18
Kate went to the grocery store the next afternoon. Val stayed in bed, and there was no body the next morning, not on the front step or in the road on her way to town. She’d asked him to come with her, asked him what he wanted, but he replied with a listless melancholy that got under her skin. It wasn’t him. Who had come back from prison?
She’d asked if he was okay one too many times, and he’d snapped at her, and she’d been clumsy and somehow knocked a glass off the counter. That was when she left.
She headed back to the trailer with two plastic shopping bags full of mac-and-cheese and other crap—she didn’t have a lot of cash and she’d panicked, not knowing what to buy—along the forested road, tall pines standing by like sentinels on either side. Something moved on the side of the road, hidden in the trees except for a few flashes of color. Something pink. A person. A woman. Kate cranked the Daytona’s wheel, pushing the car onto the dirt road. The car didn’t have good tires, so when she braked hard she skidded forward, already formulating her defense.
She stepped right out in front of me. I wasn’t even speeding.
Hopefully they would be able to examine the skid marks and see she hadn’t been speeding, braked as soon as she could…but if they did they would see the blood in the trunk. The thoughts flashed like lightning, taking only a few seconds to surge through her brain. She didn’t want to think or worry anymore.
She didn’t hit the woman.
When the dust cloud settled all around them, she saw Maria looking at her.
In her surprise, she let the car stall.
Kate cranked down the window. Maria peered at her like a zombie, and moved on towards the other side of the road. She looked like she was in shock, like a disaster victim.
“Maria!” Kate called.
She didn’t respond.
Kate threw open her door and hurried toward her, leaving the door open. The car sat cockeyed in the road from her skid.
Maria wore a stylish silk blouse, though it was dirty and torn, black leggings that showed off the rose tattoo on her ankle, and…sneakers? Maria had never worn sneakers. She was short, liked the extra height of heels; always said after so long in heels, flats bothered her feet.
“Maria,” Kate said again, taking her by the shoulder. Her skin was hot under the blouse, feverish.
She turned her head to Kate slowly, her eyes not seeming to register, her left pupil much larger than the right. That wasn’t a good sign. She cradled one of her wrists, and her hand flopped at her side. Broken?
“Are you all right?” Kate asked. “What are you doing out here?”
Maria responded in slow Spanish. Kate picked up a few words, “nothing” “watching” and “going” and then Maria turned to go again.
“We have to call Rich. He’s worried sick about you!”
She spoke again, and Kate struggled to understand it. She didn’t care for him anymore, something about light? She’d have to bring Maria back to Val’s and have Rich come get her. Or she could take her to him. Was he at work?
Kate pulled her cell phone from her pants pocket.
The next word Kate understood loud and clear, a sharp “No,” and Maria slapped the phone out of Kate’s hand. It bounced against a rock.
“What did he do to you? Are you running away from him?”
A head injury might explain her reverting to only speaking Spanish. If Rich had done it then it would make sense she wouldn’t want to go back to him.
“I can call Spence. He’ll make sure you go someplace safe.”
More Spanish and she turned away again.
There is no place safe, not from the light?
Kate had to be translating wrong. Her Spanish was really abysmal.
“Maria—” Kate moved after her again, but Maria turned and shoved her, planting her hands on Kate’s shoulders and pushing her back. Kate’s ankle caught a rock and she dropped back, landing on her tailbone.
Maria moved away into the pines, determined and methodical.
“Maria!” Kate called, standing up, not putting much weight on her left ankle. It hurt, her tailbone hurt. But she couldn’t leave Maria out there in the woods.
Picking up her phone, not bothering to check to see if it was broken, she limped back to the car. She’d ask Val. They could call Rich, call the real police, though the idea of the police anywhere near this car, even Spence, worried her.
Maybe having something to do would snap Val out of it.
Back at the trailer, she jumped from the car calling his name. She found him inside, on the couch, watching Oprah of all ridiculous things, a bottle of Jack Daniels by his feet. He hadn’t gotten far into it, but it rankled her how much he looked like his mother. Some subtle lines of his face, his nose and chin and cheekbones, but his posture mimicked Caroline’s perfectly. The whiskey only helped the illusion.
Anger flared in her. She didn’t know what he had to do with these killings but she wasn’t going to let him look like this. On screen, Oprah held hands with a young black man, and they were both crying.
Kate turned the TV off.
“Hey—”
Then she grabbed the bottle of Jack. It crossed her mind to pour it down the drain, but she capped it and set it on the counter. He looked up at her, dazed and irritated.
“There’s something going on out here. I saw Maria in the woods. I think Rich roughed her up. Like worse than ever before.”
“What do you want me to do about it?”
“Stop whining or I’ll slap you.”
He stood up, one hand going to the small of his back, the other going to his temple. “Stop whining and do what?”
“Help me find her! She’s out here in the woods and she needs a doctor.”
“I don’t particularly care what happens to her. I hope she falls in a whole nest of rabid pumas.”
“What happened to your compassion?” she asked. She knew the answer, though, could read it in his flinty blue eyes. The past six years had stripped it from him.
“Call Spence. Get him and his guys looking for her.”
“They can’t be out here! What if she goes to the mine?”
“Then we’re fucked.” He moved to sit on the couch. She let the air out of her lungs in an exasperated whoosh.
“Fine. I’ll go look for her by myself.”
If Val didn’t take this bait, it would mean he was fundamentally changed, no longer the man she’d fallen in love with.
From the couch, he sighed, a dramatic, pitiful gesture, and stood up again, this time both hands going to his temples.
“What are we going to do if we find her?”
“Put her in the car—your truck—and take her to the hospital.”
He sighed again, and she wanted to smash the bottle of Jack over his thick, stupid skull. But he pulled on his boots, took his sweet time lacing them up, and walked over next to her.
“You look like the fresh air would help.”
“I don’t know what would help. At least no one died last night.”
She followed his gaze to the doorjamb. True, it could have just been dirt, but they knew the dark spot between the linoleum and the wood of the sill was blood. He followed her out the door, hopping to the driveway below.
“Where did you see her?” Val asked.
“Sort of by the mine. I think she was coming this way.”
“Hold on,” he said, and hauled himself back up into the house. He came back out with a bulge in the back of his jeans, under his T-shirt.
“What do we need that for?” she asked. He didn’t seem well enough to be carrying a weapon. Not to mention he’d be headed back to jail if they caught him with it.
“Something out here is doing a whole mess of damage. Maybe I can solve our little problem.”
“Are you sure?”
“You heard Spence. There’s a rabid puma in these here hills.”
They trudged around the woods and the rocky scrub land for two hours. Sometimes Val seemed okay; sometimes she would catch him massaging his temples, a sick look on his face. The gun, she was pleased to see, never left the waistband of his pants.
The sun sank lower into the sky, and hung above the hills, casting long shadows, by the time they got back to the trailer.
“Do you want to go out tonight?” she asked, even though she’d bought food. Going out might raise Val’s spirits, and it was bound to be better than macaroni and cheese.
“No,” he said.
Then he raised a hand, silencing her.
“What?”
“Shhh.”
She searched the shadows, by the Oldsmobile, the Daytona, by the truck. She didn’t see anything. She stood a step behind him, and focused on the gun in his pants. Why didn’t he get it out?
“Stay here.” His voice was breathy whisper.
He went to the trailer, picked up the shovel he’d used on the coyote, hefted it in his hands like a weapon.
Kate stayed.
Something moved. Something tan. In the rocks by the Oldsmobile. Call out to him?
The thought was plundered from her mind by a keening scream.
Maria, in her filthy, ripped fuchsia blouse, erupted from the long shadows of the remaining wall of the barn and hurled herself at Val, wailing at him.
He caught her by the shoulder, but she swung at him, Kate saw the sun catch the glint of a switchblade in Maria’s left hand. She was clumsy; her right hand drooped at her side. Something was very wrong with her.
It looked like he’d dodged it, but she couldn’t tell from here.
Movement from the rocks caught her eye. The rabid puma stood there, front paws on the rock, watching. She blinked at it; strained her eyes. Shadows obscured most of its tawny hide.
Pumas don’t have tails like that.
Or mouths.
Nothing looked like that.
The thing flexed a front paw. Pumas don’t have claws like that. A scream percolated in her throat, it all made sense…TJ, Rich freaking out.
This thing was under the house.
Its eyes were like two diamonds, Spiderman eyes, glassy and black, catching the pink from the sunset. What would it do if she ran? What would she do if it ran?
There was a heavy
thunk
, the sound of something hitting meat, and the wailing stopped.
Val…
She took a step towards the house, and the thing stayed still, watching, superior in its silence. Then it turned and melted into the desert shadows, like a quiet trickle of water over some rocks. She blinked into the darkness once, twice, even took a step towards where she’d seen it. Val.
She ran to Val’s side, slipping in the loose dirt of the driveway, her ankle complaining where she’d twisted it when Maria shoved her.
Val stood over a slumped form, all fuchsia silk and tangled black hair. He held the shovel like a baseball bat. Blood and hair matted the blade.
The skin on his knuckles was white from gripping the handle. Tendons stood out in his arms and his neck.
She put a hand on his shoulder and it was like touching high-tension wires clad in cotton.
“Don’t touch me,” he said; his voice a growl.
“Is she?”
Val shook her off, lowering the shovel.
“I did it. This proves it. I did all of it.”
The gravel underneath Maria’s hair was turning red and wet.
The sun disappeared behind the hills.
“Val, I saw something. I don’t think you did it.”
When he turned to her, his eyes were dark and devoid of emotion. For a moment they were the thing’s eyes. Black pools of nothing.
“Look at this. Look at her. What don’t you get? I’m a killer.”
He threw the shovel. It lodged in the dirt of the driveway with a
thunk
.
She watched him head into the house. He took the big step into the kitchen in one stride. The air outside was still, the rocks where she had seen the thing were deserted.
The claws. It had to be what had killed those people. Had to be what Spence thought was a rabid puma.
Kate held the gun out in front of her, using both hands, since her wrist still hurt a little bit from the other day, and took a few steps closer to the rocks. It had been there, for all the world to see, watching Val and Maria.
Maria. Another body to hide. If only they hadn’t hidden two others, perhaps this one could be written off as self-defense. She should have called the police when she found TJ. No, she should have ignored him, turned around and come back. Maria looked more like a clump of dirty rags than a person. Rich would kill Val for sure. He might kill her, as well.
They had to get out of here, and soon.
She couldn’t move Maria without Val’s help. The trailer was dark, he hadn’t turned any lights on inside. It was night now, and without any light pollution the stars glittered from above. There was no tell-tale blue glow from the TV, maybe he’d gone to bed? A job would help, but he couldn’t get one until they got to Santa Fe, ‘til his mom died. What would he do for a job? He couldn’t be a lawyer or a cop now; she didn’t think he’d make it very long as a paralegal.
Taking one last look into the dark for the monster, she went to the trailer. The pink of Maria’s shirt made a light spot on the black driveway, Kate guessed she’d go into the Daytona, and then to the mine.
She grunted taking the big step up to the trailer. They could build a new stoop tomorrow. It would be a fun project, something to do. Anything to avoid thinking about the human puddle in the driveway. It was dark in the kitchen. The microwave clock glowed the time, after nine, and the house was silent. The couch was empty.
Maybe he was in his room?
She pushed open the door, stepped inside and froze.
Val sat on his bed in the light of one dim lamp. Maria’s switchblade hovered in front of his face. He looked up at her, and she could see more blood vessels burst in his eye.
She held out her hand.
The door slammed shut behind her.
“This proves I did it. Did all of them.” The blade hovered. If she tried the door, would it be locked?
“I don’t think you did. I saw something outside—”
The phone rang and it stopped. All the tension and energy fled from the room. The darkness left his eyes.
It rang once, twice, three times. Each time Val twitched, like the ring was inside his skull with him.
Val cleared his throat, coughed, and said “Can you get that? Please?”
The door opened agreeably for her, and she went, reaching the cordless phone on the coffee table on its fifth ring.