Body Rides

  After a while, he forced himself to look away from her.

  He looked toward the body of the man he’d shot.

  ‘Still there?’ Elise asked.

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘Thought so.’ She lifted her left hand away from her side and put it on Neal’s shoulder. ‘Still no police,’ she said.

  ‘Not so far.’

  ‘I don’t think they’re coming. Not unless we call them ourselves. Which I don’t think we should do.’

  ‘We have to,’ Neal said.

  ‘No, we don’t.’

  ‘Sure, we do.’

  She squeezed his shoulder firmly, but not so hard that it hurt. ‘Listen,’ she said.

  He gave the rope a rough tug with the pliers. The jaws slipped off and the pliers leaped sideways. ‘Damn!’

  ‘Stop it for a minute. Listen. Nobody has to ever find out about any of this.’

  ‘He was going to kill you.’

  ‘Yeah. And he’s dead. So it’s not as if he has to be apprehended or put on trial or anything. He’s already been . . . brought to justice. He’s never going to hurt anyone again. So what’ll we accomplish by bringing in the cops?’

  Neal shrugged. ‘I’m not sure, but . . . You don’t just walk away from something like this.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘I killed this guy.’

  ‘In self-defense,’ Elise reminded him.

  ‘Maybe it won’t look like self-defense if we run away. It’ll make us look like the criminals.’

  ‘How will you explain your gun?’

  ‘Tell the truth.’

  ‘Do you have a permit, or whatever?’

  ‘Not to carry. Are you kidding? In L.A.? Nobody gets a carry permit. Not unless you happen to be the chief of police, or something. That’s why crime’s so out of control around here.’

  ‘The thing is, are you going to be in trouble?’

  ‘Maybe. They won’t prosecute me for killing the guy, I’m pretty sure. Though I guess his family could always sue me. You know, for wrongful death.’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘I guess that’s very likely, if he has family. Not that they’d win. But I’d be up to my neck in legal stuff . . .’

  ‘And what about the gun?’ Elise asked.

  ‘Carrying a loaded gun in my car . . . I’m pretty sure it’s a felony.’

  Her hand tightened. ‘You could go to jail?’

  ‘I guess it’s possible.’

  ‘My God. For saving my life?’

  ‘Well . . . The main thing is, I did what had to be done. If I have to go to jail for it . . . those are the breaks. I mean, I sort of assumed that risk when I started carrying the gun. But I’ll probably just end up with a suspended sentence and a fine.’

  ‘What sort of fine?’

  ‘I don’t know. A thousand bucks, maybe.’

  ‘Okay, get this rope off me.’

  He lifted the pliers, clamped the knot, and started tugging again.

  ‘I didn’t think it’d be that bad,’ she said.

  ‘What?’

  ‘The trouble you could get into.’

  ‘Hell. The way things work these days, you’re in trouble if you look at someone funny.’

  ‘I wasn’t going to mention that.’ A slim crescent of teeth appeared in the blur of her face, then vanished. ‘Anyway, none of that will happen if we keep quiet about all this.’

  ‘I’m the one who’ll be in trouble. You haven’t done anything wrong.’

  ‘Do you think that’ll matter? By the time the media gets finished with us?’

  Neal grimaced. ‘You’ve got a point there.’

  ‘You know exactly what’ll happen. They do it to everybody. Doesn’t matter how good a person you might be, they won’t quit till they make you look like the scum of the earth. If they can’t find dirt on you, they’ll make something up.’

  ‘Yeah. That sort of thing happens.’

  ‘All the time,’ Elise said.

  ‘Well, most of the time.’ As he said that, the knot gave a bit. He pulled harder. The tight bundle of rope came apart. ‘There.’

  ‘I’ll get it.’ Elise let go of him and worked on removing the rope.

  Neal watched her.

  She said, ‘Even if they don’t try to trash me – and they will – I don’t much like the idea of suddenly being known throughout the world as the woman who got abducted and tortured by some sadistic maniac. That I was found naked and tied to a tree. It won’t just be strangers who find out about it, either. It’ll be everybody who knows me. All my relatives and friends . . .’

  ‘Doesn’t sound very pleasant,’ Neal admitted.

  ‘There’ll be pictures of me everywhere. Guys will probably look at them and have daydreams about stripping me and using pliers and knives.’ She threw the rope down and rubbed her right wrist. ‘I want to keep my life,’ she said. ‘I don’t want to become public property.’

  ‘You talked me into it.’

  ‘You’re with me?’

  ‘Yeah. I don’t want to end up in court or on Hard Copy.’

  Three

  ‘Are your clothes around here someplace?’ Neal asked.

  Elise, still rubbing her wrist, shook her head.

  ‘Here, you can wear this.’ Neal took off his shirt and gave it to her.

  ‘Thanks.’ She put it on. As she fastened the buttons, she turned away and walked toward the body. The tail of the big, loose shirt draped her buttocks.

  Neal followed her, the pliers in his hand. ‘What’re you going to do?’ he asked.

  ‘Borrow his shoes, for starters.’ Crouching by the body, she started to pull them off. ‘Don’t want to wreck my feet on the way out,’ she said. ‘He carried me over here.’

  He carried her naked?

  ‘I’ll carry you out, if you want,’ Neal offered.

  ‘Thanks, but you don’t have to do that.’

  I wouldn’t mind, he thought.

  She stood up. Balancing on one foot, then the other, she put on the man’s dark sneakers. ‘Disgusting,’ she muttered.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Wearing his shoes. But at least they aren’t gigantic.’ She squatted and tied the laces. Then she duck-walked away from the body and tugged a couple of thick, leafy weeds out of the ground.

  ‘What’re you doing?’ Neal asked.

  ‘I want to hide him.’

  ‘Shouldn’t we just get out of here?’

  She twisted sideways and tossed the weeds at the body. One landed on the chest, the other on the face. ‘If the cops were coming,’ she said, ‘they’d be here by now. Don’t you think so?’

  ‘I don’t know. Depends on how busy they are, I guess.’

  ‘I think they’d show up fast for a report of shots being fired.’

  ‘Probably,’ Neal admitted. He pulled a handkerchief out of his pocket. As he wiped the pliers, he said, ‘I’d still like to get out of here.’

  ‘This won’t take long.’ She pulled out more weeds.

  Done wiping the pliers, Neal squatted beside the man. He placed the tool on the ground near the gloved hand.

  ‘The longer he goes without being found,’ Elise said, ‘the better off we’ll be. Don’t you think?’

  ‘Yeah,’ Neal said. ‘Things’ll deteriorate. It won’t be so easy for the cops to pinpoint when he died.’

  ‘And people might forget they saw us,’ Elise added.

  ‘Let’s hope nobody does see us.’

  ‘But if they do, it won’t matter so much if the body doesn’t get found for a while. If nobody knows for sure when anything happened . . .’

  ‘Yeah. You’re right.’

  ‘I wish we had a shovel.’

  ‘That’d be pushing it,’ Neal said. ‘The quicker we get out of here, the better.’

  ‘Maybe so.’

  ‘You go ahead with that,’ he told her. ‘I’ll look for my brass.’

  ‘Your brass?’

  ‘My cartridge casings. I want to find them
if I can. We should try not to leave anything behind.’

  On hands and knees, he searched the ground to the right of where he had stood while firing. He quickly found two of the shells. The chances of finding all four were remote, but he figured there was no reason to quit. Not yet. Not while Elise continued to work at concealing the body.

  She hurried about, pulling bunches of weeds and grass, and even uprooting a couple of small bushes.

  Neal found the third casing. It must’ve flown six feet before landing on the ground beside an old beer can.

  ‘That should about do it,’ Elise said.

  Neal raised his head. The body had disappeared under a cover of foliage.

  ‘I’m still missing one shell,’ Neal told her.

  She came over. On hands and knees, she helped him search. ‘What happens if we don’t find it?’ she asked.

  ‘The cops will.’

  ‘Does that matter?’

  ‘It might. I’ll have to get rid of the pistol, anyway. But the shell might have my prints on it. Partials. Maybe not, but I’d feel a lot . . .’

  ‘Is this it?’ Elise picked an object out of the weeds. She held it up between the tips of her thumb and forefinger.

  ‘Let’s see.’ Neal held out his hand. She dropped it into his palm. ‘That’s it. Good going.’

  ‘The least I could do.’

  The four brass casings jingled in the pocket of his shorts as he got to his feet. Beside him, Elise stood up. She bent over and brushed off her bare knees.

  ‘What about you?’ he asked. ‘We can’t leave anything of yours behind.’

  ‘Nothing here. He just brought me.’

  ‘You weren’t wearing anything at all?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘How about jewelry? Earrings? Anything like that?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Okay, good. Did you touch anything around here?’

  ‘Just the rope, I think.’

  ‘That’s all right. I don’t think they could lift any sort of decent prints off that. What about him? Did you touch him? His pants?’

  ‘With my hands?’

  ‘Yeah. They’re leather. That goes for his gloves, too. Any chance your prints might be on them?’

  ‘I doubt it.’

  ‘There wasn’t any sort of struggle?’ Neal asked.

  ‘He got me from behind,’ she explained. ‘All of a sudden, I had this arm across my neck. It lifted me right off my feet. I didn’t have a chance to struggle. Next thing I knew, I was in the back of his van with my hands tied behind me.’

  ‘Okay. Good.’

  ‘Good?’

  ‘Just that we don’t have to worry about his pants and gloves. Anyway, even if you did leave some prints, all that stuff we piled on him’ll probably mess them up pretty good.’ He frowned down at the oblong, bushy mound.

  ‘What?’ Elise asked.

  ‘I’m just wondering if we should go ahead and take them anyway, just to play it safe.’

  ‘Take what, his pants?’

  ‘And gloves.’

  ‘Are you kidding?’

  ‘You could wear his pants,’ Neal said.

  ‘Not a chance. It’s awful enough having his shoes on. If you think for one second . . . no way. Not his pants. Let’s just go.’ She took hold of Neal’s hand and pulled him along beside her.

  ‘Are you sure you aren’t leaving anything behind?’ he asked.

  ‘I’m sure.’

  ‘You didn’t have a purse, or . . .’

  ‘No purse. Some blood, that’s all. I guess I’m leaving some of that behind. Along with some sweat and tears.’

  ‘Nobody can identify you from any of that.’

  ‘What about DNA and that sort of thing?’

  ‘They might be able to match you to it, but first they’d have to know who you are. You’d basically have to be arrested and indicted before they’d ever run tests like that.’

  ‘You seem to know a lot about . . . crime things.’

  He shrugged. ‘Not that much. I see a lot of movies, read a lot of books. Watch some trials on TV. That’s all.’

  Before stepping out of the trees, they stopped and scanned the field, the nearby streets, the sidewalks and yards. They saw no one. A couple of porch lights. A few lights showing through windows. But no headlights.

  Elise let go of Neal’s hand and started to run. More of a quick jog than a dash. Neal guessed that she might be afraid to go all-out wearing the large shoes.

  He rushed along beside her.

  At first, he had almost objected to running. We’ll look too conspicuous. But he realized it would be a silly argument. At this hour of night, coming through this no-man’s-land, they were so out of place that running wasn’t likely to draw any additional attention.

  Better to hurry and reach the street as fast as possible. They’d be far less conspicuous there.

  Except she’s not wearing anything but my shirt.

  And a dead man’s shoes.

  As he jogged by her side, he glanced all around. So far, so good. Still nobody in sight. Still no cars coming.

  Doesn’t mean we aren’t being watched.

  Doesn’t matter, he told himself. In this light, somebody’d have to be right in our faces to get a good look.

  A block to the left, the street suddenly brightened with the lights of a car approaching the intersection. ‘Watch out,’ Neal gasped. Moments later, the headlights appeared. No turn signal, but the car started to make a left-hand turn.

  Elise dropped. Neal dropped.

  They were both flat on the ground before the headlights swept by.

  Neal kept his head down as the brightness washed over him and went away. Not moving, he listened to the car’s engine. A steady, windy noise.

  What if it’s a cop car?

  What if it stops and the cops get out?

  The thoughts sickened him.

  But the car kept on moving. As its engine sound began to diminish, Neal raised his head. Just a regular passenger car. Near the stop sign at the corner, its brake lights came on, doubling the red brightness of its rear end. Though no turn signal started to blink, the car turned right and headed for the underpass.

  In front of Neal, Elise rose to her hands and knees.

  The shirt tail covered less than when she was standing. A lot less. Neal glimpsed the pale curves of her buttocks, the dark split between them, the backs of her legs. He turned away quickly, feeling guilty.

  Looking over his shoulder, he saw the car disappear into the underpass.

  When he faced forward, Elise was scurrying up. The shirt tail slid down and covered her rump.

  Neal scrambled to his feet and ran after her.

  Watched her leap the railroad tracks. Watched her duck through the gap in the chainlink fence. Watched her crouch by the side of the van.

  A few seconds later, he crouched facing her.

  They both huffed for air. His heart was slamming.

  ‘What’ll we do . . . with his van?’ Elise asked.

  ‘What’s in it? Anything of yours?’

  ‘Blood, sweat, whatever.’

  ‘Clothes?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Jewelry? Purse?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘Fingerprints?’

  ‘My hands were tied behind me. I was on a mattress.’

  ‘What’s in there?’

  ‘I don’t know. It was dark. Should we drive it away? We could leave it a few miles from here, or something.’

  ‘We didn’t bring the keys.’

  For a few moments, Elise didn’t speak. Neal heard her quick breathing. Then she said, ‘One of us could go back for them.’

  ‘That’d be fun.’

  ‘Yeah. Any volunteers?’

  Neal imagined himself running all the way back, entering the darkness of the trees, creeping over to the body, reaching into the bushy mound, feeling blindly, digging a hand into a pocket of the dead man’s leather pants. All alone.

  And what
if he’s not dead, after all?

  And if he is dead – a corpse?

  I’m all alone in the dark, digging into the pocket of a corpse.

  And while I’m busy at that cheerful task, Elise is waiting for me here, all by herself. God only knows who might happen to come along . . .

  Have her wait in my car.

  Big improvement.

  Neal was not about to let her go for the keys while he stayed behind. If it came to that, he would go instead.

  ‘We could both go back,’ Elise suggested.

  ‘Let’s just leave the thing here. Even if we had the keys . . . The less we have to do with the van, the better. You never know. We try driving it someplace, we’re just asking for trouble. Somebody might see us. We might get stopped by a cop. We’d have to worry about leaving prints inside – hair, blood. Let’s not bother. It isn’t all that conspicuous here, anyway. It could probably sit here for a week without anyone giving it a second thought.’

  ‘You’re probably right about that.’

  ‘Besides,’ Neal said, ‘there might be something inside that’ll incriminate the guy. Which would be good for us, in case we do end up getting caught.’

  ‘Okay. So we leave it here?’

  ‘Might as well. I’ll drive you home in my car. Wait here for a minute. I’ll back it up to the rear of the van.’

  Leaving Elise crouched beside the van, Neal hurried to his car. He jerked open the door. The overhead light came on. He dropped behind the wheel and swung the door shut, quickly but silently. The car went dark.

  He reached to the ceiling, removed the courtesy light’s plastic cover, and popped the bulb out of its socket. After tossing the cover and bulb onto the passenger seat, he dug the keys out of his pocket. He fumbled in the darkness for the ignition key, found it, slid it in and gave it a twist. The engine started.

  Keeping the headlights off, he backed slowly to the rear of the van. He stopped and shifted. Brakes on, he called out the window, ‘Stay low and get into the back seat.’

  Eyes on the side mirror, he watched Elise rush forward. She squatted beside his car, reached up and opened the rear door. After climbing in, she pulled the door shut gently.

  Neal drove forward.

  He kept his headlights off.

  Four

  After turning right at the corner, Neal put his headlights on. ‘You okay back there?’ he asked.