned the ditch and the field beyond it. Both were overgrown with weeds that had flourished and bloomed under the recent spring rains. The uneven terrain of the field was dotted with clumps of bushes. There were a few trees scattered around.

He saw no one.

Chuck cupped his hands to the sides of his mouth and yelled, “Hello! Hey, out there!”

Jake, standing beside him, could barely hear his voice over the noise of the siren.

The siren died. Chuck called out again. Jake heard the groan of air brakes, the tinny crackle of a radio. He looked back and saw the town’s bright yellow pump truck.

“How come you suppose he wandered off?” Chuck asked. “It was me got banged up, I’d stick around and wait for help.”

“Maybe he’s in shock and doesn’t know what he’s doing. More likely, though, he wanted to haul ass out of here. The girl says she was riding her bike along minding her own business and the van tried to run her down on purpose. Which would mean the guy’s not a model citizen. You take care of matters here, I’ll see if I can dig him up.”

“Don’t take all day, huh? I’m getting the hungries and my stockpile’s dry.”

The stockpile was the cache of Twinkies, chips and candy bars that Chuck kept in the patrol car.

“You’ll live,” Jake said. He slapped Chuck’s paunch, then climbed down into the ditch.

After looking for traces of blood, he climbed out of the ditch on its far side.

Back on the road, the firemen were blasting at the flames with chemical extinguishers. Chuck was walking over to Celia, who was standing now, though bent over a bit and still holding her right arm.

Jake wondered if she was from the university. She was the right age, and he probably would’ve known her if she was a local. Also, there was her wise-guy attitude. Do I look all right?

Don’t hold it against her, he told himself. She was hurting.

A good-looking woman, even with her face scraped up.

Came damn close to getting her ticket canceled.

He turned away and continued searching.

Two in the van, one bought the farm and the other guy got away. The dead guy was obviously the driver. The survivor must’ve been in the back of the van, or he would’ve gone out the windshield, same as the driver. And Celia didn’t mention seeing anyone in the passenger seat.

If he was in the back, maybe he wasn’t part of it.

No, he was part of it, or he would’ve stuck close to the van after the crash.

Wandering back and forth, Jake spotted a dandelion with a broken stem, a smear of blood on its blossoms. It was a few yards north of where he’d come out of the ditch. In his mind, Jake connected the two points and extended the line across the field. It led to a low rise a couple of hundred yards to the northwest. The high ground was shaded by a stand of eucalyptus trees. He headed that way.

From behind him came the blare of another siren. That would be the ambulance.

Nice response time, he thought.

He checked his wristwatch. 3:20 P.M. He and Chuck had spotted the smoke at 3:08. They’d reached the accident site two minutes later and called in. So the ambulance had taken ten minutes.

Good thing nobody’s life was depending on it.

Jake waded into Weber Creek, peering up and down the narrow band of water. On the other side, he stopped long enough to check the area for signs. The weeds were nearly knee-high. He couldn’t find any traces of blood or trampled foliage. Maybe the guy had changed course. Looking back, though, Jake could only make out the faintest sign of his own passage.

I’m hardly the world’s greatest tracker, he thought.

And if the guy had made any effort to be careful, he could’ve skirted the places with high weeds and stuck to areas where the ground cover was sparse. Or maybe followed the creek.

Maybe I already passed him. If he stretched out flat…

Sneaking up on me…

Jake whirled around.

Nobody there.

His gaze swept over the field, then back toward the road. The van was still smoking, but he couldn’t see any flames. Chuck was standing close to Celia. An ambulance attendant was heading their way.

Jake continued toward the rise, but he’d begun to feel that he’d lost the suspect. He didn’t like that. In spite of the blood, it was apparent that the man hadn’t been severely injured. Hurt, sure, but not incapacitated.

A potential killer.

Jake didn’t want to lose him.

What kind of man pulls a stunt like that—tries to run down a total stranger in broad daylight? He wasn’t driving, of course, but he was an accomplice, Jake was sure of that.

Maybe they never intended to kill her, just run her off the road, rack her up enough to take the fight out of her, and snatch her. That Jake could understand. A good-looking woman, get her into the van, have their fun with her, dump her later on, maybe dead.

If Celia’s account was accurate, though, they actually tried to smash her with the van. It would’ve killed her for sure. And messed her up pretty good. Hardly your typical MO for a pair of traveling rapists.

They wanted her dead first?

Sick.

Outlandish, too. There just aren’t that many necrophiles running around; the odds against two of them linking up must be staggering.

It could happen.

More likely, though, they just would have left her.

Thrill killers.

Combing the roads in a van, looking for suitable victims.

If I lose this guy…

Jake turned slowly, scanning the entire expanse of the field. He trudged to the top of the rise and made a quick circuit around the trees. Nobody there. On the other side, the ground sloped down to a narrow road. Beyond the road, the field continued. The foliage and trees were heavier on that side. Plenty of places for a man to conceal himself.

Jake spent a long time watching the area. Turning around, he gazed at the field he had crossed.

You lost him, all right.

Get up a search party, go over the area inch by inch. The logical step, but not very practical. How do you get together enough men on short notice to do the job properly?

He leaned against a tree. He kicked a small rock and sent it flying down the slope. It landed in a clump of bushes, and he imagined his suspect crying out, “Ouch!” and making a run for it.

Dream on, Corey.

Shit.

He looked up the side road. It led only to the Oakwood Inn. The old restaurant had been closed for years, but a couple from Los Angeles was planning to reopen it. He saw a station wagon parked in front. The folks must be there, fixing the place up.

I’d better warn them.

The damned restaurant only looked like it was a quarter of a mile away. Weary and discouraged—and gnawed by guilt for letting the creep slip away—Jake shoved himself away from the tree and made his way down the slope. He waded through the weeds. Once he reached the road, the walking was easier.

He kept a lookout, though he no longer expected to find the suspect.

Suspect, my ass, he thought.

This guy’s into wasting random victims.

And I lost him.

Maybe the accident, losing his partner, took some of the starch out of him.

Right.

Goddamn it.

I lost him and it’ll be my fault if he…

The distant sound of a car engine broke into Jake’s thoughts.

Chuck coming to fetch him?

He turned and realized that the sound came from the direction of the Oakwood Inn. He remembered the station wagon.

Snapped his head forward.

He was standing in a dip.

He saw only the road.

From the noise, the car was speeding.

And he knew.

He’d been slow—he should’ve guessed it the instant he saw the car sitting there, vulnerable, in front of the restaurant.

Your van is totaled, you’re on foot and hurt, you spot an unattended vehicle…

Heart racing, mouth gone dry, Jake Corey snatched out his .38, planted his feet on each side of the faded yellow centerline of the road, lowered himself into a shooting crouch, and waited.

He aimed at the road’s crest fifty yards away.

“Come on, you mother.”

Jake wished he had a .357 like the one Chuck carried. With that, he’d be able to kill a car.

Jake would have to go for the driver.

He had never shot anyone.

But he knew this was it. He couldn’t let the bastard get away.

Six slugs through the windshield.

That should do it.

The car burst into view, bounced on loose shocks as it hit the down slope, sped toward him.

Wait till he’s almost on you, blow him away, dive for safety.

Jake’s finger tightened on the trigger.

Brakes shrieked. The car skidded, fishtailed, and stopped thirty feet in front of him.

Jake couldn’t believe it.

“Let me see your hands!” he yelled.

The driver, a thin and frightened-looking man of about thirty, stared at Jake through the windshield.

“I want to see your hands right now! Grab the steering wheel right now!”

The hands appeared. They gripped the top of the wheel.

“Keep ‘em there!”

Jake kept his revolver pointed at the man’s face while he approached the car. The head turned, eyes following him as he stepped to the driver’s door.

No one else in the car.

Jake pulled the door open and stepped back. Crouching slightly, he had a full view of the man.

Who wore a blue knit shirt, and Bermuda shorts, and who didn’t appear to be injured in any way.

“What’s going on, Officer?”

“Place your hands on top of your head and interlace your fingers.”

“Hey really…”

“Do it!”

Why are you keeping this up? Jake wondered. Because you don’t know. Not yet. Not for sure.

The man put his hands on top of his head.

“Okay. Now climb out.”

As he followed orders, Jake got a look at his back. No blood or sign of injury there, either.

“Turn around slowly.” Jake made circular motions with his left forefinger. The man turned. Jake looked for bulges. The knit shirt was skintight. The only bulge was at the rear pocket of his shorts—a wallet. Good. Jake didn’t want to frisk him.

“Will you tell me what’s going on?”

Jake holstered his weapon.

“Could I see your driver’s license, please?”

The man took out his wallet. He knew enough to remove the license from its plastic holder. Probably been stopped for traffic violations.

Jake took the card. His hand was trembling. It reminded him of Celia’s shaking arm. The name on the license was Ronald Smeltzer. The photo matched the face of the man in front of him. The home address was on Euclid, in Santa Monica, California. “Thank you, Mr. Smeltzer,” he said, and returned the license. “I’m sorry about stopping you that way.”

“A wave would’ve sufficed.”

“I was expecting trouble. I assume you’re the new owner of the Oakwood.”

“That’s right. Could you tell me what’s going on? I realize I was taking the road a bit fast, but…” Smeltzer shrugged. He was obviously upset, but showing no belligerence. Jake appreciated his attitude.

“I was on my way to speak with you—to warn you, actually. We just had an incident over on Latham Road.”

“We were wondering. We heard the sirens.”

“On your way to investigate?”

“No, no. As a matter of fact, we haven’t got ice. My wife and I have been working all day, trying to get the place in shape. No refrigerator, yet. It’s supposed to be delivered tomorrow. We thought we’d relax over cocktails for a while, but…” He shrugged. He looked as if he felt a little foolish. “No ice. What can I say?”

“Your wife is back at the restaurant?” Jake asked. The man nodded. “I don’t think you want to leave her alone just now. We’ve got a situation. Give me a lift to your restaurant and I’ll explain.”

The two men climbed into the car. Smeltzer turned it around and headed back up the road at a moderate speed.

“Pick it up,” Jake told him. “I know you can do better than this.”

Smeltzer stepped on the gas.

As the car raced toward the restaurant, Jake explained about the attempt to run down Celia Jamerson, the blood behind the van, and his search for the injured passenger. Smeltzer listened, asking no questions but shaking his head a couple of times and frequently muttering, “Oh, man.”

The car lurched to a stop at the foot of the restaurant’s stairs. Smeltzer flung open his door. At the same moment, a door at the top of the stairs swung wide.

A woman stood in the shadows. She stepped out onto the porch as Smeltzer and Jake climbed from the car. Her perplexed expression altered into a frown of concern—probably as she realized that Jake was a cop.

She had nice legs. She wore red shorts. This is my day for beautiful women in red shorts, Jake thought. The front of her loose gray jersey jiggled nicely as she trotted down the stairs. The jersey had been cut off, halfway up. Any higher, Jake thought, and he’d be seeing what made the jiggles.

“Ron?” she asked, stopping in front of the car.

“Honey, this is officer…” He looked at Jake.

“Jake Corey.”

“I ran into him on my way out. Almost literally.” He gave Jake a sheepish glance.

“Some kind of trouble?”

Jake let Smeltzer explain. His wife nodded. She didn’t say, “Oh, man,” after each of his sentences. She didn’t say anything. She just frowned and nodded and kept glancing over at Jake as if expecting him to interrupt. “Is this true?” she finally asked him.

“He covered it pretty well.”

“You think there might be a killer hanging around here?”

“He didn’t kill anyone today, but it wasn’t for lack of trying. Have either of you seen anyone?”

She shook her head.

“But we’ve been working inside,” Smeltzer added.

“You folks have a home in town, don’t you?” Jake asked. He seemed to remember hearing that they’d bought the Anderson house.

“I was on my way there,” Smeltzer said, “for the ice.”

“It’s certainly your decision, but if I were you, I’d close up here for today and go on back to your house. There’s no point in taking unnecessary risks.”

Husband and wife exchanged a look.

“I don’t know,” Smeltzer said to her. “What do you think?”

“We’ve got to get this place in shape before they bring in the equipment.”

“I guess we could come in early tomorrow.”

“It’s up to you,” the wife said.

“This guy does sound like he might be dangerous.”

“Whatever you say, Ron. It’s your decision.”

“You’d rather stay,” Ron said.

“Did I say that?”

“I think we’d be smart to leave.”

“Okay. It’s settled, then.” She smiled at Jake. It was a false smile. See? You got your way.

Hey lady, he wanted to tell her, sorry. Just thought you might want to know there’s an asshole in the neighborhood and maybe you’re his type. Forgive me.

Smeltzer turned to Jake. “Could we give you a lift?”

“Yeah, thanks. I could use a ride back to the road.”

“Fine. We’ll just be a minute. We need to lock up.”

He and his wife headed up the porch stairs.

Jake glanced at the woman’s rear end. He didn’t find it especially interesting. She was a fine-looking package, beautifully wrapped, but Jake had the idea that he wouldn’t like what he found inside.

So much for lust.

They were inside the restaurant for longer than Jake expected. At first, he assumed they were probably delayed by a heated discussion about leaving ahead of schedule. Then he began to worry.

What if the guy from the van was in there and got them?

Not very likely.

But the possibility stayed with Jake. He counted to thirty, slowly, in his mind.

They still weren’t out.

He went for the stairs, took them three at a time, and reached for the door handle.

The door swung away from him.

“Sorry it took so long,” Smeltzer said. “Had to use the john.”

“No problem.” Jake turned away, not even trying for a glimpse of the wife, and trotted down the stairs.

From behind him came her voice. “This really is the pits.”

“Better safe than sorry,” Smeltzer said.

“Of course.”