There’s a locking key box on the wall near the door to the house, with another code. I find the right keys after some hunting. Fortunately, the DB5 is near the doors, so I don’t have to do any tedious rearranging.
There’s nothing in the house except bad memories and old nightmares, so I don’t bother going in. I just pull the Aston Martin out and close the door with the clicker I find in the glove compartment. The gates open automatically as I approach, and close behind me.
I breathe a sigh of relief as I put the monstrous old house in my rearview mirror. I blank my mind, just like in the bad old days when I had to do something unsavory for my former crime syndicate employers. Don’t think about Mom. Don’t think about that last fucking phone call.
Blank mind.
Just drive. Out of Boston. I don’t know fucking where. Don’t care. Anywhere but here.
* * *
I’ve leftMassachusetts behind and I’m somewhere in Pennsylvania—the sticks. Farmland. Miles of barbed wire and clusters of cows grazing. Hay fields. Silos. The occasional little farmhouse, with an old barn, one of those lights hanging from the electrical wire over the dirt driveway.
I fill the gas tank at a gas station so old and behind the times that it doesn’t even have pay at the pump. I grab a package of beef jerky, a liter bottle of water, and a styrofoam cup of old, bitter, burnt coffee.
Keep driving.
Blank mind.
No memories, no thoughts. No feelings. Fuck, please god, no feelings. Feelings are toxic. Feelings are the enemy. Lock that shit down tight, way down deep inside a box. Wrap the box in chains and padlocks, and toss it into the Marianas Trench of my cold, black, bitter, broken soul.
Just drive.
* * *
Past midnight.No fucking clue where I am, except still in the goddamn boonies. West Virginia, maybe.
My headlights pierce the night—it’s pitch black out here, with an endless wash of stars against a black sky. A deer crosses ahead of me, pausing on the other side and watching me, its eyes shining silver in the darkness.
A farmhouse ahead, the obligatory light glowing orange-amber, illuminating a patch of dirt driveway, a pole barn, and a battered old truck.
Off in the distance, on a rise, small yellow squares indicate a house. Here, a high fence runs parallel to the road, six feet high at least, with barbed wire rolling across the top. Clearly, someone likes their privacy.
A huge gate, this one chain-link, manually operated.
Oddly, it’s ajar a few inches. Some security.
I’m in an almost zen-like state, and I almost hit her.
She’s half-jogging, half-stumbling on the shoulder of the road. Holding her ribcage. My headlights give me a snapshot of her—fairly tall, slender, willowy. Auburn hair, long, the tip of the braid dancing just above her ass. She’s wearing an ankle-length skirt, the kind ultra-conservatives make their women wear. Denim or khaki material, it’s hard to tell from the brief glimpse. Long sleeve shirt—not enough for the chill in the air this time of night.
I keep going.
Not my fucking problem.
I glance in my rearview—I can just make out her shadowy shape behind me. She stumbles, falls, catches herself on her hands, scrabbles to her feet and lurches into an agonized, desperate run.
Fuck.
Fuck, fuck, fuck.
I jab my foot onto the brake pedal and slew the car onto the shoulder. Neutral, parking brake. Leave it idling. Hop out. My taillights bathe the road in a dim red glow, exhaust curling in the light.
She halts several feet away. Arms around her ribs, gasping. Not crying audibly, but I see the tears on her cheeks.
Good fucking lord, she’s stunning.
Exquisitely beautiful. Her features were crafted by a master artisan, and she is his opus. Symmetrical, all perfect curves and delicate angles. Wide almond eyes, dark, brown or gray. Even in that conservative, almost Mennonite or Amish getup, it’s clear she’s got a hell of a body. Slender, svelte, but with enough curves to make a man dream of her.
