The Spider Thief (9 page)

The guy holding it had spider tattoos all the way up his shoulders, under his leather vest and up his neck. He sneered at Mauricio.

A gloved hand clamped on the guy’s shoulder, and a middle-aged man in a black suit stepped into the bedroom. He had shoulder-length black hair and a close-cropped goatee speckled with gray. He frowned, and shadows grew in the lines on his face. His deep-set eyes held a bleak sadness, as if he’d just gotten back from a funeral. The silenced pistol dangled from his other hand.

Mauricio tried to ask them what they wanted, but his throat went painfully dry. He couldn’t make the words come out. He could barely breathe.

The man in black drew in a deep breath through his nose and let it out. “You, young man, what is your name?” He had a thick Spanish accent.

“M-Mauricio.” It came out a squeak.

The edges of the man’s eyes crinkled, softening his face, and for a moment he looked like a normal guy, maybe a neighbor. “You know, you have my sister’s eyes. She was so very beautiful, Selena was.”

“That’s . . . that was my mom’s name.”

“Yes. I never see her again, since your father take her to America, which breaks my heart. I so wanted to see you grow into a man, Mauricio.”

He had no idea what this madman was talking about. His mom had died when he was a baby, and his dad had remarried a white woman. He’d never known his real mom.

In the hall, a broad-faced man with an assault weapon stepped into view. His eyes were cold and brutal. That made three of them, penning him in.

The man in black tucked the silenced pistol inside his jacket. He spread his arms, holding his gloved hands wide. “A hug. For your
Tìo
Andres.”

Mauricio stared.

“Your uncle.” Andres smiled, sending a shiver down Mauricio’s spine. “We are family.”

Spider

The black iron stove quietly warmed the old wood-paneled living room against the steady rain outside. Ash sank back into the comfortably worn armchair, watching Cleo doze under a comforter on the couch.

He tried to calm down the whirlwind of thoughts that plagued him, but had no success. Was Mauricio safe? Where was the money Prez was looking for? Could he convince Cleo to help him instead of going to the cops?

Too many questions. And no way to get answers. Not until morning, anyway.

As exhaustion rolled over him, his eyes grew heavier and heavier. Then a flicker of motion overhead drew his attention.

He looked up, where a shape moved in the darkness. For a second, he thought it was a ceiling fan, or maybe a chandelier rocking in a cold draft.

But then it began to crawl.

A spider, impossibly huge, with a body the size of his head, darker than the surrounding night. Carried across the ceiling on spindly legs as long as his arms.

The horrifying sight anchored Ash to the spot. His breath caught in his throat.

No spider could possibly be that big.

Then a rush of adrenaline kicked through him. He drew in a breath to warn Cleo, but his mouth felt gagged. He tried to stand, but he realized he was tied down. Glistening looms of spider web wrapped him to the chair, shrouding his entire body, right up his neck and over his mouth. He struggled, but he couldn’t escape.

Delicately, the spider played out a ropelike strand of web, sliding down toward Cleo’s sleeping body. Its legs, impossibly long, splayed out like the eight points of a compass.

Ash tried to shout Cleo’s name, but the webbing smothered his voice. He thrashed against it with all of his strength, the muscles in his arms and legs shaking with the effort. Blood pounded in his temples.

Slowly, the spider lowered itself and settled onto the couch, its bristly legs dimpling the quilt that covered Cleo.

With a muffled yell, Ash strained against the webbing. It unraveled thread by thread, like old fabric. He landed on his hands and knees, the chair following him. He managed to twist one arm free, in the process tearing the webbing from his face and neck.

Gasping, he grabbed the corner of Cleo’s quilt and yanked.

The quilt snapped out from beneath the spider, but Cleo was gone. In her place was a pile of hundred-dollar bills. They erupted into the air, fluttering down around Ash like falling leaves.

The spider scuttled around to face him, its cluster of emerald green eyes burning in the darkness, locking gazes with him. It knew him, he realized. It knew everything about him. His weaknesses, his loneliness, his fears. It had stalked him all his life, and now it had him cornered.

In a blur, the spider pounced on him, pinning him down with inhuman strength. Its long legs entangled him, cold and hard as metal. A musty smell filled his nostrils, like an attic closed up too long. The spider reared back, exposing the shimmering gold crescents of its fangs. It whispered his name.

Ash woke with a gasp, heart thudding in his chest. He sat up in the armchair, and the blanket fell into his lap.

The blue light of predawn filtered in through the curtains, revealing Cleo sleeping peacefully on the couch. Her black hair peeked above the edge of the quilt, which rose and fell with each slow breath.

A thorough inspection of the ceiling revealed nothing. Just a featureless expanse of textured white that spread uneventfully to all four walls. The sound of rain pattered on the roof, lighter now but steady.

He gripped the arms of the chair.
Just a dream
, he told himself, still fighting for air. His heart hammered in his chest.
Just a dream.

Shaking, he rubbed his face, trying to bring himself back to reality. The goosebumps wouldn’t go away.

Eyes aching, Ash crept through the room, his knees wobbly. Although the place was tidy, it had a deserted feel to it. The thinnest layer of dust covered everything. Cleo slept peacefully, her breaths soft and soothing.

With a sprightly tapping of toenails, Moolah trotted in and nuzzled Ash, then headed for the door. After a lingering look around the roof, Ash followed the dog and let him out into the cold drizzle.

A small table by the window was cluttered with photos in ornate metal frames. Cleo at different ages, with one or both parents, her mom different shades of blonde and an occasional sunburn, her dad with his dark mustache and gradually receding hairline. Then there was Cleo and Ash at the prom, formal attire, balloons behind them, bad complexions and big smiles. At the end of the table, her dad’s portrait in his tan sheriff’s uniform, doing his stern Old West pose, all business. Ash couldn’t look at that one too long.

The thick rug silenced the sound of his footsteps. Worn binoculars sat on a shelf next to the glass case of hawk feathers, each one with a hand-lettered tag showing the date and location where it was found. An old snapshot had young Cleo in an orange vest, grinning, holding a feather so close to the camera that it was out of focus.

Ash bent over Cleo and brushed the dark hair back from her face. She slept peacefully, her lips parted, one hand tucked underneath her chin.

Outside, Moolah started barking.

Ash crossed to the window and eased the curtain back. The Galaxie sat partly sheltered by a huge cottonwood tree, looking nearly black in the washed-out light. Moolah stood well behind the car, hackles raised, barking at the trunk.

Moolah hardly ever barked. Except at something dangerous.

A cold, nameless fear coursed through Ash. He stepped outside, pausing beneath the front awning to scan the woods around the house. His breath steamed in the air. Leaves shook in the rain. Ripples spread out in pools of water. Nothing else moved.

He tried to reassure himself that it was nothing. But he couldn’t shake the primal fear that something was closing in on him, just out of sight. Something deadly.

He had to get Moolah back inside. Now.

He sprinted down the wet driveway toward the Galaxie, watching the woods around him as he went. “Moolah!”

Moolah whined and backed up a step, then barked at the Galaxie again. His frightened tone raised the hairs on the back of Ash’s neck.

He stopped a few yards behind the car. “Moolah, come here! Let’s go back inside.”

Moolah moved to stand between Ash and the Galaxie’s trunk. His wet fur stood on end. He barked again, louder, more urgent.

Rainwater trickled off the flat expanse of the Galaxie’s trunk. Tiny spouts of water arced off the thick chrome around the tail lights and dripped from the shining bumper.

Ash remembered waking up in the shed next to the red bulk of the car. The sunlight had peeked in through the cracks of the wood-plank walls. Fingerprints had been drawn through the dust on the trunk, like claw marks. They’d been recent.

Slowly, Ash crept past Moolah, who stayed close at his heels. He gingerly ran his fingers across the wet trunk, leaving trails in the water. Just like those fingerprints in the dust. They’d been his.

Heart pounding, Ash dug the Galaxie’s brass keys out of his pocket and unlocked the trunk. It clicked, and the old metal pushed up against his hand.

He stepped back. The trunk swung up, creaking on old springs. A tiny bare light bulb, bolted to the metal, flared to life. There, on the checkered-cloth floor of the trunk, between the spare tire and a wadded-up old sweater, sat the source of his dreams and nightmares.

The gold spider.

It gleamed in the light, shining like an Aztec treasure. A skull-sized lump of gold with eight pointed legs, so skillfully made that it looked like a live spider dipped in molten sunlight. Its eight emerald eyes flared in the dawning light, staring at him. Alive.

Those inhuman green eyes seemed to lock with his, the way a predator would lock on to its prey. The spider
knew
him. He could feel it.

It wanted him. Wanted to consume him.

He stared back, unable to break away. His hand rose, as if it had a life of its own. It reached out for the spider. Reached out for the indescribable wealth it promised. The power. The answers to the mysteries of everything that weighed on him.

It promised release. It promised the end of all pain. The end of loneliness.

It called to him. Beckoned him. Promised him with a sickly sweetness that he would never lack for anything again. Looking at the spider almost hurt. It stirred up an ache inside him that he knew was the very reason he had run away all those years ago.

It wanted to use him. It wanted to break him and consume him.

It was beautiful. It was perfect. It was all his.

He reached toward it.

“Ash?” Cleo’s voice jolted him out of his trance. He blinked.

Cleo stalked toward him, hair flattened in the gentle rain, her big steel pistol trained on the Galaxie’s trunk. Moolah trotted just ahead of her, leading her to him.

“Ash?” she called again softly, her breath steaming in the air. “You okay?”

He nodded mutely, and she lowered her gun.

As Cleo got closer to the open trunk, her eyes went wide. Ash watched her carefully, searching for any sign of recognition. A brief twinge of fear crossed her face, but it quickly vanished.

“So this is what Andres is after.” Her voice dropped to a whisper as she said it. She stretched one hand out toward the gleaming gold spider. For a painful moment, Ash wanted to join her. Instead, he caught her wrist. “Don’t.”

She looked at him, her eyes forming an unspoken question.

He held up his free hand, showing her the fading red rash. “If you touch the spider, it curses you. Steals your memory. You can’t give in to it.”

Cleo backed up a step, throwing a wary glance into the trunk and then at Ash. “What do you mean?”

“I don’t remember the last two weeks,” Ash said at last. “They’re a total blank. I woke up beside this car, and now I know why. I must have touched the spider. You get a good look at the guy who shot at you? Notice he had a rash on his arm?”

She shook her head. “I was a little preoccupied.”

“I think he touched the spider, too. Maybe brushed up against it, like I must’ve.” He tried to pretend it was an accident. But he had to wonder: Had he given in to it? Is that how this had started? He averted his eyes, determined not to look into the trunk again.

Cleo pushed rain-soaked hair out of her eyes. “This thing is cursed? Seriously. It’s a statue, Ash. If it’s solid gold, it could be worth a million dollars, maybe, but it’s not
evil
.”

“We have to get Mauricio.” Ash reached over and slammed the trunk.

Secrets

Dawn spilled gray and bleak across the curves of the mountain road. Every so often, Ash had to slow the Galaxie to navigate through slicks of mud and fallen rocks that had been washed out by the night’s storm. It took a couple of hours before they made it around the closed-off section of highway and got back on track, headed downhill toward Denver. Moolah hung his head out the window.

From the passenger seat, Cleo watched him. She didn’t say anything. Just let her gaze rove over him until he finally had to break the silence.

“What?” he said at last.

“Nothing. You just seem . . . different.”

“Of course I’m different. It’s been a while. We barely know each other anymore.”

She kept studying him. “You think that’s true?”

“I don’t know.” He gripped the steering wheel hard, as if he could shake it. Which he couldn’t. “There’s something in my head I just can’t put my finger on. Which would be weird enough, if I didn’t feel so lost about everything. I don’t like feeling lost. I always have an angle. I don’t
do
lost.”

“We just passed mile marker one twenty-eight.”

He gave her a sour look. “Not geographically. I mean spiritually. Emotionally. Whatever Hallmark category you want to hang on it.” He took a deep breath and blew it out. “I’ve never felt like this before. It’s weird.”

“Maybe you should just focus on the fact that you’re not dead on the side of the road right now.”

“Well, that is a bonus.”

She leaned closer. “Or maybe you’re having an attack of conscience. About your life. About your choices.”