Clark drove the Mustang down I-35 until they reached the northern outskirts of Oklahoma City, where Lois spotted a Chick-Fil-A on their side of the road. Instead of hitting the drive-through lane, though, Lois convinced Clark to go inside and sit in a chair that wasn’t buzzing down the highway at sixty-five miles per hour.
“See, isn’t this better?” she bubbled. “We can focus on what we’re eating instead of worrying about staying between the white lines on the road. And if you drop some food, you don’t have to dig underneath yourself to find it.”
Clark chewed and swallowed, then took a big drink of tea. “I admit it, you’re right. Food tastes better when you’re sitting still.”
“Of course I’m right. Hey, how long before we get to Amarillo?”
His eyes narrowed and he glanced around the sparsely populated seats near their booth. “Let’s keep our voices down, okay? The odds are better but we’re not exactly in the clear yet.”
“You really think they’re looking for us here?”
“Can’t be sure, of course, but I wouldn’t be surprised if there was an All-Points Bulletin out on us.”
“Sorry. I’ll be good from now on.”
“I certainly hope so.” He waited for a moment, then said, “I think we’ll get there by about eight tonight, assuming you don’t have a lead foot in this car and rocket us down the road. We don’t need a ticket for going over warp seven.”
“Warp seven? How very Trekkie of you.”
“The proper term is Trekker, and my instructions stand. Once we get out of Oklahoma City, the speed limit goes up to seventy. I don’t know how much attention those licenses will stand, so the helm officer needs to stay below warp seven point two.”
She stuck her tongue out at him. “Killjoy.”
“Can’t afford to be stopped and you know it. Oklahoma Highway Patrol officers are not recruited for their sense of humor.”
“Nuts.” She pouted for a moment, then perked up. “Hey, just how fast will Farrah go on the highway, anyway?”
“I think she’ll do a steady warp nine pretty easily. Maybe even warp ten if the tires are really as firm as they look.”
Lois grinned. “You sure I can’t find out myself?”
“Lo-is!”
“Okay, boss man, I’ll drive like a little old lady.”
“But not the one from Pasadena, I hope.”
They shared a soft laugh. “No, not her,” Lois insisted. “But I do love to have fun, fun, fun in my 409.”
“No fair! Only one pop song reference per sentence is allowed.”
“Then why do you get to use all the Star Trek references you want to?”
He leaned closer and mock-growled, “Because I have a badge, lady, and I’m not afraid to use it.”
“Boy, do you ever suck the life out of a party.”
*****
Nigel stared at the fax he’d received from the math professor. He’d assumed that Mrs. Luthor had secreted some confidential information somewhere, but he would never have believed that she’d been this good at hiding it.
He shook his head. Staring at the paper would not change the information contained within its text.
At least he now had two IP addresses, one of which was supposed to hold a spreadsheet containing years of information on Mr. Luthor’s criminal enterprises. He’d already typed each of the series of numbers into his Netscape web browser, but all he’d seen on his screen each time was a request for user identification and a password.
The additional text on Mrs. Luthor’s rear end had been utterly confusing. He didn’t know what was a user ID, what was a password hint, and what was nonsense. There was text which appeared to be longitude and latitude, down to the second, which might direct him to the location of the computer he needed. But there were four such sets of numbers, and the professor had warned him that even though she’d decoded the information in the fractals, she had not had the time or the resources to discover the underlying meanings or discern any relationships among the items.
The password hints in her tattoo were equally as puzzling. One, apparently, was “Rene Descartes,” an obvious reference to the Renaissance philosopher who was said to have sought vainly for an honest man. That could point to the real password – it might even be the real password – but it might also be misdirection, it might be meaningless, or it might even initiate a self-destruct sequence on the server.
Or it could merely be a taunt.
Mr. Luthor’s tattoo was smaller and yielded fewer terms once it was decoded, but it was nearly as frustrating as the larger one. One of the text strings in his image was “Roy Rogers,” which as unrelated to the documents he sought as anything else. The only word which might have some real relevance to Mr. Luthor’s tattooed information was “Rosebud,” which might be a real clue or might be a time waster.
He decided to risk trying the IP address from Mr. Luthor’s tattoo with one of the text strings. It might be dangerous, but it also might be his last chance to locate the computer where the evidence was stored.
After hesitating a moment, he brought up the second screen with its request for user id and password. He typed in “Roy Rogers” for the user and “Rosebud” for the password.
The screen went blank.
After a long moment, the screen flashed the words, “Retrieving requested information.”
Then a video image filled the screen.
A young, slender, red-headed white man wearing a green sport coat over a striped shirt was singing into a microphone while weaving across a stage as two young women danced behind him. The song was one Nigel had never heard, but it was one whose irony he recognized immediately.
Never gonna give you up, never gonna let you down
Never gonna run around and desert you
Never gonna make you cry, never gonna say goodbye
Never gonna tell a lie and hurt you
The music continued as the scene on the computer screen froze on one of the dancing women. Then a line of fuzzy text marched across the screen. When it was centered, the text became clear.
CONGRATULATIONS – YOU’VE BEEN RICKROLLED
Rather than express his fury, Nigel slowly nodded at the screen. He’d been taken for a ride, to be sure, but now he had confirmation that Lois Lane Luthor was behind this. No one else would dare to taunt Mr. Luthor or his lieutenants in such a fashion.
He also knew that the other website almost surely contained the information he sought. If Lois Lane Luthor believed that he would stop now, she was wrong.
It was her first serious mistake. And Nigel would do his best to be certain that it would be her last.
*****
State trooper Renee Woods frowned at her computer display and pondered her options. A classic white Mustang II with blue trim hummed west on I-40, its speedometer dancing just above and below the posted speed limit of 70 miles per hour. The two occupants seemed to be enjoying the journey, as the woman driver and her male passenger often exchanged frequent smiles and occasional laughter. The Oklahoma state trooper following at a distance considered stopping them to verify that they weren’t the couple she’d been warned about, but if they were fugitives their behavior didn’t make sense to her. These two weren’t trying to hide anything, including themselves, the license plate check had come back clean, and the car was nothing like the one in the APB. There was no probable cause to pull them over, so Renee decided to keep looking.
*****
It was close to seven in the evening by the time Lois pulled into the Motel 6 parking lot and let Clark out by the front door. Within five minutes he was back, wearing a smile Lois didn’t recognize.
“Ground floor around back. There’s a Chinese place across the road that will deliver to the room, or we can walk somewhere close. Your call.”
She frowned as she turned the key and shifted into first gear. “Chinese is fine with me. And why are you smiling so funny?”
He chuckled. “I asked for directions to Hoover Dam, and she said that Vegas was prettier, and if there wasn’t a beautiful woman waiting for me in my car she’d eat my spare card key.”
Lois bit the inside of her mouth to keep from laughing. “What did you say to her?”
“I asked her if I had to eat my card key if I lost the bet.” Lois guffawed, and Clark continued, “That’s just what she did. Then I asked her if she took cash with a deposit, and she said that if I ate the card key I wouldn’t have to pay for the room.”
Lois’ shoulders shook. “So you’re too full to eat now, right?”
They shared a laugh. “I decided not to push things with her. She reminded me of my mom, so I’m still hungry.”
*****
The door opened and Lois snapped on the light. “I’m just saying, the Chinese food in Metropolis is much more authentic and it tastes better. And it isn’t cooked by Mexicans, either.”
Clark locked the door and sighed. “Do you know how few ethnic Chinese there are in this part of Texas? California and Oregon, yes, but not in the Texas panhandle. Most of the folks who do the restaurant work around here are either of Mexican or Native American descent. A lot of them grew up on one of the reservations just west of here.”
She squinted at him. “See my previous comment. That may have been the blandest and cheesiest food I’ve ever eaten.” She put a fingernail in her mouth and worried at something between her teeth. “And why do they call it a panhandle, anyway?”
“Just look at the north-west portion of the state map. This area looks like something you could grab and hold or even wave the state around in the air with. We’re also heading through the Oklahoma Panhandle tomorrow morning, and don’t roll your eyes at me in that tone of voice.”
“You’re sure that’s the quickest way to Denver from here?”
He reached for the TV remote. “Yes. Mayson’s map pointed us into New Mexico on I-40, then up to Denver via state highway 84 and I-25, but that’s a good ten-hour trip even at New Mexico and Colorado highway speeds and taking into consideration the way you drive.” He ignored her repeated eye roll. “And taking 287 to 84 into Colorado to I-25 to Denver is more direct. Being on the state highways will cut down on the likelihood of our being spotted, too.”
“Fine. You want the bathroom first?”
“You go ahead. I want to see if the national news has anything on the case.”
*****
Lois ran the brush through her hair a final time, then stopped and took a good look at herself. She tried to see herself objectively, as if she didn’t know herself. Of course she couldn’t, not completely, but she gave it a good try.
She saw a slender woman in her early thirties, the slightest hints of gray tinging the part in her still-lively dark hair, framing a face with fewer wrinkles and stress lines than she might have expected. Of course, Lex’ insistence on maintaining her youthful appearance through regular exercise and the occasional minor cosmetic procedure would account for some of that. Her narcissistic husband desperately needed a youthful wife to reinforce his public image of continued strength and virility.
The contrast between Lex and Clark was striking. While Lex wanted her to serve his ego, Clark seemed to care almost nothing about himself. He wanted her to trust him, of course, but in the beginning it was because he needed her cooperation to protect her. The days since their “swim date,” as she called it in her head, had been different. He’d let down some of his protective walls and allowed her to see inside his heart. She wondered how much of his heart he’d revealed to Mayson – then decided it didn’t matter. If Mayson had had the death grip on his heart she wished she had, he wouldn’t have opened up to Lois so easily.
And, truthfully, she’d reciprocated and opened her heart to him. It had been a scary thing to do. At first she did it out of fear, to pull him closer to her and make him more likely to stay with her, but that had quickly shifted as she’d seen how open, how trusting, how honest, how – how very good he really was. He was, without a doubt, the best man she’d ever met. Not even the walking Federal disaster that was Lois Lane-Luthor, the triple-L herself, could destroy his character.
Again, perhaps it was the conspicuous differences between Clark and Lex that made her smile, but perhaps it was the fact that he’d spent the entire trip protecting her and keeping her safe. She doubted that any other man would have been as non-judgmental and compassionate with her. And no one else could have guarded her so well. Just look at how quickly he’d picked up on Billy and his—
How did he do that, anyway?
How did he know Billy was spying on them?
How did he even know Billy was there?
And that wasn’t the whole of it. How had he reacted so quickly in the garage shootout? He hadn’t saved Mayson from being shot, but keeping Lois safe had been his mission and she’d seen the trap before he had. Still, he’d put her on the ground behind the car before she could have hidden herself. And he’d deliberately put himself between her and the bullets flying around without any suggestion that he feared being shot.
Why hadn’t he trusted Sue Riordan, a fellow cop? Had he seen or heard something that had tipped him off? If so, why hadn’t he shared it with her?
Why had he changed cars again so quickly? Was it just to keep them invisible or was he really that suspicious? If he was that suspicious, what were his reasons?
And what had he said about their swim date? That he just wanted to spend the day in the sun? Why? What did the sun have to do with his choice? Granted, it was a good idea. The day had relaxed both of them and probably driven Asabi and Nigel a little bit crazier than they already were. But Clark had spoken of the side trip as if it were something he needed to do for his health. Did he have a vitamin D deficiency that only sunlight could take care of?
Other things came to her mind, like the way he squinted slightly any time they pulled in to buy gas or use the bathrooms or buy food. If she hadn’t known better, she might have thought he was trying to look through the walls.
Another thought broke over her musings.
The trip was almost over and she wished it weren’t. In fact, she almost wished that he’d sigh deeply in the morning and suggest that they just take off for Canada or Montana or Idaho and just disappear. The thought of the upcoming trial, the constant threat of Lex having her murdered, her own culpability in his crimes – everything seemed to cascade down on her at once.
She wanted it all to be over. She wanted the entire thing to end. She wanted to fly away to an island in the Pacific or the Caribbean and stay with Clark for the rest of her life.
The fantasy engulfed her, buoyed her, lifted her heart and mind and relaxed the furrow between her eyebrows. For a long moment, she leaned against the counter, closed her eyes, and fantasized about going to sleep in Clark’s arms and waking up still entangled with him the next morning, every night for the rest of her life. They’d live simply, using the cash in the money belt until it was gone, then she could pick up shells on the shore and sell them to tourists or sailors passing through. He could take casual work on the docks, or maybe they could open their own place and have live music every Wednesday and Saturday evenings. They’d take turns behind the bar, and maybe they’d hire a part-time cook for simple meals and snacks. No one would get drunk and start a fight or Clark would throw them out. And Lex would never find out where she was.
It would be beautiful.
If it could only happen for real.
But she couldn’t avoid her appointment with the court and she knew it. She had to testify. She had to put away an evil man and help the authorities dismantle his organization. There was no time to moon over an impossible fantasy.
She stared at her tear-stained reflection and decided to take a shower. She could cry in the spray of the water and no one would ever see the evidence.
*****
Clark checked the station listing for the motel TV and selected one of the 24-hour news channels. Anything but Luthor News Network, he mumbled to himself. At least the others had a chance of telling the truth.
He sat through a report on an earthquake in Chile and a flood in Bangladesh. As always, the mention of innocents being in danger cut him deeply. He could have helped at either place, maybe both. He couldn’t have stopped either disaster from happening, but surely he could have saved a number of lives.
But he couldn’t leave Lois alone. As brave and capable as she was, it would be like staking out a goat for a tiger. Great bait to bring the tiger in. Not such a good thing for the goat.
He had to finish this job. Maybe then he could think about helping out at other places, other bad events.
And he liked this job a lot more than he should.
It wasn’t the tension of running from people trying to kill Lois that made the job fun. That was easily managed. And it wasn’t his churned-up feelings about Mayson. He knew now that he had to break things off with her, as gently as he could, as soon as he delivered Lois to the feds in Denver. Nor was it the thrill of escaping the bad guys and their unwitting accomplices.
It was hearing her laugh.
It was bantering back and forth with her.
It was seeing her learn to trust him without reservation.
It was touching her hand or elbow when she seemed close to tears, when the pressure threatened to crush her, and his presence seemed to lift her.
It was feeling her smile directed at him.
It was just being with her.
He’d done the very thing Mayson had so often warned him against, the thing that his instructors and supervisors had always cautioned him about, the thing no cop should ever do. He’d opened his heart to someone he couldn’t have, someone who wasn’t just part of the job.
She was the job.
And he was an idiot.
The sound of the shower being turned on pulled his attention away from his own moronic self. She’d decided to clean up. Good. He could use the time to regain control of his emotions.
As if it were mocking him for his pain, the headline crawl under the picture mentioned Mayson. He watched for more information and was quickly rewarded when the talking head came on screen.
“And now the latest on the trial of Lex Luthor. The judge in New Troy has denied several defense motions to delay the start date or change the venue of the prosecution, and the only question now seems to be whether Mr. Luthor will face justice in state court or a federal courtroom. Our legal insider, Christine Polanski, tells us that Mr. Luthor will probably face the federal charges first, since federal rules of evidence and the limits on prosecutorial conduct are somewhat looser than in New Troy state court. The other important factor is that if Mr. Luthor is convicted of conspiring to murder or solicit murder across state lines, Mr. Luthor might face the death penalty in federal court. New Troy does not currently have the death penalty, since the state’s appeals court struck down that statute last year and the legislature has yet to replace it.
“The whereabouts of Lois Lane-Luthor, the defendant’s wife, are still unknown. Mrs. Luthor may or may not testify in open court concerning her knowledge of her husband’s illegal activities. The judge has yet to rule on the defense motion to exclude her testimony.
“According to Metro General Hospital spokeswoman Dean Ashley, Assistant District Attorney Mayson Drake has been transferred from intensive care and her condition has been upgraded to serious but recovering. The other wounded survivor of the shooting where Drake was wounded, Detective Willard Burke, has also been upgraded from critical to serious. Both are expected to recover from their wounds, although both will also require extensive physical therapy before returning to active duty. Back to you, Phil.”
*****
The TV was off. The only light came through the worn curtain from the security lights in the motel parking lot. The skinny twin beds were silent, and Clark’s breathing was even and regular.
But she could tell that he wasn’t asleep.
Neither was Lois.
She couldn’t stop thinking about how Clark had gotten them this far. Not only was he a good man and a very good cop, he seemed to live on the edge of knowing what was about to happen before it happened. Did he have some kind of ESP? Was he just that observant and did he just react that quickly? Lois had seen professional athletes – middleweight boxers with blurry hand speed, martial artist masters who couldn’t be touched if they didn’t allow it – who weren’t as quick as Clark was.
She thought back on the officer they’d disarmed in Kansas, Sue Riordan. Lois hadn’t really noticed at the time, but as she reconsidered how it had happened, she realized that Clark was never nervous about the outcome of that confrontation. He’d been calm, cool, collected, and relaxed.
Too relaxed. He should have tensed up, at the very least, when Riordan had told him that she knew the car was stolen.
But he hadn’t flinched, not one little bit. Add that to the other things she’d seen and remembered, and it made the total package of Clark Kent an enigma wrapped in a mystery inside a puzzle.
She had to know.
“Clark? You awake?”
“Yep.”
“Can’t sleep?”
“Not yet. Thinking about finishing the trip, I guess.”
“Yeah. Me too.”
After a long moment, he said, “It sounds like there’s something else on your mind.”
She took a big breath and let it out. “There is.”
His bed squeaked as he shifted position. “Want to tell me about it? Maybe you can drop off if you share it, whatever it is.”
Her fingers drummed on the top of the comforter and found a worn spot she started worrying with her nails. “I’m not sure you can help.”
“Won’t know unless you try.”
She nodded despite knowing that he couldn’t see her. “Okay.” She rolled on her side and braced herself on her elbow. “You’re too good at what you do.”
She heard him shift back. “I’m what?”
“You’re too good at this.”
“At what, escorting people to court?”
“Yes! Exactly! You’re too good at what you do.”
“You say that as if it were a bad thing.”
“It’s not! You just – you’re too good to be real.”
“Maybe I’m just overqualified.”
“That’s not what I meant. I mean that you made sure I was safe back in the garage shootout. And you – oh!”
“What? What ‘oh’?”
“You were too upset about not anticipating that ambush. Nobody could have seen it coming.”
“You did. You warned Mayson that the plan had too many moving parts, remember?”
“That’s only because I know Lex and Nigel and Asabi better than you guys do. I was sure they’d try something, but I didn’t know what it would be. You, on the other hand, almost stopped it from going down. If you hadn’t hesitated to make sure I was safe, I don’t think there would have been time for the bad guys to get off more than one shot.”
His voice was flat and hard, and Lois missed the lilt in it. “That one shot was enough.”
“I know, and I’m sorry that Mayson got hurt. But my statement stands. You would’ve stopped it if you’d been free to act on your own.”
“You don’t know that.”
“From what I’ve seen you do since then, I’m certain of it. The way you caught Billy was great, but it wasn’t like he was waving a sign or calling you by name. You still caught him.”
Clark sighed. “Look, Lois, I’ve always been able to do things other people couldn’t do. Even the other football players in high school used to ride me about it. ‘Just give the ball to Kent and get out of his way so he can score.’ And I work hard to maintain that edge, I promise.”
“You could have been an All-American in college, maybe a Heisman winner, and an All-Pro in the NFL. Coaches all across America would have been drooling at the thought of you playing for them. Your mom would’ve helped you fill in any money gaps, too. I bet she all but begged you to continue your education.”
He shifted to a sitting position. “She did. She even offered to sell the farm and move into Smallville so I could go.”
“But you didn’t let her do that.”
The silhouette of his face turned away from her and he whispered, “No. I didn’t.”
“And I’m sure you had the best of reasons and the purest of motives.”
He turned to face her in the dark. “That sounds almost sarcastic.”
“It’s not meant to be, I promise. I mean every syllable of it. You proved yourself to be loyal and self-sacrificing and you stayed with her because you love her.” She sat up and put her feet on the floor. “But we’re getting off topic. You’re the most capable man I’ve ever met, Clark. And you care more deeply about right and wrong than anyone else I’ve ever known. I can see what Mayson sees in you. And I’m sure that she thinks she’s the best woman in the world for you.”
“But you don’t agree.”
“That’s your call, not mine. But I can tell you for an absolute certainty that if Lex had your physical talents, he’d want to rule the country. Maybe even the entire world – or at least all of North America.”
A grace note of humor crept into his voice. “Then I guess it’s a good thing he doesn’t have them.”
“That’s probably the understatement of the decade. God certainly knew what He was doing when you got those gifts instead of Lex.”
He tensed a little and she didn’t understand why. If she could have used Lex’ money to rebuild the Planet, to update it and save everyone’s jobs, she would have done it in a heartbeat. But she didn’t control that much of her – of Lex’ wealth. If she had—
Blast it! Life wasn’t fair.
If she’d met Clark six years ago, she’d never have married that sentient slimeball. Lucy would still be alive. And she wouldn’t be trudging toward a court date that would shatter her world, assuming she survived the experience.
But then, if life were fair, you could shoot teenagers if they got too snotty.
*****
The car was what bad novelists would call “too quiet.” Neither of them spoke after Lois verified the route she’d take toward Denver. Clark wanted to reach out and hold her hand, to caress her cheek, to stroke her hair, anything for the physical contact with her.
But he didn’t do any of those things.
Lois sat tensed up behind the wheel, driving the car with uncharacteristic abruptness at every turn, every lane change, every stop and start. The previous day, her shifting had been race-car smooth. Now it was sharp and jangly, and twice she clashed the gears as she accelerated.
He wanted to comfort her, to ease her pain, to release her tension, but he didn’t know how he could without revealing too much of his heart to her. Not only that, but she’d made him nervous the night before as she’d talked about how well he’d done getting them this far. He knew he’d put her off by shutting down and not discussing her thoughts with her, but he had no idea how to have that discussion without admitting that she was more right than she knew.
A sign flew by, telling them that Denver was only forty-two miles away.
About an hour, maybe a little more with downtown traffic.
And she’d be gone from his life.
They’d been so quiet for so long that one word from her startled him. “Clark?”
His head spun around and his eyes sought out the threat – but there wasn’t one.
She frowned at him. “Clark, are you okay?”
He took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Yes, I’m fine. I was in my own little world and you startled me.”
“I’m sorry.”
“No problem. What is it?”
“Um – I think we should make a pit stop pretty soon. And I think you should drive the rest of the way. I don’t want to get shot because some overly excited rookie marshal gets suspicious because the witness is driving the detective instead of the other way around.”
He nodded. “Sure. First place we see?”
“First one that looks like it has indoor plumbing.”
He smiled. “That’s right, you’re not exactly an outhouse kind of girl.”
She seemed to relax a bit. “No. That’s for girls who hunt deer with their men and can pack them overland to the pickup truck with one arm.”
“Okay. Castle Rock is just ahead. I’m sure they have real pipes with water in them.”
“Just as long as it goes ‘whoosh’ when you press the right lever.”
*****
Francisco Ybarra frowned at the man across the outside table from him. Francisco didn’t like sitting and waiting, especially with one Matt Durham, a small man with a pockmarked face and a foul mouth. Durham cursed at his food, at the chair he sat in, at the small diner where they were watching, at the waitress who only wanted to refill his coffee cup, at life in general and anything specific in it. His only redeeming qualities were that he followed orders to the letter and wouldn’t back down from anyone.
Francisco still didn’t like him.
But he was given no choice in the matter.
They were supposed to look for a Plymouth PT Cruiser, a car Francisco didn’t know but which Durham did. And they were also to be on the lookout for Lois Lane-Luthor, who Durham couldn’t have picked out of a lineup with a cheat sheet but who Francisco would recognize no matter how she’d changed her appearance. He’d worked for her husband for a year before being sent west to keep him out of the Lucy Lane murder investigation. A witness Francisco hadn’t noticed in the back of the store had given the police a good description of him, so after meeting with Mrs. Luthor the next day, he’d boarded a Greylines bus to Denver.
He didn’t like Denver at all. And he hated Castle Rock.
There was the snow. There was the cold. There was the wind. There was the smog. Metropolis had all of those qualities, but not in the abundance that Denver did. There were no decent diversions for a man of his East Coast tastes. And he’d yet to find a decent burrito anywhere in the city.
A man could eat only so much pizza and venison before his stomach rebelled.
A car crunched the gravel near the gas pumps and stopped. A tall, dark-haired young man with wide shoulders got out of the passenger seat and began filling the tank. At the same time, a dark-haired young woman stepped out of the driver’s seat and tossed the keys over the car’s roof to the man. He heard her say, “Be back in a minute,” and the man nodded to her.
As she came around the back of the car, he felt his eyes pop open. He quickly turned away from her and tried to push his jacket up around his ears.
Durham saw his reaction and frowned. “What are you doing?”
Francisco waited until the woman entered the store proper before answering. “That’s our target,” he muttered.
The other man glanced toward the gas pumps and scowled. “Wrong car. That’s a classic Mustang. They wouldn’t be dumb enough to drive that around.”
“I’m telling you the woman who just went inside is Mrs. Luthor!”
Durham rolled his eyes. “Fine. You call it in. I’m getting another beer. You want one?”
“Stay here!” he hissed. “I’m calling in now.”
The man’s frown deepened. “You phone it in if you want to. I’m getting a =bleep= beer. =Bleep-bleep= this =bleep= baby-sitting detail.”
Durham rose and stalked to the store’s door. Francisco thought about calling to him, but decided not to risk alerting the targets. He lifted his burner phone and pushed the button for the single programmed call number.
“Hello? Yeah, this is Ybarra. Yes, Castle Rock just south of Denver! The targets are here! I said the targets – no I’m not drunk! I just saw Mrs. Luthor! Looks like they’re headed to Denver. What? Engage? Just the two of us? Look, I heard about this guy. He – Fine! I’ll be as quiet as I can be! Just get someone here fast! Right, right. I will.”
Francisco put the phone away and took a deep breath. He quickly decided the best way to take them was to get up and walk behind Mrs. Luthor when she left the store. The cop with her wouldn’t risk her getting hurt, and they could wait for the backup he’d called for—
Then he heard a woman’s voice scream “Kent!”
And everything came apart at the seams.
Last edited by Terry Leatherwood; 05/16/17 06:03 AM. Reason: add italics
