“Did I? Well, I’m probably right.”
“About which one?”
“Both of them. Maybe Naomi shot him the first time and Trina shot him the second time. Or maybe they were in on it together.” Bitty turned around in her seat to look at me. “It’s possible, you know.”
“But not probable.”
“Pfft!” said Bitty with a wave of her hand, and she turned back around and adjusted the AC vent. “What do you think, Rayna?”
“I think someone should be writing all this down. Just the facts, though. About their relationships with Race, how the cottage looks, where he was found, the panties left behind—what was on your mind about the lights, Trinket?”
She glanced up at me in the rearview mirror. I wasn’t sure if I was imagining things, but decided it wouldn’t hurt to verbalize my theory.
“Well, standing in the alcove, I could see into the bedroom pretty well. It occurred to me that at night with the lights off, someone in the bedroom wouldn’t be able to see me well, or at all. Maybe Naomi was telling the truth when she said she couldn’t see who shot Race.”
Leather made a snicking sound as Bitty turned around in the seat again to look at me. “Are you defending Naomi?”
“No. I’m just presenting an alternate theory of how things might have happened.”
“Write down the facts,” Rayna said again, and I reached for the notebook we had brought with us. The ballpoint pen stuck in the notebook’s metal rings took a moment to produce ink, and I made several scribbles before getting it to flow correctly.
“So what should I start with?” I asked when I was ready.
“Describe the cottage interior,” Rayna said at almost the same time Bitty said, “Tell how shifty Trina and Trisha were being.”
I paused. Then I decided to go with Rayna's dictation. It was no contest, really. I wrote down the details of the alcove, living room, and bedroom, including the panties on the floor. I also included that the night of the murder, there had been no lights on in the front room, just the bedroom. Then I read it back to them.
“You didn’t include about Trina and Trisha being shifty,” Bitty complained.
“I just didn’t get to that yet,” I lied. “What else?”
“Maybe note that the only outside help they have come in are two employees. Oh, and the deliverymen from Sharita’s catering.”
“Sharita’s really building up her business,” I said while I wrote down Rayna's suggestions. “She’s likely to turn into a corporation one day.”
“Like that Mrs. Fields,” Bitty said. “Sharita’s baking makes Mrs. Fields’ cookies taste like they’re made from sawdust.”
I agreed. Then I looked up at Rayna and waited for her next suggestion. It took a while. All of us went quiet as we mentally replayed our time at Madewell Courts in an effort to pick out anything unusual. Or “off the wall” as Gaynelle had said.
Something struck me while I went back over all that happened, but I couldn’t quite put my finger on it. There had been something said that didn’t ring true. But what was it? Ah. I hate it when that happens. I’m always afraid it’s a sign of impending senility. Usually it’s just imbecility.
“Did you write down that Trina and Trisha were acting shifty?” Bitty asked after a moment, and I sighed.
“I’m doing that now,” I said, and started writing.
Just as my pen hit the paper, the SUV jerked forward on the road and I made a long black line across my notes and nearly bumped my head on the front seat headrest.
“Hey,” I started to protest when the SUV bounced forward again. I threw my arms up to keep from hitting the back of the front seat, lost paper and pen, and gagged as the shoulder strap of the seatbelt yanked hard across my neck and throat.
Rayna started cussing, and I saw her yank hard at the steering wheel as we were tossed around inside the vehicle. Bitty’s head bobbled like one of those dolls on a spring people stick to their dashboards. I grabbed hold of the handle above the door as the SUV rocked from side to side, then it suffered another seizure in a lurching jump forward.
“Someone keeps hitting us in the rear!” Rayna screamed as she tried to keep the top-heavy car upright. “Who is that?” I craned my neck as best I could with the seat belt restraining me and caught a glimpse of a black truck. It looked huge. Chrome everywhere. Tinted windows. Dust a haze in the air. Engine roaring, sounding like a train engine, noise and fear all jumbled up together in a passing collage of images. My body jerked every time the truck hit us, and I held on for dear life.
“They’re trying to knock us off the road!” I shouted back at Rayna. “Pull over!”
“I can’t! We’ll go in a ditch!”
I looked out the window. My stomach turned over. Steep red banks fell away from the narrow road, cushioned here and there by kudzu-covered trees and bushes. There was no shoulder, nowhere to go but down an abrupt drop to a wooded creek. If we stayed on the road, maybe we could outrun the maniac behind us. If we went over the side—it wouldn’t be good.
“Duck, Trinket!” I heard Bitty yell at me, and even as I ducked I wondered why. In the next instant I heard an ear-shattering
boom!
and the crackling sound of breaking glass. Another boom immediately followed it, then another. Tires screeched, rocks and gravel shot into the air, and the big black truck fell back. The smell of sulphur and cordite was suddenly strong, and my ears rang.
When I glanced up, I saw why.
Bitty had a gun as big as a small rifle held in one of her hands and braced on the back of the front seat. With her other hand, she held on to the headrest for dear life. She had the most determined expression on her face I’ve ever seen; I saw her lift the gun again and automatically ducked for cover.
Kaboom!
This time it worked. I peeked over the backseat. The black truck braked to a stop in the middle of the road.
“Yee-haw!” Bitty hollered so loudly I could hear her even through the ringing in my ears. “Come get some more, you sonuvabitch!”
“
Oh noooo
,” Rayna screamed loudly, and I turned back just in time to see a big wall of kudzu loom right in front of the SUV. She jerked the wheel hard left, and the SUV went to the right, dipped, back wheels spinning, and the engine died. Kudzu leaves pressed hard against the windows as we smacked into whatever was hidden behind the tangled vines. My body slammed hard against the car door. Then it got very quiet.
I drew in a deep breath. Dust and smoke rose up around the vehicle. Bitty had been tossed to the floorboard. Rayna sat like a statue behind the steering wheel. I saw her nostrils flare in and out.
“Are we all right?” I asked in a loud whisper. My ears still rang, and all sound was barely audible. I saw Rayna's head turn and her lips move.
“Don’t anyone move. Stay on the floorboard, Bitty.”
“I dropped my gun,” came a muffled voice from the front floorboards. “Do you see it?”
“Yes. Be still.”
“Like this?” Bitty snapped. “My ass is on the floor and my feet are hanging over the backseat!”
It was true. I saw her Aigner flats dangle near my face.
“Listen to me, dammit! The rear end of this truck is hanging over the edge of the road and if you—oh!”
A low rumbling beneath the SUV made the entire vehicle quiver, and slowly, slowly, it began to slide backward. As if in a made-for-TV movie I saw the kudzu leaves shudder and fall away as we began to slide down and down, it seeming to happen in slow motion.
“Hang on!” someone screamed, then there was nothing but chaos, red dirt, an ear-splitting shrieking of metal, and the smell of fear thick in the air. With a nauseating roll and drop, we bounced down the side of the ravine like a child’s toy. I remember thinking that this wasn’t a nice way to die, then we slammed hard against something and everything went dark.
CHAPTER 10
I don’t know what woke me. It could have been that I was hanging upside-down from my seat belt like a vampire bat and all the blood had rushed to my head. Or it could have been the strong smell of gasoline. Or even that my seatbelt was cutting into my boobs and making it hard to breathe. Whatever it was, I knew I had to get us all out of that SUV.
The vehicle was tilted at an odd angle, kind of nose-down and leaning to the driver’s side. Red dirt and crushed kudzu were all I could see out that side, so that left the passenger side as a possibility. If I could get my window open, maybe I could unfasten my seatbelt, then unfasten Rayna's, and get us both out. Rayna slumped over the steering wheel, her face turned toward me, her eyes closed. A fine white glow covered her, and for a moment I panicked. Was she dead? Could it be that people . . . glow . . .right after they die? Then I saw her deflated airbag. It cushioned her head against the steering wheel. When her nostrils flared slightly I knew that she was breathing. But Bitty?
My heart lurched. Her door was ajar. Had she been thrown out and . . . and been rolled over?
Ohgodohgodohgod,
I started praying in a kind of moan, let her be okay!
I fumbled around for the latch to the seatbelt, but it was really difficult. Since I was sort of just hanging there, I had to do it blindly, feel around for the latch by twisting my arm backward. It took forever, but finally I found it. Then it took another forever before I could get the blasted thing to free the metal latch that held me suspended. When it finally slid free, I immediately dropped like a stone.
Now I was half-on, half-off the seat and in the floorboard. My right arm bent at an odd angle, and when I tried to use it to push up, sharp pain shot up all the way to my shoulder. I yelped.
Maybe my yelp woke Rayna. She stirred slightly, her eyelids fluttered, and from my awkward position, I could see her try to push away from the steering wheel.
“Wha—?” she muttered in confusion.
“We ran off the road,” I said, only it came out all smushy for some reason. That was when I realized I must have smacked my face on something, because my lips were swollen and I’d bitten my tongue. I tasted blood. It was not nice.
Rayna shifted position slightly. Then she seemed to really come to, because she immediately leaned forward and turned off the SUV’s ignition. It must have been an automatic reflex.
“Bitty? Trinket?” She sounded hoarse.
“Trinket here. Bitty not. You okay?” It was the best I could manage with my lips all puffy and my tongue uncooperative and painful.
“Yeah . . . I think . . . so.”
I tried my door, but the handle didn’t budge. Nor did my window roll down since the engine was off. I would have to get out the front door, if possible.
“Must find Bitty,” I got out, and managed to scoot slightly so I could loop my left arm around the back of the front passenger seat. Pain shot through me every time I tried to use my right arm, so I decided to listen to my body and desist. It was clumsy using just my left hand and arm, and took a lot more effort than it should have, but finally I managed to pull myself up so I could get my legs under me.
By this time I was sweating. Perspiring is too gentle a word for the stuff that poured off my body in rivers. Heat shimmered beyond the wrecked SUV, coming up in visible waves off the red dirt rock scraped free of kudzu. The inside of the vehicle was an oven, and we were slowly being baked to a crisp. I didn’t want to be crispy. I wanted to be my familiar soggy self.
“Come on,” I said to Rayna as I worked my way toward the opening between the two front seats. “We need to get out.”
Rayna shook her head. “I . . . can’t. My arm is trapped . . . my left foot is stuck.”
“I’ll try to get you free.”
“No . . . my foot is wedged in by the wheel well . . .. It will need . . . to be cut free.”
“Where’s your cell?” For the first time I regretted not having my own cell phone. It would certainly come in handy about now.
“Don’t know. Somewhere.”
Rayna still sounded hazy and slightly confused. Even through the white powder coating her face and arms, I could tell she was pale. Her eyes looked like huge smudges in her face.
With my left arm I grabbed the front of the passenger bucket seat and pulled until I inched forward down to my waist. Getting my hips through the opening would be the trick. Maybe I should have refused that last muffin at breakfast. Or the countless muffins I’d eaten in the past few months. Not to mention the one cup of sugar ratio to two quarts of sweet tea that I drank regularly.
None of which helped at this moment.
I huffed, I puffed, I wiggled and squirmed. I panted and swore, then prayed for a miracle. Lo and behold! Just as I was giving up on ever squeezing thirty-eight inches of hips through a twelve inch opening, I shot through like I’d been greased. I landed with my face on the passenger floorboard. A crumpled airbag cushioned my landing. It tasted awful. I didn’t care.
I rested a moment after my exertions, and then tried to free Rayna. It was futile. As she had said, her left foot was wedged tightly into the damaged wheel well of the vehicle. It would take the jaws of life to free her, I was pretty sure.
I contorted my fifty-one plus body into an aching position no human has ever tried before. While I do not recommend it, I did succeed in slithering very close to the open passenger door. It’s amazing what determination, desperation, and downright idiocy can do. My body would never be the same. But at last I launched myself free of the SUV and into a patch of nettles.
“Ouch, ouch, ouch,” I said. Then I added a few obscenities I shall not repeat here. It took a minute or two of sticky, stinging effort to get to my feet, but I did it. By that time I was really breathing hard and fast. I had a stitch in my side, my right arm was useless, and I’d lost a shoe. I limped over to the SUV still leaning heavily to the left, and reached up into the floorboard. Maybe Bitty’s cell phone was there. Or Rayna's. At that point, I would have borrowed a cell phone from Jack the Ripper if he’d ambled past.
No such luck. Rayna looked at me and smiled weakly. That cut straight to my gut.
No!
By god, I was going to get us all out of here, even if I had to drag Bitty from under this damn SUV myself! We were all going to survive this. And when we did, next time Bitty went to the pistol range, I was going with her.