“You have no idea,” she replied with a wink. “Pull up a seat. The show’s just about to start.”
Exactly what I was afraid of.
Chapter Forty-Seven
The sun had barely peeked over the horizon the next morning as we drove through the center of town, everything looking orange and radioactive. Adding to the eeriness was a warm, prickly wind blowing from the east like oven fire. The feeling reminded me of the Southern California Santa Anas. Warm, early mornings always make me edgy. It doesn’t feel natural. The farther we drove, the more the winds seemed to pick up, blowing dust and loose debris into our path, making my nerves even more ragged.
“I didn’t think it was possible,” CJ said, “but this place looks even worse in the daylight.”
“Weirder, too,” I added.
“Seriously,” she said, watching a tree branch as it tumbled alongside us. “It’s like the bastard child of
I made a sharp and sudden turn into a service station. Two guys sat on a bench; one of them had to be pushing eighty, the other, a skinny guy, probably in his twenties. Both wore vacuous, stoic expressions.
“Roll down your window.”
She did.
I pulled up to them, leaned across her, and said, “Excuse me, fellows. Either of you know a gentleman by the name of Bill Williams?”
Nothing. No sign of movement except for the wind blowing through their ears. The wooden expressions remained that way.
“Our father’s an old friend from high school,” I continued. “We heard he’s living around here. Promised dad we’d stop and say hi if we ended up passing through.”
Finally, a sign of life: the young guy looked at the old guy. The old guy shook his head, then the young guy looked back at us and shook his head, too. I waited a second or two, just in case one of them had a flash of recollection. Wasn’t going to happen; in fact, I had a feeling they’d already forgotten the question.
CJ took a crack at it. “What about Nancy Skinner?”
A light bulb seemed to go off in the young guy’s head. He leaned forward, slowly raised his hand, and pointed up the road.
“Okay. Thanks,” I said with a smile and a wave, then pulled away.
“I swear,” CJ said. “It’s like Valley of the Dolts in this place, starring Loose-Brain and Lunk-Head over there.”
A few miles up the road we came to Nancy Skinner’s street, although, it was hardly a street, more like a dirt trail about ten feet wide with ruts so deep it forced the car into a tumbling motion. Scrub oak overgrew both sides, their branches whipping against our windows. No sign of a house.
“This doesn’t look right,” CJ finally said.
“It’s what Sully gave me.”
“Where’s she living these days, in a lean to?”
“It has to be somewhere,” I said, leaning forward slightly and looking from side to side through the windshield.
“Hold on,” CJ said. “I think I see something.”
I strained to look ahead. Off in the distance was a house, or something that looked like it might be one. As we drew closer, I could see the front door wide open, swinging back and forth to the commands of a howling, angry wind.
“Okay,” she said, staring at it, “definitely not cool.”
We pulled up a very rocky, very bumpy path leading to the house. As we got out of the car, CJ said, “I’m not loving the atmosphere around here.” She put a hand into her purse.
“Not sure I am, either.”
“And it’s not abandoned.” She had the gun out now and was using it to point at the front door. “I can see furniture.”
“Would you put that thing down?”
“What? We may need it.”
“It’s not the needing part I have a problem with. It’s the waving it around part.”
She rolled her eyes, lowered it to her side.
We made our way toward the front of the house. I thought about Bill and wondered if CJ’s gun would be enough to defend against a man like that.
The wind whistled loudly, and I felt something tug at my leg. I lurched back, startled, then kicked away a dead branch that had blown against me.
Then we heard a loud bang.
Both of us jumped, then looked toward the house just in time to see the wind grab the front door and blow it shut again. Even though we saw it coming this time, we both still jumped as it slammed. CJ looked at me, palm flat against her chest. I breathed deep. If houses had minds and mouths, this one would have warned us to get the hell away.
But instead, we moved forward, CJ holding the gun out in front of her, finger poised on the trigger, ready to fire at the first sign of danger. When we got to the porch, she turned and stared at me.
I motioned ahead to her. “You’ve got the gun…”
“So I get to have all the fun? Is that it?”
“That’s how it goes when you’re the one packing heat.”
She aimed the gun at the door, spared me a glance, then said, “So be it. Locked and loaded.”
“Okay, Ms. Oakley.”
She climbed a few steps, then without looking back, said, “You know, most men would feel emasculated letting a woman take the lead.”
“Not me. I’m an equal opportunity masochist.”
I caught an acerbic smile, then she placed a palm against the door and held it there.
“What are you doing?”
“Feeling for vibrations.”
“What kind?”
“A TV, stereo, even people talking inside will cause them.”
“Feel anything?”
She held her hand there a bit longer, shook her head, then said, “Ready?”
“Yep. Let’s do it.”
Rolling a sleeve over her hand, she turned the knob ever so gently, and pulled the door open.
She moved forward into the entryway, gun extended, gaze sweeping the room. I followed. She was right: furniture and pictures on the walls. Somebody still lived here.
We moved first to the kitchen. Freshly-dirtied dishes in the sink. Then we moved out into the hallway, toward two more closed doors.
CJ eased open the one on our left. “Holy shit.”
She stepped aside to reveal a woman laying in bed. Well, sort of: she was on her stomach, lower body under the sheet, upper body hanging over the edge. Her arms dangled loosely, and her head barely touched the floor.
We moved in closer, and CJ pointed to a syringe next to one hand.
“Looks like Nan fell off the wagon hard this time.”
“Doubt she ever got on,” I said, then placed two fingers on the woman’s neck.
“Dead?”
I nodded.
We moved into the other bedroom, and it didn’t take long to figure out whose it was: a mattress on the floor, a pair of jeans, two pairs of cowboy boots, and an empty pack of Marlboro Reds beside an ashtray overflowing with
