could do this. Wow!
He turned to his date and held out the concoction.
She was slumped on the seat.
“Vicki?”
No reaction.
“Vicki, here’s your drink.”
Looked like she was out cold. There she lay, her low-cut dress showing off enough feminine attributes through her blue cotton blouse to make
He put the drink down.
Nope, he couldn’t pass up this opportunity! He scooted over and put his arm around her nonchalantly.
“Yup. Hot as a dog out tonight. Weird for September, don’t you think?… Vicki?”
Still no reaction. She wasn’t waking up.
“That’s a nice blouse. Good material. Must be awful hot, though,” he said, reaching over and undoing a button.
Yow! Lots of creamy skin. The hint of more… The very sight got him hot, got his heart pumping.
“That’s better, huh? No? Well, maybe one more.”
He undid another button. Not a peep from Vicki.
Oh, man! What a chance. To touch those hooters, get a grip on paradise. Boy, what a charge.
He went for it, slipping his hand down deep into her blouse, expecting the thrilling touch of a bra to give way to the feel of a nipple in his—
He heard it before he felt it.
A wet, squishing sound.
His hand felt something give, something like sticking it into a vat of warm gelatin.
And then he realized that in his enthusiasm, he’d pushed too far and… No, that couldn’t be! What the hell? Had Vicki been sweating so much that his hand had slipped down her abdomen?
No, it was at the wrong angle!
His hand and his arm had gone straight through her!
Before this fact could fully register, though, the instinct to pull out came over Scott Jesky. He drew his hand back through the squishy stuif, but then something
He couldn’t moved his arm! Something tight and hard held his arm by his wrist, held it fast!
“Wha—” he said.
Then Vicki’s body—pale white in the moonlight streaming through the fogged windows—began to tremble. Her face lolled toward Scott, as though seeking another of his wet and sloppy kisses. But instead of an invitation from those rouged lips, there came a bloody froth, bubbling up.
“Oh, God, oh, no!”
Scott’s words turned into a scream.
He pulled away again, more desperate now. But with a greater tug the something inside Vicki Desoto’s dead body yanked back, jerking him to the elbow, the forearm, right into the girl’s face.
His arm vanished all the way into the body, even as a kind of steam hissed up around him, and a foul acid smell filled the confines of the car.
Then he realized through his terror that his arm felt as though it had been soaked in kerosene and touched with a match.
He screamed louder.
A
The features of her face started disappearing, eaten away from behind her skull. A bulbous, bloody mucus seeped up out of the ruined eye sockets, the distended nostrils, the once inviting lips, splashing with a searing impact onto Scott Jesky’s face.
He was pulled, kicking and screaming, into the horrible mess that Vicki Desoto’s body had become.
His flailing foot hit the side window so hard that it smashed it. It quivered there against the sill for a few seconds.
And then it was drawn in, limp.
The screams stopped, and the sucking, sopping sounds grew louder.
Steam rose from the window and was pushed away by a light mountain breeze as the moon glittered and shone on the surging, feasting creature within the Impala.
13
Meg Penny studied the oversized crystalline paperweight she held in her hands. She lay in her bed, the room lit only by a dim lamp on her desk.
What was the name of that song? Oh, yeah. “Make the World Go Away.” That was the way she felt now. She just wanted to sit here and just switch everything
She tried staring into the paperweight, placing herself inside the quiet snow-filled scene. It had always been her way of escaping.
Tonight, though, it wasn’t working.
Tonight her mind seemed fixed on what she had seen.
That thing… that awful
She shuddered and gasped, trying to push the thought from her head, even as she heard her parents’ voices drifting up from the stairs below her.
“I knew I shouldn’t have let her go out with that little son of a bitch in the first place,” her father was saying, his voice tight and hoarse.
“Lower your voice,” her mother cautioned. “That poor boy is probably dead.”
“Whatever it was, you can bet that Flagg kid was behind it,” her father said harshly. “It’s about time they nailed that little psychopath. His ass is gonna fry for this, believe me.”
Brian. Brian Flagg. It was Brian her father was talking about, and he was wrong. Of that Meg was certain. She’d thought he was a hood, too, but she knew that he hadn’t had anything to do with tonight’s horrors. She’d seen it in his eyes. He looked tough on the outside, sure, but his eyes showed a confusion, even a kind of vulnerability.
Her thoughts were interrupted by the sound of footsteps coming up the stairs. The door opened. Meg turned and saw her mother, a glass of water in her hand, something unseen cupped in the other hand. Probably Valium. Her mother swore by the stuff to get you through times of trauma.
Mrs. Penny sat on the bed. “Here, Meg,” she said. “Take this.”
“I don’t want it.”
“Come on, honey. You need to sleep.”
Meg sat up. Sure enough, there was a tiny Valium pill in Mom’s hand. Meg took it and put it in her mouth. She took a sip of water. But she did not swallow the Valium.
“That’s a good girl,” said Mrs. Penny. “Now, not another word. I’m sure the police will have this thing settled by morning.”
She kissed her daughter’s forehead and went to the door.
“Mom?” called Meg after her. “You don’t believe me, either, do you?”
“You’re home now. You’re safe. That’s all that matters.”
Mrs. Penny shut the door behind her as she left.
Immediately Meg sat up and spit the bitter Valium out into her hand. She tossed it away. What they had said about Brian Flagg was all wrong. The poor guy… they were going to pin the blame on him. The blame for what had happened to Paul and the Can Man.
