About the time it hit me that I was staring at mother and son, it dawned on me that I was also staring at a couple of stone-cold killers who, so far, had four bodies to their credit. And if I didn’t do something quick, I was going to be number five.
Immediately, my survival instincts—panic and paranoia—that had gone complacent when told that Sonny Slatterson was dead slammed back with a vengeance. My gut felt like it had a lump of ice in it, my hands went numb and my legs got wobbly.
For better or worse, I realized I had been thrust into war against a couple of really evil, nasty people and immediately started working on a battle plan as I turned and stumbled my way out of the building via a side exit. By the time I’d rushed to my car, fumbled with my keys, unlocked the door and was squealing out of the parking lot, my strategy was in place. It was three-pronged in nature and would require split-second timing.
First, was to get the hell out of Dodge.
Second was to lay low and hide for an indefinite period of time.
Third was to hope it all went away.
Admittedly, my initial plan was a bit rough. Even as I sped out of town at over seventy miles an hour, running stop signs and red lights along the way, my steel-trap mind was refining it. By the time I’d gotten past the city limits, I knew that I might have to take on a new identity or leave the country in order to be truly safe.
To those of you who say I left town in a blind panic, I say bullshit.
A person in a blind panic would have missed the turnoff that took the road back to Charlotte.
I didn’t. Even though it was dusk and getting dark, I didn’t drive by the turn.
A person in a blind panic would have kept on speeding.
I didn’t. Once I hit the county line, I slowed down and regrouped.
No, I was not in a blind panic, but in a tightly controlled, well-managed and—dare I say?—professional panic.
I knew, without doubt, that if I’d stayed in or around Warhill, I’d have been dead before the next morning and Sheriff Crump would turn a blind eye to everything. When the cops turn on you, there ain’t anything you can do but run. A person in a blind panic wouldn’t have figured that out.
Moreover, I can categorically and confidentially say this was not a blind panic because I know what a blind panic is.
I was going to experience one in about an hour.
After about thirty minutes or so of driving, I was beginning to feel a bit better. I was, for the time being, out of any immediate danger, and as I drove down the road through rural North Carolina, I began to reconsider some of my earlier plans.
I figured that as soon as I hit Charlotte, I would track down Ernie and tell him what had gone down. Then, it’d be off to the lawyers, make a sworn statement, notify Cheryl Slatterson and Bradshaw that the game was over, and I’d leave them alone if they left me the hell alone.
In hindsight, of course, I realize the sheer naiveté of this idea, but I was still a young pup back then. Now I know how to squeeze as much money, legally, as possible in this type of situation, before screwing the parties concerned and turning them over to the cops.
Yep. Overall, I was beginning to feel a bit better over the situation, even a tad proud of having figured out what was really going on back in Warhill. For the first time, I was starting to feel like an honest-to-God detective, a shamus, a real private eye. Then my car engine began to sputter and in less than one minute I found myself stranded out in the middle of nowhere on a two-lane country road, out of gas and with that familiar lump of ice beginning to grow in my gut again.
I started cursing my own stupidity, realizing I had broken one of Ernie’s cardinal rules. Never let your car have less than a half a tank of gas, and if you’re on the road, never turn in for the night without first filling up. You never know when you might have to leave in a hurry. In the rush and excitement of the last couple of days, I’d forgotten the basics and was now about to be taught the lesson from hell for my failure.
I sat there in the dark a minute or two and surveyed my situation. I was on a stretch of road that had nothing but woods on either side as far as the eye could see. It was getting dark and the sky was overcast. The surrounding terrain was made up of gently rolling hills, and I remember seeing a sign a couple of miles back that said, “Cherryburg - 5 m.”
Cherryburg was a small town of five thousand souls or so and I figured it was now roughly three miles away. Traffic was sparse on this road since the interstate had been built, so I figured that I’d probably be able to hoof it to town for gas about as quick as waiting for a car to come by and lend me a hand. With the temperature in the mid fifties, it wouldn’t be that bad of a walk. If a car offered me a lift while I was jogging down the road, so much the better.
Still, I was upset up over the timing and bad luck of the incident, but I knew that the quicker I got gas and out of there, the better. I left my car and quickly began to walk down the road towards Cherryburg.
I’d been walking fifteen minutes or so when the first car came up over the hill behind me. It slowed down by my car for a split second and then continued to heads toward me. I turned and faced the car as it sped by me, partly out of hope that it’d stop and pick me up and partly because I wanted to make sure it didn’t run over me. It turned out to be a good thing that I watched the car go by because it turned out to be full of teenagers who screamed some obscenities and then flung a few empty beer cans at me, which I managed to dodge. The little sons-of-bitches just kept going. I did the only thing I could do and that was to flip them the bird.
I kept walking and a few minutes later, headlights again appeared behind me. Once more, I turned around to watch the vehicle go by me. It was a large truck that didn’t even give me a moment’s pause, but just roared down the road, to be enveloped in the dark.
I kept walking.
After about ten more minutes, I began to notice the glow of the town in the night sky before me. I figured I was only a mile or two away from civilization. I picked up the pace. The quicker I made it there, the better. Another pair of headlights came up behind me, and once more I turned to face the car, not really nursing any hope of catching a ride. I watched as the headlights came down the road, at first at a fairly rapid speed. Then, as the lights got nearer to me, the car apparently slowed down to a near crawl.
Suddenly, I knew what was going to happen even before I knew it—if you know what I mean.
The driver of the car suddenly gunned the engine back to life and the automobile was hurtling itself directly at me, tires spinning and squealing in protest. I leaped off to one side, throwing myself headfirst into the wooded area by the road. I tumbled forward and managed to get back on my feet and look back at the car that had tried to run me down.
After plowing through the soft shoulder of the highway, it had spun out into the middle of the road. The driver’s side of the car opened and out jumped Stan Bradshaw with gun in hand. Inside the car was a woman who looked a lot like Cheryl Slatterson, but I couldn’t be sure.
Bradshaw figured correctly that I had run into the woods for cover. As he looked into the dark, searching for any sign of me, I instinctively grabbed for my old trusty .38. It was then that I realized, in cold sobering detail, that I had checked my gun in at the Sheriff’s office and had failed to get it back when I had abruptly made my exit.
Bradshaw yelled at the woman to get the hell out of there before another car came by. He’d call her at her home after he finished the job. He then came crashing into the woods after me.
I made an instantaneous evaluation of the situation and decide that the only option for me was blind panic.
I ran, screaming, deeper into the woods.
There’s a lot to be said for the physical benefits of being scared shitless. Your heart pumps faster which in turn gets more oxygen to the muscles and reduces fatigue. Adrenaline is flooded throughout your system, which greatly enhances both voluntary and involuntary reflexes. Reaction times are thereby dramatically reduced, which results in the in
dividual’s ability to avoid sudden obstacles, like tree branches and stumps. I also personally feel that one’s night vision improves in such situations, but I don’t think there are any scientific studies to back me up on this one. It probably has something to do with bulging eye effect that is created when absolute terror is induced.
I ran like this for more than a few minutes, crashing through the woods as fast as I could, give no thought to stealth or hiding. Eventually, sheer physical exhaustion snapped me back into reality. I stopped behind a tree to catch my breath and rest before having another go at it. As I stood there and tried to get my gasping for air under control, I listened for any hint of Bradshaw following in my wake and at the same time, figure out in which direction to run.
I’d been running without rhyme or reason through the woods and not giving any thought to direction. Now that I had some of my wits back about me, I knew that I had to make my way, somehow, to Cherryburg and civilization. There lay safety.
Luckily, the glow in the sky told me that Cherryburg was in the direction I’d been fleeing. I was about to start heading that way when I heard Bradshaw trudging away in the woods behind me. I froze against the tree I was leaning against and listened, praying that he’d keep walking and miss me.
Bradshaw kept slogging towards me, and then he stopped. Except for the wind and occasional groan of a tree trunk swaying, it was silent.
“Dafoe!” Bradshaw’s yell pierced the air. “You couldn’t leave it alone, could you?”
I just stood there, waiting. I heard Bradshaw take a few more steps, then stop.
“First that Baylor bitch fucked things up, got greedy, and had to be taken care of,” he shouted, “then you had to play hero and save Sonny.”
I could tell he was getting nearer. I knew what he was doing. He didn’t have a clue as to where I was at and was trying to draw me out, get me to say something.
“Then you had to go find out about my dear—Mother,” you could hear the venom in his voice when he mentioned her.
“This was supposed to be the payback for me, Dafoe, to make up for the past. It was her idea, you know.”
He was getting closer and I found myself holding my breath, to keep him from hearing me breathe.
“Sonny was to get it all, and she wasn’t about to stand by and let that happen. She’d kept in touch with me, always promised it’d be mine—and hers. Five years we’ve been planning this, and I’ve been waiting for twenty.”
He was not more than ten yards from me and getting closer. I could just make out his silhouette.
“I know you left your gun back at the office. Time for you to die, Dafoe—come’ on, let’s get it over,” he growled.
Bradshaw was so close that I could almost have touched him. I knew where he was, but he didn’t know where I was hiding. A braver man would have suddenly charged him, used the element of surprise to attempt to overpower him, take his gun.
I just prayed he’d keep on walking and not see me. I thought he had when suddenly he turned and started to walk straight at me, gun ready.
He hadn’t seen me yet, but he was only a split second from being able to make out my form against the tree trunk.
It forced my hand.
I bent over and flung myself at him, football tackle style, and knocked him to the ground. He grunted in surprise and pain, then his gun exploded above my head. I think I knocked the wind out of him, but I didn’t take the time to ask. He was strong and was quickly rolling away from me. In a flash, I was on my feet and running towards the town.
I heard his gun crack behind me after I had run about thirty yards, but I just kept on running. It was a footrace now, with my only chance of survival being getting into town or somewhere with people.
I kept pushing myself to run as fast as I could. Once or twice I stumbled over the undergrowth and was constantly weaving in and around the trees, but I knew that Bradshaw was close behind me, and that kept me moving. I think I gained a bit of ground on him, but I couldn’t be sure.
Off in the distance ahead, I saw what looked like a car cross my vision from left to right.
A road, I thought to myself.
I was getting near town, and with a burst of speed powered by renewed hope, I picked up the pace.
After a minute or two, I ran out of the woods and found myself standing on a two-lane blacktop, across from an open field. I looked to my left and saw only more fields. I could tell that the town was about a half a mile down the road. In my condition, it might as well have been a hundred miles.
I was exhausted. My legs felt like lead. I was laboring for breath, and I could tell by the noise that Bradshaw was nearby. I had a sinking feeling that not only was he bigger and stronger than me; he was also in a lot better shape.
Then I heard the music.
It was coming from my right, and I looked over that way. There, not more than 200 yards away, was a large church next to the road. The lights were on, and I could faintly hear the sounds of an organ and singing coming from it.
Sanctuary.
Suddenly, a hundred yards or so to my left, I saw Bradshaw lurch out of the woods.
I launched myself towards the church, and not a moment too soon. As I sped down the road, my feet slapping against the payment, I heard the crack and the “zing” of a bullet as it whizzed by my head. It gave me the boost of adrenaline I needed to get me to the church before Bradshaw could run me down and get a clean shot.
It was a Thursday night, and I remember fleetingly thinking that choir practice must be going on, since churches around here only gather for services on Sunday mornings and Wednesday nights. However, as I got nearer, I realized that the parking lot was jam-packed and that something else must be taking place.
That suited me just fine. The more people the better as far as I was concerned. The name on the sign in the front of the church read Evangelical Assembly of God. It was a fairly large church and looked prosperous.
I raced to the front of the church, ran up the steps and got to one of the front doors. As I wrenched it opened I looked over my shoulder to see where Bradshaw was.
He was bent over in the middle of the road. He had his gun in hand and was trying to catch his breath. I went inside the church.
I found myself in the front vestibule. I could hear the sounds of singing coming from behind both sets of swinging double doors before me. I knew I had only a few moments before Bradshaw got there, so I went to the doors on the right, swung them open and entered the church sanctuary.
Inside, there were close to a thousand white people standing up, singing, stomping their feet and getting all worked up with the Holy Spirit. There were a few in the aisles jumping up and down, and I saw one man drop to knees and start howling at the ceiling like a man possessed. All the while, the organ was belching out Hymn #235, Holy, Holy, Holy at a beat about twice as fast as it was originally written. Everything was horribly off key, and no one really had the right rhythm going except for a few kids in the choir—who did look a tad bit dusky to me, if you catch my drift.
On the elevated dais at the front of the church sat a man, no doubt the preacher. Behind him was the choir, decked out in aquamarine robes with white collars trimmed in gold. Up behind and above the choir stretched a white banner and printed on it in bold, red letters were the words Repent and be Saved.
I’d stumbled into an old-fashioned, full-throated, evangelical Holy Roller revival, and I was about to become the star attraction.
Chapter 20
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