Desert Noir (9781615952236) (34 page)

Had Agnezia prayed for me last night?

Well, well. They say there were no atheists in foxholes and now I had proof that there were few atheists in car trunks, too. But not believing in miracles, I shook the thought out of my head. The only thing that would save me now would be my own actions.

A particularly severe lurch of the car threw me against the side of the trunk and smashed my nose against the jack. Stars again, a rush of hot liquid—blood, not tears. I was too terrified to cry. Trying not to injure myself further, I probed the bridge of my nose and found it misshapen. Another probe again—more stars—and to the accompaniment of a scraping sound, the bridge moved.

My nose was broken.

The car lurched again but I was able to brace my arms against the side of the trunk and keep my ruined face away from the jack.

The jack.

It wasn't my .38, but now I had a weapon. I only hoped that I'd get a chance to use it.

Was it still dark? I raised my head again and stared at the area where I thought the trunk lid might connect to the body of the car. A cat's whisker of light bled through the darkness. It was already growing uncomfortably hot in the trunk and I knew it would soon become an oven. How long had I been unconscious? Minutes? An hour? How long had Evan been off-road?

And
where
off-road?

I remembered Evan's car, an Infiniti I-30 sedan, not a vehicle known for its off-road capabilities. So he probably wouldn't be heading up a dirt track into the mountains.

Just out into the desert.

With difficulty, I smothered a hysterical laugh.
Just
the desert? With the last monsoon rain days in the past and daytime temperatures averaging around 115, I'd be lucky, even if I managed to escape from the car trunk, to survive a full day out there. Not unless…

I searched the floor of the trunk again, hoping to find that plastic jug of water most desert-savvy Arizona residents always carried in their trunks. No such luck. Evan had apparently not been a Boy Scout.

I lay there quietly with my fingers clutching the jack, and conserved my strength until I felt the car slow down. Then I lifted my head off the floor of the trunk and listened.

The up and down bumping motion I'd endured changed to a slow, sideways rocking. The purr of the Infiniti's motor lowered to a troubled growl.

We had to be in soft dirt. Or sand.

The river bottom, maybe?

I began to feel hope again. If we were in the river bottom, my chances might not be so bad. Water from the monsoons frequently collected in small pools and stayed there for days. Water might even be still running in some places. Then I remembered how low an Infiniti rode, how few inches of the undercarriage cleared the pavement. Nobody, not even poor ol', dumb ol', murdering ol' Evan, would be fool enough to drive an Infiniti down into the Salt River bottom. With its low-slung carriage, it would be certain to belly out on the rocks that tumbled down from the mountains.

The Infiniti's growl changed to a whine as the car slowed even more. Within a few more seconds, the car stopped moving.

When I cocked my head, I could hear a muffled noise which sounded human. A curse? The engine's whine shrieked up the musical scale into a soprano's register as the car began to rock furiously backwards, then forwards, then backwards again. Evan must have gotten it mired in sand and now he was trying to rock it out. But he was doing it too quickly, too forcefully, and it was all I could do not to yell at him not to burn up the engine.

While the car continued its relentless back-and-forth, I took the opportunity to scrunch around in the trunk, to hunch over and get my feet under me. Even though I angled my body to the side to gain maximum space, my head still pressed painfully against the trunk's lid. My spine creaked, my heels jammed into my butt, my knees savaged my chin. But I was balanced on my toes, ready to spring.

If I only got the chance.

The Infiniti's rocking movement continued for a few more minutes until the engine's shriek became almost unbearable. Stop it! I wanted to call. Look at your tachometer!

The shrieking continued until I heard the Infiniti give a final desperate wail, then fall silent. I smelled the acrid, metallic odor of overheated metal.

The fool had burned up the Infiniti's engine.

“Fuck!” Evan's voice was quite clear, now.

The hair stood up on my arms as I heard a door slam and footsteps crunching around the side of the car towards me.

Showtime.

As a key scraped at the trunk lid, I tightened my grip on the heavy jack. Evan probably had a gun and I knew I'd have only one chance at him—and not a very good one at that. After all the time spent in the darkness of the trunk, the morning's light would probably blind me as soon as Evan lifted the trunk lid.

Then light exploded into the trunk and I exploded out. Totally blind, I swung the jack in a wide arc with all the strength left in my aching arms.

I connected.

I heard a crunch, a grunt. The sound of something big falling.

A soft, bubbly moan.

Leaning down and aiming the jack in the direction of the moans, I swung again.

And again.

Soon all I could hear was the hot wind rushing through the mesquite.

Panting, I stood there, cramped muscles screaming. But I kept the jack at the ready until my retinas adjusted to the morning light. When I could finally see again, I stumbled over to Evan's crumpled form to discover a gaping wound on the left side of his head. He was bleeding profusely and the forehead just above his eye looked slightly misshapen. I pressed my fingers to the carotid artery under his jaw. His pulse was regular, but weak.

At least I hadn't killed him.

I tossed the jack back into the trunk and disentangled the gun from his limp fingers. It was a .45, probably the very .45 he'd shot me with from a rented Taurus. Then, the gun trained on him, I sank onto the sand and tucked my head between my knees. When the dizziness finally passed, I stood up and took a good look around.

I was surrounded by miles and miles of desert in every direction. Far to the east, under a hot sun which had only just begun its merciless ascent, stood a range of jagged peaks which looked like the western end of the White Tank Mountains. Evan had driven us at least seventy miles out into the desert from Phoenix. The Infiniti, its engine now probably residing in Infiniti heaven, was stuck up to its axles in sand. Even if I'd been able to crank the engine over, there'd still be no digging it out.

And the day was heating up.

In disgust, I glanced at Evan.
Here's another fine mess you've got us into, Ollie.
Then I got up, walked over to him, and—just in case—tied his hands behind him with his own belt, and his ankles with more strips of cloth from his shirt. The dilated pupil didn't bode well, but I'd seen people injured more severely get up and swing a tire iron at someone. I didn't want him trying to kill me again when I was busy trying to keep us both alive.

The knowledge of the severity of our plight made me want to vomit but I didn't dare. In the next few hours, I'd need all the liquid I could conserve.

But even if I could conserve the very sweat that dripped from my body, we might both be dead by sundown.

 

But I wasn't dead yet.

Gun firmly in hand, I scrambled onto the Infiniti's hood, stood on tiptoe and looked around, hoping for a sight of a windmill or a water tank. Nothing. The dirt track Evan had driven the car down curled off to the horizon, passing nothing that looked even remotely man-made. Then I held still for a few moments, listening for any sounds of civilization: machinery, traffic, laughter. But all I heard was the whisper of the wind and a few peeps from cactus wrens.

Trying to walk out of the desert was a fatal mistake, the very mistake which killed so many tourists and even desert-dwellers every year. Without a survival kit and at least a gallon of water, I had no hope of surviving more than an hour or two out there. First would come the thirst. Then the stomach cramps. Then the hallucinations.

Next would come the buzzards.

The climbing sun sent waves of heat rising from the desert floor. I had to do something fast, find us some protection before it became too hot to move. I scanned the landscape again, this time for the presence of any wildlife which might indicate a local water source. I saw none, but my sinking heart lifted somewhat when I spied a patch of barrel cacti. After noting their location, I jumped carefully off the Infiniti. This was no time or place to sprain an ankle.

Now it was time to inventory the car, and after that, get Evan into some kind of shelter. I didn't like the sound of his breathing.

I found the car keys where Evan had dropped them when I'd bashed him in the head, but as I put them in my pocket, I realized how little good they'd do us. While the battery was probably still good, the car's air-conditioning would only run off it for a few minutes.

Then the battery, too, would die.

At this point, the Infiniti was of little more use than scrap metal.

And the few items I could scavenge from it.

The open trunk was empty except for the car cover, which was stuffed into a duffel bag; the tool kit; and a battered paperback by Tom Clancy. Still keeping an eye on Evan—head wounds frequently looked worse than they really were—I walked around to the passenger door and rummaged through the glove compartment. There wasn't much there to help me, either, just his car registration, a few Burger King coupons, and some women's telephone numbers written on bar napkins. Somehow it didn't surprise me to discover that Evan was a habitue of the Bourbon Street Circus, a strip club, and Babe's, a Scottsdale nudie bar. Already looking for wifey No. 4, I guessed.

“Evan, Evan,” I said, though I was doubtful if he could hear me. “You've already been reduced to living in a trailer, eating at Burger King, and here you are, still thinking with your hormones.” 

He didn't reply. His eyes remained closed.

The Infiniti's back seat yielded Evan's laundry wrapped in a sheet of clear plastic upon the end of which was stamped in red letters, 24-HOUR LAUNDRY AND DRY-CLEANING, A VALLEY

TRADITION FOR 32 YEARS. The thought that Evan had stopped off last night to get his laundry, and then proceeded to try and kill me seemed sicker than hell. But then again, he was a Hyath, wasn't he? Those people invented the word
sick.

I hauled my treasures out of the Infiniti and put them in a pile by the trunk. Then I walked back to Evan. Calmer now, I noticed the largest wound I'd inflicted on him had stopped bleeding, and I thought his breathing was easier.

“Evan!” I shouted, prodding him with my foot. “Wake up!” 

A moan.

I shouted at him some more and continued to prod him until his left eye opened. The pupil was dilated.

“Huh!” That was all he could manage.

Knowing the import of that dilated pupil, I realized that all the energy I'd expended tying him up had probably been wasted. My heart clutched with unwelcome pity as I squatted down beside him. “Evan, you've got to wake up. You've got a concussion and we're stranded out here on the desert. You've got to tell me exactly where we are, how far we are from the highway.” 

He began to mutter but his words were so slurred that at first I couldn't make out what he was saying, other than it was something about Clarice, a plea for her to do… to do…

To do what?

As he continued to mumble, his pleas became clearer. He thought I was Clarice and he was trying to talk me into signing the construction contract on the Hacienda Palms. He needed the money, he begged. His ex-wives had drained him and he was facing bankruptcy. If I didn't sign the contract, he'd have to kill me, so please, Clarice, please.

“Evan,” I said patiently. “I'm not Clarice. Clarice is dead. I'm Lena Jones, remember? The detective?” 

The other eyelid lifted slowly and he tried to focus. “Lena?” 

“None other.”

He gave me a loopy smile. “Head hurts. But I bet… I bet yours does, too.” 

“Sure does, you shithead. You tried to kill me.” 

One eye closed again, but the eye with the dilated pupil remained half open. He'd lost consciousness again.

I had to get him out of the blistering sun or he'd die.

Evan was a big man, well over six feet and probably topping two hundred and twenty-five pounds, so dragging him too far, over to that mesquite tree about thirty yards away, for instance, would be impossible. I'd have to bring the shade to him.

For that I needed more tools. After putting the .45 under the car for safety, but where I'd be able to reach it within seconds if I needed to, I began working on Evan. Being as gentle as possible, I fished through his pockets, found his wallet and threw it onto the pile by the car. In another pocket I found something more useful. A penknife. I hated what I had to do next but I did it anyway. I stripped off his shoes.

Then I returned to my pile of treasures and took inventory. Clean laundry. One pair of Nikes with shoelaces. A wallet. A knife. A Tom Clancy paperback. A few bar napkins. A car cover. A duffel bag. A tool kit. A jack.

Our chances for survival were looking up. They've have been even better if the fuck-up had thrown his damned old cell phone into the car, but you can't have everything, can you?

“Hey, Evan, I might be able to keep us alive for a full day!” I called to him.

He didn't reply.

Then I looked over at the Infiniti again and said, “No, two days. Maybe even three!” 

Working slowly so as not to dehydrate myself too much, I stripped the Infiniti of everything I thought I would need. Using the heavy jack, I knocked off the rear view mirror and, with a screwdriver I found in the toolbox, pried away the Infiniti's hubcaps. I pulled the hood release and disconnected the radiator water reservoir and the container of windshield-washing fluid. They might not be potable, but the liquid was precious nonetheless. Reaching towards the motor, I pulled the dipstick out of the crank case. Evan, bless his murdering heart, had changed the oil recently and it sparkled golden and clear, so I touched my finger to the dipstick, lifted off a few drops, and smeared my lips with its soothing balm. My lips now protected from cracking, I dragged my treasures up the dirt track about twenty feet beyond Evan, as far away from the Infiniti as I dared. By noon, the sedan's sleek metal would be hot enough to cook on and staying in its immediate proximity wasn't a good idea.