Praying for Sleep (47 page)

As he started toward the house, hurrying as fast as he dared on the trembling leg, Heck heard the gunshot not more than ten feet behind him. At the same time he felt, with more shock than pain, the tug of the bullet as it tore through his back. "Oh," he gasped. He staggered a few steps, wondering why no one had ever suggested that Hrubek might have a gun. He dropped his pistol and looked down at the pucker of his workshirt where the hot bit of metal had exited.

"Oh, no. Damn."

Dimly, in his mind's eye, Trenton Heck saw his ex-wife Jill in her freshly pressed waitress uniform. Then, as in his actual life, she vanished from him quickly, as if she had far more important matters to attend to, and he dropped to his knees, falling forward and beginning an endless tumble down the hill of slick leaves.

"Lis!" Portia called, as her sister returned to the kitchen and hung up the bomber jacket, shaking the water out her hair.

Glancing at Portia she locked the door then turned and stared into the backyard, which was just a blur in the heavy rain.

"That noise," Portia blurted.

"What noise?"

"Didn't you hear it?" The younger sister paced, and wrung her hands compulsively. "It seemed... I mean, it wasn't thunder. I thought there were gunshots. I was worried — where were you?"

"I had trouble getting through the mud to the basement door. It was locked after all. Waste of time."

Portia said, "Maybe we should tell the deputy." Lightining struck nearby and she jumped at the thunder. "Shit. I hate this."

It was fifty or sixty feet to the police car. Lis stood at the door and waved but received no response from the deputy. Portia said, "He can't see you. Let's go tell him. With rain he might not've heard anything. All right, don't look at me that way. I'm scared. What do you expect? I'm fucking scared."

Lis hesitated then nodded. She put on the jacket again a black rain hat that was Owen's — more for camouflage than to protect her drenched hair. Portia pulled on the baseball cap and a navy-blue windbreaker — useless against the rain but less conspicuous than the slicker. Then Lis flung open the door. Portia stepped outside and Lis followed, clutching the gun in her pocket. They were immediately overwhelmed by the storm. They leaned into the torrent of rain and wind and struggled toward the car. Halfway there Lis's hat vanished toward the turbulent lake. It was from this direction — the lake — that the figure suddenly appeared. He grabbed Lis around the shoulders and they fell together into the saturated mud of one of her rose gardens. The fall emptied her lungs and she bent double, gasping for breath, unable to call for help. His full weight was on her, pinning her to the ground. She yanked at the pistol but the rear lip of the receiver caught in the cloth of her pocket.

Portia turned and saw the assailant. She screamed and made a dash for the police car, as Lis kicked him away. She succeeded only in sliding through a muddy trench catching herself, in an ungainly sitting position, on thorny stalk of a blossomless Prospero rose shrub. She was held immobile as the man, his head lowered like an animal's, crawled through the muck after her, muttering eerie sounds. Lis ripped the pocket flap open and pulled the Colt from it. She placed the black muzzle against his head just as Trenton Heck looked up and said, "Help me."

"Oh, my God."

"I'm... Can you help me?"

"Portia!" she shouted, pocketing the automatic once again. "It's Trenton. He's hurt. Get the deputy. Tell him."

The young woman stood at the door of the patrol car.

"It's Trenton" Lis shouted over the wind and rain. "Tell the deputy!"

But Portia didn't move. She stepped back from the car and began to scream. Lis ripped her jacket from the rosebush and crawled away from Heck. Lis approached her sister cautiously, frowning. Smoke poured from the front seat of the cruiser. Portia pressed her hands over her face then fell to her knees, gagging. A moment later she vomited violently.

When the deputy had been shot-point-blank in the face — the cigarette he held fell into his lap and started his uniform smoldering.

"Oh, no," Portia was crying, "no, no..."

Lis pushed her sister aside then scooped up mud and patted out the embers. She too gagged at the smell of burnt cloth, hair and skin.

"The radio!" Portia screamed. She stood, wiping her, mouth, and shouted the word twice more before Lis understood. But only a curly black wire protruded from the dash; the handset had been torn off. Lis bent to the deputy once more though there was nothing to be done. He was, pasty and cold. Lis stepped away and glanced at the Acura.

The water was up to the windows now and had filled the car, covering the cellular phone inside. Together, the women stumbled through the mud to where Trenton Heck lay on his side. They managed to get him to his feet and struggled toward the back door. The rain pelted their faces and stung; it lay on them heavily like a dozen blankets. Halfway to the house a huge gust of wind slapped them from behind and Portia slipped into a trench of mud, pulling unconscious Heck after her. It took long, agonizing minutes to get him out of the soggy yard and to the kitchen.

Portia collapsed in the open doorway. 'No, don't stop here. Get him inside.

"I have to rest," Portia gasped.

"Come on, you're the runner. You got the stamina genes in the family."

"Jesus."

The women dragged him into the living room and laid him on the couch.

Emil joined them but apparently the hound had no sixth sense of disaster. He sniffed once at his master's boot and went back to the corner he'd commandeered, where he flopped down and closed his eyes. Portia locked the door and turned on a small lamp in the living room. Lis pulled off Heck's workshirt open.

"Oh, my God — a bullethole." Portia's voice was high with shock. "Get something! I don't know. A towel."

Lis walked into the kitchen. As she pulled a handful of paper towels off the roll she heard a noise outside — faint at first then growing until it rivaled the howl of the wind. Her heart froze, for the sound reminded her of Claire's final keening, emanating up through the ground from the caves of Indian Leap. Dazed by this terrible memory and her present fear Lis stumbled to the door and stared out. She saw nothing but rain and wind-bent foliage, and it was a moment before she realized that the sound was Michael Hrubek's unearthly cry, calling from nowhere and from everywhere, "Lis-bone, Lis-bone, Lis-bone..."

30

Trenton Heck lapsed into and out of consciousness. Lis tried to find his pulse and couldn't, though when she rested her head on his chest his heart seemed to beat stridently.

"Can you hear me?" she shouted.

Like a sleepwalker he muttered unearthly sounds. He hardly responded to what must have been excruciating pain when Lis pressed the towels firmly against the black-bordered hole in his stomach.

Portia sat in the corner of the living room, her arms folded around her knees, her head down. Lis stood and walked past her. Standing in the dark kitchen she looked out over the yard, and saw no sign of Hrubek, who ceased calling to her. Still, the macabre sound of his voice chanting her name, resonated in her mind. She felt tainted, abused. Oh, please, she thought, despairing. Just leave me alone. Please.

For a long moment Lis stood at the window. Then turned to her sister. "Portia."

The woman looked at her and began shaking her head. "No."

"Put this on." Lis handed her the bomber jacket.

"Oh, Lis, no."

"You're going for help."

"I can't."

"Yes, you can."

"I'm not going out there."

"You know where the sheriff's department is on —"

"The car's stuck."

"You're going to take the deputy's."

Portia gasped. "No. He's in it."

"Yes, you are."

"I'm not going. No. Don't ask."

"A left out the drive. A mile and a half down Cedar Swamp you come to North Street. Another left, then drive about six miles. The sheriff's on the right side of the road. Cedar Swamp'll be washed out, parts of it. You'll have to go slow till you get to town."

"No!" Portia's face was awash with tears.

With fingers white from the rain and red from a man's blood Lis seized her sister's shoulders. "I'm going to put you in the car and you're going to drive to the sheriff's." Portia's eyes flicked to the crimson stains on the sweater, her voice cracked as she said, "You're getting his —"

"Portia."

"— blood on me! No!"

Lis pulled the blue-black gun from her pocket and held front of her sister's astonished face. "Don't say another word. You're going to climb into that car and get the hell out of here! Now let's go!" Lis grabbed Portia by the collar and thrust her out into the rain.

With their arms around each other's shoulders, they stumbled toward the car. The ground was so marshy that it took five minutes to get to the cruiser. The muddy water surrounded the garage now was approaching the bend in the driveway, four feet deep. Soon the deputy's car too would be submerged.

Once, they lost their balance and fell into the muck. Lis's knee stuck in the ooze and Portia actually had to pull her with both hands. Foot by foot they made their way through the grimy sluice of water toward the car. Twenty feet to go. "I can't look," Portia whispered. Lis left her at the edge of the driveway and struggled to the squad car by herself. The rain was still heavy but there seemed to be a faint illumination from somewhere in sky — though it was too early for dawn. Perhaps, she thought, her eyes had simply gotten used to the dark. All her senses seemed honed, like an animal's. She was attuned to the falling temperature, the smells of rain, smoke and compost, the slickness of the mud and pages of wet leaves beneath her. She was poised to attack anyone who might slip into the field of this blood radar.

Reaching for the door handle she looked back at her sister. What is that? she wondered, looking over Portia's shoulder. A dozen yards away a large cloud seemed to form, slowly growing blacker than the surrounding haze of rain. It floated forward unsteadily in their direction.

And finally stepped clearly into view. Michael Hrubek waded toward them, one arm outstretched, the other dangling, apparently injured. In the damaged hand hung a pistol, dwarfed by his fingers.

He was staring directly at Portia.

"Lis-bone... Lis-bone..."

The young woman spun around and screamed, falling backwards into the mud.

Lis froze. Oh, my God! He thinks she's me!

Hrubek reached toward her. "Eve..."

Lifting the dark Colt Woodsman with both her hands Lis pulled the trigger, once, twice, more perhaps. She yanked the sharp tongue of metal so hard she nearly broke her finger. The bullets zipped into the night, missing Hrubek by inches.

He howled and, covering his ears, fled into the brush. Lis ran to her sister and pulled her to the car.

Portia was limp with fear, her head lolling. Lis thrust the gun at her. She took it and stared at the black barrel while Lis reached into the police car, grabbing the beefy deputy by the shoulders. With a huge effort Lis pulled him out of the car and dropped him irreverently into the mud then reached inside and started the engine. She snatched the Colt away from Portia, who started to back away. Lis closed her tough hands on her sister's arms and shoved her into the front seat. Easing into the pool of blood, Portia cringed as if the liquid seared her thighs.

She was sobbing, quaking. Lis slammed the door. "Go."

"I... Get his legs... Get his legs out!" Portia wailed, gesturing down at the deputy, whose knees were directly in front of the rear tires.

"Go!" Lis shouted and reached through the window, pulling on the headlights and dropping the gearshift into drive. As the car jerked forward, the side mirror knocked into Lis. She slipped on a layer of wet pulverized leaves and fell to the swampy ground. Slowly the police car drove over the deputy and into the driveway. Portia gunned the engine. With a panicked spray of mud and marble chips the car sped forward. It vanished, sashaying down the long driveway, sending up plumes of dark water in its wake.

Lis clambered to her feet, blinded for a moment — the rear tires of the squad car had sprayed her with mud. She leaned back, letting the downpour clean her face, flushing her eyes. When she could see once more, she noticed that Michael Hrubek was wading toward her again, cautiously, churning through the water, already halfway across the yard.

Lis slapped her side. The gun was gone. When she'd fallen, it had slipped out of her torn pocket. She dropped to her knees and patted the sticky ooze around her but couldn't find the pistol. "Where?" she cried. "Where?" Hrubek was just thirty feet away, advancing slowly through the waist-high flood surrounding the garage. Finally she could wait no longer and fled into the house, slamming the door behind her.

She double-locked it and from a wooden block took a long carving knife. She turned to face the door.

But he was gone.

Stepping cautiously to the window she surveyed the backyard carefully. She couldn't see him anywhere. She stepped away from the glass, fearing that he might suddenly pop into view.

Where?
Where?

His absence was almost as frightening as watching him stalk toward her.

Hurrying from the kitchen into the living room, she knelt and checked on Trenton Heck. He was still unconscious but his breathing was steady. Lis stood and gazed around the room, her eyes looking at but not really seeing her family's pictures, the porcelain-bird collection, the Quixote memorabilia her father had brought back from Iberia, the chintz furniture, the overwrought paintings.

A crash outside. Breaking glass. Hrubek was circling the house. A shadow fell across a living-room window then vanished. A moment later his silhouette darkened another curtain and moved on. An unbearable minute of silence. Suddenly a huge kick shook the front door. She gasped. Another kick slammed into the wood. A panel broke with a resounding crack. He kicked it again but the wood held. She saw Hrubek's bulk move past the narrow doorside window.

Her head swiveled slowly, following his circuit of the house. She heard him rip open the toolshed door then slam it shut.