and along came SPIDER ( A Martina Spalding Thriller ) (Spider Series Book 1) (18 page)

“There will be an unmarked
car in front, and another in the rear.  Get to know them; they are your
escorts.  And Martina, I have something here for you and Gloria, to help you
get settled, wherever you land.”  He handed her a rather fat beige envelope.

“What is it, Lieutenant?”

“I won’t stand for
another argument, Martina,” he threatened, tilting his hat away from the
bandage above his ear, as he prepared for the worst.  “It’s five thousand in
cash.”

“Oh, no, Harry!”  She
waved it at him.  “This is your money, isn’t it?”

“Where would I get that
kind of money, this time of night?  Of course it’s not my money.  It was taken
from some drug pusher or something.  We’re allowed to use cash we get like that
for a worthy cause, now and again.”

“And I’m a worthy
cause?”

“
I
think so.  I’m going to miss you, kid.”  He pulled her in for a hug.

“Thank you, Harry.” 
She pecked him on the cheek.

“I guess you’d better
get going.  I see they’re pulling away.”  He stepped back, fearing he may fog
up if she hung around another second.

“Okay.”  Marti turned
for the car, where Gloria already sat.  Smitte had helped her into it.  “I’ll
call you, sometime!” she shouted back from the door.

“You do that!”  He
tipped his hat, then checked his watch.  “Three a.m.,” he said to Smitte
nearby.  “Right on time.”

“You okay, boss?”
Smitte then asked, after Dunbar seemed to be in deep thought for an unusual
length of time.

“Yeah, I’m okay.”  He
looked over. “I was just trying to remember what life was like before that one
came along.”

“Quiet…  Awful quiet.”

“That’s what I was
afraid you’d say.”  Dunbar moved on toward the patrol car, lowering his
umbrella as he went.  Thankfully, it had stopped raining.

CHAPTER
THIRTY

Marti took in the
unique beauty of the ancient buildings, as much as she could see of them by the
dim glow of the street lights as they passed, remembering how grand they had
appeared when she first arrived here in daylight, just five weeks ago.  What
high hopes, she had thought then that this would be the place where she could
fit in and remain awhile — find a job, meet a man, and start living
normally for a change, just being herself.  Now she wondered what being herself
really consisted of…  Certainly she was no killer, just a week ago.  And
certainly she was a virgin less than a half hour ago.  But what did all this
change really mean?  Was she just a victim of circumstance, or had she invited
all the hell that had come her way of recent?  These were things she would need
to resolve, over time, if she were to ever see herself as the same person she
once was, again.  Then, just as the tears were about to begin to roll down her
cheeks, Gloria crashed her thoughts by saying, “How was it?”

Knowing exactly what
she meant by that, Marti couldn’t help but break out into exhilarating laughter
that, almost immediately, evolved into miserable weeping.  “Gloria…it was the
most marvelous experience…  I…I…can’t explain it in the glorious words it deserves. 
Oh, God it was so beautiful!” she shouted out.  “Now…  Now, I feel like a
woman!  How great is that?”

“Alright!” Gloria
shouted gleefully, bringing up a hand for Martina to high five, which she
promptly met half way.  “God, for a moment there I thought you’d had a bad
experience.  I was starting to feel bad for you.  Did you wear the red night
dress?”

With that, Marti
quickly untied the belt and unbuttoned the trench coat to reveal the skimpy,
see through, black nightie and the matching web nylons she wore with it. 
“Yeehaa!  Ride ’em cowboy!”  She laughed, again.

“Okay, now you’re
starting to get silly!  Parker must have pushed all the right buttons?”

“If he missed any, I
don’t know where they might have been hiding,” she said, while trying to remember
what Parker did do with those hands, which seemed to be everywhere, throughout.

Up ahead, the huge
truck they followed slowed and signaled to get onto highway 66 West.  “Here we
go,” Marti said.  “Are you ready for this?”

“You bet I am.  Here’s
to a new beginning, Martina,” Gloria said soberly, displaying her hand again,
and receiving the same result.  “I can drive now, if you want?  I’m rested,
you’re not.  Besides, you may be wanting to get out of that thing.”

“The nightie?”  She
looked down.  “No way!  I’m wearing this cotton picking thing until it rots off
my ass!” she squealed, laughing wildly.  “I’m not done with the memory yet!”

Gloria tossed Martina a
sideways glance, wondering if she’d been that silly after her first time. 
Finding it difficult to recall, she scooted down in the seat and focused on the
rental truck’s taillights ahead of them.

It was just after
daybreak when they pulled into a truck stop for gas and breakfast.  While the
attendant filled the tank, washed the windshield, and checked the oil, Marti
took jeans and a sweatshirt from her suitcase and went to the women’s
restroom.  On her way out, after changing, she violently slammed the black
nightie into the trash can.  “Take that, Raym Koffee, you sonofabitch!  May
your ass rot in hell!”  She then gave the metal can a swift kick, as if it were
him, leaving a huge dent.  Feeling a bit better now, she stepped outside.

“What did you say?”
Gloria, who had been standing guard at the the door, asked.

Thinking fast, Marti
replied, “I said, from here on out, I hope things go well.”

“That’s not what you
said,” Gloria glared.  “And what was that loud crashing noise?”  She went in to
investigate for herself.  Coming back out moments later, after using the toilet
and washing her hands and face, she said, “Well, I hope you got it all out? 
What happened to letting the nightie rot off your ass?”

“Did you take it from
the trash?”  Marti looked to see if she may have it on her somewhere.  If so,
she planned to repeat the process.

“Are you kidding me?” Gloria
said in a huff.  “It’s now on the hook inside the door.  I decided to let some
trucker mama have some fun with it.”  She laughed.  “It’ll probably end up
hanging from some eighteen wheeler stud’s rearview mirror.”

“In that case, maybe
it’ll end up having a life of its own.”  Marti smiled at the thought of it
traveling the country for years to come.  In that regard, it certainly had
gotten off to a rousing start.

In the restaurant, they
spotted the six off duty cops seated around a corner booth and took a table
nearby.  Before they were even fully situated, one of them sprang to his feet
and came over.  Marti recognized him as the guy who had asked her name in the
Brass Badge, when Dunbar took her there for fried chicken.  The expression on
his face now said he was all business.

“Ladies,” he greeted,
touching the bill of the Chicago Cubs baseball cap he wore.  “We’ll be pushing
it hard from here on in to Oklahoma City.  So I have to ask you, would you like
one of us to take the wheel of your car for the remaining seven hours or so?  I
know you must be awfully tired.”

It had been near
twenty-four hours since Martina had slept, so she looked to Gloria for the
decision.  Seeing her doing the best she could to make moon eyes at the rather
handsome man, through her battered face, was almost comical.  Then when she
said, “Would the one taking the wheel be you, by chance, officer?” Martina
openly laughed.

“It could be, if you
want?”  He smiled back at Gloria.  “The name’s Tom, ma’am.”  He absently tipped
his cap again.

“Well, then I think we
ought to do it, don’t you Martina?”

Not wanting to spoil
her friend’s fun, Marti shrugged and said, “Whatever.”  She probably owed
Gloria this.

And so it went.  After
breakfast, Marti put the suitcases into the trunk and climbed in the back
seat.  Then, once on the road, she stretched out as best she could, and before
long she was sound asleep.  She didn’t awaken until four hours later, when they
stopped for fuel and food again.  Having Gloria alone for a moment in the
bathroom, she asked, “You haven’t told anyone where we’re planning to go, did
you?”  She knew she must have chatted up the driver the entire way, since she
was smitten with him.

“Look at this face,”
she said, suddenly angry, pointing a finger at it.  “Do I look stupid?”

“Yes,” Marti said, and
laughed.  “You look pretty stupid.”

“Well, I’m not,” she
said, and laughed a little, herself.  “But we did have a good talk.  He’s
divorced, Martina.”

“So?”

“Well, so he’s
available.”

“Available for what,
Gloria?”  Marti glared.  “In three hours we’re going to be in Oklahoma City. 
And then these guys are gone.  You’ll probably never see him again.”

“We’ll see,” Gloria
responded casually.

“Now, just what in hell
did you mean by that?” Marti confronted her.

“Well… all these truck
stops have small rooms in the back, for…”

“Oh, God, don’t tell
me!”

“Listen Martina, that’s
fine for you to say, but you got the release you needed with Parker.  Did you
ever stop to think I may have a few bottled up anxieties of my own that need
some attention?”  She said angrily, and left the restroom.

And sure enough, when
they arrived at the final truck stop on the western outskirts of Oklahoma City
to refuel before saying their parting goodbyes, Martina saw Tom and Gloria
disappear inside.  Then, after near a half hour of miserable waiting on
everyone else’s part, they emerged hand in hand, all smiles.  Then, as if to
add insult to injury, they openly embraced for a minute or two, before
splitting off to go their separate ways.

“I hope that was worth
it?” Martina said and turned away to head for the rental truck.

“You know it!” Gloria
smilingly shouted after her as she climbed into the car and prepared to follow.

“Good!”  Martina smiled
back.  Regardless of everything, she couldn’t help but be happy for her, if she
got what she wanted.  Frankly, Tom wouldn’t have been her choice, however. 
There was another one in the group with a much nicer smile she planned to
fantasize over as they traveled.  Like Parker, he had nice buns.  But then, she
figured, every man in her future from now on would be measured against Parker
McLean.  He was her first, and would definitely be a tough act for any man to
have to follow, she knew.

An hour or so outside
of Oklahoma City, a huge canyon appeared on the right side of the highway.  And
ahead a ways, Marti spotted a roadside park that overlooked it.  Shifting down
then, she eased the huge truck into it and stopped adjacent to some picnic
tables there.  Getting out, she walked past the tables to a rock barrier wall
at the edge of a sheer drop off.  It appeared to extend downward from there a
few hundred feet to the canyon floor far below.  Walking back then, she came up
to Gloria, who was standing by the car.

“How much of that
stuff, in the truck, can you live without?”

With that, Gloria,
seeing Martina was dead serious, puffed up and said, “Well, you know, most of
that furniture was Raym’s.  I got it in the divorce…  I don’t know…all but a
few small things, I suppose.  Why?”

“Well, let’s get it out
of there, then!” she said, marching toward it, not bothering to answer her
question.

Near an hour later,
with the trunk and the rear seat area of the car packed full with the can’t
live withouts, Marti got into the truck and backed it around in the parking
lot.  Then, after a group of cars passed by on the highway, and no more were
visible for miles in either direction, she slipped the truck into the lowest
gear, set the dashboard throttle to a medium roar, dropped the clutch, and
hopped out to the ground.  With that, the big van lunged forward, soon caught
up to the set speed, plowed through the few picnic tables, and then on to the
three feet high rock barrier, taking it out as well.  After that, the expected
occurred: the truck lazily dipped over the canyon edge and near silently
dropped from sight.

Waiting for something
more to happen, the two glared at each other for what seemed an eternity before
the sound of an enormous explosion reached their ears, and a ball of fire rose
up into view from below.  It was accompanied a short time thereafter by a
mushroom cloud of black smoke.

“Wowee!” Gloria yelled,
and she began to laugh hysterically.

“Come on!” Marti
shouted, and ran for the car.  A moment later, loose gravel from the parking
lot shot from beneath the tires, like buckshot from a shotgun, as the old two
tone grey Chevy fishtailed toward the highway.  Entering it on two wheels,
Marti immediately accelerated to sixty.  Then, after checking her rear view
mirror, she stepped the speed to seventy-five and held it there for at least
twenty miles before easing back to the speed limit.

Thinking what else she
could do to cover their tracks, Martina drew a blank.  She then turned to
Gloria, who seemed mesmerized from what they had just done.  “I think we’ve
made a clean break.”

“Alright!”  Gloria came
to life and poked her head out the open window.  “LA, here we come!  Yahooooo!”

Thinking on that for a
moment, Marti asked, “How set are you that we go to LA?”

“I thought we were
going to seek employment at the Spencer House affiliate, there?  I mean, isn’t
that what we told Scott Harris?”

“I didn’t tell him
that,” Marti glanced to Gloria, as she gripped the wheel.  “Did you?”

“I don’t know.  What if
I did?  I was so upset at the time, I don’t remember what I said…”

“Well, it’s for certain
Lieutenant Dunbar figured we were heading someplace west.  I wasn’t given an
option when he said the great City of St. Louis was escorting us out of town,
in the middle of the night.  And that they were taking us as far as Oklahoma
City.”

“Then do you think he
knows?” Gloria asked.

“I don’t know what to
think.  Maybe it’s just paranoia setting in,” she said, and checked the
rearview mirror.

“Where else is there to
go?” Gloria asked.  “Someplace fun?”

“Well there’s always
Vegas.”

“Las Vegas is an
expensive place to live,” Gloria said.  “We’d need to get a job right away, or
we’re sunk.  But then I suppose, I could turn some tricks until we get on our
feet.”

“I appreciate the
generous offer, Gloria.  Better you than me,” Marti said with a chuckle,
reaching into her purse on the seat beside her. “But I don’t think we’ll need
to resort to that, just yet.”

“What’s this?”  Gloria
looked at the envelope handed her and peeled open the flap.  “Oh my God!  Where
did this come from?”  She removed the cash, and fanned out the fifty one
hundred dollar bills.

“Harry Dunbar gave it
to us.  He said it was from some slush fund of confiscated crime money they
have at the police department.”