Nightcrawlers

28

ROBERT LEMOYNE

When he first saw something moving in the woods, he thought it was a deer. Lots of deer up here, roaming alone or in little herds, eating up all the ground cover and crapping everywhere so you were always stepping on their turds. Rats with hooves. But then, in the next second, there was a splash of color… two legs, not four… and that brought him up short. Somebody trespassing on his property? He squinted hard, shading his eyes. And then the figure hobbled onto a patch of open ground where sunlight slanted down among the trees, and there was a ripping sensation behind his eyes that brought fragments of confusion, disbelief.

Dark Chocolate.

Couldn’t be, she couldn’t have gotten out of the trailer. But it was. How? Carrying something wrapped in a blanket… Angie? Not Angie, the stranger who wasn’t Angie. Both of them trying to get away.

She wasn’t moving anymore. Poised like a deer trying to blend into the background. She’d seen him, too. Deer and hunter, only he was too far away for a clear shot and he wasn’t any good with a handgun anyway. All he could do was take off running. And as soon as he did, she did the same thing-wounded deer, dark chocolate deer, limping deeper into the woods.

He raced across the yard, unzipping his jacket pocket, fumbling the gun out. Another blip of sunlit color, then he couldn’t see her anymore in the tree shadow. But he could hear her, even at a distance, blundering around in there. He reached the creek, trampled some ferns getting down the bank, splashed across, and then he was in the woods with her.

Where would she go? Savage pounding ache in his head now… he couldn’t think clearly. He gritted his teeth, pinched his eyes hard with his free hand. Think! Where would she go? The road, across it to the thicker woods on the other side? If she made it into that stretch, there were plenty of places she could hide and he might not be able to find her. Or would she go over the boundary fence onto Brannigan’s parcel? You could see the farmhouse from there, Brannigan had a big family and there was always somebody around. If they saw her… if he couldn’t stop her…

Boundary fence. Wire, barbed wire. Meadow on the other side, graze for Brannigan’s mangy herd of dairy cattle. No, she wouldn’t go that way… the barbed wire, all that open ground… if she made as far as the fence she’d veer off…

The road.

He pulled up, sucking air. Pinched his eyes again, jammed the heel of his hand against one socket, then the other. The road. Couple of hundred yards of woods… she didn’t know them, it’d take her a while to find her way through. He didn’t have to chase her on foot to catch her before she ruined everything. The road, Old Stovepipe Road.

He swung around and ran back out of the trees, over the creek and across the clearing to where the Suburban waited.

TAMARA

She heard him crashing around somewhere behind her. Then she didn’t hear him anymore. Must’ve slowed down so he wouldn’t make as much noise and she wouldn’t be able to tell where he was.

She forced herself to do the same thing. Would’ve had to anyway because her ankle was on fire and she was afraid it’d give out on her or she’d step on a rock or something hidden under the thick matting of needles and twist it even worse, maybe break it. And Lauren, small as she was, was no longer a clinging featherweight; heavy now, a constant strain on the tired muscles in her arm and shoulder.

The first rush of panic was gone. She was still plenty scared, but mad as hell and even more determined. Son of a bitch wasn’t gonna get his hands on them again. Not after all they’d been through, not this close to freedom. If he got near enough to shoot her he’d better kill her with the first bullet. Otherwise she’d find a way to claw his eyes, break his balls, tear his throat out with her teeth, take that Saturday night special away from him and shove it up his ass so far the barrel be poking out one of his nostrils. Wasn’t gonna hurt Lauren. Wasn’t gonna stop her. Wasn’t, wasn’t, wasn’t!

She dodged around tree trunks, hopping on her good leg, dragging the bad. How far was the road? Couldn’t be too far now. She was sure she hadn’t lost her sense of direction, it had to be straight ahead. Ground slanted upward here, little moss-coated humps of rock sticking out of it, thick grass and bushes and ferns and the trees close-packed again. She made it to the top of the rise, paused with her back to one of the pine boles to catch her breath and listen. At first all she heard was Lauren’s breathing-raspy, liquidy, as if she might have fluid in her lungs, hot and moist in her ear.

Sudden rustling, snapping noise somewhere behind her… but it wasn’t Lemoyne. Jay or some other bird high up in the interlacing of branches; it squawked when it flew off.

Was that a fence over there?

She focused, staring past a tangle of brush and dead limbs to a spot twenty or thirty yards away. Yo… fence post, wire, barbs glinting in a patch of sun. She pushed off the tree, forgetting her ankle for a second, biting down hard against the splintering pain, and hobbled that way. Once she got to the tangle she could see all the way past. Boundary fence, long stretch of it visible from there. And on the other side a wide meadow, empty except for stumps where some trees had been cut down. Above it was a section of tilled land And a farmhouse. Long way off, few hundred yards. Flatbed truck parked on one side, some kind of car under a carport on the other. Thin streamers of smoke coming out a tall metal chimney.

People.

Help.

Her pulse rate jumped. But the rush of relief didn’t last long. Try to climb over or through that barbed wire, she might get herself hung up and Lauren hung up… and she didn’t know where Lemoyne was, he might be close enough to catch her before she made it onto the other property. The farmhouse was too far away for yelling to do any good; it’d just tell him exactly where she was. And even if she did get past the fence, there was all that open space over there. She couldn’t outrun him with a twisted ankle. Be easy for him to catch her in the meadow, drag her and Lauren back onto his property. Or shoot them while they were out in the open, pick them off like animals on the run…

Her attention snagged on a long driveway that led up to the house between rows of whitewashed wooden fence. She followed it with her eyes. She couldn’t see where it intersected with the road, but in the distance she could see a piece of the road itself. Cars, other farms, other people… all she had to do was get to the road. It had to be closer than the farmhouse. And the boundary fence paralleled the driveway, just follow the fence.

She hobbled along it, holding on to Lauren with both hands now, straining to hear over the blood-pound in her ears. Wherever Lemoyne was, it couldn’t be too near… there were no sounds of pursuit. A berry thicket forced her away from the fence, back among and through the trees. Sharp-thorned suckers scratched her bare legs, caught at her skirt. Twigs snapped and crackled under her shoes, loud, loud. But nothing happened, she didn’t see or hear Lemoyne, and when the berry thicket ended and she veered back to the fence, she was near enough to the road to see the driveway gate next door, longer pieces of the road. Empty pieces, but somebody might come along any minute. Wasn’t far now, less than fifty yards.

Long, dragging seconds… minutes… she’d lost all track of time. Follow the fence, just keep picking her way along the fence.

The trees thinned again ahead. Through them she could see part of the road directly in front of her.

A little farther… and out of the trees finally, onto a grassy verge, onto the road itself.

Made it!

ROBERT LEMOYNE

From behind one of the pines that edged his driveway he saw her stagger into sight a hundred yards away. Watched her limp out onto Old Stovepipe Road, turn in the direction of Brannigan’s place. Just what he’d figured. He ran to where he’d left the Suburban, engine idling, just far enough back on the drive so it couldn’t be seen from down the road. The Saturday night special was on the seat. He put the car in gear, swung fast out of the driveway.

Dark Chocolate heard him coming, but by then it was too late for her to get away again. She took a couple of lurching steps toward the woods on the other side, stumbled back when he veered over that way to cut her off. When she tried to run, her hurt leg gave out and she fell down, almost fell on the little girl that wasn’t Angie. He hit the brakes, twisted the wheel, rocked to a stop a few feet from them, and jumped out with the gun in his hand.

She looked up at him, angry and scared. The blanket had pulled away from the little girl’s head; she looked scared, too. He felt sorry for them both, but not too sorry. They were strangers. His head hurt so much and they were strangers and the only thing that mattered was taking them back and putting them where they had to be put, so he could go home and start looking for Angie again.