Body Rides (26 page)

She stared at him. ‘No. No, you didn’t.’

‘I did.’

Her head jerked a couple of times quickly from side to side. ‘That’s impossible. Nobody can read minds.’

‘I can.’

‘No.’

‘I had no idea he was your brother,’ Neal explained.

And wished, right away, that he could call the words back.

Karen’s lips moved, but no words came out. She was breathing hard.

Why didn’t I keep my mouth shut!

‘It’s all right,’ he told her. ‘I’ll never tell anyone.’

She looked horrified. ‘Tell what?’

‘About you and Darren. The things you’ve done together.’

‘You . . . you
know
?’

‘I’m sorry.’

‘Oh, God!’ Her hands flew to her face. She dug her fingertips into her cheeks and blurted, ‘Oh, God, no!’

‘It’s all right,’ Neal said again.

‘No!’ she cried out.

‘Shhh. I’ll just leave. Okay? If you’ll move out of the way? You’ll never see me again. I’ll never tell anyone.’

‘Bastard!’

She threw herself at him, squealing, reaching for him with hooked fingers.

Neal lurched backward. ‘No!’ he gasped. ‘Jeez!’

‘Bastard!’

He flung his arms up to protect his face. She raked his forearms. ‘Ow!’ He shoved her away and glanced at the raw furrows on his arms. ‘Look what you did to me! Jeez!’

She came charging at him again. She was sobbing. Tears poured down her face.

‘No!’ he snapped.

She kept on coming, hands up, fingers ready for clawing.

Neal said, ‘Shit!’ Then he braced himself, rammed his left arm up to block her, and drove his right fist into her belly. She was soft there. His fist pounded deep. Her breath exploded out and she folded over his hand.

As she went down, he caught her under the armpits. He lowered her gently to her knees. When he pulled his hands free, she slumped over and pressed her forehead to the floor. She made noisy sucking sounds, trying to breathe.

Neal crouched in front of her head. ‘Are you okay?’ he asked.

She kept on gasping.

‘I’m sorry I had to do that, Karen. I shouldn’t have come here. I’m sorry. But as far as I’m concerned, this is the end of it. It was all a big mistake, and I’m sorry I found out about your . . . your thing with Darren. But I’ll never tell anyone, I promise. Your secret’s safe with me. Okay? Just don’t call the cops on me. I’m going. I’m going right now. You’ll never see me again.’

I hope, he thought.

Then he stood up, stepped around her, and hurried to the door. As he grabbed the knob, he looked back at her. She was still on her knees, her head to the floor. Neal expected her white bikini pants to show, but she didn’t have them on anymore. He glimpsed pale buttocks, a shadowy cleft, a glistening slit, hair. Looking away quickly, he jerked the door open.

He shut it gently, silently.

Then trotted down the stairs and ran for the rear gate of the courtyard.

In Marta’s bathroom, Neal used toilet paper and water to clean the bloody scratches on his forearms.

Everything just keeps on getting worse, he thought.

How could he explain to Marta about the scratches? She was bound to notice them. He couldn’t make them go away. Nor could he hide them by wearing long sleeves, not every minute he was in Marta’s presence, not in July.

How does a guy get his arms scratched in the middle of the night?

He needed an explanation that didn’t involve leaving Marta’s apartment and having a fight.

Tell her I went back to my own place and tangled with Rasputin?

No!

He’d had enough of lying. Lies had gotten him into this mess.

Lies, and curiosity.

Never should’ve gone to see Karen, he thought.

That had been his first mistake. He made a second mistake when he stepped through her door. By then, he’d already seen her and confirmed the reality of his earlier visit. There’d been no need to enter her apartment.

So why did I do it? he wondered.

He wanted to think that he’d gone in because he felt sorry for her and hoped to distract her from her loneliness. That had been part of it, at least. But he’d also been attracted to her. He’d liked her mind, while inside it, and he’d liked her looks.

Hoping to get lucky?

No, he told himself. It wasn’t like that. I don’t cheat on Marta. Hell, I proved that, didn’t I? If I was going to fool around with anyone, I would’ve done it with Elise. She was much better looking than Karen. And willing. But I refused.

So why
did
I go into Karen’s apartment, if it wasn’t to mess with her?

Just to see what might happen?

Yeah, right. You wanted to see her in that T-shirt. And maybe without it. And maybe you’d get to fool around with her through no fault of your own
.

He had gone in knowing that she was terribly lonely.

Figured you might at least get to hug her
.

Maybe cop a little feel along the way, all innocent
.

Never thought she’d attack
.

He remembered punching her. He’d been scared at the time. He’d only hit her to defend himself, and he felt a little sick at the memory of it.

But the punch . . . feeling his fist drive into her soft belly . . . and grabbing her so she wouldn’t fall hard . . . knowing she was naked under the T-shirt . . .

He’d caught her beneath the arms, but he could’ve easily grabbed her breasts. Grabbed them, and told himself later that he’d done it by accident . . . just trying to help.

I didn’t, he reminded himself. I didn’t take any sort of advantage of her.

All I did was look . . . a glance back on my way to the door. Nothing wrong with that. Not my fault she’d taken off her pants. Besides, I didn’t
really
look. It’s not like I stopped and crouched down and
inspected
her. I
left
.

Remembering it, he felt aroused and guilty.

And I’m trying to tell myself I didn’t mess with her?

I messed with her, all right. Didn’t make love with her, but I sure as hell
fucked
her.

And she fucked me, he thought, looking at his ripped arms.

The scratches stung. She’d raked away strips of skin from both his forearms: three scratches on one, four on the other. Some were insignificant. On each arm, however, were two deep furrows that still leaked blood.

Her middle and ring fingers had done the main damage.

The wounds looked like exactly what they were. Nobody was likely to mistake them for scatches from thorns, a cat, or anything other than human fingernails.

Marta sees these, Neal thought, and she’ll start thinking maybe I
am
the guy who killed Elise.

He opened her medicine cabinet to look for an antiseptic.

And he realized that he’d never been inside this cabinet before. Its shelves were lined with Marta’s private things: her toothbrush, dental floss, paste, little plastic bottles of aspirin, Tylenol and prescription drugs, cotton balls, tubes of ointments and creams, a dispenser of birth control pills.

Talk about invading someone’s privacy
. . .

He didn’t want to know what she kept in here.

This is almost as bad as riding someone, he thought.

As good as
.

Embarrassed, he tried to ignore the labels. And he listened, afraid Marta might arrive home early for some reason and catch him looking at these things.

When he found a tube of antiseptic ointment, he turned his back to the cabinet, twisted off the tube’s cap, and squeezed some goop onto a finger.

As he spread it onto his wounds, he wondered how to deal with the
real
problem: not the injuries themselves, but how to prevent Marta from finding out about them.

He could think of only one solution.

Leave.

Disappear, and not come back until they’re healed.

My God, he thought, that might take a couple of weeks.

It seemed like an awfully
extreme
way to solve the problem. But also an
attractive
way.

As he finished applying the ointment to his injuries, he thought of some very good reasons to disappear. Mainly, it would save him from Marta’s curiosity about the scratches. Also, however, it would take him away from his apartment: the place where he was most in danger from Rasputin.

If I’m not there, he thought, the bastard won’t have a chance of finding me.

Neither will the police. In case they should come looking.

And the same with Karen. Neal was probably the
last
person she ever wanted to see again. But she knew his real name. If she looked him up in the phone directory, she would find that he was her neighbor. For one reason or another, she might come looking for him.

Nice not to be there, if she does.

He capped the ointment, put it away, then cleaned his fingertips with toilet paper. He flushed all the toilet paper that he’d used on his wounds.

Then he headed for the bedroom.

To pack.

Is there any reason
not
to take off? he wondered.

Wouldn’t miss any teaching jobs, since this was summer break. As far as he could remember, he had no appointments set for the next couple of weeks. Though he had a few screen projects in
various stages of development, no deadlines or meetings were coming up in the near future. He’d planned to spend all his time fooling around with some new ideas for screenplays.

Money shouldn’t be a problem, either. He still had more than five thousand dollars in his checking account – money left over from the payment he’d received for the first draft of
Dead Babes
. And another good chunk was due in September, when primary filming was scheduled to begin on
Depth of Night
.

Assuming they don’t blow it, he thought.

Can’t ever count on a damn thing with these film jerks
.

Yeah, you can count on something
–
that one way or another the whole deal will be blown out of the water so they never get to the primary filming of ANYthing
.

September doesn’t matter, he told himself. I’ve got the money for my getaway.

Two weeks, probably.

Or until my arms heal. Or until I figure a great excuse for the scratches.

Before Neal had driven over to Karen’s apartment, he’d put the video tape of his statement, along with the bracelet and pistol, into the bottom of his overnight bag. He’d hidden them beneath his toilet kit, gym shorts, socks and underwear.

They were still there.

He left the video tape where it was, but took out the bracelet and gun. He slipped the bracelet onto his wrist. He stuffed the pistol into the right front pocket of his trousers.

Then he took his bag into the living room. Leaving it near the door, he entered the kitchen. Marta’s old, Royal portable typewriter was still on the table. Neal rolled a sheet of paper into it, and typed.

Dear Marta,

You’ve probably noticed that I’m gone. I decided to take the proverbial ‘powder.’

Don’t be alarmed, okay?

Everything is fine, really.

It just seems like a good idea to pull a disappearing act for a while.

For one thing, I don’t like getting you involved in all this.
It might be dangerous. After all, I
am
the only living witness to Elise’s murder. Not that I actually saw it happen – but as good as. Also, I shot the guy and hurt him. He would probably like to kill me if at all possible.

If he makes a try for me, I don’t want you to be anywhere nearby.

I don’t want him even to
suspect
that you are a person who has anything to do with me.

I don’t want him to know that you exist.

I hate to think what he would do to you.

Anyway, there’s less chance of Rasp coming after you if I take a leave of absence.

Also, I don’t want to get you in trouble with the police.