Ruthless (19 page)

CHAPTER TWENTY

THE FOG HAS LIFTED SOME.
The sky remains starless, but at least the trees are visible again. This is good. This is necessary. Necessary for my plan to work. It's not without risk, but I'm done hoping. It's time to force things to happen.

Time is never easy to measure alone in the wilderness, but it's not too long before the deep rumble of an engine tells me to get ready. My heart is in my throat as I lie down in the middle of the road, across the yellow line.

I cover up the gun with the flap of my jacket. I don't want to abandon it, but I don't want anybody to see it either. The trick is to not move a muscle, to appear unconscious. An unconscious body is not scary at all. It is helpless and in need of help. I'm determined to hold on to stillness as long as I can.

There's a chance the driver could be on their phone or ­dozing
off or messing with the radio. There's a chance that I'll have to scramble for safety, and I'll run straight into the car. There's a chance I'll die. But I think there's a better chance that a girl lying in the middle of the road will get the help she needs.

Seconds stretch into forever. Will the car see me? Will they stop? They might swerve to avoid me, go up on the shoulder and continue on into the night. They could be like everybody else who has come before them.

The squeal and squeak of brakes tell me the car is slowing, then stopping. I turn to see my rescuer, but the headlights blind me. The driver's side door opens with a loud creak.

The headlights are big, round. High up off the ground. Funnily enough, it's the headlights that tell me what I've done. They're old-fashioned truck headlights, the kind you don't see very often anymore.

When his frame steps in front of the light, it's what I expect to see. The massive outline of Wolfman.

It's not that I don't try to get away, it's just that I don't succeed.

His giant fist grabs my holster belt. I remember the terror of his inexorable strength. He picks me up by my waist, snatches the gun, and tosses me into the cab in one smooth motion.

There are no words. Not from him. Not from me.

This isn't cute for him anymore. This is business now. This is death.

The gun is against my temple as he puts the truck into drive. Even though he has to reach across with his left hand to the gear shift, the movement doesn't look awkward. It looks deadly in its controlled power.

He steps on the gas, and we move off into the night. Wolfman doesn't want to shoot me inside his truck. Too messy. He wants to take me to the nearest side road and kill me there, in the woods. This is going to happen. I am going to die.

I am going to die.

These words rest inside my head in a new way. It's not like the whispering, insidious voice that said
Maybe you're meant to die out here
. This is different. This is real. It is not weakness and pain and self-pity. It is clarity and awareness and strength.

I am going to die. This is going to happen.

And it's okay.

I don't want to die, and I will not submit without a fight. But I am not afraid to die either. Because it's okay. It's okay. My life has been filled with countless mistakes, but also success. I have been a coward at some points, but brave at others. I have loved and been loved; I have failed to love and to accept love. Above all else I have tried my best, every step of the way. I tried to be good and did those things I thought were good to do. I fought hard to live a life worthy of the gift God gave me. What more could I have done? I could have done no more with what I had at the time.

I let go of the idea that the past could have been any different than it was.

If I should live, and I will do everything in my power to make that happen, my life will never be the same, and I will be better for it. But I am going to die. And that's okay. I have faith I will go to a better place.

All of this runs through my mind in less than a second. I have
a plan, a way to fight before I go, but before I can put it into effect, something happens.

A cop drives by.

Both Wolfman and I see it. Having just put his truck in gear, he's driving at a suspiciously slow pace. That cop is no coincidence. The SUV did come through for me. The SUV called 911. That cop is looking for me. I'm certain of it, because my gut tells me so.

The wheels turn behind Wolfman's orange eyes. He's checking the rearview mirror more than he's looking at the road ahead of him. My plan is put on hold, waiting to see if the cop flips a U-turn and appears behind us. Wolfman watches the mirror, I watch ­Wolfman, and both of us wait to see what fate has in store.

The cop doesn't show.

Wolfman lets go of a long breath. That's my cue.

“I know you're going to kill me.”

He says nothing, doesn't even look at me.

“I am going to die unpurified. Unrepentant. And without fear. Look at me.”

He doesn't look.

“Look at me. Look me in the eyes.”

Wolfman turns to see me, strangely obedient. Except it's not so strange. I can feel my own power. In a way it doesn't surprise me that he does what I tell him to do.

“I'm not scared of you. I'm not scared of death. You may kill me, but you're not going to beat me.”

His eyes are as empty as ever, still far emptier than an animal's eyes, but it doesn't take heart or soul to realize I'm right.
­Wolfman realizes I am right. I can see it in him. I can see the hate, the powerful, overwhelming hate. The devil himself could not look at me with more hate. I would be scared out of my wits, but there's nothing to be scared of now. I already know what's going to happen.

And that's when I bite his hand.

My arms are no good, but my jaw works. His hand becomes a fist that smashes my head into the seat, the window, the door. But I'm a pit bull that won't let go. Blood fills my mouth. Flesh tears in my teeth. My job is to fight as hard as I can, for as long as I can.

I hang on for a few seconds more. Wolfman rips his hand free, aims the gun at my face, and pulls the trigger.

Nothing happens.

The gun misfired. Whether it's two days in the grit and wet of the river or providence, I don't know, but it makes me fight even harder. Using teeth and nails I try to force the gun out of his fist. Wolfman needs both hands to clear the bullet from the chamber. He's strong enough to drag me over to the driver's side. My ribs hit the steering wheel, and I get a new idea.

Crash the truck.

Forcing my body between him and the windshield, I push my back into the steering wheel. It's the best I can do without letting go of the gun. The truck zigzags down the highway. Hope rises as it goes to two wheels, but then it slams back down to earth, jostling me out of position. I sail back to the passenger side.

It's the break Wolfman needed. With lightning speed he clears the jammed gun and points it back at my head. In the dim, green
light emanating from the dashboard his hand shines with blood. I'm thinking he no longer cares if his truck gets messy.

Before he pulls the trigger, a brighter light, a white light, fills the cab of the truck. Headlights. From behind us. He lowers his gun hand to hide the weapon from view, jamming the muzzle up against my heart.

“Move one more time and I pull the trigger.”

“Is it the cop?”

He says nothing.

“It is, isn't it? He's following us.”

“One more time, I pull the trigger.”

The question becomes whether or not Wolfman will make good on his threat. I think he's bluffing. If he shoots me, he'll likely be killed by the policeman. If not killed outright, then caught and killed on death row. Pulling the trigger right now would mean a terrible outcome for Wolfman.

Does he hate me enough to sentence himself to that future? I don't think so. He's still driving slowly. Slowly enough that I'm thinking I can jump out and survive. I've fallen off bolting horses, landed on rocky ground. Didn't even break a bone. Horses get close to forty miles per hour. I can't see the speedometer, but it feels slow.

I might not make it, but this police car is a chance I can't waste.

Breathing deep, I count down in my head.
Three, two, one.
On one I unlock the passenger-side door. Rip open the handle. Slam my body into door. Sail out into the night.

Somewhere in there came a gunshot, deafeningly loud in the confines of the cab. Somewhere in there came a massive impact. Whether it was a bullet or hitting pavement, I don't know. Somewhere in there was gravel and my spinning body and pain.

Sound happens first. Scrape. Scrape. Scrape. It scratches at the surface of my brain until I open my eyes. The truck looms over me. The edge of the police cruiser is visible behind it. The vehicles are dark and silent. The scraping is coming from somewhere else.

Rolling my head over, I see the source of the sound. Two feet. It's so dark and foggy it's hard to tell what I'm looking at. Eventually I realize those feet are being dragged. The heels are scraping along the road.

It's the policeman. He's dead.

Wolfman has him under the armpits. He's pulling him off into the forest.

I have no room for emotion, but the thought floats through my mind that this man is dead because of me. I jumped because he was behind me. I jumped because I thought he could save me. But there is no saving anyone from Wolfman.

Turning the other way, I discover the guardrail above me. This is the edge of the road. Wolfman needs to dispose of the body and hide the car. Maybe he won't notice I'm gone. Getting up is an impossibility; I don't even try it. Instead, I squirm and push and kick my way through the posts. Below me is a grass-covered hill. I begin to slither my way down. Everything is broken now. Ribs are
definitely broken. My legs are raw from road rash. It's nothing but pain, so I leave my body. Floating above myself, I watch as I work my way down the hillside.

It's fog and darkness and rocky ground. It's belly-to-the-dirt army crawl. It's the only thing I can do. My right shoulder is almost useless, making me veer in that direction.

I reach the bottom of the hill and enter a flat field. The grass is high. The fog is thick. The wilderness is silent. The world becomes small, just the foot of space before me, beside me, behind me. It's good that the world has become so small. It makes it easier to do my work. To keep moving.

Grandpapa walks toward me, his hands cupped. We had a picnic outside tonight. Ribs, potato salad, sweet tea. We feasted on summer and it tasted so good. Now I'm chasing lightning bugs in the dusk, but they stay three steps ahead of me.

“Ruthie, come here,” he says, his voice even lower and slower than usual.

I trot over to him, rise up on tiptoes, try to see what's in his hands. He squats down, but his hands are held together, a hollow ball with something inside.

“Be very quiet.”

I do as I'm told, holding my breath, waiting for the moment of discovery. What does Grandpapa have? It must be something glorious.

With great care, Grandpapa opens his hands. On his palm sits a beetle. There's a patch of red behind its head, orange outlines
its long, slender body, but these colors are not bright or special. Mostly it's a plain little insect.

I open my mouth to speak, but Grandpapa says, “Shhh . . .”

So I keep staring at the beetle.

Then it glows, a yellow-green living miracle.