Alicia was there, standing just outside the open side door. Her mouth was twisted in a smirk. “Sheesh, I go away for ten minutes and you fuckers start writin’ your own motherfuckin’ Lifetime movie.”
Marcy turned up a middle finger and extended it.
Alicia’s smirk deepened. “Crying fits and obscene gestures.” She opened the front passenger door and began to pull herself inside. “Time for the Estrogen Express to hit the road before one of you bitches starts quoting lines from Thelma and Louise or some dumb thing.”
She paused at the sight of the glass shards sprayed across the front seat area. “I missed some kind of drama, I guess.” She looked hard at Dream, her dark eyes flat and unreadable. “Anything I need to be worried about, Dream?”
Dream did not wilt beneath that unforgiving gaze. Her lips curved upward. “Of course not. Just having an old-fashioned heart-to-heart with Ellen. I think we’ve come to an understanding.” Her eyes flicked toward the still-sniffling girl. “Haven’t we, Ellen?”
Ellen at last managed to compose herself. She lifted her head off the steering wheel and wiped her face dry with a sleeve. Then she did something that astonished Marcy-she looked Alicia in the eye as steadily as Dream had a moment ago and said, “That’s right. I had a weak moment.”
Alicia’s trademark smirk returned. “Latest in a long, long series, I’d say.”
“That’s right.” Ellen reached for Dream and clasped hands with her. “And Dream called me on it. Think what you want, but I see things differently now. Wherever this road takes us, I want to be there. I want to see what’s at the end of it.”
Alicia picked glass shards off the passenger seat and tossed them on the parkling lot asphalt. “Whatever, Dorothy.” A small piece of glass nicked the ball of her thumb and drew blood. She popped it in her mouth and sucked on it. “Mmm.” She withdrew the glistening digit and stared at it. “I don’t know exactly what’s at the end of our yellow brick road, but I know it’s a bad place, a place like the one where I died.”
Marcy said, “The House of Blood.”
Alicia wiped her thumb on her jeans and climbed into the van. She pulled the door shut and turned in her seat to look at Marcy. “That’s right, girl. And I know one more thing. There’ll definitely be a wicked witch waiting for us when we get there.”
Marcy shoved her hands into the pockets of her brown hoodie and slumped further down in her seat. “Ms. Wickman.”
“Damn straight.”
Marcy’s brow furrowed. “And you’re sure you can kill her.”
“Ain’t sure about shit. But I’ll either kill the bitch or die trying.”
Marcy’s mouth twisted in a humorless smile. “That’d have to be a real kick in the ass. Dying twice at the hands of the same person.”
Alicia scowled. “I don’t-”
“Any a you ladies spare some change?”
Marcy jumped at the sound of the gravelly voice and turned to look at the homeless guy standing outside the van. He smelled like a sewer and Marcy was surprised he’d gotten this close undetected. He had limp brown hair tucked under a ratty New Jersey Devils cap. His face was seamed and his nose sat like a swollen red ball in the center of his face. He wore a heavily stained yellow windbreaker over raggedy clothes.
He leaned in through the open door and sniffed. “Smells like wine in here. Good stuff. ’Spose I could get a taste?”
Ellen piped up from the driver’s seat. “Fuck off.”
“We don’t have anything for you, bum.” Alicia directed her eerily intense gaze at the old drunk. “I’d advise you to leave before you stir up trouble you can’t handle.”
The man sneered at her, displaying a mouth missing most of its teeth. “Whaaaaat?” He drew out the syllable and laughed. “You ladies don’ wanna tussle wit’ the likes a me. Tell ya that much.” He leaned further into the van and his rheumy eyes roamed over its interior. “Aw shit, just gimme a bit of pocket change and I’ll be on my way.”
Marcy shifted in her seat and turned slightly to the right. The bum’s aggressiveness stirred an old memory. That night in Overton Park. The homeless guy. The bottle. The first time she’d taken a life. Her fists clenched at the edges of the seat.
“Say, you bitches look kinda familiar.” The bum scratched at a cheek with long nails turned brown with infection. “Yeah.” He waved in the general direction of the convenience store. “Over there at the paper boxes, last week I think it was.” He looked at Marcy and squinted. “I seen you staring out at me. You the one killed all those kids. Maybe I oughta go to the cops, huh?”
The atmosphere in the van turned frigid. Marcy’s heart raced as a paralyzing sense of panic began to set in. This was it, then. The end of the road. But it wasn’t right. Their journey wasn’t over. Not even close. Anger rose inside her.
The old guy sneered again and said, “Or maybe I’ll keep my mouth shut if that one-” He nodded at Dream. “She gives my pecker a good suck and I’ll keep quiet. Come on, bitch. Whatcha say?”
Dream surged past Marcy, seized the bum by the front of his black sweatshirt, lifted him off his feet, and pulled him inside the van. He yelped and flailed a little until Dream slammed the top of his head against the closed door on her side. The man went limp and Dream cradled him in her arms like a child. Her eyes pulsed with cold energy as she looked at Marcy. “Close the door.”
Marcy swallowed a lump in her throat and nodded, then shut the door.
And then she watched in horrified fascination as Dream closed her hands around the unconscious man’s neck and began to twist.
A man in a powder blue 1970s Plymouth set his paper coffee mug in the plastic cup holder he’d purchased at a truck stop the previous night. The cup holder was clipped inside the ash tray and dipped precariously as it accepted the mug’s weight. He hated the old jalopy, but the people in charge said it was better for tailing people than something new and flashy. The man disagreed. He thought the old piece of shit stuck out like a sore, infected thumb, but what did he know, he was just a goon with a gun.
A creepy three-fingered kid named Dean sat in the passenger seat. He kept playing with his favorite knife, running the edge of the blade over the fabric of his jeans, up and down his inner thigh, over and over. The kid was a world-class geek, but he was stone psycho and a merciless killer.
“What do you reckon the odds are we just got ol’ Ducky killed?”
The corners of the kid’s mouth lifted slightly. It had been his idea to send the old bum over to check things out. Ostensibly, the plan had been for “Ducky,” as he called himself, to report back to them with his findings, but that looked to be out the window. “He’s dead. I can feel it.”
The man nodded and removed a pack of smokes from his shirt pocket. He tapped a Winston out and wedged it in a corner of his mouth. “I reckon you’re right, boy. So what do you think? Seems pretty certain these are the ones the Mistress wants.”
The boy licked his dry lips. “Yeah.”
The van’s tail lights came on and the van began to glide out toward the street just as the man was applying a lighter flame to his cigarette. “Oh, shit.”
He flipped the lighter shut and tossed it onto the dashboard. Then he twisted the key in the ignition and listened to the engine groan. He twisted it again and got a rattle. He looked up and saw the van cross the intersection and pick up speed.