by Ann Self
Brian led a wolf-pack of other impatient drivers winding through the confining cement boundaries, until he finally rolled to a stop at the last traffic light before the on-ramp to the overhead Central Artery. His vehicle was right up tight to the only car left in front of him. The relative freedom of the elevated expressway was so close, only forty feet overhead, and he glanced up at the streaming cars and then back down to the heap waiting in front of him for a green light. Brian suddenly realized it was the same junker Buick in line at the garage, still emitting its perfume of burning oil. He sighed irritably, closing his window again and shutting the vents.
Being a hideous color was the least of the old car’s problems. The muffler was shot, the engine was running rough and shaking the frame, the car listed to one side and the rear end and side panels of the car were completely plastered with dried mud. An old bumper sticker in the back window read: HONK IF SOMETHING FALLS OFF. He gave a half-laugh and nodded in agreement. Then he growled in mounting irritation, “That thing’ll die where it stands, and I’ll get boxed in behind it.”
Brian looked at his watch again, and then back at the driver. Female. All he could see was long dark hair, wispy bangs and the whites of her eyes in her rearview mirror. She was staring at him wide-eyed, and for a moment their eyes locked. He thought she looked shocked.
“Damnit...” Brian grew agitated when the light flashed green and she was still staring back at him. Boston drivers in line behind them were in a rage in seconds and honked loudly, the mismatched pitch of their horns ringing in his ears.
“What in hell is your problem?”
He was about to honk himself, but the old car lurched from its spot like a frightened rabbit, crop-dusting a path with smoke, careening through the intersection and bucking over every imperfection in the lumpy road. The vehicle continued under the expressway and entered the uphill on-ramp on the far side as Brian and his impatient wolf-pack followed. The old car’s speed was erratic, as though the driver had lost focus, and the following cars accessing the ramp jammed up behind it.
“It’s the long pedal on the right, woman!” Brian yelled in exasperation, gunning the 349 horsepower V8 engine and yanking the Mercedes around her; dual stainless exhaust pipes rumbling. He tried to flash her a where-are-your-brains look as he—and all the other cars with their comments and gestures roared by—but she let a curtain of dark hair slide forward, hiding her profile. Brian thought he’d hide his face too if he drove that badly.
The artery shifted quickly to downhill as it fed cars the into an already existing half-mile tunnel, and Brian and his wake of road-rage drivers blended expertly with heavy traffic, gaining the middle lane after leaving the old Buick in the dust. Long black hair nagged at Brian’s mind for attention, but faded as he wrestled with three lanes of congested traffic.
Jane Husted watched the black SUV as it miraculously jumped into the passing lane, just before the Artery spilled the cars down into the South Station tunnel. Her cheeks were flaming with humiliation; she was crowded and trapped in the senile lane and driving like a recent brain donor. Since the moment the three-pronged Mercedes emblem on the toothy grill of the vehicle had caught her attention in her mirror, her mind had taken a lunch break. It was hard to drive forward and merge into expressway traffic while concentrating on the back view.
“So it’s a stealth Mercedes for you, huh?” she grumbled, amazed that such a big vehicle had snuck up on her—the round emblem piercing into her consciousness like a fiery branding iron as she sat and waited for a green light, her attention slacking since she had decided she'd lost track of him. She now had the shakes and had obviously been rendered dimwitted. Jane had one quick glance at the overhead signs as she plunged downhill into the tunnel under ChinaTown:
I-93 3 SOUTH KNEELAND ST. I-90 MASS PIKE
BRAINTREE ALBANY ST. CHINATOWN
“Here’s hoping for 93 south,” she murmured, adjusting her eyes from bright sunlight to tunnel gloom. The narrow tube with its endless rows of dirty yellow tiles and choking exhaust fumes agitated her; the view ahead was limited and she was moving at a turtle pace, while the passing lane zoomed by like a train. Giant fans in the aging tunnel looked like dinosaur fossils, unmoving and rusted in place.
After a half-mile of claustrophobic travel, the Buick traveled a steep upward slope and popped back into daylight as the road deck again elevated over Boston, heading for the outskirts of the city. Brian and his black SUV were nowhere in sight. Jane suddenly felt a flash of anger sending adrenaline boiling through her veins and surging to the driving foot. She forced her way through heavy traffic into the middle lane, and then—pedal-to-the-metal—whipped the old Buick into the passing lane, jumping from the feeble lanes into the shark pool. Her shopping bag slid off the seat and spit the shoebox out on the floor, but Jane knew better than to grab for the bag and end up climbing a barrier and sailing into oncoming traffic.
Warm spring air rushed into her car, flailing her satin, blue/black hair into a million shimmery threads and sucking it out the open window. She had neglected to anchor the long hair with a covered elastic—and the higher the speed the more it waved over the roof. It was too warm to crank up the window, so she tried to wedge some of the strands behind her ears, but it was useless, most of her hair stayed outside the car.
The expressway was now traveling on a raised grade, rolling and twisting over the landscape as it meandered out of city towers and skipped around the flat blue bay of the Atlantic Ocean. Jane scanned endless rows of traffic ahead and jumped lanes several times to get around knots of slower cars. Holding on to the swaying body of the old Buick was a challenge during wild lane changes and she felt a sheen of sweat on her neck. The Buick had lost its power-steering ages ago, but the lack of power-assist improved her upper body strength. Better than a gym workout.
She tried to ignore sparks of sunlight winking from the car floor, hoping the rusted-through places weren’t all that serious. She always avoided peeking under the rubber floormat to see just how badly things were progressing.
Jane squinted at the traffic. No black Mercedes SUV. She coaxed the Buick to even higher speed as traffic opened up a little, moving surprisingly well for a Friday. It was congested, but the passing lane was still grinding right along unimpeded by accidents or slowpokes. She raced by an exit for the JFK Library, and the rest of the Boston landscape fell away under the determined wheels of her car:
Channel 56.
The Boston Globe.
Dorchester Yacht Club.
Her steering wheel began to shudder as she gained more speed; more speed than the old car might be able to handle.
So much for not being an idiot.
Jane patted around for the lap belt; but it had disappeared into the bowels of the old bench seat. She resumed her death grip on the wheel. The expressway brushed even closer to the ocean and she looked out over DorchesterBay dotted with sailboats, but only for an instant—not caring to end up in it. She rounded a sweeping curve and the brightly painted Boston Gas Tank on Commercial Point presented itself on the landscape.
“There he is!” she gasped, when she spotted the boxy Mercedes, late afternoon sun glinting off alloy wheels. It was not hard to distinguish the vehicle from other more common rides. Brian was zipping along in the passing lane several cars ahead, and his four-wheel drive, off-road SUV looked like it could easily traverse a moonscape. Her stomach tied itself in knots.
Jane yanked her car back into the middle lane when it started to move faster than the passing lane, so she could continue catching up with him, and then tried to ease the white-knuckle wheel grip on the wheel and get feeling back to her fingers. “This has not been the relaxing day off I planned for myself,” she groused, gritting her teeth. And never in a million years would I have guessed at the outcome...me stalking Brian Canaday again, just like high school.
She narrowed her eyes at the black Mercedes, now three cars ahead. Her lane slowed again to match the speed of the passing lane, locking the
cars in place, almost bumper-to-bumper, and tethering him in her sight. She planned to jump back into the passing lane and tag along when that lane picked up speed, and was quite pleased with her cleverness. “I still got it,” she complimented herself. She wondered if Brian were indeed, headed for Brockton—which would make it that much easier to tail him and not draw attention to herself. But no matter. She had once again become a master at spying and would deal with every twist and turn of the chase. Black hair still flailed over the roof of the old Buick, and white smoke enveloped cars behind her as she rolled over the highway, mile after mile, keeping pace with the Mercedes.
Her tires bounced on another rough patch of pavement, quaking the old car and exploding the shoes out of their box on the floor. She took a quick glance at the frivolous designer heels. It was the first time in ages that she’d splurged on something so feminine and so absolutely unnecessary; regular street clothes just did not fit into her lifestyle. She lived in breeches and boots, wearing riding outfits seven days a week teaching, training and showing horses for multi-millionaire real estate developer Elliot Whitbeck. Elliot owned the lavish two-thousand acre Springhill Estate in Southbrook, a town several miles south of Brockton, and had hired Jane two years earlier.
She considered this job to be the best one of her life, even with some of the downsides. It had provided her with her own little apartment, finally removing her from the demanding clutches of an irascible Aunt. Not to mention the relief from endless carping about long hair being vain and ‘unkempt’. Jane had finally put her foot down when she turned fifteen and started growing out the mop of hacked hair. It took years to restore itself to its present state, and the growing-out phase was frightening, but she stubbornly refused to let scissors anywhere near her head, no matter the shrill ranting and raving.
“While you’re living under my roof...” had lost it’s sting when she started earning her own money at a small horse farm, cleaning stalls and learning to ride. She took an old bicycle there most everyday after school, until she was hired for a modest salary and riding lessons. After a couple of years her natural talent and uncommon skills rose to the top like cream, and she progressed to teaching children and then adults, but still didn’t escape cleaning stalls at the low-budget operation. After graduation from high school she was hired full-time, and managed to scrape up enough money to buy the old Buick. When a stable in Rehoboth offered a better salary and a chance to show and study Dressage, she jumped at the chance. While still not a top-drawer establishment, the beautiful farm with its wide open spaces and wonderful horses was a dazzling escape from the close walls of a dingy three-decker apartment, and Jane spent more and more of her time at the stables, honing her skills and looking to the future.
The future had been Springhill—a wonderful opportunity to work with blueblood horses and Lars Wallenberg, a European coach and “O” level judge of international renown. A man of his caliber brought her closer to her dream of international horseshow competition, and the barn apartment made her independence and separation from Edith permanent; although she did send a small part of her salary to the old woman until she died a year and a half later.
Jane stretched a cramped neck and listened to the Buick’s old tires whining along the expressway, wishing she’d bought replacements sooner. Please don’t explodenow, she prayed. Nothing like cartwheeling end-over-end down the road to close one’s career as a spy.
The lanes were still maintaining equal speed for the moment, preserving the three car spread between herself and the Mercedes as it cruised in sports-utility splendor.
Her lane abruptly slowed, but she couldn’t jump into the passing lane as planned because, for some reason, the Mercedes was also reducing speed, closing up spaces between the cars. Her foot jumped off the accelerator as the SUV’s right signal blinked, and the vehicle swept into the space in front of her.
Years spent in Special Ops—Delta Force—engaged in rescue operations and intelligence-gathering in foreign hotspots, had left Brian Canaday with his already razor-sharp senses heightened. Eyes in the back of his head. He adjusted the rearview mirror a tick to keep the junk Buick in frame, watching it careen from lane to lane in a cloud of smoke as it gained ground on him.
“My my—we’ve finally discovered the gas pedal, have we?” he joked as he flicked his eyes back and forth from the road to the mirror. He was amazed the woman could hold her swaying wreck of a car together, and that she could’ve maneuvered it through heavy traffic to catch up with him.
Got a few driving skills after all...
Brian watched her jump into the middle lane when it started to move faster than his outside lane. He reduced speed just a little to let her vehicle catch up, but the middle lane slowed again before the Buick could pull along side. She seemed to be content to hang back three slots, and he sensed she did not want to move up too close or pass. He tried to stare through the glare of her windshield as traffic in the two lanes rolled along at the same speed, but reflections rippled over the window like a backwards waterfall, keeping him from seeing her clearly. Her long black hair was streaming out the car window and whipping in the wind.
His lane picked up speed again but he did not accelerate, instead slowing down and signaling, darting into the slot in front of her. She dropped back abruptly, still thwarting his attempts to get a good look at her face. He recalled how startled she had been at the stoplight when she looked back at him in her rearview mirror, and how sloppy and unfocused her driving was at the expressway on-ramp.
Startled. That’s exactly what she was, startled. So startled she could hardly manage to drive.
Was he supposed to have been ahead of her? Industrial spy, extortion plot, kidnapping—the list filed through his mind; extremely wealthy people had to be very careful these days, and his Special Forces training still kept his nerves humming like a fine-tuned panther.
Canaday International avoided government contracts, so he didn’t think he was ensnared in that murk with feebs, spooks and goonies on his tail. And this would not be their vehicle of choice. A decades-old Buick Skylark that left smoke like an Atlas rocket launch was a strange pick for a surveillance car. He could see the thing coming for three miles, even without the hair waving wildly at him. She might as well have been shouting “yoo hoo” over a bull horn.
Brian glanced in his mirror again. She didn’t look dangerous. She also didn’t look like Mario Andretti, but she drove like him. The woman had his full attention now and his mind was busy knitting the puzzle together. He watched her long hair snapping in the wind, the air stream carrying it out her open window and flailing it like a signal-flag over the car roof.
That long black hair...
The hair triggered an awareness in him that he’d seen her quite a few times that afternoon. The woman, he decided, probably didn’t realize she was far too striking to blend into a crowd. Not that tall, and not with amazing hair that was sleek and black as a raven’s wing, winking blue fire in the sun and reaching almost to her waist. Now she was inadvertently signaling him with it, completely blowing her cover—if she had any cover in the first place. He shot a glance at the shopping bag sitting on the back seat.
Nothing.
The highway stretched on in front of him. No images. He glanced at the cone of pink roses lying on the contoured, Napa leather seat beside him. Also nothing. He took a second to concentrate on the loaves of French bread next to the roses.
Bingo.
A flood of images raced to the front of his mind, almost blocking his view of the road, and he knew without a doubt she had been very close to him when he’d made that purchase. He plucked through the thoughts in his mind to isolate pertinent scenes.
Boston and Maine Fish Company...
Glass display cabinet...
She materialized crystal-clear for a brief second, looking into the display case across the aisle from him. Beige skirt, long legs in strappy sandals, white jersey, shopping bag, yards of dark, gleaming hair. Crystal clear, except fo
r the fact she never looked up. He briefly saw the tip of her nose behind her straight hair. But he couldn’t conjure up memory of eye-contact with the woman—not counting the moment in her car mirror—and for some reason he found that much more irritating and frustrating than it should’ve been. As if he’d been frustrated by the experience more than once in his life. He really needed to look closely at her eyes.
He suddenly recalled a sound: heels tapping on bricks. “She was behind me!” He could see her shadowy form trudging along the alley, looking down, heavy hair obscuring her face. Then his mind presented him with another little bubble of memory: elevator doors closing on his view, preventing him from getting a good look at the mysterious woman entering the lobby.
This was going to drive him nuts. He deduced that sitting in his car in the parking garage, returning a cell phone call to a business partner, delayed him just long enough to place him behind this woman instead of her tailing. But that didn’t explain how she still knew the route he would take. Maybe she even knew his destination. He felt slightly uneasy leading a strange woman to his sister’s house, even though he knew that the Special Forces missions he had been involved in were covert and almost invisible. It was unlikely his past was chasing him around.
Brian studied her car again for a moment in the mirror and thought that the woman following him could use some intensive training in keeping a low profile.
No front plate.