No time for cops: no help there. By the time Seattle checked me out, my flight would be somewhere over Wyoming.
Move.
Move now and move fast.
I called out for a cab. The dispatcher said she had drivers in the neighborhood. The wait would be five minutes, ten tops.
Cover your ass.
I called the desk. Yes, the Hilton ran a shuttle service to the airport. It ran twice each hour, at seven minutes past the half hour.
It was now 9:55.
The key.
Crystal would need my room key to get in here and take out my stuff. Had to hide it somewhere so she could find it.
In the car.
Out there in the garage, all logic dictated, Pruitt would be waiting.
Good. Face the bastard head-on.
Eleanor sat rigidly in the chair. She looked terrified, her knuckles white as she gripped the armrests.
“Wh-why’re you…d-do-ing this?”
I reached out to her but she recoiled. “I’m on your side, kid,” I told her, but it didn’t help.
“Th-at m-man in the hall…”
“His name is Slater. He’s gone now.”
“He’s with the d-darkman.”
“He’s nothing. He’s out of here.”
“Darkm-man.”
I squeezed her shoulder. “Cheer up now, you’re in good hands.”
I turned off the light, flipped off the TV. Nobody was fooling anybody anymore.
“Let’s go,” I said.
We went with the clothes on our backs. I hung a do not disturb sign on the door.
“Stay close,” I said as we came into the garage.
She was shivering so violently she could barely walk. Our footsteps echoed as we crossed to the far wall where I had left my car.
He was with us all the way, I could feel him out there in the dark. “Oh, please.” Eleanor’s voice quaked with fear. She too had sensed him there, and Slater had it right, he was her bogeyman: just the thought of him made her incoherent and numb.
“Darkman,” she whispered. “D-d…kman.”
I put an arm over her shoulder. “Everything’s cool. We’ll laugh about it on the plane.”
“Darkm-m-an’s‘s-here.”
“Hush now. We’re heading for the land of sunshine.”
I jerked open the door and hustled her into the car. I looked over the roof, my eyes sweeping down the ramp and across the garage to the door. Just for show, I moved around the car, opened the driver’s door, and slid under the wheel.
I kept watching through the mirrors. I put the key in the ignition and turned it. It did nothing but click.
Eleanor whimpered faintly in the seat beside me.
