That was the moment when Wes attacked. He spun round, pushed Boots hard. She crashed back into Duke.
Suddenly there was pandemonium. Folk shouting. Wes and Duke fighting.
Norman ran into the center of the room from where he could get a clear shot at Wes. Priest kicked out with his one remaining leg. Norman stumbled over it. His hand spasmed. He fired a bullet down into the floor. Hank lunged at him. Norman sidestepped; the old-timer fell flat on his belly. The impact was enough to make Hank fart with a loudness and a violence that Norman wouldn’t have believed humanly possible.
Shit. Smells worse than a reptile house at the zoo.
Boots was picking herself up from her fall. She grunted, ‘That’s no way to treat a lady.’ Her thick legs had been grazed during the rough ’n’ tumble.
Wes was brave.
Wasn’t enough.
Three swift punches from Duke knocked the guy cold.
Barely ruffled, Duke stood back in the doorway. He leveled the Magnum to cover the milling people in the room.
‘Okay,’ he called out. ‘Everyone stand still.’
They saw the gun.
They stood still.
Lauren and Nicki were next to Priest. He shook his head and spat. ‘Pah!’
Boots’s piglike eyes scanned the room. ‘Hey, where’s Pamela?’
Duke turned to look back at the empty landing. ‘She must have slipped out.’
‘I’ll go get her.’ Boots cocked her pistol.
‘No, you stay here with me,’ Duke ordered. ‘Norman, what’re you waiting for? Go bring Pamela back before she calls the cops.’
The cops!
Norman had forgotten all about those guys.
‘What’re you waiting for, Normy?’ Then Duke said something that electrified Norman. ‘You find her, bud, you’ve got my authority to be the first to take her.’
‘Don’t worry, I’ll find her.’
Norman jumped over the unconscious Wes, then ran along the landing to the stairs. He ran down those two at a time.
Pamela?
I get to take her first!
Oh boy, oh boy.
Chapter Forty-six
Pamela thought: I’ve traveled back in time. It’s happening to me again.
Is it really Norman chasing me?
Or is it Rodney?
Back from the dead.
Zombie Rodney Pinkham. He’ll do the bad things to me in death that he couldn’t do in life.
Her mind-chatter went into overdrive as she ran from the old house on the hill. When Wes had attacked Duke in the bedroom she’d seen that Boots had landed on her fanny. The pig-girl had been in no position to fire her gun. The scary old guy, Priest, had tripped Norman.
So Pamela had taken her chance.
She’d fled.
Down the stairs. Through the door. Out into brilliant sunshine. Dazzled, she could barely see.
Didn’t stop her running, though.
Unlike last time, when Rodney had pursued her, firing his pistol at her as he went, Pamela wasn’t barefoot as she ran across the arid, stony ground of the Mojave. She wore new trainers that Lauren had given her for her waitress work. Clean white ones with a soft rubber sole.
Even so, those sharp stones made themselves felt as she ran.
But where am I going? she thought, dazed. I’m running away from the cafe. I should be running toward it. Might be some would-be customers. One might have a cellphone, or they can drive me to the nearest town so I can tell the cops.
Tell the cops what?
When they come to investigate the Duke Gang’s armed takeover of Pits they’ll also find that we’ve been killing and eating people.
Go figure.
Pamela’s eyes were by now more accustomed to the sun’s midday glare. Even so, the yellow rocks reflected a hell of a lot of rays. She had to squint to see.
Above her, the burning blue of the desert sky. In front of her, the ground rose up into rocky hills. These were sliced by brutal ravines. She saw the ruins of mine buildings. Rusty hunks of machines littered this side of the hill. There were the remains of iron rails, complete with a corroded ore hopper or two.
She could also see that she was being chased.
Norman had raced after her. She made out the golden gleam of the automatic in his hand.
Chasing her. Just like Rodney.
Only he hadn’t fired yet, thank God.
As Pamela climbed the boulder-strewn hillside she glanced back. Norman must have been nearly a quarter of a mile away. He weaved between clumps of cacti. She’d gotten a good start. Was he gaining on her? She couldn’t tell.
Could she hide?
No tree cover. No intact buildings.
Only rocks, sand, skeletal ruins. Not many options when it came to concealment.
Press on, she told herself. You might find somewhere in the hills.
So Pamela pressed on. She could almost see herself from a vulture’s point of view. A young woman with blonde hair. Dressed in the uniform of a Pits cafe waitress: knit sweater, bright red shorts, dinky apron, white sneakers. Still had her order book in the apron pocket.
Could do with a Luger. Or a machine gun. Then I could blow Norman away.
She huffed for air. Sweat ran in a salt river between her breasts. The sun burned the back of her head. She dodged a cluster of prickly pear. Then pushed for speed again: chin tucked down to her collar bones, back hunched, arms pumping, feet splashing dust.
‘Pamela!’
Norman sees me all right, she told herself. I must still be out of range, otherwise he’d have tried for a lucky shot . . .
Pamela considered a change of direction. Making a run back to the cafe. Or even the highway in the hope that a passerby would pick her up. Whisk her to safety. Maybe even Sharpe again in his bus.
But to double back would take her too close to Norman.
Gotta keep running away from him. That means running in the opposite direction to the cafe, too.
‘C’mon, Pamela,’ she panted. ‘You need a plan. You can’t run all the way . . . way to Vegas.’
She was slowing. She knew it. Heat, exhaustion, running uphill. All conspired against her. Norman would catch up with her soon.
Or close the gap enough for him to fire a round or two off at her.
Pamela slowed her pace to a lope. Still she had to dodge cacti and mesquite. Only she knew she had to pump oxygen into her brain. Gotta do some thinking.
A plan. Need a plan.
What to do, Pamela?
Stop here? Fight him? Brain him with a piece of old iron from the mining equipment?
Iron bar versus automatic pistol? Think harder, Pamela.
Now she was almost walking. A stitch penetrated her side. Ahead, the hill split in two.
Can’t keep climbing. Gotta take the easier route.
Pamela entered the V-shaped depression in the hillside. She soon realized that she was entering a small canyon. The ground beneath her began to run downhill. Still a lot of loose rubble underfoot. Sun beat at her from the canyon sides. But a little easier to make progress.
If she couldn’t outrun Norman this might give her more time to consider a plan.
C’mon, Pamela, think . . . think! What are you going to do to save your life?
Chapter Forty-seven
Norman was no athlete. But on the upside he was young. At college he jogged (mainly so that he could watch the female joggers jiggle pleasingly round the track).
Also, he had incentives.
Duke had given him permission to bone Pamela. His reward for catching her.
Course, there’s a downside, too. Duke will beat seven yards of crap outta me if I don’t catch her.
And if I don’t catch her she’ll call the cops.
I’m a cop-killer. Therefore the conclusion isn’t hard to make.
I fry in the electric chair.
All that was enough to keep Norman running as hard as he could. Which wasn’t that fast when it came to marathon st
andards. But not so terrible, either. He reckoned he was gaining on Pamela as he dodged cacti with their sharp spines or jumped over boulders. He even at one point sidestepped a snake that had red bands running along its body.
The gold Glock automatic in his hand grew a mite too heavy from time to time, so he’d pause to change hands.
Ahead, Pamela was running up the slope of the barren hill. Norman saw the flicker of her long, bare legs. Saw the sway of her butt clad in bright red shorts.
He wondered about claiming his prize.
Take her there and then on the hot ground? Or escort her down to the trailer where he could enjoy the comfort of a soft mattress?
Hell, she’ll be my mattress.
Norman even began to wonder about afterwards. If he pleasured her sweetly enough there might be a bond. Pamela might fall in love with him.
It’d be a shame to hand her over to Duke.
He paused for a second to wipe sweat from his eyes. Glancing back, he saw the lone house on the hill, the cemetery with its long-dead gunslingers and monkeys. Beyond that was the cafe beside the deserted highway.
Still quiet.
Quiet as a grave.
Norman pushed himself hard to run across the slabs of rock and past discarded mining machinery. At one point he had to leap over the skeleton of a mule. Perhaps three hundred yards ahead of him he glimpsed Pamela. The sight of her slim-waisted figure sent a fire running through his veins.
Man, was she beautiful.
Desirable.
He couldn’t wait for that slippery moment of entry.
Squinting against the sun’s fierce glare, he saw her hair fly out as she turned her head swiftly to look back at him. He couldn’t see her face so he couldn’t tell if she wore an expression of fear.
But being chased by a horny guy with a gun, how would you feel?
Feel shit-yer-pants-full scared, that’s how you’d feel.
Norman grinned. This was a rare feeling of power, of being in control. He realized that he was enjoying himself. He even called out Pamela’s name a couple of times. Never expected her to stop, but that was part of the chase game, wasn’t it?
Let the victim know that you’re hot on their trail.
He upped the pace. Now it was hot perspiration on his face that dried the second it beaded from his skin. Only his shirt became damp and itchy from sweat.
Once he’d tamed Pamela he’d put her to good use soaping his back in the shower. That would feel good.
Norman circled a patch of prickly bushes. Now he could see that a section of the hill ran into a gully. Pamela was headed along it.
She can’t run forever, can she? I’m going to catch her soon. And then?
Chapter Forty-eight
Questions Pamela asked herself – whether her stamina would hold out, or whether she’d suddenly find she’d happened upon the main route to Las Vegas, crowded with vacation traffic – were suddenly answered for her.
‘Damn.’
She gazed up at the rock face in front of her. The canyon had ended as suddenly as if someone had built a fifty-foot wall in front of her. Pamela looked left. Looked right. Looked forward. Sheer cliffs.
Only one way out.
That’s back.
Back the way I came.
Right into the arms – and firearm – of Norman.
But Norman is no Rodney Pinkham. He looked like a college boy from a good family. He spoke politely. He didn’t act like bad-boy Duke. And he certainly didn’t seem a psycho like Rodney.
But who can tell a psychopath from a friendly, well-mannered guy? There’s no knowing who’s nice and who’s a killer.
‘Pamela!’
She looked back along the canyon. It was perhaps a hundred feet wide. Flat at the bottom and covered with a loose scree. Almost like the dried-out bed of a river.
‘Pamela!’
The sun had passed its zenith now. A strip of deep shadow ran along the right-hand side of the canyon floor. She could still see Norman.
He had gained on her.
Now he was a hundred yards away.
‘Pamela!’ His voice echoed along the canyon walls.
Oh, God. She saw the glint of the gun, too. A gold brilliance.
After being nearly killed by Rodney she couldn’t just stand there and wait for Norman to stroll up and shoot her.
‘Pamela. There’s nowhere to run.’
He didn’t even seem to shout now. The narrow gap between the horizontal planes of rock amplified his voice. They channeled it to her as well. Lending it an eerie quality.
‘So here you are, Pamela,’ she hissed to herself. ‘Caught like a rat in a trap. So . . . what ya gonna do? Stand and fight? Or walk toward him? Beg for mercy? Offer anything he wants?’ She gulped. A tear came to her eye.
And when she wished for someone to save her it wasn’t the man she once believed had loved her – her dead husband, Jim – it was Sharpe. Guardian angel of the freeway. Driver of the gray bus of salvation. The tear rolled down her cheek.
‘Pamela.’
Norman was now maybe eighty yards away. He stepped over knee-high boulders. Sometimes he’d vanish into shadow then re-emerge closer.
Shockingly closer.
‘No,’ Pamela hissed. ‘I’m not giving up!’
Her eyes scanning the rock face, she searched for something – anything! A cave. A niche to hide herself. A secret passageway.
The sunlit cliffs were featureless. Very nearly as smooth as a man-made wall.
Only now she took a closer look at the cliff that lay beneath a veil of dark shadow. Ah ha. This was different. More exposed to the west wind. She saw that the yellow rock had been weathered. There were fissures, hollows, recesses and protrusions. Not big ones.
But, God willing, big enough.
‘Pamela!’
Closing out the voice, she ran across the stones that shifted beneath her feet. She stumbled. Almost fell. But sheer willpower kept her balance. Seconds later she reached the rock face.
Good-bye, fingernails. Hello, grazed knees. But needs must.
Pamela began to climb the vertical rock.
‘Pamela. You’re wasting your time.’
She didn’t care. She climbed. A born-again rock monkey. Driven to scale a vertical wall of stone because her survival depended on it. Her eyes scanned the rock, locating hand-holds. Some were more like burrows in the cliff.
Pray God that there are no snakes in them.
Pamela’s fingers probed hidden spaces. She expected the needle-sharp sting of fangs in the back of her hand at any moment. But her luck held. No snakes, no scorpions. Steadily she worked upward. Her back ached. She panted. Her fingertips were sore. One finger bled from the nail. Not a bite; just relentless wear and tear.
‘Pamela. Don’t risk it. You’ll fall.’
‘No, I won’t.’
She glanced down. Thirty feet or more to the canyon floor. As she began to climb again she glimpsed Norman. He was perhaps forty yards away now. Close enough to fire on her.
Gritting her teeth against pain, gravity, exertion, Pamela drove herself higher. Still a helluva way to the top. She’d never make it before Norman reached the bottom of the cliff.
She glanced to her right. Almost level with her there was a protruding lip of rock. It formed a ledge a good five feet wide. Ten feet long. It didn’t go anywhere. It was covered in boulders and loose stones that had dropped from above due to erosion over the years.
It had one thing she prized, though.
Sanctuary!
Not risking another look to see where her pursuer was (though she could hear his feet clattering over stones – he must have been close), Pamela shuffled sideways across the cliff face. Her body ached. Her muscles felt as though they were on fire. She’d grazed her chin because she’d hugged the vertical surface so closely. Fifteen seconds of shuffling like a human fly brought her to the lip of rock. Almost recklessly she flipped sideways so that she could grip the ledge with her hands, while her fe
et were still wedged in a crevice on the rock face.
It was awkward. Her torso was twisted. Elbows locked straight, she took her body weight on the palms of her hands that were flat down against the horizontal surface of the ledge. Then, like someone climbing out of a swimming pool without using the steps, she hauled her body onto the platform of rock. A moment later she lay panting on a mattress of jagged stones.
As mattresses went it was uncomfortable. But right at that moment an exhausted Pamela thought it was the most beautiful place on the planet to rest.
A voice wailed from below. ‘Pamela. There’s no way out of here. Come on down.’
‘Get lost.’
‘I won’t hurt you.’
‘Yeah, like I believe that, Norman.’
She realized that her legs from the knees down still hung out over the edge of the ledge. A bullet in her shin wouldn’t help matters so she wriggled forward. The dust that she raised made her sneeze. But when she glanced back she saw her entire body was laid flat on the rock.
Not even a heavy-duty handgun like the gold one Norman hefted could punch a slug through three feet of sandstone.
‘Pamela,’ Norman called. ‘There’s nowhere to go from there.’
‘I’m not coming down.’
‘Aw, don’t be like that. Climb down here. We can talk.’
Pamela worked herself into a sitting position with her back to the cliff. She didn’t risk glancing over the edge just in case Norman shot her in the head.
‘Please, Pamela. I wouldn’t hurt you for the world. Believe me.’
She called back. ‘If you don’t want to hurt me, prove it. Go back down to the cafe.’
‘What? And leave you here?’
‘Yes.’
‘You’ll call the cops.’
‘How? The nearest telephone must be fifty miles away!’
‘You might have a cellphone.’
‘They don’t work out here.’
‘Pamela,’ he pleaded.
‘Go away, then I’ll come down.’
‘You know I can’t do that.’
‘Why not?’
‘Orders. You saw what Duke’s like. He’ll rip me a new corn-chute.’
‘Norman. Go away. I’m not coming down.’