The distance started to close.
He kept his footsteps as quiet as death.
Now he was thirty steps behind.
Now twenty.
Now ten.
Suddenly the man turned.
His arm rose.
From the end of that arm, a small flash of orange flame pierced the darkness, here and gone just that fast, simultaneous with an ear-shattering explosive pop.
110
Day Four
July 24, 1952
Thursday Morning
The only window shade in Waverly’s roach-in-the-wall hotel was a spring-loaded, pull-down deal with tattered edges. She woke up Thursday morning when the first rays of daybreak pushed around the borders of that piece of junk. She laid there, torn between getting more sleep and getting things done, before finally rubbing her eyes and swinging her legs over the side.
She took a hot shower that got her 70 % awake.
Then she headed over to the White Spot to take care of the other 30 % with coffee, ending up on a barstool at the end of the counter with a piping hot cup in her hands and a gal named Jane behind the counter that kept that cup topped off.
This insanely early, the diner was a graveyard. All the barstools were empty, plus most of the tables. Two seats down, on the counter in a glass cake holder, was a stack of donuts. The ones on top were concrete but the ones underneath might actually be edible.
She resisted.
If they still tugged at her in five minutes, she’d get one.
Today would be critical.
She needed to find out what Bristol’s investigator, John Stamp, was finding out, if anything. What was the best way to do that? Follow him around? Break into his office while he was out?
She shook it off.
The gal behind the counter, Jane, came over with the pot and topped off the cup. “I saw you eyeing those donuts,” she said. “They’re evil. They’ll break your teeth and steal the soul of your firstborn. Personally I’d go with pancakes. You want some?”
She smiled.
Yes.
She did.
Good idea.
“Thanks.”
Time passed.
The city woke up.
The diner filled.
At ten minutes to eight, Waverly left a healthy tip on the counter, checked her purse to be sure she had plenty of change, then headed outside to find a phone booth.
At exactly eight, she called Su-Moon in Cleveland.
The woman answered before the first ring stopped.
“Waverly, is that you?”
The words were laced with explosion. It sounded like she just stepped off a roller coaster.
“Yeah, what’s going on?”
“You’re not going to believe it,” Su-Moon said. “Bristol was here in town when the woman got dropped off the roof.”
“Are you sure?”
“Positive. I can prove it, too.”
“How do you know?”
“I’ll explain when I see you. I’m heading to Denver.”
“When?”
“Now.”
“Now?”
“Yeah, now. On the first flight I can catch. Tell me how to contact you when I get into town.”
She did.
They’d connect at Waverly’s hotel, fleabag that it was.
“See you soon.”
“Okay,” Waverly said. She almost hung up then brought the receiver back to her mouth. “Su-Moon, are you still there?”
She was.
“How do you know Bristol was in town?”
“He stayed at the Renaissance. He signed the register.”
“Was anyone with him?”
Silence.
“I don’t know.”
“Find out.”
“Why?”
“The woman he’s with here in Denver is someone named Jaden,” Waverly said. “I’m just wondering if she was with him when he was there too.”
A beat.
“No, I don’t think so. I don’t remember seeing a Jaden on the register.”
“Do me a favor,” Waverly said. “Go back and check. If there’s no Jaden there, at least find out if he paid the room rate for one occupant or two.”
“Even if he paid for two, it wouldn’t do us any good. There was no Jaden written on the register.”
Waverly exhaled.
“Okay, forget it then.”
111
Day Four
July 24, 1952
Thursday Morning
River thought he felt a presence in the room Thursday morning and opened his eyes to find out if he was right or just having a trick of the night. He was right. The presence was January, sleeping peacefully next to him, naked, on her stomach with her arms up and her hands tucked under the pillow. The sheet draped over the lower half of her body. Her back and ribs and the sides of her stomach and the cusps of her breasts were exposed.
River studied her tattoos and the wonderful curvature of her body for a heartbeat, then rolled onto his back and closed his eyes.
Last night was still in his brain.
Finding January out there in the night still alive was by far, without a doubt, the best moment of River’s life so far. With the first wiggle of her body that showed she was alive, a terrible weight lifted off River’s shoulders. Everything in the world was suddenly right again, just like that.
He didn’t want to bring her back home.
He wanted to get her a thousand miles away.
“Forget it,” she said. “I hope he does come for me, or you, or us, or whatever sick plan is in his sick little brain. I really hope he does. In fact, I hope he does it tonight while I’m still mad enough to do what I’m going to do to him.”
“Which is what?”
“Which is what he did to me.”
River cocked his head.
The tone in her voice was absolute.
He could try to talk her out of it, but that’s all it would be-a try.
“Fine, we’ll go home,” he said.
She looked into his eyes.
“You said home,” she said.
“Right. So?”
“You didn’t say your place.”
“No, I said home.”
Coyotes barked and howled under the stars. The eerie sounds came from three or four different packs, all suddenly on the hunt at the same time.
January’s bare feet were no match for the Colorado prairie.
River carried her all the way to the road without rest.
She was naked and even though River cured that by giving her his shirt, she was still naked underneath, not to mention imbedded with dirt. Her wrists and ankles were raw and chaffed, almost to the point of bleeding. River, now shirtless, was half naked.
They walked for an hour before the first car appeared.
It was a woman, fifty something, a veterinarian, driving home to a nice warm bed after a night call. She took them all the way to River’s place and wouldn’t take a dime in return. Apparently there were still a few people like that left in the world.
They showered.
They melted their bodies together.
Then they passed out.
That was last night.
Now it was morning.
River slipped out of bed without waking January and headed for the shower.
The water was hot.
The sound of the spray was heaven.
The fact that Spencer hadn’t stopped to kill January didn’t mean he wasn’t going to. It only meant that he’d been too occupied with his new captive-Alexa Blank-to get distracted at that particular time and place in the universe. Spencer would get around to them first chance he had.
River knew that.
He also knew that might be as early as today.
It might even be in the next sixty seconds.
He got the soap off and turned the valves to the right until the spray stopped.
He listened for sounds.