“Uh huh.”
“Are you coming in today?”
Frank couldn't believe the audacity. “Not today...bye.”
He turned to Lynn. “She's off to Albany to bring back someone from the Attorney General's Office to investigate. They won't get anywhere. This place has itself legally covered. She'll just get herself killed if she comes back here. Stay at the motel okay. I'll be back as soon as I can.”
Frank drove the hour or so to Albany, went to the Attorney General's office and was assured that no one named Allison Crossfield had been in yet that day. He figured that she might not have arrived yet, having been delayed or had just checked right into a motel to rest before gong to the A. G.'s office. He requested that the A. G.'s office give Allison a note. The note pleaded with her to call him before doing anything. He checked a few of the posher sounding hotels and motels near the exit to Albany, the type of motel or hotel that Allison might choose but no luck. He phoned the A. G.'s office one more time before leaving to return to Southford.
The setting sun was on the horizon preparing for its final plunge. It reminded him of a similar scene not so many days ago when he and Lynn had arrived at Southford. He decided to drive back to his new motel by a different route to see if maybe Allison had taken a back road to Albany. There was a secondary road weaving back and forth along the Mohawk, paralleling and crossing under the New York thruway from time to time. She was spoiled but not dumb. She'd maybe have taken a way that wouldn't be suspected. Frank exited the thruway and got on to that road.
Allison was just starting out as the last glow of the sun disappeared from the sky. She did take the secondary road for the reason that Frank imagined she would.
She was angry at herself for having slept so long. The visit to the Attorney General's office would have to wait until tomorrow. She'd drive to Albany, check in to a motel or hotel, and leave a wake-up call this time, and be off to file the complaint first thing in the morning.
Allison listened to some music and relaxed. She started to enjoy the ride, the windows of her car wide open to the invigorating Mohawk Valley air blowing in. Even after dark, the twisting road was interesting. Unlike mile after mile of highway with nothing but broken white lines and trees to hypnotize a driver, this back road had picturesque barns visible in a streetlight or small quaint villages or a covered bridge around every other turn. Occasionally the road would cross under or parallel the New York Thruway and Allison wondered if there was anyone driving along it looking for her.
About ten miles along the back road she noticed the lights of a vehicle behind her and she sped up. She didn't like to be passed. The vehicle kept with her and tried to pull alongside, evidently to pass. She felt uncomfortable about the speed so she slowed to let the car go by. “All right you jerk,” she said. “Go ahead. What, are you late to watch some drivel on T. V.”
The vehicle pulled alongside and for a moment she thought it was passing but it changed direction and side swiped her. Allison's car swerved to the right onto the shoulder but she recovered and got back on the road. The large pickup truck had red streaks of paint along its side that had scraped off of Allison's car. The pickup kept alongside her as she managed to get back on the pavement and regain control. She reached into her handbag and took out a handgun. She couldn't get a shot since her car was much lower than the pickup and she couldn't see the driver. She rolled down her window anyway and fired at the pickup's window, hoping to scare the driver off. She expected to see the window shatter, but nothing. The thought exploded into her mind, Christ bulletproof glass. This isn't just some road rage asshole.
Her fear gave way to anger and she pulled her wheel full left and rammed the truck. It barely moved off its course at all, merely vibrating a bit along its wheelbase. She realized it was no contest and thought of slamming on the brakes, doing a one-eighty and heading back to the last little town she passed. Then she thought that maybe the gun could blow out the tires. She put her arm out the window to line up a shot but it was too late. The pickup driver now used the truck's full force and her arm was crushed between the truck and her car. The gun fell to the ground. Her car went over the shoulder and down the slope. There was no recovering this time.
Her car caught a tire in the soft ground, rolled over, continued down to the bottom of the embankment, doors flapping open again and again as the car rolled. Allison was thrown out of an opened door as her seat belt mounting failed. Finally the car came to rest sideways a few feet from her. It was leaning precariously against a tree, and was threatening to fall back on her. The tail lights of the vehicle that had driven her off the road disappeared around a bend, The only sound was the spinning tire and gasoline dripping rapidly from the torn open fuel tank.
Allison tried to move but could only move her head. She lied there looking at the car propped up against the tree, willing it to stay up.
Blood ran from her forehead and clouded the vision in her left eye. She didn't feel any pain from her body but her head hurt. A strand of hair lay across her face matted in place by blood. She could smell the gasoline now as it advanced toward her and saturated the ground around her.
Headlights appeared, coming from the direction that the attacking vehicle had disappeared. She screamed for help. A blanket of clouds hid the Moon now making it as dark as the inside of a vault. She was terrified that she would not be seen but the vehicle slowed and she could see by the stationary glow that it had stopped. A flashlight appeared over the edge of the embankment and the person holding it made his way down.
“Oh God.” The gasoline was wicking up into her clothes now and she felt the dampness. “Help me!”
The man arrived at the bottom and looked at her but said nothing.
He appeared to be surveying the danger.
“Please! Help me! Get me out of here! The gas!”
The fuel puddled against her and the dripping blood mingled with it. The man looked at the car and walked over to it. He seemed to be looking over the bottom of the car in the area around the trunk then he walked around to the other side of the car. The last sight that Allison Crossfield saw was the car falling over and crushing her, the engine block smashing her skull.
The man reached into his pocket for a pack of matches. He picked up a twig with dried leavers on it and lit it, then stepped back farther and threw the burning twig and leaves toward the gasoline-soaked area, running after the twig left his hand. He turned and looked back as the twig landed. The fluid ignited all at once with a whump. He watched for a moment, then touched the match. It was cool now. He put it in his pocket, not wanting any investigator to find the charred match, if indeed there was ever any investigation.
The flames lit up the area and the man noticed, a few yards from him, a small round plastic and metal object a little way up the slope. A radio location transmitter. He rushed to it, picked it up, pushed the small antenna back into it and pocketed it. He knew that he had been fired upon so he looked around for the gun. He walked back along the road a bit and found the gun, and pocketed it along with the locater.
After rushing back to his truck he saw the distant hint of headlights approaching the bend. He got into his truck and drove off. The approaching vehicle slowed and crossed to the accident side of the road. The driver looked down the embankment and called 911.
Frank felt that rubber band loosening effect again that told him that he was not far from Southford. He rounded the bend and saw flashing lights, police cars and fire trucks and a vehicle that said Coroner on the door. They were putting the remains of Allison's car up on the truck and Frank could see the Massachusetts plate that he knew so well. Only the last digit had been charred by the flames. Men in surgical masks brought a covered body up the slope on a stretcher. He pulled off the road and stood just outside the drivers side door. In the still air the smells of burned tires, grass, upholstery and trees, mingled with the smell of burned skin and hair.
They put the body in the coroner's vehicle. One of the policemen noticed Frank'
s car and signaled to him, waving him away figuring he was just a gawker. Frank's hands were shaking so bad that the steering wheel vibrated. He thought of getting out to talk to the officer but he knew he'd better get back to Lynn as soon as possible. He started driving slowly away, his mind numb. His stomach writhed and then contracted as if in a vise. Food and stomach acid made their way up his esophagus. He tried to drive farther but stopped a few hundred yards down the road, opened the door and emptied the contents of his stomach onto the pavement. At that point he didn't care if a car was coming or if he got hit.
Frank managed to drive back to Southford to get Lynn. He planned on leaving her where he felt she'd be safe in case he was followed when he got on the Thruway. He would head to the nearest State Police station to the west of the town and tell them of Allison's probable murder and ask for their protection.
Lynn was watching television when Frank walked in. She saw the look on his face and turned off the TV.
“She's dead,”
Lynn sat down on the edge of the bed, unsure about what to say. She felt concerned for Frank, but how do you show emotion for someone you didn't like and that didn't like you? She had just a few words with Allison and those were unpleasant. Allison had a well-staked-out claim to Frank and now she was dead. Those were the thoughts that went through Lynn's mind. She knew this and didn't feel guilty about having these feelings, but she also knew that a caring person should act concerned, at least, out of compassion for those who did feel a loss.
“Oh Frank, you must feel terrible. You knew her for so long. I don't know what to say.” Lynn volunteered to go down to the lobby to get a couple of colas, saying she would be right back.
Frank sunk into the chair and stared unfocused. A small insect made its way across the wall, its motion catching Frank's attention. He couldn't have felt less like killing anything right now. After what had happened he would be feeling more compassion for the small insect than for most of the human race. He watched out of tired eyes as the insect disappeared behind a curtain.
CHAPTER 27
Frank and Lynn drove the rental car to Scott's camp in the woods. He sat outside the front of his cabin, on an aluminum beach chair, drinking a beer. After filling him in on what had happened and unsure about the advice that Don Phillips had given about walking out of town, Frank drove back toward the highway and the nearest land line phone outside of Southford. He decided that he would call the State Police to let them know he was coming and to tell them what he could over the phone in case he didn't arrive. Frank hoped that the distorted society and influence that existed in Southford didn't extend any farther than the town line and it turned out that the town line was as far as he got.
Scott asked Lynn if she wanted a beer. She smiled and said she did.
“I'll be right out,” he said as he went inside and closed the door.
Lynn heard Scott's voice, muffled, intermittent like talking to someone else inside but she couldn't hear another voice.
Lynn got up and moved over to the window. There was a slight opening where the curtain had bunched and she was able to look in. Scott was on the phone. Thoughts of whom he might be calling made her run, but she knocked over a rake that was against the cabin and it clattered down the wall before hitting the ground. Scott ran to the door, saw Lynn run down the road and took off after her.
The darkness and unfamiliar road surface slowed her and she tripped a few times. Scott, panting by now, caught up with her as she got up to run again and in the little light from the house that reached this far down the road, she saw that he held a gun. “Stop right there.”
She was as immobile as a deer in the headlights of a car and the thoughts that went through her mind and the connections that she now made told her that she was in as much danger as a deer watching thousands of pounds of metal speeding towards it.
“Start walking back to the house,” he said, between efforts to catch his breath. Lynn walked, her legs like rubber, her body shaking with fear.
Scott put his hand to Lynn's back and she felt the five spread fingers shove her into the cabin.
“This way,” he said as he pointed her in the direction he wanted her to go. Lynn heard the door close behind her and locks being engaged. He shoved her farther.
She bolted and ran, surprising Scott, pushing him back as she ran around him, back toward the door. He fell back against a table, knocking it over along with its contents, a hurricane lamp that smashed to the floor and a couple of green glasses that had been left sitting there after they were emptied. The fragments of green glass and clear glass mingled on the floor. Scott held on to the gun and got up.
Lynn couldn't open the door quickly enough. Two locks and a latch slowed her down. Scott was next to her in a few seconds.
“It's not you that I need to keep alive you know. Give me a hard time and I'll just shoot you.”
He shoved Lynn again and they headed toward a door in the back corner of the cabin. Scott opened it and pushed her in. He flipped the light switch. What Lynn saw made her stop in her tracks but all that she could manage was a gasp.
“What?” Scott said, irritated still, “Don't you like red?”
It was the room, the room of her last vivid dream. Images of Candy being victimized flashed into her mind. The 60s decor was gone, replaced by red wall hangings resembling huge swatches of thick plush carpeting. Gone was the large braided carpet. It had been replaced by an equally plush red carpet in front of the familiar fireplace. Lynn knew the room, not from its present furnishings which had been updated, but from its shape, its size, its configuration and from the fireplace, and she knew the location of the other side room. But most of all she recognized this room from the painting she had seen on the wall in the main part of the cabin and from the feeling of terror she felt at being in this room, a terror that reached across the void of death to stay with her spirit into this life.
A glance through an open door into another room revealed that over the years, the Lowell brothers' preferences had changed. What he filmed now involved more elaborate equipment than just restraints. Lynn could see manacles on the wall, a thick post sticking up in the center of the room with restraints hanging on it to secure the victim.
Scott had the same sexual preferences as Lawrence.
Scott let Lynn stand there for a while, contemplating her future then said, “Over here.” He pointed to the manacles on the wall and put her hands in them and locked them closed. “Oh, by the way. You're probably wondering. I gave you a fake last name. My real name is Scott Lowell. F. Scott Lowell to be exact.”
Scott thought back. Seeing Lynn restrained, brought back memories of the first time he and his brother Lawrence had done it. They were at summer camp, sent there by their parents, both brothers in their early teens, both ready and willing to experience sex for the first time. But unfortunately, just as some boys get their first sexual arousal peeking through a fence or hedge, staring at girls underwear on a neighboring clothes line or a bra hanging there, Lawrence and Scott's first sexual encounter was associated with death and it set the tone for the rest of their lives.
They were on a hike in the Adirondacks. Out by themselves for the day. They came across a slightly older girl who sat on top of a large house-sized rock, the type of erratic that the Northeast is known for, deposited all through the mountains, tens of thousands of years ago as the glaciers retreated. The girls legs were crossed in a lotus-type position and she looked down on them like a forest pixie.
“Seen Jane?” she said and giggled.
Scott looked at Lawrence then back at her. “What?”
“My friend,” the girl laughed a bit too much for Lawrence's liking.
“What's so funny?” said Lawrence severely. He noticed she had a bottle of liquor in her hand.
She saw that they were looking at the bottle. “Want some?”she said suggestively. “You've got to come up here. Think you can make it,” she goaded as she let one leg dangle over the edge tantalizingly.
Scott could still picture this day in his mind clearly. So vivid. Every detail of how they had climbed to the top of the huge flat-topped glacial erratic. He suddenly realized that it was Lynn's hair that had reminded him, the same shade of blond.
They made it to the top, Scott slipped and skinned his knuckles and it angered him. “Where's your friend...Jane?” said Scott in an annoyed tone.
“Oh she got fed up with me and went on. I just wanted to sit up here on this rock. Look at it. Isn't it fantastic?”
“It's just a big god-damned rock,” criticized Lawrence.
“Asshole.” commented the girl and she turned away with a flick of her hair. Ignoring them now, she lifted the bottle to her lips and Scott went crazy at the insult. He slapped the bottle out of her hand and it tumbled down the side of the huge rock, breaking into more and more pieces as it hit ledges and outcroppings on the way down.
She looked surprised, then angry. “Asshole! Asshole!” she screamed. Scott grabbed her, got on top of her and punched her in the face. She screamed. Scott put a hand over her mouth and he felt tears run down from her eyes and collect against his hand.
“She'll tell and then we've had it,” said Lawrence.
Take off your belt,” said Scott. He and Lawrence took off their belts and Lawrence secured the girl's hands and feet. She still tried to scream and she tried to bite into Scott's hand. He tore off her shirt. She squirmed and Scott's hand slipped off of her mouth. She screamed. Lawrence took over, covering the girl's mouth.
Scott then tied the shirt tightly around her mouth and sat back to see if it worked. She could get some sound out but not loud enough to be heard more than a few yards away.
Scott and Lawrence watched her struggle as they regained their breath from the exertion and excitement of restraining her.
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