The Stake

They set the coffin on the garage floor.

Hal hurried forward. “Good God,” he said. “You people weren’t kidding.” Holding the bow and an arrow at his side, he bent over for a closer look.

Barbara came up beside him. “Yuck,” she said. “I’d forgotten just how disgusting...”

“It’s like she’s mummified,” Hal said.

“Jerky,” Barbara said.

“Let’s everybody quit admiring her,” Jean said, “and get this over with.”

Hal reached in. His fingertips prodded Bonnie’s thigh. “Tough,” he muttered. Then he rubbed the leg with his open hand.

“Cut it out,” Larry told him.

“Sorry.”

“Come on, everyone,” Jean said.

“Yeah,” Pete said. “Let’s get this show on the road. Larry, get on the other side of the coffin.”

Larry stepped around to the other side. Pete took the video camera from Jean, raised it to his shoulder and peered into the viewfinder. “Everybody clear away,” he ordered. “Hal, get ready with the bow.”

Larry crouched beside the coffin. The others stood together a few yards away, gazing at him. Hal raised the bow and nocked his arrow.

“Okay,” Pete said.

“Hold it,” Barbara said. “Shouldn’t we wait for Lane?”

Do it now while she’s not here, Larry thought.

He lowered his gaze to the body in the coffin. He looked at its straw-colored hair, its sunken eyelids, its hollow cheeks and horrible grin. Then he stared at the stub of wood protruding from the hole in its chest.

Take it out and I’ll be yours.

He wrapped his right hand around the stake.

Closing his eyes, he saw Bonnie alive. He saw her striding toward his bed, hair drifting around her face, her eyes innocent and loving, the tip of her tongue moist at the corner of her mouth. Her flawless skin gleamed. Her breasts jiggled just a bit. Her nipples stood erect. Her pubic curls glinted like filaments of sunlit gold. Kneeling on the mattress, she swung a leg over Larry. On hands and knees she hovered above him.

Pull the stake, she whispered. We’ll be lovers forever.

Larry’s hand tightened around the wooden shaft.

He opened his eyes and looked at Jean. Her fists were planted on her hips. She was scowling at him. “Well, go on,” she said.

Shifting his gaze toward Pete, he looked into the camera lens. “Forget it,” he said. “I’m not going to do it. We’renot going to do it. None of us. It’s over. Forget it.”

Lane moved in from the darkness beyond the garage door. She halted. She looked at Larry. Then at Hal.

“No!” she yelled, and ran at her teacher.

Forty-seven

Once the others were out of the house, Lane waited at the kitchen door and watched until they were inside the garage. Only then was she convinced that Kramer wouldn’t break away from the group and come in for a visit.

She went into her bedroom. There, she removed her crucifix from the small nail on her wall.

Pushing the bottom end of the cross under her waistband, she thought about the revolver.

She could take the gun instead of the cross.

And do what with it? Blow Kramer away? Make him confess, first. It’ll all be on videotape.

I can’t.

I don’t have to, she suddenly realized. She’d made the phone call to Riley. Right now he was probably waiting in Kramer’s house eager to nail the bastard for murdering Jessica.

I’ll be in the clear. He’ll be dead, and nobody will ever have to find out what he did to me.

If Riley doesn’t botch it.

He won’t.

Leaving her room, Lane decided to go ahead and use the toilet. She went to the end of the hall, turned on the bathroom light and shut the door. She locked it just in case Kramer might decide to come back, after all. She took out the crucifix, set it down by the sink, lowered her corduroys and panties and sat on the toilet.

Maybe I should just stay here, she thought.

She finished, dried herself, and didn’t get up.

Just stay here, and I’ll never have to see Kramer again. I can read about him tomorrow in the newspaper. Buford High School English teacher brutally slain in his home.

Nobody will ever know what he did to me.

Unless they get Riley for it. Then I’d have to testify for him.

Maybe that won’t happen. Maybe it’ll just go unsolved forever, and Mom and Dad will never have to know.

Lane wondered if they were waiting for her. They might not pull the stake until she was there. Maybe they would send someone in to get her. Maybe Kramer would volunteer.

He can’t get me with the door locked.

Hell, anybodycould unlock the damn thing. All it takes is something that’ll fit into the keyhole. You could almost do it with a fingernail.

Besides, I should be there for Dad.

With the crucifix tucked into the front of her corduroys and out of sight under the draping shirt, Lane left the bathroom. She walked slowly down the hallway. No need to hurry. The longer she took, the less time she would have to spend in the presence of Kramer.

Not that it had been too bad, being around him tonight. With all the others in the same room, he didn’t seem very threatening. Or maybe he didn’t seem so threatening because she knew what was waiting for him.

He was a dead man. He just didn’t know it yet.

In the kitchen Lane rolled open the sliding door. She stepped outside and pulled it shut. The wind swept her hair back. Though it fluttered the front of her shirt, the T-shirt underneath kept her from feeling much chill. She walked toward the driveway.

The garage door had been pulled back no more than four or five feet. Light spilled out onto the pavement, but she couldn’t see anyone inside until she stepped through the opening.

Dad was squatting on the other side of the coffin, his hand inside, gripping the stake. The others were watching him. Pete had the camera on him.

Hal had an arrow aimed at him. At Dad.

“No!” she yelled.

Dad looked confused. Everyone else whirled around as she ran at Kramer, shouting, “You bastard!” Even as the words left her mouth, she realized her mistake. Kramer hadn’t been about to shoot Dad; the arrow was meant for the vampire. You blew it, she thought.

She saw shock in Kramer’s eyes. He yanked back the bowstring. Barbara rammed an elbow into his side at the same instant he released the string. The arrow zipped past Lane, missing her right arm by less than an inch.

Almost on him, Lane hunched down. The top of her head struck the bow, knocked it aside, and rammed