It did his smarting ego some good to know that he had caused all this commotion. Too bad he couldn’t crow about it.
Some of the curious had felt the impact of the blast, others had heard it, a few had actually seen the fireball that had lit up that side of town. Doral had to park two blocks from the tracks and go the rest of the way on foot… for the second time that night.
The area had been cordoned off by first responders. Uniformed police officers were still needed to keep the gathering crowd back and to make way for arriving emergency vehicles. The flashing strobes gave the whole scene a surreal aspect.
New arrivals asked questions of those already there.
Doral heard a dozen different versions of what had taken place and who was responsible, none of which were right. It was al Qaeda, it was dope dealers running a meth lab out of the trunk of their car, it was two lovesick teenagers with a suicide pact. Doral was amused by all the hypotheses.
He received condolences for the loss of his twin, who had been a victim of this crime wave. A mass murder on Sunday. A kidnapping on Tuesday. Now a car bomb. Concerned citizens wanted to know, what had happened to their peaceful little town?
Playing the role of city manager, Doral somberly pledged that the city government and local law enforcement were doing all they could to catch those responsible and put a stop to the series of violent crimes.
He’d been glad-handing for about an hour when he saw the coroner backing his van away from the burned-out car. Doral positioned himself to be on the driver’s side when the van stopped while officers cleared a path for it through the crowd.
Doral motioned for the coroner to lower his window. He obliged and said, “Hey, Doral. Had some excitement tonight, huh?”
Doral tilted his head in the direction of VanAllen’s car. “Any guess who it was?”
“The driver?” He shook his head. “No idea. Wasn’t enough to make a positive ID just by looking.” Lowering his voice, he said, “But don’t quote me on that. License plates were destroyed, too. They’re trying to get the car’s VIN number, but the metal is so hot—”
“What about the other one?”
“What other one?”
“The other person. On the passenger side.” He hitched his thumb over his shoulder. “Somebody said there were two.”
“Then somebody said wrong. There was just the one.”
“What?”
“There wasn’t anybody on the passenger side.”
Doral reached through the open window and grabbed the man by the collar.
Stunned by the sudden move, the coroner pushed Doral’s hand aside. “Hey, what’s with you?”
“Are you sure? There was only one body?”
“Like I said, only one.”
The earth dropped out from under Doral.
Coburn had been partially beneath the train when the bomb detonated, which is what had saved him. Triggered when VanAllen answered his cell phone, the explosion had instantly vaporized most of VanAllen and demolished the car.
When Coburn crawled out from under the boxcar on the other side, burning debris showered him, scorching his skin, hair, and clothing. With no time to drop and roll, he batted out the most dangerous of the burning patches as he ran like hell the length of the train.
The man in the caboose had saved his life. Had it not been for his running away, Coburn would have been standing in the open passenger door when VanAllen answered his phone. He rounded the caboose and ran in a crouch along the weed-choked tracks, trying to keep a low profile against the fiery glow of the burning car.
He was almost on top of Honor before he saw her, and even then it took him a second to process that the huddled form on the tracks was a body, a woman, Honor.
With full-blown panic, he thought, Oh, Jesus, she’s hurt. She dead? No!
He bent over her and dug his fingers into her neck, looking for a pulse. She reacted by slapping at his hands and screaming bloody murder. He was glad she was alive, but at the same time furious with her for endangering herself. He hooked one arm around her waist, scooped her off the ground and up against him.
“Stop screaming! It’s me.”
Her legs gave way and she slumped.
“Are you hurt?”
He turned her and, holding her upright by her shoulders, looked her over. She didn’t have any wounds that he could see, nothing grisly like shards of glass protruding from her torso, or shattered bones poking through her skin, no deep gashes. Her eyes were open and staring at him, but unfocused.
“Honor!” He shook her slightly. “We’ve got to get away from here. Now come on!”
He jerked hard on her hand as he struck out running, trusting her to come along. She did, although she stumbled several times before gaining her footing. When they reached the garage, he opened the door, shoved her inside, then rolled the door shut. He didn’t even wait for his eyes to adjust to the darkness, but guided her by feel to the car. He secured her in the passenger seat, then went around and got in on the driver’s side.
He pulled off his T-shirt and used it to wipe off the grease camouflaging his face and arms. The shirt came away blood-smeared. He checked his reflection in the rearview mirror. He looked exactly like what he was: a man who had barely escaped becoming a human Roman candle by clambering beneath a freight train.
He reached into the backseat and retrieved the ball cap that he’d found in the pickup truck. It helped some to conceal his face. But he figured that anyone on the streets of Tambour in the next half hour would be curious about the explosion, not about a man in a ball cap driving an old sedan.
He looked over at Honor. Her teeth were chattering, and she was hugging herself tightly as though to hold herself together against the violent shudders that seized her. He didn’t even attempt to snap her out of her daze. For the time being it was just as well that she had shut down.
He got out of the car and opened the garage door. Once in the car again, he placed his hand on the top of Honor’s head and pushed it down below the level of the window. “Stay out of sight.” He started the engine and drove out of the garage, his destination the only place he knew to go.
This job sucked.
By now, Diego should have been washing Coburn’s blood off his razor.
Instead, the whole day, wasted.
He could have spent it with Isobel. He’d even thought it was safe enough now to take her out into the open. They could have gone to a park, sat on a bench and fed ducks, shared a blanket under a tree. Something like that.
He’d seen people doing things like that, and he’d scorned such unproductive pastimes. But he realized now why people enjoyed them. It was all about being close to another person and letting nothing distract you from the joy of simply being near them.
He could have spent the day gazing into Isobel’s lovely eyes, teasing small, shy smiles out of her, perhaps daring to hold her hand. He could have seen for the first time how her hair and skin looked in sunlight, how a breeze from off the river would mold her clothes to the dainty body that tantalized him.
He would have enjoyed that.
He would have enjoyed killing the fed.
Instead, he’d wasted all day babysitting the fat guy’s car.
Bonnell Wallace hadn’t even left the bank for lunch. He’d parked his car in the bank employee lot that morning, and there it had stayed until he left for home at ten after five. The Bookkeeper had said to follow him, so Diego had followed him through rush-hour traffic. He’d gone straight home.
Fifteen minutes after he got to the mansion, a black woman driving an SUV and wearing a domestic’s uniform had left. She drove through the property gate, and it had closed behind her automatically.