Demon Demon Burning Bright, Whisperings book four (16 page)

The pickup was right up my rear now. Likely
some young ace short on intelligence, thought nothing could touch
him, not even the laws of gravity. The pickup had huge tires,
jacked-up suspension, a row of lights above the windshield and a
cage over the grill. It looked like a demolition derby candidate.
The windows were tinted too dark to be legal. I couldn’t see the
driver.

I concentrated on the road.

The impact seemed to suck me back in my seat
then throw me forward. The seatbelt clamped my chest, the steering
wheel spun through my hands. My sunglasses slipped off my nose and
dangled from one ear. The tires juddered along rather than rolled
as my car headed for one of those ineffectively barricaded gaps.
With the smell of burning rubber coming through the air vents, I
grabbed the steering wheel and forced it left. For a moment I
seemed to be hung up on something, then my girl busted free and we
spun back across our lane. I jerked the steering wheel right and
mashed the accelerator pedal to the floor. All in a matter of
seconds during which my mind stopped working and instinct took
over.

It was no accident. The pickup rammed me,
tried to push me through the break in the wall. I’d have gone
straight in the furiously churning river.

I ripped off my sunglasses, threw them on
the passenger seat and glanced in the rearview mirror. The monster
had fallen back but came in again now, outsized tires churning
slush, throwing it up in sheets. So close it loomed over me, the
massive grill filled my rear window.

Holy Mother, he was coming after me
. What
is wrong with you?
Did he see me wave at thin air and think I
gave him the finger? Some motorists are quick to take offense and
road rage has terrible consequences.

Praying the impact did not damage anything
vital and thankful the County did an excellent job keeping the road
clear of snow and ice, I kept my foot down. The Xterra shot away,
putting feet then yards between me and the pickup. I resisted the
impulse to keep my eyes on the mirror and concentrated on the
winding road, watching for stray ice slicks.

I’ve told people I can drive the canyon with
my eyes closed. As I entered the Narrows, where the river goes
underground and the rock walls loom inches from the road, I knew
the inanity of that statement. Fast as I drove, I wonder my car
didn’t take those bends on two wheels. I became terrifyingly aware
of how the rock bulges a few feet above the road in some places,
how sharp the bends are.

My fairy godmother must have waved her magic
wand. A big double-bed gravel truck inched around the second bend,
taking it wide, covering its lane and a quarter of mine. I curse
those big trucks, the canyon road is steep and too narrow for them,
more so in the Narrows where rock juts about eight feet above the
road in some spots. This time I was glad to see one of the
behemoths. The pickup was wider than my Xterra; it had to fall back
and let the truck through.

Hugging the canyon wall, I came abreast of
the big truck.

I dare not look up, but I bet the driver had
a fit. The gray steel side whipped past inches from my left side
mirror. I didn’t intend to drift to the right, it was an
involuntary reflex - a
crack
as my right side mirror scraped
the wall and snapped off. My knuckles were white as I tried to keep
the Xterra from bouncing off either the truck or the rock face.

My knowledge of the road and faith in my
vehicle got me through the Narrows. I popped out the other end like
a cork out a bottle. I picked up speed on the flat. Fifty-five.
Sixty.

I shot through a wider stretch of the canyon
where anglers liked to park on the twenty feet of snow-covered dirt
on my right during summer. I checked my mirror as I neared Elk
Lodge, its steeply pitched, snow-covered roofs and deep eaves
peeking through a stand of pine. Could I turn down the road which
runs beside the big log structure and whip into the rear parking
lot? No. The pickup driver would see me if he came out the Narrows
in the next few seconds and I would be trapped. Would he come after
me in a public place? I daren’t risk it. I needed more distance
from him.

I checked my mirrors yet again. The pickup
nosed around the bend a quarter mile behind me. Sweat stung my
eyes.

Ahead, the canyon zigzagged for a quarter
mile before it became Thirteenth, a straight, smooth road to
downtown Clarion, where the pickup driver would have an unimpeded
view of me and where I went. But if I could take either the north
or south exit before Thirteenth out of sight of my pursuer, he
would not know whether I left the road or went onward, until he got
on Thirteenth and didn’t see me ahead.

I slalomed around the next bend, hit my
brakes and slued crazily onto Ridgemont, a poorly paved road which
winds between two sandstone buttes. I took the first right off
Ridgemont, a left to Pine Crest Lane.

Then I was among pine, aspen and wood-framed
homes. I pulled into a dirt road shielded from Pine Crest by a
thick mat of pine and scrub oak and cut the engine. Forehead on the
steering wheel, I felt I could breathe properly for the first time
since leaving Janie’s. I clenched my hands on my knees to still the
trembling.

Someone tried to kill me.

I should call Clarion PD, but they’d want me
to go down there and fill out a report and I couldn’t blow my
chance to get into Bel-Athaer with Gia.

God only knew who tried to run me off the
road. I surely didn’t. Maybe it wasn’t a matter of road rage and
the assassins were after me again. The notion made my stomach turn
over.

I’d planned to go home and get a cab to
downtown. I told Wanda I’d be out of town for a few days and asked
her to get my mail and papers in. She already had my key. My bag
was already in the car. I timed it so I’d go from the garage to the
cab, and not have to go back in the house and another haranguing
from Jack and Mel. I’d taken care of everything.

But the black pickup might be waiting for me
if I went home now.

I hooked my cell from my back pocket and
called Ted Crossley.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Calling in favors can be an asset when you
are a private investigator. Clarion does not have any long-term
parking garages, but Ted would punch a new twenty-four hour ticket
for me each morning he came on duty and saw my Xterra in The
Bancroft’s parking garage. He directed me to a corner spot on level
three.

“Thanks, Ted. I appreciate it.”

He waved me through. “No prob, Tiff.”

Bless him for not asking why I wanted to
leave my car here.

Ted’s mom Jean died three years ago. The
autopsy ruled accidental death when her car went off the road as it
crested Gallaway Peak. Ted didn’t believe it. His mom was a careful
driver who in her time had driven all over the world and never got
a ticket or been involved in an auto accident. Ted suspected her
husband of two months and half her age arranged her murder. He
never liked nor approved of Peter. His mom invested a bundle in new
hubby’s fledgling company, but Peter’s dream became a nightmare
when his venture flopped and Jean refused to give him another
penny. Ted figured Peter wanted Jean’s money, which he would
inherit if she died before him. But Jean’s car wasn’t tampered
with, drugs or alcohol were not found in her system and the medical
examiner found no health-related cause of death. And Peter had an
alibi.

The simplicity of Peter’s plan awed me. He
knew where Jean headed that morning. He drove to Gallaway before
her and waited. Jean drove along Route 21, as always keeping to the
speed limit, but too fast to stop when Peter jumped in the road in
front of her, too fast to avoid killing the man she loved, unless
she swerved off the road and over an eight-hundred foot drop. His
alibi? His business partner cracked when Mike Warren started in on
him.

I found out later he set up a champagne
breakfast in a pretty little grove off the road. If she managed to
stop, he would say, “Surprise!” and she’d respond, “Peter! You
nearly scared me to death!”

I wish she hit the bastard. Then
his
shade would be lingering on Gallaway.

Jean spent her days and night sitting under
the trees, or following the path her car took, down to the crash
site, up to the road. “It was lovely last spring,” she told me. “I
didn’t know so many wild flowers grew on the mountainside
here.”

I talked Mike into dragging Peter up there.
It was one of those rare times Mike was in a good mood so humored
me. He already had Peter’s written confession after his partner
fingered him, so I don’t know what reason he gave to have Peter
revisit the scene. I was too busy watching poor Jean to care. She
didn’t believe Peter deliberately ran her off the road till then.
Peter didn’t know he confessed to his wife as he corroborated where
he hid as she drove toward him, whereabouts on the road he ran in
front of the car. He didn’t see her as she stood before him,
wringing her hands in distress.

In the dim parking garage, still sick
inside, I scooted my butt out the Xterra and checked her over. The
left side from rear door to rear lights had buckled, pulling the
roof down at a drunken angle. The left rear fender was pushed into
the wheel well. And no side mirror. It could have been worse. I
could be in the Snake River.

With no idea what to tell my insurance
agent, I decided to think about it later.

My breath caught in my throat when a car
climbed the ramp from the second level, but it was a Honda heading
for level four. I took my backpack from the passenger seat, locked
the Xterra and took the concrete stairwell down to the street.

I glanced over my shoulder on and off as I
walked to Montague Square, but no sign of a jacked-up pickup with
dark windows.

Cold nipped my nose and my boots left icy
footprints in new snow as I trudged along, hands deep in my
pockets. My Ruger in the angle-draw holster snugged my side. The
backpack containing a few essentials shifted between my shoulder
blades. A change of socks and underwear, a lightweight hoodie,
toothbrush and toothpaste, hairbrush, and travel size deodorant,
body wash and shampoo. Our cases often took me and Royal out of
town so I always had plenty travel size personal hygiene minis on
hand. I also packed my Derringer, a flashlight and lock picks. And
I had Lawrence’s note. I had been through two home invasions, one
when demons trashed the place, again when assassins planted an
explosive device - maybe I was paranoid, but I worried about
whoever was after me this time breaking in and getting their hands
on Lawrence’s plea for help. Paranoia is not always a bad
thing.

Temperatures had dropped below-freezing
overnight, but recalling the heat in Bel-Athaer I did not bundle
up. The chill penetrated my sleeves and I wished I had my insulated
hat with flaps which cover the sides of my face. My cheeks felt
cold and chapped.

Gia leaned back on the saddle of a bullet
bike, glossy black hair pulled into a tail at her nape. The maroon
leather fitted-jacket and pants molded to show her graceful curves.
The maroon, thigh-high, flat-heeled leather boots clung to her
shins like a second skin. The color matched her bike. She looked
stunning, damn her.

I paused on the sidewalk, staring. I sensed
an oddness, a wrongness, when I met Gia and Daven Clare. When I
heard their name, Dark
Cousin
, I concluded they were another
type of Gelpha, demons who didn’t glitter, and persisted in the
belief until I read Gorge’s book. Now, I tried to detect anything
abnormal in Gia’s appearance, anything alien, as if now I knew, I
should perceive a difference. But she was the same as ever.
Attractive, but not beautiful. An awesome figure, lovely hair, and
eyelashes which could sweep crumbs off a table. And if I were a
guy, I bet her mouth would work like a suction cup.

“Are you coming, Miss Banks?”

Swinging a helmet with an opaque visor by
the strap, she watched me approach. Another helmet rested on the
bike’s saddle. You bring two helmets for a reason.

“We’re riding that thing?” I hate bullet
bikes. Too many died in Pineview Canyon as a result of collisions
involving bullet bikes.

She smiled, a cat lapping cream.

About to ask why we didn’t use what I fondly
call the demon dash, I changed my mind. Dark Cousins can move as
fast as Gelpha, but I would have to cling to her. And perhaps
dashing through Bel-Athaer, where demons do not normally dash,
would attract attention as well as risk colliding with other
speeding demons. Who knew?

By the way, when I say “fondly,” it is
sarcasm. Having my insides churned to mush is not my idea of a good
time, nor is fighting to not throw up afterward.

I grimaced as my gaze ran over the gleaming
machine. I would have to angle my body along her back. I hate
bullet bikes.

She tried to pass me the helmet. I shook my
head. “I don’t use helmets, they restrict the vision.”

“They are also an excellent disguise.”

She had something there. I took the helmet.
“I think someone tried to kill me.”

“Think?”

Her expression became pensive as I told her
about the pickup.

She ran her fingertip along her lower lip.
“I wonder . . . could it have to do with our little venture?”

“It came to mind.” I swung the helmet back
and forth. “But Royal and I put a few people behind bars. They’re
still there as far as I know, some on death row, but they have
friends and family.”

She took up her helmet and placed it on her
head. “We should go, quickly.”

I felt dampness on my cheek. Tiny flakes
drifted down from the cloud-laden sky, tiny flakes which would
settle and build up on the frozen ground. The sidewalk was already
treacherous. The roads were a mess of slippery sludge where the
plows laid down a mixture of salt and sand on packed snow and
ice.