“I saw her, dammit!”
“Well, I didn’t.”
I let it go. We could come back another time. If she wasn’t lying in the middle of the road, or unconscious on the shoulder, I probably hadn’t hit her. Or else, if I had struck her, she’d been rescued by a Good Samaritan, though I didn’t recall any vehicles going by.
“Okay.” Damn, I hurt. “Get my helmet off. Everything moves okay; there’s no back or neck injury. It’s okay to take it off.”
Remi freed me, set the helmet aside. “Don’t get up!”
Because I was trying. I got as far as sitting, stared down the road. “My bike.”
“Forget about the bike! You need a hospital.”
I made an awkward attempt to climb to my feet. Remi called me all kinds of names, but in the end he helped me up.
“I’m okay,” I told him again, holding myself stiffly and trying not to overbalance one direction or the other. “I’m—I’m gonna hurt like hell tomorrow, a few days after, but this is why I wear all the leather and a helmet. This isn’t the first time I’ve wrecked.”
Though none of them had been this . . . this extravagantly dramatic.
McCue said nothing, just stared at me.
I ran a gloved hand through my hair, scrubbed, unstuck it from my head. “Let’s go look for my bike.”
“We’re not looking for your bike, dammit! We’re waiting for the ambulance.”
I improvised. “They said an ambulance is thirty minutes out. And it’ll take twenty or so back.”
“Christ,” Remi muttered. “Okay, let’s not wait. I’ll take you to the hospital myself. Can you make it across the road?”
I made it across the road. Remi hovered, but saw I was walking okay, if stiffly. I managed to haul myself up into the passenger seat, and McCue closed the door for me.
As he turned the engine over, I inspected my left-side leathers. Sleeve was badly scuffed, but the pants showed significant damage with leather scraped thin from hip to knee. My left boot was deeply scuffed. I rubbed a hand up and down my left arm, checking for pain, then pulled off my gloves.
Yup, I hurt like hell already. Bruised underneath the leathers, probably some scrapes as well, but I wasn’t broken.
We were about ten yards down the road when I asked McCue to stop, and it pissed him off. I’d never seen him angry before, just irritated.
He shot me a disbelieving glance, then turned his attention back to the road. “I’ll come look for your bike tomorrow, okay? I’m just thinking about you right now.”
I explained the facts of life in Motorcycle Land. “If we leave it, even if they can’t lift it—and they can’t; it’s a heavy son of a bitch—people will steal parts. Strip it. I need to see where it is, see if it’s hidden well enough until we can get someone out to collect it.” I paused. “It left the road right about here. See the broken branches?”
“Will you shut up if I stop?”
“Yes.”
McCue pulled over on the shoulder and parked. “Stay here. Wait here. I’ll look. I don’t need you staggering around in a forest and keeling over when it all catches up to you. Don’t want to haul your tough-guy black-leather ass back to the truck.”
I shut up. Remi scowled at me, then went off to track the path of my bike.
I leaned my head against the window. Okay, yeah, the truck seat was better than hiking around a forest. The aches were ramping up.
Remi remained gone for some time, and I began to fret. And when he showed up, his expression verged on blank.
“Nobody can strip it,” he told me. “No one can reach it.”
“What?”
“There’s a ravine.”
I was horrified. “My bike’s in a ravine?”
“And there’s a creek at the bottom. Lots of boulders.”
I felt numb. “No. No no no. You’re shitting me.”
He shook his head. “I’m not. I’m sorry.”
I planted my elbow on the arm rest, stuck my head in my right hand, and closed my eyes. I wanted to mourn my bike. But I hurt too much, and I was concerned about the woman.
The woman who had been there.
And then it occurred to me that maybe she hadn’t been there at all.
Or, at least, not a human.
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
It was quiet in Remi’s truck. I heard only the engine, the rumble of the road. I’d carefully shifted positions any number of times, uncomfortable. I’d become more certain that I hadn’t broken anything, but skin and muscles were definitely insulted, and it was difficult to remain in one position for much longer than a few minutes.
I was biding my time before I told Remi we weren’t going to a hospital. I had my ammo ready to go.
I shifted again. Needed distraction. “How about some tunes?”
Remi shot me a glance, smiling, then reached forward to turn on the radio.
Sure enough, shrill, twanging country. Should have known it. I thought about asking him to find another station, but it was his truck, after all, and I’d learned long before that, in the succinct words of a TV character: Driver picks the music, shotgun shuts his cakehole.
Then that song came on. “Okay,” I said, on a stuttered breath, “tell me the truth.”
He glanced at me, frowning. “Yeah?”
“Mamas and cowboys and babies. You know—this song. You know it?”
“Willie Nelson, Waylon Jennings. It’s a classic.”
I thought about it a minute. “Doesn’t it bother you? A song suggesting babies should never grow up to be cowboys? I mean, isn’t that against the code, or something?”
Remi smiled for the first time since I’d wrecked my bike. “Well, that’s not actually what the song is about. And a lot of us flipped it.”
I started to turn my head toward him, stopped because my neck hurt. “Flipped it?”
He was looking through the windshield, but his smile grew wider, broke into a grin. “Mamas, don’t let your cowboys grow up to be babies.”
Hah. Very clever. And it provided the perfect opening. “So, you’ve been hurt a lot riding all those animals?”
“Bulls and broncs? Well, for me most injuries have been bruises, maybe a couple of broken ribs now and then, stretched ligaments in an arm. Other cowboys sometimes run into something a little more serious, but for the most part it’s nothing we can’t take care of ourselves after a quick look-see with paramedics at the arena.”
“You all opt for the hospital when it’s bumps and bruises?”
He rolled his eyes. “Okay, okay. I get it.”
“Suck it up tough, huh? Cowboy tough?”
“We are tough.”
“Okay,” I said amicably, “the same can be said about bikers. And that’s why I called Lily, not 911.”
He shook his head. “You’re an asshole.”
I grinned. “Yes. I am.”
* * *
—
By the time we reached Lily’s rig at the RV campground, I could barely move. Remi opened my door, took a good look, said he’d get me down.
I told him to go to hell.
He ignored me.
And so it took Remi’s aid to get me out of the truck no matter what I preferred. Lily descended the motorhome steps part way through the attempt. She eyed me up and down, assessing my condition, then told Remi to take me into the garage and have me sit on the cot.
The first order of business was to learn medication allergies. I said I had none. Then it was family medical history—and I told her, rather sharply, that the history probably didn’t matter because, hey, I wasn’t human, was I?
Then she told me to take off my jacket, which I did with great care. Followed by holster. Then, I was told, it was t-shirt and leather pants.
I stared at her. “What?”
�
��Take off your t-shirt and your pants. I need to check out bruises, scrapes, etc.”
“I’m bruised, and I have scrapes. Okay? Nothing new.”
She was adamant. “T-shirt.”
Remi stood all of two feet away, watching over Lily’s shoulder. He’d put his hat elsewhere, and his head looked naked, hair standing up from his efforts to undo hat hair.
I sat on the edge of the cot, let down from its position against the wall. “I just want a hot shower, then ice.”
“And you shall have them,” she said. “But first let me treat the contusions and scrapes. There is no weakness in it; d’ye think many brave men have scorned a women’s touch after battle?”
Well, me laying a bike down wasn’t exactly battle. “I really only need a hot shower and a bed. I’ll just head back to—” And I stopped. Because now I lacked the freedom of my own transport.
Remi wasn’t laughing or smiling. “Let her take a look,” he said, “and I’ll chauffeur us both back to the bar.”
I’d lost eighteen months with the bike, a year after I’d bought it. And it wasn’t just the bike in and of itself, but what it represented: the me who had been, the me I yet might be. The me I’d never be again.
I made a valiant attempt to shed t-shirt, which was seriously uncomfortable since it required lifting my arms. The true difficulty arose as I realized that I simply couldn’t do for myself. I needed Lily. I needed Remi. They worked me out of the tee, and I was bare-chested.
Okay, so a few bruises and scrapes. Minor road rash, seeping lymph-diluted blood a little. My left elbow, a strip down the side of my forearm, tenderness low on the left-side ribs. Red bruises were blooming as broken blood vessels made themselves known.
Lily used alcohol wipes on the scrapes, which only added insult to injury. I sucked in a hissing breath, then glared.
She smoothed antibiotic ointment over the scrapes. “All right. Off with the pants.”
“I’m not taking off my pants!”
She shook her head, scoffed. “I’ve slept with a thousand men. D’ye think you’ve got anything they hadn’t?”
I looked at Remi in appeal, but he was no help at all. In fact, he was studiously looking elsewhere.
I caught Lily’s eyes and glared. “You may have slept with a thousand men, but none of them was me.”
After a startled moment, she laughed in joyous abandon. Then she told me I could take off my pants willingly, or she’d cut them off.
Okay, taking them off was going to be a challenge. I was stiffening more and more by the minute. But I got them unzipped and shoved down past my hips, refusing help. Fortunately my boxer briefs were intact.
More contusions. Point of hip, knee, also seeping a little. I had a few dings on my right side from tumbling, but most of the damage was confined to my left.
“Aren’t you the fortunate man,” Lily observed, wielding wipes again, followed up by the ointment.
“Considering what could have happened, yeah.” I worked the pants back over my hips, asked for my t-shirt. It wasn’t easy to put on, but I managed it.
Lily looked me up and down. “You know the RICE protocol?”
“I’ve been banged up before, you know. Rest, Ice, Compress, Elevate. I can’t very well elevate my whole body, but I’ll go for the others, okay?”
“You can stay the night here,” she offered.
Just what I wanted; sharing grunts of effort, the hissing expulsion of breath if I moved too quickly, with a woman who reveled in war. And I was pretty damn sure her offer wasn’t an offer. “Thanks, but no. I’ll head over to the roadhouse.” I looked at Remi, hating my lack of freedom. I’d only just gotten it back.
He looked back. “If it were me, you wouldn’t fret over giving me a ride. Well, I’m not frettin’ over giving you a ride.”
He didn’t understand. Unless he’d been in prison, he couldn’t. Everything there was regimented. Everything. Now I was free of it. Riding the bike almost 1,300 miles had given me myself back.
Lily dug something out of one of the cabinets, handed me two pill bottles. “Tramadol,” she said. “Painkiller. Be sure to take it with food, otherwise you’ll vomit all night. The other is Flexeril, a muscle relaxant. You’ll be stiff tomorrow.”
In the movies, the hero would turn down medication, intending to tough it out. But I was no hero, and I knew how I felt now, how I’d feel the next day. I took the bottles.
“RICE,” Lily reminded.
“I got it.” Now I was getting testy and tried to soften my tone. “Thanks, Lily.”
Remi pulled the truck remote from his pocket and walked back into the RV living quarters with me on his heels. I didn’t wear either holster or jacket; less to take off when we got to the Zoo.
McCue had the RV door open when he stopped short on the first step. I started to ask him what the hell he was doing, since I almost walked into him, but then he descended the rest of the steps, and I saw at the bottom a manila envelope.
Shit. Shit.
I turned, walked back into the living room and eased myself into the recliner. Remi came up behind me, pulled the door closed.
Lily looked perplexed. I warned her this wasn’t going to be pretty.
McCue tore open the envelope, removed a note, read it then handed it to me. Once again letters cut from various sources. Two words only: And another.
Remi slid the photo from the envelope, looked briefly, closed his eyes. I took it from him.
Another woman, messily dead. I didn’t linger on the image, just turned over the photo. Again in red ink, a name: Annie.
Lily took the photo from me and studied it. I remembered then that as Goddess of Battles such images were familiar and probably would not bother her.
She said, “This is not new to you.”
“The envelopes began arriving a few days ago,” Remi explained. “At first just notes. Said ‘I know who you are,’ then what we are. Now two photographs. We were going to mail the first to the police, but it was in Gabe’s saddlebags and the bike’s in a creek at the bottom of a ravine. Though now we have this one. You see anything in the local papers?”
“No,” Lily said firmly. “Nothing at all about murdered women, and you know the news would be full of it with reporters descending on us. The time is spent on the killings at Wupatki.” She handed the photo back to Remi, who slid it and the note back into the envelope. “I don’t think this happened locally.”
Remi nodded. “I’ll get on the computer, try a few searches under various keywords. I might turn up reports.”
I shook my head, anxious. “How is this guy finding us? It’s almost like he’s tracking us with a GPS unit, or stalking us. Two envelopes delivered to the Zoo, one to us at the chapel outside of town—” And then I remembered. “Our beacons. Grandaddy said hell could find us.”
Lily’s expression was solemn. “And so you are found. And followed. You are safe here, safe in the Zoo. And at Wupatki, because you cleared it.”
Well, no—Greg had. But I opted not to say anything.
“Sunset Crater,” Remi said, sounding tense. “It was a second black dog. We killed it, then cleared the area.”
“The chapel,” I added. “We installed a protective circle. Remi reconsecrated the building, then consecrated the earth surrounding it. It can’t be burned.”
“And so the photos.” Lily nodded. “I believe this is called gaslighting. Psychological manipulation.”
“But why us?” I asked. “I mean, we’re barely born. Newbies, as you said.”
“Oh, not just you,” Lily replied. “I’m sure this is happening elsewhere, if not in the same fashion. But especially you, yes. Newbies or not.”
“Especially us?” Remi asked. “Why especially us?”
Lily looked at each of us. “You were born on the same day, at nearly the same hour, minute, second. Tha
t is of significance.”
“Again, why?” I asked.
“Because it’s never happened before. No one, including the angels, quite knows what you are, or who you’ll be. I imagine you are at the top of the demon hit list for no reason other than that.”
I felt a chill pimple my flesh. “And the angels? Are we on their hit list, too? If no one knows what or who we are, including the angels, wouldn’t it be safer just to kill us?”
Lily shrugged, utterly matter-of-fact. “Oh, I’m sure some will try.” She flicked a bright glance at Remi. “Might could even succeed.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
The ride back to the bar, a mile away, was short. The only thing said at all was a comment Remi made. “Guess we don’t have to mail the new photo to the cops.”
Remi’s computer search might turn up something. I thought at first it would indicate the surrogate’s whereabouts, then remembered we received the notes and photos locally. I supposed it might be two demons, with one doing the killing while the other delivered the envelopes. Hell, if we were at the top of a hit list, maybe dozens of demons were after us. It all began the night Remi and I put on the rings; the next night the hot blonde with the whackjob eyes had nearly killed me.
Or maybe it was angels.
I didn’t want to think about that. I just didn’t. Angels were supposed to be the good guys. But Greg had planted the idea, and it hadn’t gone away. On one hand, if Grandaddy were right, it made no sense that angels would want to kill us—unless what Lily said was true, and Greg, that none of them knew what McCue and I were capable of.
Then again, we didn’t know what we were capable of.
The parking lot was crowded as we turned into it. At twilight, bar-goers headed out, even on weekdays. It was a social activity, and offered escape for many into beer or the hard stuff.
It was now habit for us to park in the back, though this time it was only the truck. And that made me anxious all over again. Landing in a creek might have softened the bike’s impact. It would most likely need a lot of work, depending on the damage, but some motorcycle mechanics are wizards.
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