15 Signs Of Murder (Fifteen thrillers)

by Luis Samways

  “Looks like you’ve seen a ghost,” Bill said as I stared at the sporadic traffic in front of us, nearly jolting at the sight of every police car we passed. It being California, there were a lot of instances when you might come across a patrol car or two.

  “Just tired, that’s all.”

  We didn’t speak for another ten minutes; I just stared out of the window, growing ever impatient with the unknown that surrounded me. I spotted a sign that read “San Diego – 87 miles.”

  “Still a while off, I’m afraid,” Bill said, pushing down a little on the accelerator as if he wanted me to know that he was trying.

  “Yeah,” I replied, buried deep in my thoughts.

  I was mesmerized by the lights that were flashing past us. Some were emanating from the taillights of cars, others from roadside buildings, but most, I could have sworn, were coming from my brain. It was like I had had a flurry of color that exploded in my head, making me see lights and shading in the world for the first time. I can’t quite explain the sensations that I was feeling, but I knew somehow that the closer I got to Mexico, the safer I would be.

  “Funny thing,” I heard Bill say as I was about to close my eyes and re-establish my dream. I guess I was curious as to what it meant. “You haven’t told me your name, whippersnapper.”

  I opened my eyes in complete shock. He was right. I hadn’t muttered as much as my damn name to the man who was helping me cross the border. I guess my bubble had come to bite me in the ass, because if Bill hadn’t suspected me of being a crook before, he sure as hell would be thinking it now. What sort of person doesn’t introduce themselves when somebody else does? Someone who spends too much time in their head. Somebody like me. Somebody who ought to get out of that habit if they don’t want to draw attention to themselves.

  “I’m ever so sorry, Bill,” I said, sounding a little shaken up. I turned to face him so he could at least see my face. I was certain he was now suspicious of me. My assumption was confirmed when I saw Bill glance over, looking a little serious.

  “I mean, it’s fine and all. Your business is your business. I just don’t want to be helping a child murderer over the border, that’s all,” he said, shifting gears once again as we sped up.

  “I’m not a child murderer, Bill,” I insisted, trying not to sound flustered and show my guilt.

  “So just a standard murderer, then?”

  I shook my head adamantly. “Heck no!” I said.

  “I think thou protest too much,” he said, taking a left as we drove into the middle lane.

  I was silent for a few seconds. I didn’t know how to explain my situation to the man. I knew he himself was a bit of a shady guy, but I doubt he’d see my rap sheet as anything but alarming, even if I was being framed for the murder of my best friend and his mother. So I decided to come half clean.

  “I can’t tell you my name, Bill,” I said.

  “Why not?”

  “Because I’m accused of something. Something that could blow back on you if you’re discovered to have gotten me out of the country. You seem like a good guy, Bill. I’d rather keep you that way,” I said.

  He didn’t say anything; he just shifted gears again, the truck sounding like an iron being set upright once a shirt had been flattened. I watched as his hand rested on the shifter. It bounced up and down, vibrating through the tremendous torque the truck possessed as we droned down the highway, silent and in deep thought. I just wondered what he was thinking about. Was he ready to stop the truck and make me walk the rest of the way to San Diego? Or would he do worse? Maybe he had a shotgun under his seat, or tucked in the compartment on the driver’s door.

  I wasn’t sure of anything anymore, bar one thing. I was in deep trouble, no matter who I came across. The likelihood of me lasting a week, let alone the rest of the night, was slim.

  Thirty-Three

  I had fallen asleep again. Unluckily for me, two things had occurred. I hadn’t managed to resume the dream in which the voices and lights were calling for me. And the truck was stopped in a pullout, hazards on, Bill looking at me with an alarmed expression on his face.

  I opened my eyes to the sound of the blinking lights going on and off, like an indicator.

  Click click - - - click click.

  I then heard another sound. The hammer on my gun being pulled back. I shot up in a panic, checking my sleeves for my piece. I caught a glimpse of my tired face in the mirror. My eyes screamed pain and anguish. My forehead was pale and slick, my hair damp with sweat.

  Impossible, I’m feeling human again! I thought. But it was a con. I looked at myself once again, and the sweat and panic were gone. All that remained was a placid look of indifference on my face. A permanent look of disappointment had been etched across my cheeks. But then I turned to see Bill staring at me. The hammer on my gun being cocked wasn’t something I’d imagined, unlike the rest of the scene from my interrupted slumber.

  Bill had a cold look on his face. He was staring at me and the gun, shocked and afraid. A few cars whooshed past us. A sign lay a few yards down the pullout. It read “San Diego – 32 miles.”

  “You brought a weapon into my cab?” Bill said, his voice a little shaky, a cigarette askew in his mouth as he spoke.

  “Bill, I can explain,” I pleaded, my voice sounding forced and squeaky.

  There wasn’t much to say, though. I was in a state of anxiety that I hadn’t ever experienced before. The other feelings I was experiencing took me by surprise. For some reason, I felt ashamed of myself for lying to Wild Bill. Not more than three hours ago the man had been a stranger, but now I felt some sort of bond with the guy.

  “Bill, the trouble I’m in makes carrying a gun a good idea,” I said.

  Bill rolled his eyes like he’d expected me to say something along those lines. “You think I’m stupid, boy?” he asked.

  “No, of course not, Bill. I think you’re intelligent.”

  “Don’t patronize me!” he snapped, lowering the gun and giving it another look. He took a drag on his cigarette. It seemed to be a long one, the orange tinge at its end glowing in a violent beam of light, momentarily illuminating the dark cab. I saw the key was still in the ignition. I thought to myself that maybe if I knocked Bill out of the truck, I could commandeer the vehicle and drive across the border myself. But I decided against it. I didn’t have time to, anyway, not after what he was about to say.

  “This gun is a police-issue firearm, boy. Do you know how I know that?” Bill asked with a sour tone to his voice.

  “No, sir,” I said, sounding like a scolded schoolboy.

  “I know that this gun is a damn police-issue firearm for the LAPD because my son is a blueblood. You don’t think that carrying a weapon like this can put you in peril?”

  Three cars passed us in succession, each breaking the speed limit. I watched the lights emanating from the tailgates disappear down the stretch of road.

  “Could be dangerous,” I said.

  “You’re damn right, it’s dangerous.”

  I heard a police siren. It was wailing at a high pitch that rang at our ears. Immediately, Bill and I slouched down in our seats, trying to avoid the passing cruiser. It whizzed past us. It was going after the three other speeding cars. I breathed a sigh of relief.

  “You see what I mean, though?” Bill asked.

  “Certainly,” I replied, not actually knowing what he was getting at. We were still slouched down in our seats, looking at each other with strained necks.

  “You can’t be carrying this. This will link you to whatever you’re running away from. I’m ditching it out of the window. If you have a problem with that, then I suggest you scoot your whippersnapper ass out of here and leave me be! I don’t want any connection with a damn police shooting.”

  Bill rolled down the window and threw my gun out of it. I heard it land in some bushes. It must have rolled a few times because the impact echoed off the brisk wind. I looked at Bill as he rolled the window back up, and attempted to ap
ologize.

  “Look, Bill, I didn’t shoot any damn cops, I only —”

  Bill interrupted me. “I don’t want to hear it, whippersnapper. You stay mysterious. I prefer it that way. My job is to get you across the border. Anything else, as you said earlier, would link me to your woes. Now, if you don’t mind, I’m running late, so let’s get a hustle on.”

  Bill keyed the ignition. The instruments on the dash came to life, beaming wonderful color into my darkened eyes. I tucked my head into my hands and sulked. I was embarrassed. I couldn’t believe my stupidity. Carrying around a damn cop gun was idiotic. If the feds found it on me, they could link me to anything they wanted. Even string me up for a cop shooting if they pleased. There was something about Bill that made everything he said make sense. The guy was wise. Sort of like a guardian angel.

  “Why didn’t you just shoot me?” I asked.

  “Now, why would I go and do something like that? You never know who may come back from the dead and haunt you,” he said, winking at me as we drove off toward San Diego.

  I looked out of the window, wide-eyed. The irony of what he’d just said wasn’t lost on me. If anything, it made me a little more cautious.

  Thirty-Four

  We didn’t have much driving left. I saw another sign that stated we weren’t more than ten miles from San Diego. The sign proclaimed that if we continued on the highway, we would reach San Diego in around ten minutes, maybe fifteen, if traffic was heavy. We were gunning it, though, so I figured we’d be there in no time.

  “Not too long to go now,” I said out loud, still feeling a little flustered from the gun incident. We hadn’t said much to each other since then. I had been wrapped up in my thoughts, as usual. Bill, on the other hand, had turned the radio on full blast, and he and I had Metallica to keep us entertained. He mustn’t have heard me over the radio. He didn’t answer me. He just drove and drove, not taking one eye off the road. The traffic was a little denser now. I was spotting other trucks on the road. I wondered what goods they were carrying. How likely was it that they were transporting runaway fugitives as well? Probably not very likely at all.

  We started to slow down, and Bill turned the radio dial a little, subduing the heavy guitar riffs blasting out of the radio. I took the opportunity to repeat myself.

  “Not too far now, is it?”

  Bill turned to me and grunted. I guess that was his way of agreeing with me. I could see he was pissed off. I understood the reasoning behind his anger, but I didn’t think he would take it so hard. After all, he seemed like the sort of guy who would expect those sorts of things. He looked a little rough, so I assumed he himself had a gun somewhere in the truck. Maybe not a cop gun, but a gun nonetheless.

  “We have another stop to make first,” he said, slowing down some more.

  “Where to, if I may ask?”

  “You may not ask,” he replied, the truck nearly coming to a stop, releasing the pressure from the engine with a whoosh that sounding like steam coming off an old-time locomotive.

  We made a left off the main highway. The road we were turning on seemed to be covered in darkness and surrounded by trees. I heard the wheels spin as they went from the asphalt of the highway to the dirt and dust of our new road. I watched as the cab bounced up and down, the suspension flexing and releasing. I figured that this new route would be a bumpy one.

  “Small road for a truck?” I asked.

  “Not really. Just looks that way from here,” he said, downshifting gears.

  I decided to remain quiet for the time being. I could tell that the conversation between Bill and me was running dry. I started to wonder if this whole border-jumping idea was stupid or not. I was now involved in a world I didn’t understand. I was unaware of the characters who surrounded me. Who were the good guys? Why weren’t the bad ones easier to spot? Was I really as innocent as I believed, or was I the whole reason behind Chad’s and his mother’s deaths?

  “I shouldn’t have gone back,” I muttered to myself.

  “What’s that?” Bill asked.

  “Nothing. Just thinking that my whole life is fucked now, that’s all.”

  Bill laughed for the first time in the last hour. His smile returned to his face. I felt a little more secure.

  “Son, our lives were destined to be fucked. That’s why they call it a bitch, you know?”

  “Sorry? Who’s the bitch?” I asked.

  “Life. You never heard that saying before?”

  I nodded.

  “Well, don’t worry about it, whippersnapper. It can’t get much worse than it already is. Not many Americans find themselves hopping the border into Mexico. So just look on the bright side.”

  “The bright side of what?” I asked.

  “Mexico has a lot of drugs. It has a lot of drink. It has a lot of women. If you blend in enough, you could have a really good time!”

  Thirty-Five

  After another fifteen minutes on the winding dirt road, we pulled up to a desolate building, stuck slap bang in the middle of nowhere. The trees rustled as our headlights hit the windows of the building, lighting them up like Christmas trees. The engine ticked and hissed as Bill pulled on the handbrake and stretched his arms out wide, giving a massive yawn.

  “Holy cow, I’m nearly done for the night,” he said.

  “What about the border?” I asked.

  He reached into his pocket and pulled out his pack of smokes. He stuck one in his mouth and asked me if I wanted a puff. I declined.

  “Don’t worry about the border, my boy. We’ll get there within the hour. Just need to pick up my last package, and then we’re good.”

  I caught myself looking out of my window and the windshield, wondering who in the hell would pick up a package from here.

  “Looks a little deserted, Bill.”

  I heard his cigarette burning as he pulled on it. The sound was surprisingly loud compared to usual. I put that down to the distinct lack of engine noise and our new serene environment.

  “It’s not all city lights and traffic jams, whipper.”

  “This doesn’t look like an Amazon warehouse,” I replied.

  “That’s because it isn’t,” Bill answered, dragging again on his smoke.

  We sat there, looking at nothing for a few minutes. The engine was still hissing away and the radiator was pluming thin condensation into the air. I dreaded to think how hot that engine must have been running. I also dreaded to think what would happen if the damn thing gave way, leaving us stranded in the middle of Coyote Country.

  The building in front of us looked derelict. The best way I could describe it would be using the words “abandoned crack house.” It was a pasty white; the stucco looked like they had mildew growing in between them. The windows on the face of the building were mostly broken. Some had wooden boards on them, nailed in, with graffiti artwork donning the surface of the splintered wood. There was a big red door. It looked like a double. It, too, was made from splintered wood and had shades of white meshed in with the rough red paint. To put it another way: shithole.

  Suddenly, there was some movement. The cracked and splintered red door to the building opened, and a man holding a large briefcase strolled out of the shadows. He was tall, yet slender. His face was obscured by the darkness, but judging by the look on Bill’s face, he recognized the guy.

  “Wait here. That’s the package.”

  Bill got out of the cab and closed the door. The wind had momentarily made its way inside, making my hair wave a little. The heat from the cabin had mixed in with the cold and blanketed the windshield in a misty fog. I wiped at the condensation and saw Bill walking up to the guy with the briefcase. They met in the middle, between the truck and the shithole behind the guy. The trees swayed from side to side. The meeting was brief. It was over in a matter of seconds. The guy handed Bill the briefcase and an envelope. They nodded at each other and went their separate ways. Not before the briefcase guy gave me a look, though. Then he turned his back on Bill and m
e, and walked into the building again. The rickety door slammed shut, just audible from inside the cabin.

  The driver’s door opened, and Bill climbed in, looking a little edgy.

  “Went well, I take it?” I asked.

  “As well as these things go,” he replied.

  He flung the case into the sleeping quarters in the back and turned the engine on almost instantly. He seemed to be in a hurry to get out of the forest clearing. I didn’t bother pressing him on the reason behind his sudden nervous disposition. I mean, it was obvious from the get-go. Bill wasn’t that much different from me. He, too, was mixed up in something he clearly didn’t want any part of.

  Thirty-Six

  I saw the “Vacancy” sign as we pulled into the highway motel/gas station. The traffic was whizzing past us. We were no more than three miles from the Welcome to San Diego sign. I had no idea why we had stopped. Bill had pretty much hauled ass out of the small forest enclosure once he got that mysterious briefcase from the equally mysterious guy. We hadn’t spoken as much as a syllable to each other. It was quieter than a library in the cab. I decided to break the silence.

  “What gives? Why are we stopping?”

  “I thought I’d get some supplies. I figured you could hop into the back of the truck right now and minimize the chance of anybody spotting you in the cab. It will be like you were never here!”

  I didn’t like the sound of it. I knew I’d have to get into the back of the cab at some point, but the thought of it still didn’t fill me with joy. I hated the idea of being in the dark. What freaked me out about it, though, was the idea that anything could pop out at you. Something could reach out for me and pull me into the darkness. It was silly of me to think like that, considering I had bigger and badder things to worry about, things that were actually happening to me. But you know how it goes; the human brain can be a little bit paranoid sometimes.