She gave him a look as if she knew exactly why he wanted her ahead of him. With a smirk, she halted and said, “Age before beauty. You go first.”
He shrugged. He smiled. “Okay. Just thought I should offer to protect your rear.”
“My rear’s fine.”
“The beast likes to jump people from behind.”
“Sure.”
He stepped past Monica, turned right in the corridor, and walked slowly.
Slowly so she wouldn’t sense his eagerness.
Slowly to give himself plenty of time for his inspection of the guide.
Already, his mouth was dry, his face hot, his heart pounding hard and fast.
He could see the attic door up ahead.
But so far, the guide was still out of sight. Too many people clutteced the hallway.
Why can’t I spot her? She’s taller than most of them.
No she isn’t, he thought when he spied the pretty, young guide who was standing near the attic door. She isn’t that tall or that beautiful.
How the hell did I...?
After a moment of shocked perplexity, he realized that this was not the same guide he’d seen earlier.
He felt a surge of relief.
Mixed with disappointment.
Where is she? Where’d she go? Maybe went on a break. Maybe she’s gone for lunch.
What if I don’t get to see her again?
As he approached the replacement, he heard her talking to a small group of people who were gathered near the open attic door. “The attic’s never been part of the regular tour.”
He stopped to listen.
“It’s just not very safe. I do take people up there during the Midnight Tour every Saturday night. But that’s a small, carefully supervised group. We can’t leave it open for the general public. There aren’t floorboards everywhere. Also, there’s a lot of clutter. Too many places where the beast might be lurking.” She grinned.
According to the nametag on her chest, she was LYNN.
“We don’t want to lose anybody,” she said.
Owen wanted to ask where the other guide had gone, but he didn’t dare.
Monica would flip out.
“If we wait here long enough,” Monica whispered, “maybe she’ll turn into the beauty queen.”
“Very funny,” Owen told her.
He started walking again.
Where is she?
He stopped at Station Five, in the corridor a few feet beyond the top of the stairs.
Monica, stopping beside him, thumbed the Play button on her player.
Owen started his tape.
What if she’s gone for the day? What if I never see her again?
I can’t let that happen, he told himself.
“We lived sixteen nights in this house,” Maggie said, “before the beast struck.”
Chapter Eleven
SANDY’S STORY—August, 1980
Sandy carried Eric down the wobbly stairs in his travel basket—a wicker bassinet with a closed lid and handles at both ends. Worried about the slippery steps, she moved slowly and carefully. She sighed with relief when her feet met the ground. She set down the basket.
Together, she and Lib lifted the stairway and shoved it inside her trailer. Lib stepped out of the way. Sandy swung the door shut.
Turning around, she found her new friend picking up Eric’s basket by its two handles.
“We gonna keep him in dis?” Lib asked.
“We’d better. In case we get stopped.”
“Poor little pucker.”
“I don’t think he minds. It seems pretty nice and cozy in there. And he’s got his favorite dolls.”
“Can he breet okay?”
“Sure. All kinds of air gets in. He’ll be fine. Let’s just put him in the back seat.”
Sandy hurried ahead and opened the back door. Then she took the basket from Lib and lowered it onto the floor in front of the seat. It was a fairly tight squeeze. The wicker made dry, crackling sounds. Sandy figured that the tightness was good for Eric’s safety in case of a crash.
She stepped back and shut the door.
“I guess I’ll drive,” she said.
“How come?” asked Lib.
“You’re drunk as a skunk.”
“Well, dat ain’t nebber stopped me.”
“You polished off the whole bottle.”
“It weren’t pull in da pirst place.”
“Anyway, you aren’t in any shape to drive. Even if you weren’t polluted, you just got the crap pounded out of you and half your teeth knocked out.”
“Hap ob ’em? Nah. Lots, dough.”
“Go on and get in. You can drive later if you feel like it.”
“Who says I wanta?”
Sandy shrugged, then opened the passenger door. When Lib was in, she shut the door and hurried around the front. She climbed into the driver’s seat.
“Ya ebber towed sometin’?” Lib asked.
“No,” Sandy said, and started the engine.
“Here.” Reaching over, Lib pulled the shift lever backward from Park to Low. “Try dis. And go slow.”
Sandy put on the headlight, then eased down on the gas pedal. Engine racing, the car began to move forward. She could feel the weight of the trailer and hear the rattling sounds it made as it bumped over the ground behind them.
She pictured Slade’s body rolling and sliding around in the back bedroom, spreading his mess like a blood-soaked mop.
Maybe they should’ve done something with it.
At least, maybe, tied it down or thrown it into the shower stall.
But they’d both been clean and wearing their Blazing Babes shirts by the time Lib had said, “Ya gonna let me get a look at yer stip?”
“My what?” Sandy asked.
“Yer stip. Dat guy ya killed.”
“You want to see him?”
“Sure. Where’s he at?”
“Why don’t we just get going?”
Lib’s puffy eyes narrowed. “How I know ya really got a stip?”
Sandy suddenly understood: Lib needed to see the body, needed to know for certain that she hadn’t lied about killing Slade.
We’ve both got to be killers, That’s what makes us partners.
“Okay,” Sandy said. “You wanta see him, you can see him. Come on.” She lowered Eric into his travel basket, then hurried down the hallway. Lib followed, bottle in hand.
Sandy slid open her bedroom door, flicked the light switch, then stepped back. “Help yourself,” she said. “But be careful not to step in any blood.”
Lib took a step into the room. A moment later, she spotted the body on the floor to her left. Sandy saw her back straighten. Then Lib crouched down. Her head shook slowly from side to side.
“Dis guy’s massacerated.”
“Huh?”
“What’d he do to ya?” ,
“For one thing, he threw Eric across the room. And he tried to rape me.”
“Dis guy’s deader ’n fried shit.”
“Yeah.”
She looked over her shoulder at Sandy, and smiled. “Yer a mighty bad little dude, Chany.”
“He had it coming.”
“What’re we gonna do wid him?”
“I figured to leave him in the room, here, and wait till we’re someplace far away. I want to make his body disappear, you know? Someplace where it’ll never be found. The thing is, there might be people who know he came looking for me tonight. Maybe if we both vanish off the face of the earth...”
“Suits me pine,” Lib said. “Let’s all banish.” Standing up, she put her hands on her hips and seemed to be studying the body. “We get to moobin’, he’ll start to roll around. Wanta anchor him down or put him someplace?”
“Nah, that’s all right. We’d get all messy. Let’s just finish up and go.”
At least he’s confined to the bedroom, Sandy thought as she drove slowly down the hillside, trying to stay in the ruts.
I shut the door, did
n’t I?
Sure I did.
In her imagination, though, she’d left the bedroom door wide open and she pictured Slade tumbling through it, rolling into the hallway, his bloody mutilated corpse somersaulting down the whole length of the trailer.
Probably didn’t happen, she told herself. And if it did, the harm’s already done.
Just try not to let the trailer flip over or you’ll REALLY be in trouble.
In spite of the low gear, they were picking up speed on their way down the slope.
“Carepul,” Lib said.
Sandy eased down on the brake pedal for a few seconds and watched the speedometer needle sink. When she let up, it started to climb. So she put on the brakes again, squeezing the speed down, the needle dropping from 20 to 15 to 10. By the time she reached the edge of the paved road, she’d slowed almost to a stop.
The road looked empty, so she made a slow, right-hand turn. Then she shoved the shift lever to Drive and started to pick up speed. Cool air, smelling of the woods and ocean, blew straight into her face through the hole in the windshield.
“Made it,” Lib said, and patted her leg.
Sandy took a deep breath. She felt relief about coming down the hill without mishap, but now they were on a real road—where they were sure to be seen, sooner or later, by people in passing cars.
Maybe by cops.
A squirmy tightness came into her stomach.
“I don’t know how far we’ll be able to go,” she said. “The way this car looks, we’ll be stopped by the first cop who sees us.”
“Just tell him we hit a deer.”
That didn’t seem like a bad idea. Vehicles crashed into deer fairly often in this area. That sort of accident might explain the damage to the car.
“But I don’t have a driver’s license,” Sandy explained.
“Huh?”
“I’m driving. No matter what we tell him, he’ll want to see my license. And I don’t have one.”
“I got one.”
“But you’re smashed. And if he takes one look at you, he’ll know somebody pounded the crap out of you. If we get stopped, we’re sunk.”
The single headlight caught a sign by the edge of the road:
WELCOME TO MALCASA POINT
POP. 2,600
HOME OF THE LEGENDARY “BEAST HOUSE”
PLEASE DRIVE WITH CARE,
WE LOVE OUR CHILDREN.
Then the speed limit went down to 35.
Sandy took her foot off the gas pedal until the needle dropped to 30.
Turning her head slightly to the left, she stared out across the moonlit field at Agnes’s house.
Home.
I’m going to miss it so much. And Agnes.
She ached to turn into the driveway.
One more look around. It might be my last chance forever. And give Agnes a last kiss before I go. I might never see her again. She might be dead by the time I ever...
“Place sure looks spooky at night,” Lib said.
It’s not spooky, it’s home.
She frowned at Lib, but saw that her friend’s head was turned toward the right, toward Beast House.
So her frown became a smile. “You oughta try being inside it in the middle of the night.”
“Tanks but no tanks.” She faced Sandy. “So, is dat where you met Eric’s padder?”
“He was known to hang around in there.” She turned her head for a final glimpse of Agnes’s house. Her throat suddenly felt thick. Tears welled up in her eyes.
How can I just drive away like this and not even tell her goodbye or thanks or ANYTHING. She’s the only person in the whole wide world who loves me.
Except Eric.
And a whisper came as if from a malicious twin caged in a corner of her mind, What about Mom?
No! Fuck her! She hates me! I hope she’s dead.
The twin whispered, No you don’t. You miss the bell out of her.
Bullshit!
“Uh-oh,” Lib said.
Sandy came out of her thoughts and spotted the trouble.
Several blocks ahead of them, a car with bright, twin headlights was making a left-hand turn onto Front Street. Squinting, Sandy tried to see if it had a light rack on top.
She couldn’t tell.
But if it does...
“Hang on,” she said.
She hit the brakes and made a hard right. The force of the turn pushed her sideways against her door. Lib swayed toward her, but didn’t fall. In the rearview mirror, she saw the trailer swing around behind them. It stayed up.
A growl came from Eric’s basket.
“It’s okay, honey,” Sandy said loudly, trying to sound confident and calm.
She raced toward the end of the block. At the corner, she turned left. She eased over to the curb, stopped, shut off the engine and killed the lights.
“If it comes,” she said, “we’ll duck out of sight.”
They waited.
Sandy’s heart thudded and her mouth felt dry.
Lib made a quiet, throaty laugh.
“What’s so funny?”
“Da pour ob us. Poor cop’d tink he popped in on a puckin’ horror moobie, huh? Couple ob dames on da road widda butchered asshole in da trailer and a baby monster in da backseat.”
“Eric isn’t a monster.”
“Tell dat to da cop.”
“I don’t think we’ll have to,” Sandy said. “Not yet, anyway.”
Reaching forward, she twisted the ignition key and started the engine.
“Tink it’s sape?” Lib asked.
“Yeah. It would’ve been here by now.”
She put on the headlight, then pulled forward, steered onto the road and picked up speed.
She wished she was back on Front Street. This might be her last time in Malcasa Point. It didn’t seem right to miss all the old, familiar places along the main road if you wouldn’t ever have a chance to see them again.
Better to be safe, though.
Anyway, who says I can’t come back?
It’d be too dangerous, she told herself. Especially after tonight.
But I could come back. If I wanted to badly enough.
Ahead of her, the road dead-ended. She turned left and returned to Front Street. Waiting at a stop sign, she looked back at the town. There were no cars on the move. She saw no one. Some of the shops were lighted, but none seemed to be open.
The lone traffic signal, a flashing red light, blinked on and off and on again.
“Whatcha waitin’ por?” Lib asked.
Sandy shrugged. “Nothing,” she said. Then she turned right and put downtown behind her.
When she drove past the Welcome Inn, she tried not to look at it. But her eyes strayed over.
At the sight of the motel, memories rushed in.
Mom...
And that dirty rotten Jud. He’d seemed like such a good guy, at first...
And Larry. Poor, funny Larry.
She felt an emptiness inside. And a hurt.
They’d all betrayed her.
Well, not Larry. But he would’ve, probably. Just never got the chance.
It had all been so exciting, right at the start. A little scary, but fun, too. Taking off with Mom, so early in the morning. The all-day drive up the coast. Then the fog and the crash and Axel Kutch coming to the rescue. Their first night at the Welcome Inn. And the next day, going on the Beast House tour for the very first time.
Those had been such great times.
Only three years ago.
But it sure felt like longer. It felt like eons. She’d still been a kid. She’d still loved her mom...
She felt a tightness in her throat.
Screw it, she thought.
“Y’okay?” Lib asked.
“It’s just...you know...I’m going to miss some stuff around here.”
“Yeah?”
“A lot of stuff.”
“Ya don’t gotta leabe. Ain’t nobody holdin’ a gun to your head.”
“I wouldn’t have to, except for that Slade. He wrecked everything.”
“Reckon he paid por it.”
Tears in her eyes, Sandy looked across at Lib. “I just wanted to be left alone, you know? That’s all I ever wanted. I had my job and my baby and Agnes and everything till those damn movie people came along. They ruined it all.”
“It’s the shits, honey.”
She took a very deep breath and exhaled slowly, letting the air puff out her cheeks and hiss through her pursed lips. When it was gone, she took a normal breath and said, “Well. I guess we’ll be fine, anyway. And maybe it’s for the best, you know? Might be kind of fun, settling down someplace new. Maybe it’ll turn out to be the best thing that ever happened to us.”
“Don’t count on it.”
Sandy glanced at Lib and laughed.
Then Lib patted her on the thigh. “Just gotta take stupp as it comes. Eben a bed ob roses got torns, and dare ain’t a garden nowhere dat don’t hab its share ob turds. You gotta watch your step, dat’s all.”
“We’ll both have to watch our steps.”
“But dat don’t mean we can’t hab pun.”
“Hab pun—will travel.”
“Puck you.”
Laughing, Sandy blurted, “Puck you!”
“And da horse ya rode in on. How’d ya like it ip I busted out yer teet?”
“My teeth?”
“Yet teet!”
“My what?”
“Yer choppers, ya little shit.”
“Then I’d be talking like you, Lib, and neither one of us’d know what was going on.”
“Dat’s real punny. Dat’s hilarious.”
Sandy grinned at her and said, “You know what?”
“What?”
“I’m already habbing pun.”
Lib gave her leg a gentle squeeze and said, “Me, too.”
With that, they seemed to run out of things to say. Lib settled down in her seat and lowered her head. Sandy turned her attention to driving.
She wasn’t exactly sure of her location.
Definitely on Pacific Coast Highway, somewhere north of town.
But not very far north.
Five or ten miles?
Though she’d traveled this section of road several times before, she couldn’t remember being on it at night. In the darkness, nothing looked very familiar.
On the other hand, it all looked sort of familiar.