He deletes his text to Bucky and Bucky’s reply about the SCOTS video, then goes to Google. There’s only one town named Sidewinder in the continental United States. It’s in Colorado. There’s no Edgewood Saloon, but there is a thoroughfare called Edgewood Mountain Drive.
He texts Alice: Leaving at 5 AM, OK?
The reply – roger – comes back immediately.
Billy downloads an app to one of the AllTech laptops. It takes awhile because the Penny Pines WiFi is weak as shit. When the download is complete he reads for an hour, then takes a long hot shower. He sets the alarm on his phone before going to bed even though he knows he won’t need it. He dreams of Lalafallujah. No surprise there.
4
It’s still dark when they stow their few belongings in the back seat of the Fusion. Billy sets one of the cheap AllTechs on the console between the front seats and plugs it into the power outlet. ‘I knew one of these cheapies would come in handy sooner or later.’
‘Did you really?’ Alice looks still half-asleep.
‘Nope, but sometimes you get lucky.’
While she fastens the seatbelt, Billy opens the app he downloaded last night. There’s a shrill sound, like an old-fashioned modem connecting. He squelches the volume.
‘What’s that for?’
Billy bends over and points to an unobtrusive panel down low and to the left of the glove compartment. ‘That’s the OBD. On-board diagnostic. It does all sorts of things, and because this is a lease car, one of the things it does is pinpoint our location if anyone at the dealership wants to check. Which they would as soon as we cross the state line, because it’s programmed to send a notification. The app is a jammer. If anyone checks, they’ll think the OBD is on the fritz.’
‘You hope they’ll think that.’
‘Confidence is high,’ Billy says. ‘You ready? Don’t want to dummy-check the room?’
‘I’m ready.’ She’s wide awake now. ‘Where are we going?’
‘Colorado.’
‘Colorado, my God.’ She sounds very young. ‘How far?’
‘Over a thousand miles. Two-day drive.’
She smiles. ‘Then we better get going.’
Billy says ‘Roger that,’ and drops the Fusion’s transmission in drive. Five minutes later they’re on the turnpike and headed west.
5
They stop for gas and food in Muskogee, the town made famous by Merle Haggard. Alice has been busy on the AllTech, and directs Billy to the Arrowhead Mall. When they get there, she points out a building with bright orange awnings.
‘What’s Ulta?’ Billy asks.
‘Makeup store. You go in. I don’t want to with my face looking like this.’
Billy can’t blame her. She’s young, she’s healthy, and the bruises have started to fade, but it’s still pretty clear that someone tuned up on her in the recent past. She tells him what to get and he gets it. The basic product is called Dermablend Cover Creme. It’s less expensive than the morning-after pill, but once he adds in the brush and the setting powder, he’s closing in on eighty bucks.
‘You’re an expensive date,’ he says when he gives her the bag.
‘Wait ’til you see the results.’
She sounds pert. Billy likes that. She has come a long way back from the girl who couldn’t bear to look at herself in the mirror … but not all the way back. She falls asleep that afternoon as they continue to drive northwest, and after an hour or so he hears her moaning. She puts out her hands in a warding-off gesture. One of them strikes the dashboard and she wakes up with a gasp. Then another. And a third, this time with her hand on her throat.
‘“Teddy Bears’ Picnic,” stat!’ Billy says. He’s already slowing, moving over into the breakdown lane.
‘I’m okay, keep going. I’m all right now. Bad dream is all.’
‘What was it?’ Billy asks, turning off his blinker and swerving the Fusion back into the travel lane.
‘I don’t remember.’
She’s lying, but that’s okay.
6
They stop for the night in the little town of Protection, Kansas, because it’s almost halfway to where they’re going but also because they both like the idea of staying at a place called the Protection Motel. This time Alice goes in with him when he registers, and the guy at the desk barely gives her a glance. A woman might have, Billy thinks. The makeup is good and she applied it skillfully, but it’s not quite perfect. He asks if she wants him to get takeout and Alice shakes her head. She’s ready to go public, and that’s also good. They eat at Don’s Place, which is just about the only place in Protection when it comes to food. The menu consists mostly of burgers and corn dogs.
‘This guy we’re going to see,’ Alice says. ‘What’s he like?’
‘Bucky’s sixty-five or seventy now. Skinny as hell. Ex-Marine. Pretty much lives on beer, cigarettes, Slim Jims, and rock and roll. He’s good with computers, he has a lot of contacts, and he helps put strings together.’
‘Strings?’
‘Pro stickup guys. Not kids, not junkies, not trigger-happy hot-heads. He’s part agent, part talent scout.’
‘For the underworld.’
Billy smiles. ‘I don’t know if there’s really an underworld anymore. I think the Computer Age pretty much killed it.’
‘And he finds jobs for people like you.’ She lowers her voice. ‘Hired killers.’
So far as Billy knows, he’s the only hired killer Bucky does business with, but he doesn’t disagree. How could he when it’s true? He could tell her again that he only kills people who deserve to be killed, but why bother? Either she believes it or she doesn’t. In any case it’s a moot point. He can’t change his past but he means to change his future. He also intends to have his payday. He earned it.
‘Bucky will have ID for you, I think. It’s one of the things he does. You can be a new person. If you want to.’
‘I do.’ She doesn’t pause to think about it. ‘Although at some point I suppose I’ll want to call my mother again.’ She gives a little laugh and a small shake of the head. ‘You know, I can’t remember the last time she called me. I really can’t.’
‘But you did talk to her?’
‘Yes. While you were … um, visiting Tripp and his roommates.’
‘You didn’t really tell her you were going to Cancun, did you?’
She smiles. ‘I was tempted, but no. I said I had a boyfriend, and we broke up when I quit school, and I needed some time to think about what comes next.’
‘She was okay with that?’
‘It’s been a long time since she was okay with anything I do. Can we talk about something else, please?’
7
The next day is nothing but driving, most of it on I-70. Alice, still recovering from physical and mental trauma, sleeps a lot. Billy thinks about the Fallujah part of his story, which is now stored on a thumb drive in his computer bag. That leads him to Albie Stark, who used to talk about getting his Harley out of storage when he got home and taking a road trip from New York to San Francisco. None of that blue highways shit, either, he said. I be turnpikin’ the whole way. Crank it up to eighty and pull the knobs off. Albie never had a chance to do that. Albie died behind a rusty old Fallujah taxi and his last words were It’s nothing, just clipped me. Only then he started gasping, the way Alice did when she had her panic attacks, and he never got a chance to sing even the first line of ‘Teddy Bears’ Picnic.’
They stop for gas and food in the little town of Quinter, Kansas. It’s a Waffle Delite and when they get out of the Fusion and approach, they see a couple of state cops sitting at the counter. Alice hesitates, but Billy keeps going and it turns out fine. The cops hardly give them a glance.
‘If you act right, most times they don’t even notice you,’ Billy says as they walk back to the car.
‘Most times?’