Dreams: Part Two (21 page)

Harry’s grin was wide in the darkness. “Won’t be no questions to ask, Colby. Got to have bodies before you can ask questions. You know these mountains as well as I do. You know there’s places up here where I can dump you and that kid of yours, and you won’t be found for years, if ever. As far as everyone around here is concerned, you’ll just disappear for another twenty years or so, same as last time you left town.“

Colby’s stomach tightened. “Harry, you’re going to risk a murder charge for no good reason. I’m not going to take a dime of Margaret Fulbrook’s money. I never have and I never will. She knows that. I made it clear to her this afternoon.“

“So maybe shell leave it all to Brandon. Who knows? That’s why I have to get rid of both of you.“

“Are you going to pull that trigger right here? There’ll be blood, Harry. Lots of it.“ Colby called on all the creative writing talent he could muster on such short notice. He’d written scenes like this one. He knew how they went. “You’

ve never killed a man, have you, Harry? You don’t know what’s it’s like to see someone die. It’s hard to believe how much blood there is in the human body. It’ll just pour out all over. It’ll get on your hands when you try to move me. It’

ll get all over the trunk of the Cadillac when you shove me inside.“

“Stop it. I won’t kill you here unless I have to. Ill take you up high into the mountains.“

“That won’t make it any cleaner, Harry. You’ll still end up covered in my blood. Dead bodies are real messy, Harry.

It isn’t just blood that gets all over everything. The body lets go of other stuff as well. All the muscles just suddenly relax. Can you imagine what that means, Harry? You’re going to have to get real dirty before this is all over…“

“Shut your mouth, damn you. I’ve done enough hunting in my time. If I can gut a deer, I can handle your body.“

“You think so? Can you handle two dead bodies? Because you’ll have to go through it all again when you pick up Brandon. You’ll have all that blood to deal with a second time. You’re going to have nightmares about that blood, Harry. You’re going to wake up screaming in the middle of the night. You’ll look across the room and you’ll see me looking back at you from the shadows. The blood will never go away. Every time you go to sleep, you’ll wonder if this is another night you’ll have to relive the murders. Pretty soon you won’t be able to sleep at all…“

“I won’t have any nightmares, damn you. If I do, I’ll just think about all the money. That will give me sweet dreams.

Now just shut up and get down on the ground. I’m going to tie your hands behind you.“

The crash of splintering glass shattered the tension. Harry flinched, shouted incoherently and whirled around to confront the noise.

Colby launched himself at Harry’s back as Brandon quickly dropped to the ground on the other side of the Cadillac.

Colby slammed the heel of his palm into Harry’s neck. The big man staggered and fell to his knees. Colby tried a second blow and this time Harry toppled slowly onto his back. The revolver fell from his hand.

Brandon appeared from around the hood of the car. He had the lug nut wrench raised and ready for action.

“I don’t think we’ll need that,“ Colby said, rubbing his aching hand. “But keep it handy while I find something to tie his hands.“ He ended up using the rope in the trunk of the Cadillac that Harry had undoubtedly intended to use on him.

Five minutes later the job was done. Colby stood up and studied Harry’s half-conscious form lying on the ground.

“Now what?“ Brandon asked.

He stared at his father, his voice still tense with the unfamiliar adrenaline that Colby knew must still be rocketing through him. Colby experienced a flash of pride at his son’s coolness in the bizarre situation.

“We’ll contact Gil. He’ll be able to handle it from here.“

“Should we put him into the Cadillac?“ Brandon asked worriedly.

“Too much trouble.“

“It’s really cold out here, Dad. If we leave him on the ground, he might die.“

Colby groaned and reached down to grab Harry’s ankles. “You’re right. We don’t need the extra complications.

You get his shoulders.“

It took a lot of doing but they finally managed to wedge Harry into the back seat of the Cadillac. Their victim groaned but he didn’t fully regain consciousness.

Colby opened die front door and reached toward the dash to switch off the lights. His hand paused for a moment as a tiny flicker of memory jogged through him. For a minute he gazed through the heavily starred windshield, studying the kaleidoscopic pattern of fragmented headlight beams that still cut a swath through the night.

“You worried about the windshield. Dad?“

“No,“ Colby said absently, struggling to pin down the elusive sense of wrongness. “I owed Harry a broken windshield. What do you want to bet that if she lives, your grandmother makes me pay for it, though?“

“Breaking the windshield was the only thing I could think of to distract him.“

“It worked. Like I said, Brandon, this time around you were my sucker punch.“

“That was some spiel you gave him about blood and bodies. It even made me a little queasy. It was getting to him.

I wonder if he would really have been able to pull that trigger. If you’d kept talking long enough…“

“Brandon, keep quiet a minute. I’m trying to think.“

There was silence for thirty seconds and then Brandon couldn’t resist. “About what?“

“Did you overhear our whole conversation?“ Colby straightened up from his contemplation of light through a ruined windshield. He looked at his son.

“Yeah, I guess so, why?“

“He said something about telling Eddy last summer that things would be different this time around.“

Brandon nodded. “I heard him.“

“Just before Diana and I left town last summer, I had a talk with Eddy. He told me he was onto something big, that he was finally going to get his big break. That was the night I had the flat tire and nearly got my skull caved in by Harry.“

“Dad,“ Brandon said softly, “it was Eddy who told us the ‘vette would be out here on River Road tonight. Instead of the mystery car, we get Harry in an old Cadillac. You think maybe your good buddy set you up both times?“

Colby swore.
“Diana.
If anything happened to us, she wouldn’t rest until she turned this whole town upside down. She’d go straight to Gil Thorp and he’d help her shake out the answers. Harry must have known that. He couldn

’t let her live, either.“

Brandon’s eyes widened. “She’s alone at the cottage.“

“And Eddy’s still running around out there somewhere.“ Colby opened the rear door of the Cadillac again and reached inside to pull Harry to a sitting position. Harry blinked groggily.

“What are you going to do, Dad?“

Colby didn’t answer. He gave Harry a single shake. Harry’s eyes widened as he saw the cold expression on -Colby’

s face.

“Tell me what the plan was, Harry. What’s Eddy supposed to do with Diana?“

“I’m not gonna tell you a damned thing, Savagar. You’re so smart, you figure it out for yourself.“

Brandon leaned into the car. “You want the wrench, Dad?“

Colby held out his hand without a word. Brandon slapped the lug nut wrench into his palm.

Harry’s mouth fell open as he stared from one implacable face to the other. “You’re crazy, Savagar. You’re both crazy. You can’t do this. You’re
crazy.“

“Probably comes from writing too much horror fiction. You going to argue with a crazy man, Harry?“

Harry chose not to accept the challenge. He closed his eyes and leaned his head back against the seat. “Chained Lady Falls. She’s supposed to have an accident. Same kind of accident Eddy’s old man had. It’s all over by now, Savagar. The Legend of River Road has finally lost a race. Eddy and me are going to have the last laugh.“

Colby shut the door and ran for the Buick. Brandon was hard on his heels.

Diana clutched her stomach and bent forward as the next contraction went through her. She breathed through it, trying to remember all the instructions Colby had drilled into her. When the discomfort passed, she resumed walking. She had been pacing the living room for nearly two hours.

Beside her, Specter whined again. Her anxiety had put him on battle alert, but he could find no enemy.

“It’s okay,“ she muttered to the dog, trying to comfort herself as much as Specter. “I’ve got time. Probably hours and hours of time. This is only the first stage of labor, I think. Women stay home and clean the silver during this stage.

No need to even call the hospital yet.“ Which was just as well since there was no phone in the cottage.

She couldn’t even drive herself to the hospital, she thought despairingly. Colby and Brandon had taken the can “It wasn’t supposed to be like this,“ she told Specter. “I’m supposed to be at home in Portland, packing my bags and preparing to check into a modern, state-of-the-art hospital. Colby’s supposed to be here timing contractions and giving breathing instructions, fie said he would be here with me when the time came. He
promised
he’d be here.“

Specter paced silently beside her.

“He should have been back by now.“ She felt herself tensing through another contraction and tried desperately to relax. Fear lanced through her, not just for herself and the baby but for Colby and Brandon. “What if something happened out there on River Road tonight, Specter? What if that terrible car showed up and there was a fight? What if Colby and Brandon are hurt?“

Panic gripped her. It was an amorphous sensation that seemed to well up out of nowhere and roll over her in a crushing wave. Or maybe that was just the pain of another contraction.

The pain wasn’t too bad yet. She could handle this. But it would get worse, much worse, before it got better. What was it Jennifer from apartment 301 had said?
Unrelenting agony.
Yes, she still had unrelenting agony ahead of her.

Diana experienced another overpowering urge to go to the bathroom. This would be the third time during the last hour. At first she thought she was just having problems from something she had eaten at dinner. But she had finally realized what was happening. Her body was flushing itself clean in preparation for birth.

When she emerged from the small room a few minutes later, she started downstairs and saw Specter at the front door, whining softly. He looked up at her, and then his attention fixed on the door again. Relief flowed through her.

Colby and Brandon were home. She hurried on down the stairs, pausing on the last step to let another contraction pass.

“Is it them? What do you hear, Specter? My car?“ Diana went to the window and pushed aside the faded curtain.

Headlights swiveled and pointed straight at the house as a car pulled into the drive. She closed her eyes in mindless relief. The amorphous feeling of panic receded. Colby was here. He would take care of everything.

“It’s okay now, Specter. He’s back. We’re all going to be fine.“

She dropped the curtain and opened the front door. Specter growled softly, his body rigid. It was then Diana realized that the car in the drive was not her trusty Buick. The vehicle stopped just beyond the limited range of the porch light.

Cold night air flowed through the screen as Diana stood waiting to see who her visitor was. Maybe it would be Gil Thorp, she thought. Gil was an old-time county sheriff. He would know what to do. He’d probably rushed lots of women to the hospital in his time.

“Gil?“ she called out as a car door thumped shut.

“Hello, Diana. It’s me again.“ Eddy Spooner came up onto the porch, his once-handsome face set in the familiar lines of lifelong bitterness and regret. His glacial blue eyes were almost colorless in the weak light. “Sorry to bother you, but I got to tell you there’s been an accident out on River Road.“

Diana felt a vast darkness closing in on her. She clutched the knob of the screen door, clinging to it for support.

She could handle anything but this.

“Colby,“ she whispered bleakly.

“They got him down at the hospital, ma’am. Car crash out on River Road. Nearly went into the water. Colby’s askin

’ for you. I said I’d come pick you and Brandon up and take you down there.“

Diana rallied. “He’s alive?“

“Yes, ma’am, he’s alive. But he’s hurt bad.“

Diana opened the screen door and stepped out onto the porch. The cold chilled her to the bone.

Eddy frowned down at her, looking concerned. “Uh, you’ll need a coat, ma’am.“

“Yes, of course, I will.“ Dazed, Diana automatically turned to go back into the cottage. Eddy followed.

“Where’s Brandon? Hell want to come, too, won’t he?“

“Brandon? Oh, my God,
Brandon.
He’s with Colby. He would have been in the car. Eddy, did you hear anything about him? Is he all right or was he hurt, too?“

“Brandon?“ Eddy looked confused. “No ma’am, no one mentioned him. I don’t know if he… never mind. We got to get going.“

“I’m ready. Hurry, Eddy. Please hurry. I have to get to Colby.“ Specter slipped through the door beside her, staying dose to her ankle.

“Don’t you want to leave the dog behind? The hospital staff sure won’t want him hanging around.“

Diana looked out into the darkness and saw the dark shape waiting beyond the glaring headlights. It had a vaguely familiar look to it, but she couldn’t be certain.

Another contraction seized her and she couldn’t think clearly. She responded to Eddy’s question on gut instinct.

“The dog comes with me,“ she said flatly.

“But, Diana…“

She didn’t bother to answer him. She had to get to the hospital. One way or another, she had to get there and Eddy Spooner was the only source of transportation.

She walked over to the large dark car and opened the door. Specter brushed heavily past as he vaulted over the front seat into the small space behind it. He kept his head at her shoulder.