The windshield was cracked, blood on the inside of the glass. The driver’s side window was open. He pointed the Beretta at it as he came around. The woman looked out at him, eyes unfocused. There was a deep cut over her right eye. Her braids were streaked with blood. Her top lip was split.
He moved closer, looked in. Her left leg was bent at an angle under the dashboard. No seat belt. She had a cell phone open, fumbling with it, numbly punching numbers. He reached in with a gloved hand, took it from her. Only two digits on the screen, bloody fingerprints on the keypad. He closed the phone and dropped it in his pocket.
When he looked back, she was pointing a small automatic at him, the muzzle wavering. He put a hand over it, tugged it from her grip, tossed it behind him.
“You fuckers,” she slurred. “You bastards.”
He reached in, and she batted weakly at his hand. He switched the ignition off, pulled the keys out. She looked at him, no fear in her eyes.
“You didn’t have to do him like that. You didn’t.”
He went around to the trunk, found the key to open it. He looked back down the highway, then put the Beretta in his waistband, opened the suitcases in turn, and dumped them out into the trunk. Clothes, cosmetics, a small photo album. A teak box of cheap jewelry. In the larger suitcase was a Lady Colt.38, a box of ammunition.
He turned the bags upside-down, shook them. Felt for false bottoms. He pulled up the spare, looked beneath it. Nothing. He shut the trunk.
When he went back to the window, her head was resting on the steering wheel, her breathing shallow. There were bubbles of blood on her lips. He looked into the rear seat. It was empty.
Headlights far down the road, growing brighter, the car coming slow.
He looked at the woman again, thought about nubbed fingers, bloody pruning shears, dominoes.
He knelt, found the automatic, blew dirt from it, worked the slide to chamber a shell. He touched her shoulder through the window.
“Wake up,” he said.
She coughed, shook. He dropped the gun in her lap.
“You may need this.”
He walked back to the Toyota, got in, killed the lights. When he pulled off the shoulder, the tires fought for traction for a moment, then gained the blacktop. A quarter mile down the road, he looked in his rearview and saw foggy headlight beams illuminate the breach in the fence, the silhouette of a vehicle coming to a stop.
Another quarter mile and he put the lights on. From far back in the distance, he heard faint noises, wondered if they were gunshots.
The Beretta in his lap, he turned into the unpaved driveway, driving slow, lights off. He pulled up into the yard, looked at the house. A light burned over the front steps, but nothing was on inside. The truck was gone.
He got out and went around to the back of the house, the gun at his side. Fog hung over the dead cornfield. No sounds from the house.
The back door gave way on the third kick. He went in with the Beretta up, muzzle pointing into darkness and silence.
He went from room to room. In the bedroom, he turned the light on, saw an open closet door. Clear spaces in the dust where suitcases had been.
In the kitchen, he opened cabinets. Circles in shelf dust, cans missing. The refrigerator empty except for a carton of milk, a bottle of ketchup. A cracked mason jar of preserves lay on the linoleum, contents leaking. No ants yet.
He went back to the Toyota, took the cell phone out, wiped at the blood, pushed buttons until he found the contact list, clicked down, and found BILLY. One entry marked HOUSE, another CELL. He selected it, pushed SEND.
It buzzed three times and then the line opened, faint hissing. Morgan didn’t speak.
“Lee-Anne?”
“No,” Morgan said.
More silence.
“What did you do to her?”
“You need to talk to your Haitian friends about that.”
“Where is she?”
Morgan didn’t answer.
“What do you want?”
“Same thing everybody wants. Only difference is, I don’t care about you. You can walk away, don’t make any difference to me. These others, though, you won’t have that luxury.”
“So I give it to you and I walk away?”
“That’s right. You really think you were going to get to keep it all? That it belonged to you?”
“I need it. To get clear.”
“You need some of it. You take ten grand out, leave the rest, tell me where to meet you. Then I’m gone and you can do whatever you want.”
“Why should I trust you?”
“Way I look at it, you don’t have any choice.”
Breathing on the line.
“I need to think on this.”
“Nothing to think about,” Morgan said. “You give it up, you walk. You don’t, you go down, one way or another.”
“I need time.”
“You got two hours. If I don’t hear from you, I start looking. And I won’t be the only one.”
He left the Toyota by the barn, used a rag to wipe down anything he might have touched without gloves. In the Monte Carlo, he took his own cell out. Midnight and no missed calls. Nothing from the twins.
He gassed up at an all-night station, went inside, and asked for a phone directory. There was only one Holiday Inn in the county. The attendant gave him directions.
Fifteen minutes later, he was cruising slow past a row of parked cars outside the motel. No Range Rover. He parked, took out his cell, punched in the number he’d gotten from the directory. When the night clerk answered, he asked for Dante Coleman’s room. The clerk put him through. They’d used their real names, as he’d guessed.
The line rang a dozen times. The clerk came back on and asked to take a message. Morgan ended the call.
They hadn’t wasted any time. They were out there already, looking for the money. His money.
He pulled out of the lot, headed back toward Hopedale. Wondering how much information they had, where they would start.
He needed to calm himself, to think. He turned the stereo on, pushed in the Sam Cooke tape. “Keep Movin’ On” came from the speakers.
On the seat beside him, the blood-smeared cell phone began to ring.
TWENTY-THREE
Fog was settling in as Sara drove the two miles to JoBeth’s house. It hung thick over the road, reflecting her headlights back. She turned the wipers and defrosters on. She thought about what Simone James had said.
It’s not the way I wanted it, but it might be too late to stop it.
Danny stirred in the booster seat, still asleep. She’d taken him from the house in pajamas with a change of clothes in his knapsack, along with the tyrannosaurus. She’d called JoBeth and then dressed quickly, jeans and boots and sweatshirt. The Glock was in her waistpack.
There were headlights behind her now, several car lengths back. She watched them in the rearview. As she neared the turn for JoBeth’s street she signaled, slowed. The headlights swung into the left lane and pulled ahead. An SUV jeep of some kind. Its taillights vanished in the fog.
When she pulled into JoBeth’s driveway, all the lights were on in the house. Danny stirred again.
“Come on, honey,” she said. She swiveled, got him unbelted.
He rubbed sleep from his eyes. “Where are we?”
“JoBeth’s.”
“Why?”
“You’re staying here, little guy, for tonight at least. Come on.”
He wrapped his arms around her neck, and she maneuvered him into the front seat with her and opened the door.
“It’s foggy,” he said. “I’m scared.”
“It’s okay. There’s nothing out there.”
She grabbed the knapsack with her free hand, shut the door. As she started up the slate path, the front door opened. JoBeth stood there with her father. He held the door for her as she carried Danny in.