“Hey, Mary Lisa, look here!”
She jerked her head toward him, fear and fury in her eyes, and she knew he saw it. He was grinning wildly as his camera clicked rapidly in burst mode, then quickly dropped it to his lap and brought his gun back up, this time shoving it against her neck.
“No, you aren’t going to do anything stupid or you’re dead.”
She trembled with rage, couldn’t help reaching out to claw his face, screaming at him, “You disgusting little creep!” He lurched against the door, out of the way of her nails. She jerked the car onto a narrow winding canyon road she knew dead-ended about a quarter of a mile upland. But she couldn’t wait for that. She jerked the Mustang off the gnarly asphalt through a ditch onto an empty stretch of level rocky ground and mashed down hard on the brakes, throwing both of them forward. The momentum sent her head slamming against the steering wheel.
Mary Lisa didn’t want to open her eyes, she really didn’t, because she knew somewhere deep inside that Puker was still there, but she had to. Thank God he hadn’t shot her. She jerked up, felt pain slice through her head and nearly passed out again. She felt wet on the side of her face and knew it was her blood.
“Hey, you coming back to reality, Mary Lisa? You were out of it a good two, three minutes. I got some good shots of you unconscious, face against the steering wheel, a trickle of blood snaking down to your neck. Real quality photos. Time to get yourself together now, Mary Lisa.”
For a moment, she didn’t understand. They were moving, she felt the wind on her face. Puker had shoved her over onto the passenger side. He was driving now. Thank God, he’d tossed her purse over onto the floor, at her feet. Thank you, God, thank you.
“Where are we?”
“Moseying up Coral Canyon Road. It’s nice and quiet up here. I picked it because of the great views and the interesting houses. They’ll be background. Hey, nice wheels. I’m glad I got some shots of you behind the wheel.” He tossed her a Kleenex from a packet she kept in the glove compartment. “You’re a pain in the ass, you know that? That stunt you pulled-you could have killed both of us. You knocked yourself out. Wipe off your face. I want you perfect.”
Why hadn’t he been hurt when she’d slammed on the brakes?
She wiped the blood off her face. Her head throbbed right over her left ear, but it didn’t matter. What to do next?
“Okay, we’re going to stop here. Isn’t this a panorama? A lovely windswept hill with the ocean in the background, or we could use some of those houses higher up the slope. I’m getting out with the keys now, Mary Lisa. I want you to slide over here into the driver’s seat and smile at me, your hands on the steering wheel. We’re going to take more shots of you.” He paused a moment, and she was terrified at the look in his eyes. “If you try anything again I will shoot you dead right here and leave you for the coyotes, you understand me?”
“I understand you. When did you go from annoying paparazzo to nutso psychopath?”
“I’m not a psychopath! You’ve pushed me and pushed me and now I’ve got to go further than I’d planned. Move, Mary Lisa, get behind that wheel. Now!”
He waved his gun at her. She wondered how good a shot he was, not that it mattered since he wasn’t more than a foot away. She grabbed up her purse, dropped it on her lap, and moved over to sit in the driver’s seat of her Mustang. Her heart was beating so loud it sounded like drums in her head. She turned to smile at him, praying he wouldn’t notice her purse and wonder.
Now he was standing maybe three feet away from her, too far to hit him with the Mustang door if she pushed it open hard. “How’s this, Puker?”
“That’s good. Move around, turn your head this way and that, look happy, Mary Lisa. That’s right, you’ve done this before. Give me big smiles, lots of teeth. Keep both your hands on the steering wheel.” He snapped over a dozen photos of her.
While he did it, she slowly eased one hand off the steering wheel and dipped it into her purse. She felt the cold smoothness of her SIG.
“What are you doing with your hand? Dammit, bring your hand back up on the steering wheel!”
“Sure, Puker,” she said, pulled up her gun and fired. His camera flew out of his hand, shattered by the bullet, and landed hard against an outcropping of jagged rocks by the roadside.
“You bitch!”
He was dancing he was so furious, looking from her to his smashed camera and waving his gun around. She fired again, and missed, unaccustomed to a moving target. Puker pulled his trigger as she flattened herself against the car seat; she heard the metallic clang of the bullet going through the car door and slamming into the leather seat.
Good, he hadn’t been to the firing range. She lurched up and again aimed for his arm, but he was flailing backward, trying to find some cover and shoot at her at the same time. She missed again.
He fired back but she was down and slithering across to the passenger side door. She managed to get the door open and fell headfirst to the ground. Another bullet pinged into the car over her head. How many bullets did he have in his clip?
She scrambled on her hands and knees toward the cliff about three feet away. It was her only hope, no other cover anywhere near. How far a drop was it? It didn’t matter. He could be coming around the car to put a bullet in her head.
She’d lived with terror for so long, but at that moment, she wasn’t afraid, she was angry, and getting angrier by the second.
She looked back over her shoulder to see him running around the back of her car, panting hard, the gun shaking in his hand. Soon, he’d be so close, he couldn’t miss. A bullet struck the ground beside her elbow, sending up a spray of dirt.
“I missed you on purpose, Mary Lisa! You stop now and don’t move, or I’ll put the next bullet into your head, you got me?”
“Sure, Puker, I got you.”
She fired over her shoulder toward the sound of his voice, barely looking back, and heard a blessed yelp as she rolled off the edge of the cliff.
JACK heard the gunfire and thought he’d croak right there. He revved the Suzuki dual sport he’d commandeered in the Tia’s Tacos parking lot and hauled ass up the narrow road. He saw the red Mustang at an angle off the road, the passenger door open, not many feet from a cliff edge. He saw Puker Hodges in the hazy sunlight standing at the edge of the cliff, a gun in his hand, looking down. Blood was streaking down his left arm.
Jack saw him raise the gun.
He roared forward, them slammed on the front and rear brakes, sending the bike into a controlled slide. When it stopped, he threw it down and started running, his gun drawn, ready to fire as soon as he was close enough.
All Mary Lisa could think about as she tumbled down the hillside was that Bernie was going to freak when he saw all these cuts and bruises no makeup would camouflage. She smashed hard against a scrub bush, felt pain roar through her, felt every bone rattle in her body. But hurt didn’t matter, nothing seemed broken. Good.
“Mary Lisa!”
The twiggy branches of the scrub dug hard into her flesh but it was better than tumbling over rocky ground. She slithered farther down, putting the bush between her and Puker atop the cliff. Would he try to come down?
She was ready, but she had to see him. This time she had to do it right. He appeared at the cliff edge, staring down at her, his gun in his right hand, fanning it all around.
“Hey, you dead down there, Mary Lisa? You all broken up?”
He crouched on his knees and peered over the edge of the cliff.
Her eyes met his. Mary Lisa aimed exactly as Elizabeth had taught her and very gently caressed the trigger. He wasn’t dancing around now, he was perfectly still, their eyes locked. The bullet struck him in the chest. He didn’t make a sound, simply disappeared from her sight. Mary Lisa felt a punch of shock in her gut, and pulled backward for a moment. But then she jumped to her feet, ignoring the pain broadcasting from every uncovered inch of her body, and began crawling back up the cliff. She saw Jack, who nearly knocked her backward, he was trying to get down to her so quickly.