Last Light (46 page)
Yes, she had gotten away! But had Vic caught up to her?
He glanced back at the farmhouse. He should find someone at a nearby house and tell them about the dead couple. But there wasn’t time.
So he followed Deni’s trail, praying that he would find her alive.
The sun wasn’t falling right. Deni realized with a sinking heart that she’d gotten west and east mixed up. The arc of the sun should go directly in front of her if she was going west, but instead, it was arcing off to her right. What did that mean? Was Highway 27 taking her south?
Dread fell over her as she rode, but she couldn’t decide whether to turn around and backtrack. She decided to keep going until she came to a town, and then ask someone where this road led.
She rode for several miles without seeing anyone. Then finally, she saw a trio of bikers half a mile away, riding toward her. She slowed as they approached her. “Excuse me,” she called up to them. “Could you help me?”
One of them slowed to a stop. Balancing his bike with a foot, he said, “Sure, what you need?”
“I’m trying to get to the Birmingham area. Am I going the right direction?”
The man laughed, and his buddies who had ridden ahead began to laugh, too. “What made you think 27 would take you west?”
Romeo and Juliet
, she wanted to cry. Shakespeare
said
the sun rose in the east . . .
She knew how ridiculous it would sound. “It looked like west when I started out, but the stupid road must have turned.”
They laughed again.
She didn’t even care that they found her so amusing. “Please . . . is there some place where I can get some water?”
The man’s humor faded. “You set out on a trip with no water?”
She didn’t want to go into it. “It’s a long story.”
The man slung off his backpack and pulled a jug of water out. “Here, take this. I’m close to home, and you have a long trip.”
Cautiously, she took the jug, and pulled the top off. Half expecting it to be something foul that would send them all into hysterical laughter, she took a sip. It was water, clear and clean. Gratitude seeped through her, and her eyes filled with tears. “Thank you. You’re an answer to prayer.”
The man smiled at that, then gave her directions back to I-20. “Get back there, and you’ll get home faster.”
The group rode on, and she sat there a moment, drinking more of the water, feeling life creep back into her bones.
The sun was about to set—in the wrong place—and it would be dark soon. There wasn’t enough daylight to get back to I-20 before dark, and she didn’t have enough courage to ride at night. No, she’d have to find a place to sleep. A place that was safe, where Vic couldn’t find her.
When darkness finally came, she pulled her bike into another stalled van, and tried her best to sleep.
Doug’s legs trembled as night fell, and he found himself straining to pedal. Every fiber of his being told him to pull over and sleep for an hour or two, but his best chance of catching up to Deni was if he rode through the night. It was a lonely ride, with no other cyclists on the freeway and no streetlights or headlights. The night was darker than he’d ever imagined. Loneliness fell over him like a thick fog he couldn’t evade.
Vic probably wasn’t the only killer around. What if someone came out of nowhere and murdered him for his bicycle? What if he died here alone on this dark road and his family never knew what became of him?
He forced his legs to pedal once more, twice more, three times more, and then he realized he couldn’t go another foot. He wobbled to the side of the road and stumbled off of the bike. His legs were so weak they could hardly hold him up. He collapsed onto the dirt, laying the bike down beside him.
Please, Lord, I can’t sleep. There’s no time.
He had to keep going. He’d tried to put himself in Deni’s shoes. She would have taken the back roads to avoid Vic, if he hadn’t caught her already. She’d head east, intent on reaching Washington. But there had been no sign of her . . . nothing to indicate he was even on her trail.
His mind had taken him terrible places as he’d forced himself on. What if Vic had caught up to her? He would have to kill her to keep her from talking. He pictured Deni dead, in a heap in the back of that wagon, murdered and abused. Hatred rose up inside of him, curling its talons around his heart. The thought of revenge oozed like sweat from his pores.
Then he would think that maybe she was alive, that maybe Vic had her under his controlling spell, that maybe she cooperated with him to keep from being killed.
Yes, Deni
, he thought,
cooperate with him. Don’t fight! Just stay alive.
Then his mind would stray again, and he would picture Vic digging a hole deep in the woods to drop her body in. They’d never find her, never know for sure whether she was dead or alive.
He pictured the hell his life would become after that and what it would do to Kay and the kids. None of them would ever be the same. Peace would elude them for the rest of their lives.
Now he sat on the dirt in the black of night, holding that bike in a paranoid grip. Rest would keep his mind from following destructive paths, but he couldn’t let himself sleep. He had to keep going. He stretched out on the grass and sent up a plea to heaven.
Oh, God, please let her be alive. Take care of her. Send angels to protect her. Help her, Lord. I don’t know what to do.
He wept out the agony of his fatherhood before the throne of God, but he was too weary to listen for an answer. Soon his tears drew the last bit of strength out of him, and he fell asleep there on the grass, one leg thrown over his bike.
Doug awoke sometime later. It was still dark and he sat up, realizing he had wasted time again. How long had he slept? He looked down at his windup Timex, but the moonlight wasn’t bright enough for him to see the time.
He pushed to his feet, his aching muscles protesting. But he had a little more strength than before. The rest had done him good.
He got back on the bike. His bruised pelvis settled back into the seat, and his blistered hands gripped the handlebars.
He pulled the bike back onto the road and pedaled another mile, two miles, three miles, and then he smelled it . . .
Something burning up ahead. Someone had built a fire. Hope flew up inside him, invigorating him with new strength. He pedaled faster until the scent grew stronger.
There was a rest stop up ahead, and when he reached the exit for it, he saw the light of a fire flickering inside. He turned toward it, riding more cautiously now, straining to see who the fire warmed.
There, silhouetted against it, he saw the infamous wagon.
He caught his breath, and a trembling started through his body.
He stopped, got off the bike, and hid it behind a tree. He didn’t want the clicking of the wheels to alert anyone. Staying in the shadows, he moved closer to the wagon. The horses had been detached from it and were tied to a bicycle rack. One of them lay on the ground, its feet beneath it as it slept. The others looked at him as if they’d expected him.
Doug scanned the ground in front of the fire, but didn’t see either Deni or Vic. He couldn’t see into the wagon. Could Deni be in there? He didn’t want to look for fear he would make a noise that would wake Vic up. Instead, he eased around the wagon and searched the ground around the fire.
And there he saw him, his enemy, sleeping soundly in a sleeping bag close to the fire.
Deni was nowhere around.
Doug’s heart hammered as he turned on his flashlight and went to the wagon, and looked inside for his daughter. As he moved one of the boxes, a squawking erupted.
He shone his light on the cages of chickens.
He looked to see if Vic had stirred. The killer slept like a man with a clear conscience.
But where was Deni?
Had he already done away with her?
Something snapped inside him. With cool deliberation, he chambered a round, then went around the wagon and pressed the barrel to Vic’s forehead.
The man jolted awake. “What the—?”
“Hands up. Over your head.”
Vic lifted his hands, squinting to see his assailant.
“Where is she?” Doug asked through his teeth. “Where’s Deni?”
Vic froze.
That rage that had been building for days erupted like hot lava, and Doug kicked him in the ribs.
“Where’s my daughter?”
Vic grunted and doubled over. “She’s not with me.”
Doug wanted to kill him right there.
“Where is she? Tell me now!”
Vic cowered with one hand over his head. “I don’t know! She got away.”
“You killed her, didn’t you?” He spat out the vile words. “Just like you killed all those others.”
“She’s not dead!” he shouted. “I swear I didn’t kill her. She took off, and I’ve been looking for her, but I haven’t been able to catch up to her.”
The words sank in, sending a flutter of hope up through Doug’s heart. He wanted to believe it.
“What happened at that farmhouse?” Doug demanded. “I found Deni’s wedding dress, her suitcase. And those people . . . dead.”
Vic squirmed like Gollum in
Lord of the Rings.
“It was self-defense. They attacked Deni, and I was protecting her. They turned on me, so I had to kill them. It scared Deni so much she took off, half crazed. I couldn’t stop her.”
Attacked Deni.
Self-defense.
The words echoed through Doug’s mind. Could it be true? Had Vic been trying to protect his daughter . . . ?
No. Deni wouldn’t have run away from her protector. She would have stayed with him. Vic had killed the Abernathys and Whitsons. The man was a murderer.
Again, he thrust the barrel of the gun against the man’s forehead. “Prove to me that Deni’s alive, and I won’t kill you.”
“I can’t prove it.” His arms lowered slightly. “But I can help you find her. Maybe if we join forces . . .” As he spoke, his arms came down, and one hand slid into his pocket.
“Hands up!” Doug shouted. Vic’s hand came up with a gun.
Doug fired. The gun flew to the ground.
Vic screamed, clutching his bloody hand.
Keeping his rifle aimed at Vic, Doug moved around to where the revolver lay, and picked it up. The .22 was fitted with some kind of extension he’d never seen before. A silencer? Yes, it was the same one he’d used in the Abernathy and Whitson killings. He dropped the rifle, letting it hang from its sling. Slipping his finger over the revolver’s trigger, he grabbed Vic’s arm and twisted it behind him, jerking him to his feet.
He looked around for something to bind him with. Pulling Vic with him, he backed toward the horse that was lying down. With one hand, he unhooked the animal’s bridle and worked it off over his head. The reins attached to it were long enough to restrain Vic until he could find something else.
Vic yelled when Doug tied his hands with the leather straps. The bleeding hand was limp, useless, and Vic fell to his knees in pain. Keeping that pistol on him and taking advantage of his weakness, Doug bound his feet.
Vic moaned. “I need a hospital. I’ll bleed to death.”
“Tell it to the police.”
Using his flashlight, Doug searched the boxes until he found some rope and a box cutter. Cutting off a length of rope, he wound it around Vic’s wrists and feet, next to the leather straps.
As the sun began to come up, Doug rebridled the horses and hooked them back to the wagon. He managed to throw Vic over his shoulder, and dropped him in the back of the wagon.
“You can’t do this to me!” Vic shouted. “I can help you find her. You need me.”
Doug riffled through boxes as the caged chickens squawked and fluttered. He found a rag and some duct tape. He stuffed the rag into Vic’s mouth, then sealed it by wrapping the tape around his head. “That ought to keep you quiet.”
The man grunted against the tape and squirmed to break free, but he was helpless. Just to make sure he didn’t break free, he wrapped what was left of the tape around his wrists and ankles, reinforcing the rope.
