“All set, lady,” he announced, coming out.
“You mean it’s ready?” Donna asked, unwilling to believe the surprising news.
“Sure is. Radiator came in around noon.” He walked ahead of them to the car and raised the hood. “There she is. I test-drove her, and she runs sweet as a pie.”
They returned to the office. He showed her the bill, pointing out the cost of parts and labor. “That be cash or charge?”
“Charge.” She searched her purse for the proper credit card.
“Where you staying?” he asked.
“Over at the Welcome Inn.”
“That’s what I figured. No place else to stay.” He took her credit card. “That’s what I told the fella looking for you.”
The words hit her hard. She stared at the man, stunned, until Jud’s firm grip on her elbow brought her back. “Who?” she asked.
“A fella come driving up in a ’76 Rolls, says he knows your car. He find you?”
She shook her head.
“Do you always give out information about your customers?” Jud asked.
“Don’t come up that often.” His eyes narrowed. “You folks in some kind of trouble?”
“No,” Jud said, “but you may be.”
The man handed the credit card back to Donna, then gave her the charge slips to sign. Slowly, he turned to Jud. “Piss off, mister, before I kick your fucking ass from here to Fresno.”
“Shut up!” Donna shouted into his face. “What right did you have to tell that man anything…anything…about me?”
“Hell, lady, I didn’t tell him nothing. He had your name. He was gonna find you. Like I say, no place to stay but the inn. He was gonna find you, anyway.” The mechanic flicked a hard glance at Jud, then looked back at Donna. “Gonna step out on your husband, lady, you gotta be more careful.” He grinned and walked away.
“Let’s go!” Donna called to her daughter and Larry. They were across the street looking in store windows. As they started back, Donna said, “I don’t want Sandy to know, okay?”
“She’ll be more careful if she knows.”
“She’s terrified of that man. And after what she’s already been through, today…”
“We won’t tell her. But we’ll have to be damned careful from now on. Especially back at the inn.”
Donna took his hand, and found confidence in his eyes. She met Sandy and Larry with a smile. “Miracle of miracles,” she said. “The car’s fixed.” 3.
On the way back to the Welcome Inn, Donna watched for a Rolls-Royce but didn’t see one. There was no Rolls in the parking lot, either.
“Park in front of your cabin,” Jud said.
She did. Then Jud led them across the asphalt to his cabin. He entered first, and made a quick search before allowing them inside. “I need to go to the office,” he said. “I’ll be back in a minute.”
He was back in less than five. With a slight shake of his head, he let her know that nobody had been asking about her at the office. “Why don’t we have supper now,” he suggested.
“I’m starving!” Sandy blurted.
“You’re a bottomless pit,” Larry told the girl. “An abyss.”
“You’re the pit,” she said, laughing.
“Sandy,” Donna warned, “don’t use that kind of language.”
“He did.”
“That’s different. He didn’t mean ‘pit’ the way you did.”
“I most certainly did not.”
As they walked to the motel restaurant, Donna put her arm around Jud’s back. Her hand touched a hard, jutting object just above his belt. She fingered the outline.
“So that’s why your shirttail’s out.”
“Actually, it’s out because I’m a slob.”
“A well-armed slob, at that.”
The dining room was nearly deserted. As the hostess led them among tables, Donna checked every face. Roy wasn’t here.
“We’d like a corner table, please,” Jud said.
“How’s this?” asked the hostess.
“Just fine.”
Jud took a seat, Donna noticed, that would give him a wide view of the dining room.
A young, blond waitress came. “Cocktails?”
Donna ordered a margarita.
Sandy asked for a Pepsi.
“I’d like a double martini,” Larry said. “Very dry. Bone dry. In fact, dispense with the vermouth entirely.”
“So that’s a double gin, straight up, with an olive.”
“Precisely. You’re a gem.”
“And you, sir?” she asked Jud.
“I’ll have a beer.”
“Budweiser, Busch, or Michelob?”
“Make it Bud.”
“An incorrigible snob,” Larry muttered.
Donna laughed. She laughed very hard, harder than the remark deserved, but it seemed like a long time since anything had struck her as funny, and the laughter felt good. In a moment, a giggle escaped from Larry. That triggered Sandy. Soon the three of them were convulsed with mirth. Jud grinned at them, but his eyes kept sweeping the room.
During the whole dinner, Jud kept watch as if he weren’t part of the group, but their guard. Then he insisted on paying the bill.
When they were leaving, Donna caught his arm and stopped him from following Sandy and Larry outside.
“What’s…?”
“Thank you for dinner.” She hugged him tightly and kissed him. She could feel him begin to relax, to open, to let emotion into his kiss. Then he forced her away.
“We’d better stick close to Sandy,” he said, tearing down her good feeling so that she wanted to cry.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
From the window of the end cabin, Roy watched Donna, Sandy, and two men enter Cabin 12. Her car was parked in front of 9. He guessed that 9 was her place, and 12 the men’s.
That simplified matters. Sometime during the night, Donna and Sandy would return to their cabin alone. Maybe in five minutes. Maybe not for hours. But sometime. Regardless, he would wait until after dark.
He looked around at the two beds, at the two girls tied to them and gagged. The older one, the owner’s kid, was still sniffing. He figured she was sixteen, maybe seventeen. He didn’t know her name. She’d been good, though. She’d been wet and slippery, and Roy suspected that she’d enjoyed herself. He’d spent nearly an hour with her after the four had walked off, probably for dinner. She hadn’t started crying until afterward. Guilt, more than likely.
He wondered why no one had come around looking for her. Maybe her folks were used to her disappearing.
Roy lifted an edge of the curtain, and looked again at Cabin 12. The door was still shut.
He looked around at the girls. Right now, he didn’t want either of them. Still, they were nice to look at, lying there naked and powerless in the darkening room.
Later, maybe he could find time to take one of them.
Which?
Hell, he had lots of time to think about that. Lots of time.
He got up. The older girl’s eyes watched him closely as he approached her. He bent over the bed. He traced a circle around her right nipple, watching the dark skin pucker and grow rigid. “Like that?” he whispered, smiling down at her.
Then he jerked the pillow out from under her head, took it to the chair beside the window, and used it to cushion the straight wooden back. He sat down and leaned against the pillow. That felt much better.
He inched open the curtain and continued his watch.
CHAPTER TWENTY 1.
Leaving the others inside his cabin, Jud walked the perimeter of the Welcome Inn. He saw no Rolls-Royce nor any sign of a six-foot-two man who might be Donna’s ex-husband. He returned to his cabin. He motioned for Donna to come outside.