by Susan Dunlap
The last thing she wanted was to ask the question that could smash this moment. But despite her cherished dreams about Wes Jacobsen, she was not a dreamer. She was a realist.
He stood beside the bed, leaning forward, not so much eagerly as tentatively, like a marionette, or as if he was propped on something she couldn’t see. How many times after the bike crash had she gone to the hospital, even driven all the way down here to go past his mother’s house—this house—like a teenager hoping for just a glimpse of him? How many more times had she called, desperate to hear a sentence on the phone, a laugh, a groan even?
“Why—”
“Why didn’t I answer your calls? Was I such a poor loser—”
“But you weren’t losing. We were both knocked out of the race. And it was only a bike race, it wasn’t the end of the world.” She patted the bed. “Sit down. Tell me.”
“I’ll stand.” His gaunt face was flushed; he looked as nervous as she was. “Maybe you won’t want me sitting near you.”
A draft shot down her bare back but she didn’t move to shift the blankets.
Wes shifted his weight. His arms were stiff as canes. “After that crash,” he said slowly, as if reading intricate instructions, “you were back at work in a couple days. By odds I should have been, too. But I landed a lot harder than you did. My shinbone broke in three places, messy breaks. They did surgery; it got infected. Then I picked up a staph infection and nearly checked out with it, and when I came to—” he took a breath and hurried on—“I didn’t have a leg. Well, more accurately not much shin and no foot at all. Except when I put it in my mouth, of course.”
“Oh, Wes, I never—”
“Of course, you didn’t know. I made sure you didn’t. It sounds ridiculous now, after all these years, but I didn’t know you that well then, and I sure didn’t know myself, and…well…I felt like I’d been through so much I couldn’t face losing anything—anyone—else.”
Memories, dreams, and memories of dreams tumbled over each other so furiously she could barely think. “But why? What could possibly have made you think I wouldn’t want you?”
He took a deep breath. His ashen face seemed even paler. “I was depressed, I didn’t realize how depressed till I got medication and came out of it. I couldn’t get out of bed, couldn’t deal with the prosthesis or the crutches, couldn’t eat because food made me sick, and when my mother forced me to see relatives I resented them asking about my leg and hated them if they ignored it. If you’d asked me before the crash ‘How would you react to having an amputation?’ I don’t know what I’d have said, but I’ll tell you, Ellen, ‘I’d fall apart’ would never have occurred to me. But that’s exactly what I did.”
She reached for him but he still refused to sit as if he hadn’t yet given the password.
“Didn’t I think of you, Ellen? Yeah, I thought of you every day. What I thought was: How could I expect a top-class athlete like you to spend your time with a cripple?”
“What?” She sat up in amazement, and had to make a grab for the sheet. For the first time she saw the canes on which he was leaning.
“It sounds stupid now, but in that gulch of depression it made perfect sense. It gave me an image of nobility to hang onto. Like I was the hero in some melodramatic black and white movie. I couldn’t do much of anything, I thought, but at least I could make this sacrifice for you. Your whole life was biking. What would you have done with me, waved as you rode by?”
“The one year in my life I did anything athletic—” She shook her head in amazement at the ludicrousness of it all. “Dammit, why did you think I kept calling you, so I could tell you whether I’d won or placed?”
“I know—”
Her face was flushed and the heat of her welling fury battled the cold on her bare back. “You could have—”
He put up a hand to silence her. “Not then. I couldn’t anything. I might as well have been in a straitjacket. When I came out of the depression I couldn’t believe the things I’d done, and the things I had not done. But that was seven months later and you’d stopped calling and someone said you were dating someone, and I just, well, figured it was too late. Even then, it was all I could do to admit I didn’t have a leg anymore. Now I know it’s not the worst thing in the world. I’ve got a good prosthesis and when I’m using it you wouldn’t notice anything more than a slight limp. I ride again, though—” an uncertain smile flashed on his face—“I’m not better at it than I was before.”
“Why aren’t you—”
“Occasionally it irritates the contact spot.”
“Oh.” Ellen didn’t know what to say, about the irritation, about him, the years gone, the stupidity of it all. There was so much to say, nowhere to begin. The failure of speech hung between them.
He shifted his weight onto the crutch. “Well, listen, like I said, I’m going to make a run to the store. Tell me what you need. I’ll deal with food, and I’ll pick up some quilted plaid shirts and caps for you both for camouflage. I’ve got a rifle—”
“No!”
He jerked back as if she’d hit him.
“No, please, don’t talk about shooting. I know…I know we could die…I know that, and I’ll have to deal with that, but please, not yet. Not now.” She was shaking, tears pouring down her face. And he, he was next to her holding her.
“Oh, Ellen, I’m so sorry. Don’t worry; we’ll work it out. It has to work out. It can’t not.”
She tried to speak, but she couldn’t form words. She held him to her, blocking out thought and fear with the reality of his flesh. Rain pounded on the roof like rifle shots; the air chilled her bare back. She couldn’t believe she was here with him. She couldn’t believe she could die. She pulled him closer. Last week she would have held her grievances before her like a shield, demanding explanations like tolls on the road to trust. But life had lost its grounding, and time had accordioned to nothing. “Don’t go. You can shop later. Be with me now.”
She smiled, feeling as if he were pulling her back toward him in slow motion, acknowledging the slight scratch of his not quite shaven beard before his hard moist lips were on hers. She remembered the last time, and then didn’t as he eased closer to her, and she stretched her arms back around his chest and let her head drop to his shoulder and stayed motionless in amazement.
Finally she scrunched back and pulled the covers free, and he stood.
“For a guy using a couple canes you’re damned fast dropping your clothes,” she said as he slid in.
“It’s that extra shoe that takes the time.” He pulled her to him.
She nodded and let herself be carried toward him, let herself notice the exquisite touch of her nipples against his chest, the first warm feel of his moist penis on her thigh, the raw neediness of her stomach, her breasts, her groin. His mouth was hard on hers, his body meshing frantically into hers, and all thoughts disappeared. She ran her hands around him, pulling the mounds of his butt into her. His desperate groans gouged deep, mining down to her marrow. She dug her fingers into his back, but she couldn’t pull him close enough, till the barrier of skin disappeared and they became one being.
And afterwards she couldn’t have described the passion she had so long dreamed of. The feelings resounded in her body but there were no words attached to them, nothing to anchor them in memory.
Forty-Eight
RAYMOND ZERON CLOSED OFF his mike and rubbed his eyes. It was almost dawn. The patrol car felt like a box, and the air in it like styrofoam pellets.
The radio buzzed.
“Zeron.”
“Wilkes here, sir. Hey, we got us a lead. Guy driving home last night almost clipped a girl on a bike out Route three-sixteen.”
“This case was on every newscast. Why didn’t he call us last night?”
“He was driving home from a bar. He sounds like he just staggered up.”
Zeron pulled himself together. “The witness, he seem credible to you?”
“Yeah. I don’t think he’
s to the point of seeing things. He says he almost hit one girl and then passed another. I believe him.”
“Where on three-sixteen?”
“About five miles beyond the Seventh Day. Beyond the stream. Heading north.”
“Good work, Wilkes.” Zeron switched back to the dispatcher. “Patch me through to all units.” He could have added Bentec and the Fed to that list. He hesitated. “Make sure Bentec’s on the channel.” The Feds he’d worry about later. “Okay men, and women, we’ve got a spotting out three-sixteen five miles north of the Seventh Day. These suspects have been on the lam for two days. Even if they’re Superwomen they’ve got to sleep. They could have taken hostages and be holing up in their house. They could be in an outbuilding snoring away, or even in the brush. I want someone at every door along three-sixteen and every road off it. Get yourselves inside each house and look around. Get into every garage, every garden shed, play house, doghouse. Get those dogs into the fields. Those women are still in Eugene and we will damned well get ’em before they leave town.”
He looked around for Bentec and spotted him finger-combing his L.A. gray hair. He couldn’t decide about Bentec, but that didn’t bother him. If the case went bad it was good to have a goat. When the Feds started throwing barbs, a goat was good also. And up in the copter with the sharpshooter, Bentec wasn’t going to cause him any trouble.
Forty-Nine
LIZA STOKED THE FIRE. Felton was stretched out in front. She rubbed his cute little black and white head and he gave a cute little snort in his sleep. She’d split an omelet with him that could have sated a village. If eating and sleeping were numero uno and duo in the porcine world, Felton was finally one happy pig.
The fire was crackling and she had that delicious feeling of heat on her back and cool on her front. She’d found Bisquick in the kitchen and made old-fashioned biscuits. Now she was drinking good, strong coffee with cream. She’d slept till eight—nine hours. She was still tired, but it was that day-after tiredness when the party was over, the glasses were washed and her biggest decision was whether to read Sunday’s paper or go for a swim and probably she’d leaf through the paper because the ocean would always be there.
She settled on the leather couch and sipped her coffee. The fire was crackling. The smell of burning pine logs meshed with the aroma of coffee. She had another biscuit waiting on the model train’s flatcars in the kitchen and she considered whether to call up a delivery, taking her time puzzling over the pros and cons of this decision of no importance.
She couldn’t stay here, of course. It was odd sitting on this leather sofa in a stranger’s house not knowing how soon she’d have to scurry out, or even how long she’d have charge of this room before Ellen and Wes emerged from the bedroom. She smiled. She was proud of that little mitzvah. Too bad she couldn’t have seen Ellen’s face when Wes walked in, but she was free to imagine how unmitigatedly good she felt. There had to be some way for them, some future.
Don’t get caught up in that now! This safe, peaceful moment wasn’t unmitigatedly good, but it was as good as it was likely to get. No need to let the future bleed into it! Half an hour ago—maybe an hour—she’d turned on the local news and was horrified to see her own face and hear herself described as a deranged jilted wife, armed, and of course, dangerous. With a pig. The broadcasters hadn’t had Ellen’s picture then, and if they knew of her connection to Eugene, they weren’t saying. But it was only a matter of time.
“Inspiration,” she said aloud. “Where is my vaunted inspiration?” She flicked the switch on the model railroad and watched the engine chug along the wall, curve left at the corner, make another left at the fireplace and shoot into Sofa Station. She hit another switch and watched the train back up.
The bedroom door opened. Ellen and Wes came out together and it was hard to say which of them had the bigger, blowzier grin. Their faces were flushed, their hair finger-combed and none too expertly, their eyes were watery and only for each other. If this were Hollywood, schmaltzy music would be hitting a crescendo. But these two were so real it made her want to cry.
“Thank you,” Ellen said to her in a still half-in-bed voice. She stopped, looked her in the eye and said again, “Thank you.”
She nodded and felt a wave of warmth and ease, of having evened the ledger. Of, she realized, no longer being the beggar. “Have some coffee before we talk.” She waited, no short period because they couldn’t keep their hands off each other and with what was left of their attention their coffee-pouring acumen was on a par with Felton’s. She was grinning as she watched them.
She hated to destroy this glowing moment, maybe their last, but there was no choice. She said, “We can’t stay here and wait till they find us. We have to make decisions.”
Ellen was the most controlled person she knew, but Ellen looked cow-eyed at Wes, then glared at her. In a moment Ellen had her face under control; she took a swallow of coffee and nodded in acquiescence. “We wait until dark—”
“Which gives us all day.” Wes grinned and wrapped an arm around her waist. He must have been wearing his prosthesis now; he was standing on both legs and looked perfectly normal.
“And after dark, Ellen?” Liza prodded.
“I don’t know. Clearly you’ve been worrying about this, what do you think?” There was a whiny quality to her voice, but that was understandable. For Ellen planning a getaway had to be the ultimate lose-lose situation.
Liza refilled her cup. “The obvious escape route is the freeway, north and south. But it is obvious. Is there an east-west route, Wes?”
“Hour and a half to the coast, eight or nine hours to Boise. That’s if you can drive on a two-laner.”
“What, a little L.A. bashing?”
He toasted her with his cup, then smiled down at Ellen, not saying anything more, just smiling.
Liza took her coffee and settled next to Felton by the fire. Roads in all directions, but no vehicle. The coast was a dead end, too easy for them to find her there. Inland, then. There had to be back roads connecting small towns. But if they were spotted—two women and a pig would stand out—all the advantages would be with the cops.
The answer was obvious. Tears welled up again. She swallowed hard against them, lost the battle and swiped at her eyes with her knuckles. It was the answer she’d really known for hours but just hadn’t been able to face. Ellen and Wes were still by the coffee pot. They probably hadn’t realized she’d moved away.
“What do you drive?” she asked, walking back to them.
“A pick-up, and old yellow Chevy.”
“Okay, here’s the plan. You drive me and a bicycle to the other side of town, maybe twenty miles beyond.”
“And?” he prodded.
She swallowed again. “And you take care of Felton.”
“And?” Ellen said.
“And I ride off into the sunset with my newfound thigh muscles. The police won’t be looking for a single woman. But if they find me, that’s the chance I take. You stay here. If anyone asks, you’re Wes’s wife.”
Ellen eyed Wes questioningly.
He gazed down at her, his eyes widening, his mouth stretching slowly into a half smile. He looked like a man in a dream afraid to move lest he wake himself up. “El, you know, it could be a go. I work at home. No one comes in. There’s no neighbor near enough to know who’s living here.”
Ellen eased back against him. A contented smile settled onto her face and her eyes closed.
A gush of pleasure, of pride even, washed over Liza. Underneath she felt so hollow her skin could implode. She’d planned to make herself scarce and leave them alone. But now that they were going to have the rest of their lives together she didn’t bother. She snagged the biscuit on the flatcar, slathered on jam and ate.
She’d finished the last bite when Ellen hooked her arms around Wes’s neck, leaned hard into him, and sighed. With one arm he pulled her close, and there she stayed, so still it was eerie. When she pushed back there was no sated glow in her
face; she looked as wary as Liza. “It won’t work, Liza. I’m sorry, really sorry. I’d throw you to the wolves in a minute if it meant I could stay here. That’s the kind of great friend I am. But I don’t have that choice. I’m no innocent bystander now; I hijacked an airplane. Oh, shit, and the pilot, that’s kidnapping. They send people to the electric chair for that.” Ellen was still leaning into Wes, but now she looked unaware of him, as if she felt nothing but the awakening horror of how very bad things were.
Wes’s mouth was actually hanging open and Liza was sure he never imagined Ellen as the hijacker. He gave Ellen’s shoulder a squeeze. “Damn, El, that’s so like you.”
Ellen straightened up.
This, Liza thought, was what she must have looked like at the bike races. This was who she must have been. This Ellen so foreign to her was the woman who grabbed the wheel, took the plane, found the bikes, and outran the cops. This was sure not the woman who would have settled for Harry Cooper.
Liza squeezed her eyes shut and when she opened them she saw things about Ellen she ignored before—the muscles in her forearms and her thighs, how she’d pushed her hair behind her ears to get it out of the way, the lines of determination just beginning to etch into the skin around her mouth. She recalled Ellen’s comments in the church parking lot. Then she credited them to Ellen’s euphoria or exhaustion; it hadn’t occur to her that Ellen would really take the big chance. But now she reconsidered. “So, then, we take the money?”
“What?” Wes turned to face Liza.
But it was Ellen she was speaking to. “In for a lamb, in for a sheep? I mean, just how much do we have left to lose?”
“Are you wacko, Lady?”
Liza ignored him, moving to face Ellen directly. “Bentec could shoot me—He will shoot me if he gets the chance, me and you, because we know about his illegal weapons shipment. Even if he’s unmasked and carted off to jail before he can get us, we’re still fugitives and no jury is going to say, ‘Yeah they were justified in stealing every form of transportation on wheels, plus kidnapping.’ Best scenario is we go to jail till we’re too old to care. Ellen, we’re already in for a damn big lamb.”