Walking After Midnight (5 page)

„Shit.“

Not so fast. Deliverance was snatched from her grasp even as she embraced it. He ran, with a heavy, lumbering, almost crablike lope indicating, she hoped, that his left leg might be severely injured, around the corner of the building and dragged her with him by her accursed hair.

As she stumbled in his wake, the two of them barely ahead of the pursuing headlights, a scream died in her throat without ever making it past her lips. His grip on her hair was unbreakable – and he still clutched the scalpel in his right fist.

„Make a sound and die.“ Having reached safety, he flung himself against the building’s brick wall and jerked Summer with him, her back to his chest. His right arm locked around her waist. She imagined that the scalpel nestled somewhere beneath her left breast. Close to her heart.

His body heaved with each breath he drew. She was panting too, from terror. Sweat poured off him. His skin was damp with it. The odor he gave off was not pleasant.

„Do you have on a bra?“

„What?“ The guttural question so surprised Summer that she answered in a near-normal voice.

„Do you have on a bra?“

Summer nodded faintly. From the front of the building came the swoosh of tires on pavement, and then the faint squeal of brakes. Thank God, someone was there.

„Take it off. Take off your shirt and take off your bra and do it
now.’“

The fierceness of the command, accompanied by the shifting of the scalpel from beneath her breast to the pulse below her ear, spurred Summer into complying without question. He meant it. There was no doubt whatsoever in her mind that he would kill her that exact second if she did not do as he ordered, or if she impeded him in any way. Hands shaking, she fumbled at the buttons at the front of her blouse, afraid to even speculate on what he meant to do when it was off. Surely, surely, he did not intend rape. She didn’t think he intended rape. Despite his overpowering nakedness, sexual assault seemed to be the last thing on his mind.

„Hurry.“

Summer tried, but dread made her fingers clumsy. She still had two buttons to go when he grew tired of waiting. Untangling his hand from her hair with an impatient jerk that made her grit her teeth against the pain, he grabbed hold of her blouse by the back of the collar and yanked it off her. The thin nylon gave with a soft ripping sound, and the remaining buttons shot into space.

The sheer unexpectedness of it made Summer gasp. Instinctively she crossed her arms over her chest. His hands were already at her back, clawing for the fastenings of her bra. When he could not find it, muttered curses intermingled with threats singed her ears.

Feeling as if she were trapped in a nightmare, Summer lifted her unsteady hands to undo the hook-and-eye closure between her breasts. At this point, she was willing to do anything necessary to appease him.

From somewhere out of sight came the slam of a car door. Whoever was driving the vehicle had gotten out.

Let them find me, she prayed as the bra was stripped from her and her arms were dragged ruthlessly behind her back. Please, please let them find me.

Glancing down, Summer was made ill by the sight of her bare breasts gleaming palely in the moonlight. It brought home the reality of her danger as nothing else had. This man could strip her, rape her, kill her, at will. She was at his mercy – unless she did something. But what? What could she do that would not hasten her own grisly end?

The distant crunch of footsteps told her that her potential savior was on foot now, presumably walking through the parking lot. Toward them? But he didn’t know they were there. In all likelihood, he was headed toward the mortuary’s front door. Who could it be? Mike Chaney? An ambulance crew with another corpse? A cop making a routine check on the building? Who knew?

Please… she prayed again, so shaken that she could not even put the rest of her request into words. But God knew what she meant. Please save me. Please.

Her captor was tying her wrists together with her bra. He was using both hands, which meant that wherever the scalpel was, he wasn’t holding it just at that instant. If she was ever going to do it, now was the moment to scream, while the scalpel was not at the ready and there was someone nearby to hear.

But suppose the someone could not, or would not, help? Suppose it was a woman, or worse, a woman with kids in the car, who by her screaming would be exposed to the madman’s menace too? Or a rank coward who would hear her scream but cut and run instead of coming to her aid?

Summer hesitated. He finished securing her wrists with a brutal yank that tested the efficacy of his handiwork. Her wrists ached already, and her hands tingled from the beginning effects of lack of circulation. Experimentally, she wriggled her fingers, tried to move her hands. The bra – why, oh why had she opted for the indestructability of an eighteen-hour garment instead of the flimsy nylon lingerie she had once preferred? – dug deep into her flesh. The sturdy elastic bound her as securely as a pair of handcuffs.

His hands were on her shoulders, forcing her to her knees.

On the other hand, suppose she didn’t scream. What then?

That prospect was the clincher.

Even as she sank to the grassy verge that framed the building, her mouth opened. The die was cast: she had no real choice. Drawing in a lungful of air, she prepared to shatter his eardrums and her own. Her very life might well hang on this one scream.

Before she could get out so much as a peep, her own blouse was thrust between her teeth. Stunned, Summer choked, gagged, and tried to spit it out, to no avail. The wadded nylon reached so far down her throat that she thought she might vomit.

She couldn’t vomit. She would choke to death for sure if she did. What she had to do was breathe through her nose. Breathe. Breathe.

He did something more to her wrists, then tilted her chin up so that she was forced to look at him. The scalpel was clenched pirate-like between his teeth, she saw. The slit that was his eye glittered ferally. His distorted mouth was twisted into a hideous grimace that might, on a normal person, have been a jeering smile. As if he found her terror funny.

It occurred to Summer then that there was a strong possibility he was not even sane. Suddenly she was very, very glad she hadn’t screamed.

5

„I’ll be back,“ he said, holding her gaze. The Terminator himself couldn’t have made the threat sound more terrifying. In fact, Summer decided that she would rather by far be facing Arnold Schwarzenegger at his most menacing than the man who loomed over her in real life.

He released her jaw, stepped away, and vanished around the corner of the building.

Summer wasted no more than a pair of heartbeats staring after him. Then she tried to get to her feet.

Her wrists were tied to something – she glanced around to be certain: a faucet. A plain old faucet jutting out of the side of the building. He had somehow twisted her bra so that it not only bound her wrists but tethered her tightly to the faucet, too.

Damn him. Damn him. She was not going to be able to get away.

Frantically she pulled and yanked and twisted, fighting to be free. This was her chance to escape. All she had to do was get free of the faucet, and run, and run, and run.

The nylon in her mouth impeded her breathing. She was struggling so hard that her overworked lungs screamed for more oxygen. Saliva poured into her mouth in a useless effort to combat the cloying dryness from having a mouth crammed full of cloth. Some ran down her throat. Trying not to cough, or gag, sucking in great rushes of air through her nose, Summer deliberately slowed her desperate efforts. She was trying too hard. That had to be it. How difficult could it be to break free of a bra and a faucet, for goodness’ sake?

Summer scooted on her rump as far away from the faucet as she could and used all her strength to try to yank her hands after her. Her hope was that the bra would break. She yanked again. And again. And again. The bra didn’t break, but her wrists felt like they might. What was the damned bra made out of, she wondered semihysterically, some kind of industrial strength space elastic?

Just her luck.

Silendy she cursed the space age.

Wriggling her fingers, twisting her wrists, she forced her hands into impossible contortions as she fought to be free. Using the faucet as a tool, she sawed the bra back and forth over it, disregarding the rough edges that scraped her wrists. Nothing worked. Despairing, beyond caring if she hurt herself, she yanked once more with all her strength. And, miracle of miracles, she finally felt something give. Something – a strap, a knot – had slipped or broken. The bonds were definitely looser. A few more yanks and she might be free.

Sweating, praying, Summer gave a mighty heave – and glanced up to find the madman coming around the side of the building toward her. There was no mistaking his identity. Even through the darkness, she recognized him instantly. Part of it was his distinctive gait, and part of it was pure instinct.

As his presence registered on her consciousness, she froze, then gave up the fight. Oh, God, she had only needed a few minutes more. Just a few minutes more, and she would have been free.

In the brief time he’d been gone, he seemed to have acquired clothes. Flip-flops, cutoff jeans, and a tight black T-shirt with some kind of writing on the front that she couldn’t quite read through the darkness. Something about a dog?

Not that it mattered. He was back, and she was still tethered. She’d blown what was probably her best chance to escape. She was at his mercy again.

Defeated, Summer slumped, letting her head loll forward until her chin brushed her chest. A lamb for his slaughter, that was what she was. The worst part of it was, at that instant she didn’t even particularly care.

The distinctive smell of him – kerosene and body odor – made her stomach heave as he moved around behind her. He did something to the bindings on her wrists, and suddenly they were free. Whatever he did was so quick, so easy, that it didn’t seem possible she could have struggled as hard as she had without achieving the same results, Summer thought resentfully as she brought her bruised and tingling hands forward to rub them. He reached down to pull the blouse from her mouth. The moist membranes seemed to have adhered to the nylon, and she could almost feel them rip as the wadded cloth was abruptly removed.

Her jaws ached in the aftermath of its going. Her tongue felt dry and swollen. As she moved her mouth, testing to be sure it still worked, she discovered that her lips were numb. She swallowed once, twice. It didn’t seem to help. Nothing seemed to help.

Behind her, she heard a squeak and then the rush of water. At the sound, saliva flooded her mouth. She glanced back to discover that he was sluicing his face with water from the faucet. She craved the taste of it like an alcoholic might liquor. Partially turning, reaching out an unsteady hand, she caught some in her palm, raised it to her mouth, and swallowed. The icy liquid felt wonderful to her dry throat and tongue. She reached for more, only to have him turn the water off.

How could she have forgotten? She was helpless, defenseless, at his mercy. He could even decide how much and when she would drink. Her chin sank to her chest again in an attitude of total despair. Dully she watched her mangled bra and blouse land in a bundled heap on her knees, then roll to the grass, where they spilled apart.

„Get dressed. Hurry.“

Summer, still wallowing in the psychic quagmire of defeat, didn’t move. When she didn’t instantly respond, he grabbed her hair, jerked her head back, and waved the scalpel in front of her face.

„Did you hear me? I said
hurry.“

The sight of the scalpel frightened her, and fright reawakened her survival instinct. The will to live pumped with renewed force through her veins. She reached out, fumbling for her clothes, and he let go of her hair. Still he loomed over her threateningly. She could feel him watching her as she pulled on her bra – one shoulder strap was broken – and clipped it together between her breasts after several abortive tries. Sliding her arms into the damp, wrinkled mess of her blouse, she managed to fasten three of its buttons despite fingers that shook. As she tried to fit the fourth into its hole he cursed suddenly and grabbed her upper arm in a viselike grip. Summer gasped as with ruthless strength she was hauled to her feet.

When she was standing, he shoved his face into hers. His one visible eye glittered. His breath stank. She cringed.

„You are about one minute away from having your throat slit. Don’t think you can pull some kind of delaying crap on me.
If
you slow me down, I’ll kill you.
I swear I will. Now get your ass moving. Go.“

Acute terror can last only so long, Summer discovered as he pushed her in front of him back around the corner of the building toward where a white paneled van now waited beside her car. Despite her growing certainty that it wasn’t a matter of if but of when he would cut her throat, the edge of her fear had dulled to the point where it was more like a chronic, manageable ache than an immediate, stabbing pain.
Numb
best described how she felt as she was forced toward the van’s passenger-side door – until she saw the body.