‘This is really starting to give me the creeps.’
‘Just sit there a minute. I’ll check the back.’
Bradley walked up the aisle between the rows of silent washers and drivers. He stepped past the coin-operated vending machines where patrons could purchase drinks, snacks, detergent or bleach. He tapped out a rhythm as he walked by a long, wooden table where people earlier had separated and folded their laundry. Then he disappeared into a recessed area at the rear of the room. He was out of sight for just a second.
When he stepped into the open again, he met Kim’s eyes and shook his head.
Not once did he glance toward the man in the car as he came back to her. ‘Nothing but a utility room,’ he said. ‘The only way out is the front.’
Kim nodded and tried to smile. She felt a corner of her mouth twitch.
‘You think your stuff is about ready?’
‘Close enough.’ She hopped off the washer. Bradley picked up his laundry bag and stayed at her side as she headed for the pair of driers near the front.
‘Your car’s in the lot?’ he asked.
‘Yeah.’
‘I’ll get in with you. If he thinks we’re really together, maybe he won’t try anything.’
‘Okay,’ Kim said. Both driers were still running. She could see them vibrating, hear their motors and the thumps of the tennis shoes she’d tossed into the nearer of the two.
She swung her laundry basket off the top of that machine, set it at her feet, crouched and opened the front panel. The motor went silent. Reaching inside, she lifted out a handful of warm clothes. They still felt a little damp, but she didn’t care.
‘If he follows us when we leave,’ Bradley said, ‘maybe we can lose him. But at least you won’t be alone. As long as I’m with you, he’ll think twice before he tries anything.’
She dropped more clothes into the basket, and looked up at Bradley. ‘I really appreciate this.’
‘I’m just glad that I’m here to help.’
‘Do you really think he might be the Butcher?’
‘I hope we don’t find out.’
What if you’re the Butcher?
The thought came suddenly, and seemed to turn her stomach cold inside.
No. That’s ridiculous.
Looking away from him, she continued to unload the machine.
What’s so ridiculous about it? Bradley seems to know a lot about the Butcher. And he wants me to take him in my car. Once we’re alone…
For all I know, he’s been lying from the start.
Maybe he’s with the other guy. They might be working together.
Don’t let him in the car, she told herself. Walk out with him, but…
‘Oh shit,’ Bradley muttered.
Her head snapped toward him. He was standing rigid, eyes wide as he gazed toward the front.
Kim sprang up and whirled around.
The stranger filled the doorway. Then he was inside, striding toward them.
He wore a dark stocking cap. His face was streaked with black makeup. His black T-shirt looked swollen with mounds and slabs of muscle. The sling of a rifle crossed his chest. So did the straps of a harness that held a sheathed knife, handle down, against the left side of his rib cage. Circling his waist was a web belt loaded down with canvas cases, a canteen and a holster. He wore baggy camouflage pants. Their cuffs were tucked into high-topped boots.
Bradley, fists up, stepped in front of Kim. His voice boomed out, ‘Stop right there, mister.’
A blow to the midsection dropped Bradley to his knees. A knee to the forehead hurled him backward. He hit the floor sliding and lay limp at Kim’s feet.
She whirled away and tried to run. A hand snagged the shoulder of her T-shirt. The fabric tugged at her, stretched and ripped as she was twisted sideways. Her feet tangled. She crashed against the floor.
The man grabbed her ankles, tugged her flat. His weight came down on her back. An arm darted across her throat and squeezed.
Kim woke up in total darkness. She lay curled on her side. Her head ached. At first, she thought she was home in bed. But this didn’t feel like a bed. She felt a blanket under her. The surface beneath the blanket was hard. It vibrated. Sometimes, it pounded against her.
She remembered the man.
Then, she knew where she was.
To confirm her fears, she tried to straighten her legs. Something stopped her feet. She reached out. Her fingers met hard, grooved rubber.
The spare tire.
The car stopped. Kim had no idea how long she had been trapped inside its trunk. Probably for an hour. That’s about how long it should take, she knew, to drive from town to the wilderness surrounding Mount Bolton.
Ever since regaining consciousness and realizing she was in the trunk of the man’s car, she had known where he was taking her. After a period of gasping panic, after prayers for God to save her, a numbness had settled into Kim. She knew she was going to die, and there was nothing she could do about it. She told herself that everyone dies. And this way, she would be spared such agonies as facing her parents’ deaths, the deaths of other loved ones and friends, her own old age and maybe a lingering demise in the grip of cancer or some other horrible disease. Has its advantages.
God, I’m going to die!
And she knew what the Butcher did to his victims: how he raped them, sodomized them, tortured them with knives and sticks and fire.
The panic came back. She was whimpering and trembling again by the time the car stopped.
She heard the engine quit. A door thudded shut. Seconds later, a muffled jangle of keys came from behind her. She heard the quiet clicks of a key sliding into the trunk lock. The clack of a latch. Then, the trunk lid swung up, squeaking on its hinges.
A hand pushed under her armpit. Another thrust between her legs and grabbed her thigh. She was lifted out of the trunk, swung clear of the car, and thrown to the ground. The forest floor was damp, springy with fallen pine needles. Sticks and cones dug against her as she rolled onto her back. She stared up at the dark shape of the man. He was a blur through her tears.
‘Get up,’ he said.
Kim struggled to her feet. She sniffed and wiped her eyes. She lifted the front of her torn T-shirt, covering her right breast and holding the fabric to her shoulder.
‘What’s your name?’ the man asked.
Kim straightened her back. ‘Fuck you,’ she said.
A corner of his mouth curled up. ‘Look around.’
She turned slowly and found that she stood in a clearing surrounded by heavy timber. There was no sign of a road, though she suspected they couldn’t be far from one. The car couldn’t have traveled any great distance through the underbrush and trees. She faced the Butcher. ‘Yeah?’
‘Do you know where you are?’
‘Got a pretty good guess.’
‘You’re a tough little thing, aren’t you?’
‘What’ve I got to lose?’
‘Not a thing, bitch. Look to your right. There’s a trail sign.’
She looked. She spotted a small wooden sign on a post at the edge of the clearing.
‘Stick to the trail,’ he said. ‘You’ll make better time.’
‘What are you talking about?’