by Paula Boyd
Still, no words, but I could sense a building tension in the room. I chose to interpret it as agreement with my assessment. “Well, these things happen. Mistakes are made,” I said, trying to sound very agreeable, understanding and accommodating. “There is an easy way out of it though.”
I waited for a response, but there was none, and it is really hard carrying on a conversation with yourself when you can’t see who is in the room—or even what kind of room it is. I envisioned a crappy little house at the edge of town with some dumb guys who’ve screwed up and don’t know how to get out of it. “Tell you what, guys,” I said, sounding pretty calm if I do say so myself. “Let’s all just hop back in the car and drive around for a while. You don’t have to go very far, just make it seem like it. I have no idea where I am and don’t care.” I was on a roll now. “You can just drop me off somewhere. I haven’t seen any of you or anything for that matter. Other than tying me up and making me sick, you’ve been perfect gentlemen. Just put me out near a convenience store or some place with a phone and we’ll forget any of this ever happened. Okay?”
Shuffling, mumbling, whispering and rustling sounds told me they might actually be thinking about it.
“If we stop this right now, we’re all safe. However, if I turn up missing, people will look for me, one thing will lead to another and you’ll be in for the long haul.”
More foot shuffling and throat clearing. Hopefully they were also doing a few affirmative nods and hand signals, ones that directed somebody to do something that got me out of the mess alive. To further them along in that direction, I said, “Here’s an idea—”
Someone grabbed me by the arm and dragged me across the room. I stumbled along behind him, wishing I could see where I was going. The shag carpet turned to a hard surface, maybe linoleum that felt gritty beneath my feet. Probably the kitchen.
I heard a door open and felt a whoosh of fresh air. I stumbled outside just as a car engine cranked up. I was put back in the car, and even though I was seated upright this time, it seemed to smell even worse than before. I suppose they noticed it too, because I heard coughing and windows rolling down. Then I heard the clank of cylinders and the happy hiss.
An arm wrapped around my shoulders and gripped my head as another hand forced the cup over my nose.
Aw, geez, not again…
Chapter
Fourteen
“Jolene!”
I heard the voice and knew it was my mother’s, but I couldn’t respond to it.
“What have you been doing in here? You smell like vomit. Have you been drinking? Are you drunk? I leave the house for five minutes and look what I come back to. You did this once when you were a kid. You thought I didn’t know about it, but I did. You didn’t pull one over on me like you thought you did. You were sick as a dog then too. And now here you are, a grown woman. Why, I cannot believe it. Now, you get up off that couch and get yourself into the bathroom and get cleaned up. This is just pitiful.”
With a concerted effort, I raised my hands to my head, threaded my fingers through my hair, and pulled. “Ow!” Yes, this was real. Of course, it could be just a dream and I was only imagining that I pulled my hair. I groaned and pulled again, trying to drag myself back into assured reality. Nah, it really hurt. My eyes felt glued shut but I managed to crack the lids apart slightly. Wiping the hair away from my face, I saw the fuzzy image of my mother standing above me.
“Oh, my Lord!” Lucille shrieked. “What on earth happened to your face!”
I tried not to move too fast and slid my hands to my cheeks, then upward. My forehead stung like sunburn. So did the skin around my mouth. And my lips, I realized, were raw and swollen. And it was sticky.
“Half your eyebrows are gone!”
“The wonders of duct tape,” I muttered, making the connection without really understanding why. Part of my brain was working, but it was not firing on all cylinders. How did I get back here? What happened after the last gassing? How’d I remember that? What time is it? Then, somehow the jumper cables connected to my brain, the engine turned over and I just knew. “Call Jerry. Tell him I was kidnapped.”
“What!”
Autopilot was kicking in. “Lock all the doors. Get your gun.”
“What!” Her voice escalated into a shriek.
Lucille was exactly one more “what” away from serious panic. I couldn’t blame her. I wasn’t sure I believed what had happened and I’d been there for it. I took a deep breath and pushed myself upright, gingerly opening my eyes as wide as I could and trying to blink the room into focus. No focus. God, I had a hangover and I hadn’t even been drinking. “Gas. Must have been the gas. ” I had to get some kind of control over the nausea so I could think. “I need Benadryl and water.”
Mother stood there for a few seconds, just staring, then scurried off and brought it back to me. I took a whole tablet instead of my usual half. I needed help, badly. It would take a good twenty minutes to kick in and we had to get moving now.
“What happened to you, Jolene?” she said, twisting her hands.
Another flood of remembering. “Some men took me from this very couch sometime after you left. I don’t know why. They stuck a mask over my face and gassed me. I don’t remember much after that. I saw things though. Strange things. But my eyes were taped closed so I couldn’t have.” I shook my head. That made no sense. “They took me to a house somewhere, said not a single word to me, then gassed me again and brought me back here. At least that’s all I remember. Oh, and I threw up.”
“Why, that’s, that’s…”
“Hard to believe. Yeah, for me too.” I rubbed my temples and tilted my head slowly to the side to test for vertigo. The room swayed a little but didn’t go into full tilt and whirl. I took that as a good sign. Still, I would be lucky to be able to walk across the room, much less anything else. “What time is it?”
“Around midnight. Fritz just left. Oh, my Lord, Jolene, why on earth would somebody kidnap you? Are you hurt?”
My personal inventory had turned up general muscle soreness but apparently no broken bones. My wrists were definitely sore and being taped up had really pissed me off, and I was sure I was bruised, but there was nothing really serious that I could tell. “Nothing serious. As to why, I don’t know. The only thing I could figure is that they made a mistake.” Then, like a hairspray can to the head, it hit me. I’d been in Mother’s house on Mother’s couch. Oh, my God! They’d meant to get Lucille. “We have to get out of here!”
The urge to jump and run was great, but the resulting falling on my face would hamper our exit so I took it slow and eased myself up. I also tried to keep my voice calm and direct. “Is the car in the garage?”
“Yes,” Lucille said, frozen in place and not looking so very good herself. “I just put it in.”
“Good.”
I pushed myself fully upright and stared straight ahead, trying to get my balance. Whatever they had knocked me out with had not done my system any good. I am highly sensitive to drugs of any variety, including the antihistamine I’d just ingested. Without any nausea to fight, a whole tablet would put me out like a light for at least six hours. Tonight, however, there was plenty to fight and getting sleepy was the least of my worries.
Other than oxygen, nitrogen and helium, the only other gas in a cylinder that I could come up with was nitrous oxide. Laughing gas—like at the dental office—although I didn’t remember anything being the least bit funny. Rounding out my knowledge of NO2 was a newspaper article—actually, I’d only read the headline and the lead—about some idiot falling out a window after recreationally gassing himself at a party. Lost all muscle control and sense of balance and just toppled out. The floor swayed beneath me, confirming that I could encounter a similar fate, but I managed to stay upright. The antihistamine combo might not have been such a great plan after all. “We have to get out of here, Mother, and I can’t drive.” Hell, I couldn’t even walk. “You’ll have to drive us to town. We’ll head to t
he police station in Redwater because it is closer than Bowman City and the road has fewer stretches of open highway.”
Lucille just stood there, staring.
“Mother? Did you hear me?”
Lucille nodded ever so slightly. “To the station.”
“Do not go bonkers on me, Lucille. You have to do this. Go into your room and get your gun.”
“My gun,” she murmured.
Oh, boy. “Your clips are all loaded, right?” I waited for her to nod then repeated what she needed to do. “Go get your gun and all your clips. Bring them in here.”
“In here.”
“Yes. We need to leave so you have to hurry.”
She nodded again but didn’t move.
“The gun, Mother. Now!”
She jumped then stared at me for a second with wide eyes. After a few blinks and a shake of her head, she ran.
While Mother scurried to collect the artillery, I did a more thorough personal damage assessment. I could see again, pretty clearly, which was nice, although I doubted I wanted to venture too close to any mirrors. Standing was going reasonably well and I hadn’t thrown up. Both good points. My mouth tasted horrible and was as dry as cotton so I took a shaky step toward the kitchen, intending to get a drink, then froze. What if they were still in the house, waiting to get Lucille as they’d intended? God, why hadn’t I thought of that first? “Mother!”
She came running into the room, a gun case in one hand and a bulging blue Wal-Mart sack in the other. “What is it?”
“We’ve got to get out of here. Right now. They might still be in here somewhere.”
Lucille’s eyes widened a notch more then began to narrow into a glare. She still looked petrified, but there was a burning ember of mad mixed in, and that was a good sign. “Get my purse, Jolene. It’s right there on the dining room table in front of you. Keys are in the car. I’ll be right there.”
I stumbled to the table and grabbed the purse. “I can’t drive, Mother.”
“Well, I most certainly can,” she said, back to her old self. “You just get yourself in the car. I’m right behind you.”
Using the walls and furniture as makeshift crutches, I ricocheted my way to the garage. Within seconds, we were in the car and headed toward Redwater Falls.
As we pulled out of the drive, I made a quick survey of the neighborhood. A few porch lights, two cars in driveways—and one parked in the street a half block in front of us. Not necessarily anything to worry about. I kept my eye on it anyway. As our headlights glared through the car, I caught a glimpse of what looked like a head above the headrest. Someone was sitting behind the wheel. “Let’s go,” I said, not telling her what I’d seen.
As we passed the dark sedan, its engine revved and the headlights flashed on. The lights went off and on a couple of times and then it lurched forward after us.
Lucille sucked in her breath. “Well, shit!”
“Go, Mother. Just watch in front of you,” I coached. “It’s probably nothing.”
She kept glancing at the rear view mirror anyway. “Nothing, my hind foot! Now, that just makes me mad. Like he was just sitting there waiting on us to leave.”
“Yeah, that’s what bad guys do. We’ve all seen the same movies. Now go!”
“Well, I’ll not have it! Following me like that after I left my very own house. Why, the very nerve.”
Mother’s paralyzing fear had vaporized and in its place was a serious case of rage—one might call it road rage on a technicality, but that’s really kind of limiting for Lucille.
The tailing car rushed up on us, then immediately backed off about ten car lengths—maybe because Lucille punched the gas and sprayed them with half-inch chunks of gravel. Muttering and cursing, Mother proceeded to take the next turn on two wheels. More gravel flew and the Buick fishtailed.
My stomach did the same. I prayed for the Benadryl to kick in, but every punch of the gas pedal and yank of the steering wheel pushed me closer to another unhappy upheaval. Consumed with fighting the nausea, I couldn’t do much looking over my shoulder at the car behind us or worry about how fast—or insanely—Lucille was driving. Both were potentially fatal, but when motion sickness has its hooks in me, I don’t much care about anything else and feel like dying anyway. This would be one of those mixed blessing things.
When we hit the pavement, Lucille punched up into passing gear. And kept it there.
I’d rolled my window down to help stave off the nausea, but the wind noise made the speed even more terrifying. That bugs the size of pigeons were smacking against the windshield like hail was a little disconcerting as well.
“Damn grasshoppers.” Lucille gripped the steering wheel with both hands and leaned forward, her nose just above her clenched fingers, squinting to see through the darkness and bug splatters. “Good thing I know the roads.”
Yes, a good thing, that. I chanced a glance in her direction and had an unfortunate thought, considering the current circumstances. “Did you ever have that last cataract surgery?”
She wiggled her butt in the seat and leaned a half-inch closer to the windshield. “I can see just fine out of my good eye, now shut your mouth so I can concentrate on driving.”
Crap. I’d just survived being kidnapped, gassed twice and manhandled by a smelly ape and now I was going to die in car crash? Seemed kind of anticlimactic.
Since there was only one way to Redwater Falls from Kickapoo and we were on it, there were no shortcuts and no options until we hit the edge of town, which was about ten miles away. The car behind us was keeping up with us and maybe even getting closer. It was hard for me to tell since even a quick glance sent me reeling.
“Oh, my Lord,” Lucille shrieked. “He’s flashing his headlights at us like we don’t know he’s back there. “Did you call the police?”
“I’m trying. If I look down to dial the phone…” I said, doing just that. A wave of nausea hit.
“Well, I sure wish you’d try harder because that car is just getting closer.” She stomped her foot on the accelerator—hard—but the car didn’t respond. “This damn Buick won’t go over ninety-seven.”
Yes, that meant that’s how fast we were going. Ninety-seven miles per hour in the dark on a two-lane road with a half-blind geriatric at the wheel and a windshield covered with bug guts. What could go wrong?
“Now, he’s waving something out the window! Oh, my Lord,” she screeched, bobbing her head up and down between looking forward and looking in the mirror. “He’s gonna shoot!” She unclutched one hand from the steering wheel and wagged it at the floorboard. “Get my gun out of my purse and hand it to me. Hurry up!”
I don’t usually agree with my mother on much of anything, especially regarding firearms. Maybe it was pure fear, revenge for the kidnapping or a motion sickness death wish, whatever the case, we were on the same page tonight. I kept my eyes focused on the road straight ahead and felt around beneath my legs for her purse then pulled it up into my lap. I fished around inside and found the soft case, fumbled with the zipper and pulled out the gun. “Is it loaded?”
“Of course it’s loaded, Jolene, what good is a gun if it’s not loaded? Now, hand it to me.”
“You can’t shoot, you’re driving. You can’t do both.”
“Well then, you reach over here and hold the wheel.”
“That seems like a really bad plan going a hundred miles an hour, not that anything we’re doing here is a good one.” I lifted the gun and held it out in front of me, trying to get it level enough with my line of vision to see what I was dealing with. “You just pay attention to the road.”
Lucille sucked in her breath. You’re not going to try to shoot it are you?”
“If I have to. I’ve done it before.” At the handgun handling and safety class Jerry wishes he’d never taken me to. “Are you sure you saw a gun?”
“I’ll tell you what, I’ll just stop this car. You can hunt around for the number nine on your phone while I shoot them all myself right
here and now!” She let off the accelerator. “Yes, ma’am, that’s exactly what I’ll do.”
“Do not stop this car!”
She jumped and the car lurched forward. “All right! Quit yelling at me!”
“Just keep driving.” I clutched the door and tried to balance with the movement. “I’ll try to get them to back off.”
Lucille growled and clutched the wheel tighter, possibly realizing that I had a point. Possibly. “Well, you be careful with it.” She paused for added emphasis. “Be real careful.”
Now, do not think that her concern was for my safety. Oh, no, indeed. You see, her concern was for the gun. That pistol is like a daughter to her. Actually, no, much better than that. She loves the gun and has great admiration and respect for it, not that any of my childhood neuroses were cropping up at this particular inopportune moment. As I held the gun in my hand, something about it felt different. Or maybe I just didn’t really remember. Or care. Until now. “Does this damn thing have a clip in it?”
“I already told you it’s loaded. I always keep a full clip in it at the house. It comes in handy as you well know.”
Indeed I did know that. A lot of people knew that.
“It’s on safety, of course. I always have the safety on. You know about the safety, right?”
“I took the damn class, Mother. I know about the safety.”
“Well, you most certainly do not know about the safety because they’re all a little different. This one is real easy to find with your thumb there on the left side. Flip it forward.”
I fumbled around until I thought I had the safety released. Doing it all by feel was harder than you’d think. “Is there one in the chamber?”