Killertrust (26 page)

After they topped the mountain
,
Rhetta stared at the sea below. “Wow, I never realized how vast the
Mediterranean Sea is. Look at that color. It’s azure.” She shook her head in
wonder. “It’s awesome.”

“It is, indeed,” Randolph
said. “The next time we come over here, I’ll paint some of these beautiful
scenes.”

They started down the hill,
gaining speed as they descended the steep, winding slope.

The highway was still
four-lane, but thankfully, they were alone on this part of the road. Randolph
hugged the slower lane, trying to utilize downshifting as much as possible to
keep their speed down. When he did, the car’s engine wound up pretty tightly,
so he began tapping the brakes. The car responded. Rhetta breathed easier.

“I wonder if they have
turnouts here like they have in Colorado so we can pull over and cool our
brakes.”

“I don’t see any, but we’re
doing fine. There isn’t too much farther to go.” As he said it, the four-lane
ended. They bounced onto a two-lane road for the rest of the five kilometers
into Cadaqués.

“I know, but it’s so steep.”
The car picked up more speed. “Randolph, please, slow down. We’re going too
fast.”

“I’m trying to slow us down,
but I don’t want to ride the brakes. It’s okay, honey, we’re fine. Not much
further.”

Rhetta clutched the overhead
grip handle with one hand and braced against the dash with the other. “I’m not
used to these steep hills and this little box of a car.”

Randolph smiled. “I know, I…”

He didn’t finish. He mashed
the brake pedal, but it only bounced back at him He reached for the shifter,
but couldn’t downshift. He floored the clutch. There was no resistance. There
was no fluid, no clutch pressure. The car began picking up speed.

“Sweets, please slow down.
This isn’t funny.” Rhetta clutched the grip handle even harder.

“I can’t,” he said, as he
gripped the wheel, doing all he could to steer the careening car. “We have no
brakes. Or clutch.” He stepped on the emergency brake pedal. It wobbled under
his foot. “No emergency brake, either!”

“What?” Rhetta didn’t want to
think about how fast they were going, either in miles per hour or kilometers
per hour. The view out the side window was a blur.
What?
Did he say
no brakes?

“Almost there. Hang on!”
Randolph shouted, as he gripped the wheel and careened around the last curve.
Where they met a lorry lumbering up the hill, occupying all of its lane and
most of theirs.

Rhetta squeezed her eyes
shut. This was it.

Oh,
crap!

She was pretty sure she
wasn’t dead. But, she was definitely upside down. So was Randolph.

When she saw the lorry,
Rhetta had squeezed her eyes shut but they shot open again when, instead of a
collision, she felt their car go airborne over the side of the hill. The
Peugeot sailed out about twenty feet then dropped nose-down onto an outcrop of
trees and bushes on the hillside. The heavy brush served to break their fall.
They landed upside down on the canopy.

“Oh, God, Randolph, are you
okay? Where are you?” Rhetta blinked and tried to see around the exploded air
bag, and the cloud of white cottony smoke that filled the car. The seat belt
and shoulder harness held her suspended upside down, held fast by her own weight.
As much as she fumbled with the buckle, she couldn’t unsnap it. Her fingers
caught in the seat belt, and she let out a yelp.

“I’m okay. Rhetta are you all
right?” Randolph had succeeded in freeing himself from both his seat belt and
the air bag. He crawled out, then staggered along the hillside over to Rhetta’s
side of the car, and began tugging. Her door wouldn’t open. He moved slowly,
afraid to send the car plummeting the rest of the way down the hill. Because it
had landed more on the passenger side atop a parasol pine tree, he’d managed to
push open his driver door and roll out. Now, the car shifted precariously. With
each movement, stones tumbled down to the bottom of the hill. Rhetta ceased
trying to get out. When the car began rocking all she could see under her was
air. The passenger air bag had exploded toward her, but had deflated. Her chest
hurt, but otherwise she thought she was okay. Her hand was pinched in the seat
belt, but she finally freed it. She needed to get out of the car before it fell
the rest of the way down the hill. But how? She couldn’t free herself. Randolph
tugged at her door, but couldn’t get it to open. He began to scramble back
toward the driver side.

At the sound of a gaggle of
voices shouting from the top of the hill, Randolph stood, leaning against the
hill to support himself away from the car, and shouted back. “My wife is still
in the car. Please, help me get her out!” Three young men scrambled over the
side of the hill, slipping and sliding down to where the car rested. Their
movement made the car tremble again. Rhetta sucked in a breath, and stared
through the windshield at them. Randolph gestured to them and they nodded. They
spoke and gestured to each other and she saw a couple of shoulders shrug.

She couldn’t understand them,
but she heard the fear in their voices.

Randolph signaled to them to
help him free her, and they nodded vigorously. Two of the bigger men braced
against the car as the third one helped Randolph pull the door open. As soon as
they succeeded, the man produced a jackknife, slit the belt and Rhetta dropped
to the ground. Randolph scooped her up, and the men cheered.

She hugged her husband’s
neck. She began to laugh. She wasn’t sure why, but it was one of those,
either-you-laugh-or-you-cry moments, and so, she laughed. Randolph began to
laugh and even the men, who at first looked puzzled, as though they missed the
joke, finally joined in. She laughed until the tears finally started. “Oh crap,
that was close. What happened?”

“Let’s get out of here and
we’ll figure this out.” Randolph said, and began to ease her away from the car.

“Wait,” she shouted. “I have
to get the bag, it has my purse and all the paperwork!” She turned toward the
trap where she’d just been held.

“Stay here, I’ll get it,”
Randolph said, and inched his way to the car. He peered in. “I don’t see it.”
The air bags had spewed their contents throughout the small interior. “This is
like that movie where the submarine was upside down,” he said. He finally
located the bag in the back seat, but on the inside of the roof, the strap
caught on the clothes hanger. He leaned way in, closed his hand around the
strap and pulled the prize toward him. The car lurched and began falling.
Randolph threw himself aside as the car toppled the rest of the way down the
hill. He lay on the ground, panting, her purse clutched to his chest. Rhetta
rushed to him, slipping on the rocks, and landing on her butt alongside him.

“Oh God, Sweets, are you all
right?” She took his face in her hands. He was scratched and dirty, but she
didn’t see any blood. She gently brushed dirt and leaves from his face.

“I’m fine. But like you said,
that was close.” The rescuers scrambled to them and grasping their arms, helped
them first to stand, then to scramble to the top of the hill and over the low
demolished barricade, and finally, onto the road. Two men who had been leaning
over to watch had scurried forward and grasped their hands to help them the
last steps and to hoist them over the top. Rhetta couldn’t understand a word they
chattered, but was grateful for the concern in their voices.

A crowd had gathered, with
many onlookers stopping their cars to watch the rescue. Among those cars was a
small white one with a black band around the middle, and the words
Policia
in bright
green two-foot high letters on each side.

For once, Rhetta was happy to
see cops.

Both Rhetta and Randolph insisted
that neither of them was injured from the wreck, save for some scrapes and
bruises from climbing back up to the road. The young constable, who told them
he was stationed in Cadaqués, spoke surprisingly good English.

Rhetta told him they didn’t
want to go to a hospital. She explained that it was urgent that they continue
on to Vera Mardola. However, they desperately needed new transportation. With
his help, they were able to call the car rental company and report their
accident. The constable was familiar with a car rental office in Cadaqués, and
generously drove them to pick up another car. He stayed with them and helped to
translate their request. After much paper shuffling, and credit card scanning,
they were installed in yet another small white vehicle. According to the
paperwork, this one was a Fiat, although Rhetta swore it looked just like the
Peugeot.

The constable shook their
hands and wished them a safe journey. He informed them that he would have his
report done and to the rental company in Barcelona by Monday.

“Do you think his report will
indicate that we lost brakes and clutch?” Rhetta asked, as they buckled in and
reconnoitered the interior of their new ride. “And obviously someone cut the
emergency brake cable, too. I know he was listening very carefully to your
account. He took notes, too.” Rhetta watched him jot in a black notebook
embossed with a police emblem in gold on the cover.

“I hope so. Otherwise, we may
have just purchased a wrecked Spanish Peugeot.”

“What about the insurance?
Won’t it pay?”

“I would assume the rental
insurance would cover the replacement, but frankly, I can’t read Spanish, so
I’m not sure what the agreement actually says. I kept the paperwork so we can
check in with the company when we get back, which is what the clerk on the
phone instructed. He said they would follow up and get the police report.”

Within fifteen minutes, they
were in line at the ferry dock. Before she got out of the car, Rhetta had dared
a look at herself in the mirror, and saw that now, in addition to the
“baggages” under her eyes, she had white airbag powder smeared on her face and
on her clothes. Her Capris were streaked shrub green and dirt brown, and she’d
broken a strap on her sandal. Her hair, well, it was short, spikey and messy.
It looked all right.

They climbed out and leaned
against the Fiat, watching the ferry as it chugged up to the quay. She eyed her
husband. Green and brown stains also streaked his jeans, and his shirtsleeve
was torn. His tousled hair fell across a bruised eye.

“Sweets, I think you hurt
your eye,” Rhetta said as she gently moved a strand away and inspected the
wound carefully. He must have had a close encounter with a rock when he rolled
away from the car.

He touched it and grimaced
slightly. “I hadn’t really paid any attention. I guess I did.” He grasped both
her hands in his. “I can’t believe we didn’t get killed. The brakes and clutch
went out at the same time. I find that more than suspicious. I think somebody
cut the lines.”

“That’s what I was thinking,
too, but I didn’t want you to think I was being paranoid again.”

“Not paranoia this time. This
was very real.” He wrapped his arms around her. “We have to be very careful.
There is someone who doesn’t want us to get to Vera Mardola.” He hugged her and
whispered. “Do you see the man anywhere that you thought looked familiar from
the hotel? There are two guys standing over there, looking us over.”

Rhetta eyed the two men, but
neither looked like the man she saw. “I think they are just giving us the once
over because we look so rough.”

Randolph smiled. “I guess we
don’t look like the regular tourists or whoever comes over here. You’re
probably right. We look like we’ve just been through a wreck.”

“I can’t understand what’s
going on, Sweets. Who could this person be?”

“Someone who thinks they have
the right to the trust money. I have no idea who.”

Rhetta replayed everything in
her head, again, for what she felt was the hundredth time.
Who else thinks
they should get the money? That’s who’s after us.
And, that’s
who killed George Erickson.
Rhetta shivered. The adrenaline rush from the wreck
was subsiding, and left her chilled. Or, was that fear that left her chilled?

A bell clanged the ferry’s
arrival as the boat bumped up against the dock. Two deck hands leaped down from
the deck to secure the rectangular, flat-bottomed boat by snubbing heavy ropes
to posts on the dock. Next, they lowered the metal ramp to allow the cars to
leave. It dropped with a resounding clang. Within minutes, eight cars had sped
down the ramp, off the ferry and away into town.

Rhetta and Randolph clambered
back into their car as they heard the other cars start their engines. They were
the third in line to board, with two cars and two small commercial vans behind
them. The first two cars in line ahead of them drove up toward the front where
the deck hand guided them to a stopping point, making them the head of each
row, which to Rhetta, looked perilously close to the edge. She was glad she and
Randolph weren’t first in line.

Loading the ferry took just a
little over five minutes. After more bell-ringing, the ropes were untied and
the boat was underway to its destination at Vera Mardola. Rhetta swayed toward
a wooden bench alongside the rail and she and Randolph joined the other
passengers to sit the trip out. Some of the men took the opportunity to light
up a cigarette, or to chat. She glanced over the rail at oily green water
eddying around the boat and her stomach began swirling in rhythm to the
engine’s chugging sound. Although the ferry appeared quaint in the brochure, in
reality it was small, crowded and stunk of diesel fuel. Rhetta’s stomach
fluttered dangerously. She abandoned her seat on the bench in favor of sitting
inside the car. At least there, it didn’t smell so foul.

Randolph joined her. “So,
want to take a vacation cruise after we get home?” he asked.

She shot him a look. “I
believe this is enough ship for me. I’ll do my cruising in Cami from now on,
thanks.”

Mercifully, the trip was over
within a few minutes, and Rhetta had managed not to get sick. As the ferry
docked at Vera Mardola, Rhetta reached over and grasped Randolph’s hand, and
squeezed. She pointed to what appeared to be a rock fortress in the middle of
the town square. Most European squares boasted cathedrals or churches, but here
money was religion. She suspected the rock structure to be their destination.
The elegantly scripted sign above the building,
Banc
Real de
Santo Domingo
confirmed it.

She tucked her arm through
Randolph’s, squared her shoulders, then sucked in a deep breath. “Here we go.”