Germ

fire under their investigative behinds, the death of one of their own would make them positively combust.

She stepped up to her car and unlocked the door, moving quickly. Before anything could rush out of the shadows at her, she was in the car and gunning the engine. She cranked the wheel sharply to get around a pickup parked in front of her, then punched the gas. She turned left, intending to travel on Brainerd, away from the activity at the bar, and wind through the city to her motel.

She had driven six blocks and had signaled to turn when a hand reached around from the backseat and gripped her throat. She jerked with surprise, and the car careened sharply as it turned the corner. She hit the curb. Two wheels rode on the sidewalk. She corrected the vehicle.

Still the hand held firm—tight but not choking. Julia thought one of the tires was losing air, but that's not what was making the sound.

It was her assailant, his lips near her ear: 'Shhhhhhhhh . . . Shhhhhhhhh . . .'

She grabbed his forearm. It wasn't flesh; it was hard as steel but . . . not steel, warmer, textured in a way steel wasn't. A hard plastic maybe, and huge. It was some kind of . . . gauntlet. He applied more pressure, and she let go.

'What—?'

'Shhhhhhh . . .'

At McBrian, she ignored the stoplight and made a wide arc to the left, into the westbound lane.

Finally he spoke in whispered tones. His voice was gentle, pleasant.

'Keep both hands on the wheel,' he said.

She nodded.

'Pull over.'

'No.'

He squeezed harder.

'Make a right up here and stop.' The consonants were sharper, the gentleness gone.

'I said no,' she repeated, driving past the road he wanted.

The grip contracted. She now found breathing difficult. Her pulse began to throb in her temple. Fragments of her assailant's features floated in the rearview mirror: eyes that flashed green whenever they passed under a streetlamp, messy jet hair, glasses.

'I won't hurt you,' he whispered. 'I've been sent to deliver a message.'

'I don't believe you.' Her voice was raspy.

'If I wanted to kill you, I would have.'

Julia thought about that. It wasn't true: she had not given him the chance. She'd hopped into the car and taken off too fast. Since then, the car had been in motion. Killing her while she drove risked an accident—attention and injury to himself. But why hadn't he waited to reveal himself until she stopped again? Killing her at a stop sign or light would most likely prevent an injury accident, but not necessarily an accident altogether. In death her foot might jam down on the gas pedal in what coroners called a cadaveric spasm. He couldn't wait until she reached her destination and turned off the car. What if she was meeting the police? The last reason she could think of for his not waiting to kill her until she stopped on her own was that the farther she drove, the more distance she put between him and his own transportation. Then he'd have to either drive her car back, with or without her body, or find another way back. Did killers consider such things? She guessed they did.

'So?' he said. 'Pull over.'

Instead, she punched the accelerator. The car roared ahead, past other vehicles, through stoplights.

The hand clenched tighter.

twenty-nine

Allen had slipped into Stephen's oversized clothes by the time they pulled into the space between the church and his cabin.

'This is it?' Allen asked incredulously.

'Home sweet home,' Stephen confirmed and climbed out.

The cabin was behind the rear wall of the church. The parking lot lay on the north side of the church, in front of the cabin, giving the appearance that a visitor could go either to the church or to Stephen's cabin, as though the cabin were historically significant. Dense pine forest surrounded the property. The dirt road leading to it ended at the clearing, where the gravel parking lot started. The lot had been rutted dirt until last year, when the tiny church finally had enough funds in the coffers to grade the area and pour the gravel.

Stephen led the way. At the porch steps, he avoided the middle one, pointing at it for Allen's benefit. When they were both inside, he said, 'Want anything?'

'A shower.'

'Bathroom's over there. Want something to drink, eat?'

'Water's fine.' He hitched his head toward the bathroom. 'Mind?'

'Mi casa, su casa.' Stephen was weary, but his broad smile conveyed the sense of hospitality he genuinely felt.

'Muchas gracias.' Allen sauntered into the bathroom, looking like a child in his father's clothes. 'Towel?'

'Cupboard on the right.'

Allen closed the door slowly, looking beat in every sense of the word.

Stephen went into the kitchen area. He filled two plastic cups with ice and water and placed them on the coffee table in front of the couch. 'Water's here when you want it!' he yelled at the bathroom door before plopping onto the couch. He looked at the wall clock. After one. He always rose by five—an internal clock sort of thing—so he wasn't going to be worth much tomorrow.

He stared at the bathroom door. Allen was in deep trouble this time, no doubt about it. He wondered if he could or even should help him out with whatever it was. Sometimes the best thing you could do was let people sort out their own problems. He supposed it depended on how nasty the trouble could get.

A square of light from an approaching car splashed through the front window and panned across the wall of books. It was a pattern he knew well: as the car made the last turn in the drive before entering the parking lot, the light would sweep across the books, usually stopping between Matthew Henry's New Testament Commentary and Clear and Present Danger. Then it would shoot up to the ceiling as the car entered the parking lot, sliding to about center-room before creeping toward the door as the car approached the porch.

This time, however, the light vanished after hitting Dracula. Stephen sat upright on the couch. The car had stopped before entering the parking lot. That, mixed with the hour and the night's odd events, set off all kinds of alarms in his head. He rose and walked carefully to the window. The car was moving slowly in shadows, headlamps off, closing the thirty-foot gap to the clearing. When its bumper settled over the edge of the parking lot's gravel, it stopped.

And there it sat, in the gray haze of the night. The occupants would know someone was home. They'd see the Vega parked between the buildings, lights in the cabin. Was this the bogeyman Allen was running from?

'Allen?' he said softly. No answer. He repeated it, louder. He could hear the shower running through the bathroom door. It stopped. 'Allen?'

'What?'

'Come here!'

The headlamps flicked on. The car started rolling again. Into the clearing. Moonlight peeled back the shadows like a CEO whipping off the covering of the company's newest model.

A Corvette—new enough to have headlamps that didn't retract into the front end.

It rolled slowly into the parking lot, then angled toward the cabin. The brake lights came on, making the trees behind it glow red. It stopped. He could see the ovals of faces inside, swiveling as the occupants surveyed the area. Then the car continued its slow progress toward the cabin.

Stephen pulled his face away from the window and leaned his head against the wall. Could be cops, bad guys, or simply people who'd gotten lost on their way back from the Drestin Dinner Theater. More than a few folks had stopped by for directions over the years.

The Vette stopped out front. He heard car doors open and slam. He moved to the door. Should he open it or