Chill Factor (15 page)

Dismayed, she looked up at Tierney. "It's not here."

CHAPTER  10

DUTCH RODE SHOTGUN IN CAL HAWKINS'S SANDING TRUCK, primarily
because
he didn't trust Hawkins to make an honest effort to get up the mountain
road. Second, he wanted to be the first to reach the cabin, first
through the door, Lilly's knight in shining armor.

It had been a harrowing trip back to town from the dive in
which he
and Wes had found Hawkins. Bridges were perilous, the roads weren't
much better. When they arrived at the garage, Dutch had poured several
cups of black coffee into Hawkins. He had bitched and whined nonstop
until Dutch threatened to stuff a gag in his mouth if he didn't shut
up, then literally boosted him into his rig.

The cab of the truck was a pigsty. Trash and food wrappers
left over
from last winter littered the floor. The vinyl seat covers had open
wounds that exposed stained stuffing. Dangling from the rearview
mirror, along with a pair of oversize fuzzy dice and a hologram of a
naked girl being intimate with a vibrator, there was a deodorizer
shaped like a pine tree. It was doing a lousy job of masking the
various odors.

The sanding truck had been in the fleet of heavy equipment
that old
Mr. Hawkins had rented to municipalities, public utility companies, and
construction crews. It had been a successful business until he died and
Cal Junior inherited it. This sanding truck was all that remained of
the legacy.

Cal Junior had used his late father's assets as collateral
against
loans that he failed to pay back. Everything had been repossessed
except this rig. Dutch was unsympathetic to Cal's financial woes and
didn't care if a collection agency claimed the sanding truck tomorrow,
so long as it got him up to the peak tonight.

He glanced into the exterior side mirror and saw the
headlights of
his Bronco following at a safe distance. One of his officers, Samuel
Bull, was at the wheel. He had the advantage of driving on the mix of
sand and salt that Hawkins was putting down. Nevertheless, the road's
surface was still hazardous. Occasionally Dutch saw the Bronco drifting
toward the ditch or across the center stripe.

Wes was riding with Bull. Before they left the garage, Dutch
had
told him he didn't have to come along. "Go home. This is my problem,
not yours."

"I'll stick around to lend moral support," he'd said and
climbed
into the Bronco.

Dutch would need moral support only if this attempt to reach
Lilly
failed. Apparently Wes thought failure was inevitable. So did Bull. So
did Hawkins. Doubt rang loud and clear behind everything they said, and
he detected pity in the looks they cast him.

I
must appear desperate to them
, he
thought. Desperation
was an unfit state of mind for a chief of police. For a
man
.
It certainly didn't inspire the confidence of others. About the only
thing he could inspire in Cal Hawkins was fear.

When they were about fifty yards from the turnoff onto
Mountain
Laurel Road, he said, "If I feel like you're holding back on purpose,
I'll jail you."

"On what charge?"

"Pissing me off."

"You can't do that."

"I advise you not to test it. You give this heap everything
it's
got, do you understand me?"

"Yeah, but—"

"No excuses."

Hawkins wet his lips and gripped the steering wheel tighter,
mumbling, "Can't see worth a goddamn." But he downshifted as he
approached the intersection.

It was tricky because it was a sharp turn, and coming out of
it the
road went into a steep incline. To keep from spinning out, Hawkins
would have to take the turn slowly but have enough acceleration to
handle the incline.

Dutch clicked on the two-way radio in his hand. "Hang back,
Bull.
Don't get too close."

"No need to worry about that, buddy," Wes replied through the
speaker. "My instructions to him exactly."

"Nice and easy," Hawkins said under his breath, talking either
to
himself or to the truck.

"Not too easy," Dutch said. "You've got to get up that
incline."

"I'm the one experienced at driving this thing."

"So drive it. But you'd sure as hell better drive it right."
Surreptitiously he took a deep breath and held it.

Hawkins went into the turn cautiously. The rig made it without
mishap.

Dutch exhaled. "Now give it some gas."

"Don't tell me my job," Hawkins snapped. "Shit, this road's
darker
than Egypt."

The state highway, which became Main Street in Cleary proper,
was
lined with streetlights all the way to the city limit signs at either
end of town. But once off the beaten path, the roads were unlighted,
and the contrast was dramatic. The truck's headlights illuminated
nothing except the dizzy dance of windblown, frozen precipitation.

It spooked Hawkins. He let off the accelerator.

"No!" Because Dutch had driven this road a thousand times, he
knew
that this was the point where acceleration was necessary in order to
make it up the first incline. "Give it some juice!"

"I can't see nothing," Hawkins screeched. He put the truck in
neutral and let it idle while he swiped his coat sleeve across his
face. Despite the frigid temperature, his forehead was beaded with
sweat that smelled as acrid as the moonshine that had produced it.

"Put this truck in gear," Dutch said, straining each through
clenched teeth.

"In a minute. Let my eyes adjust. All that stuff swirling
around is
making me woozy."

"Not in a minute. Now."

Hawkins frowned at him. "You got a death wish or somethin'?"

"No,
you
must. Because I'm going to kill
you if this truck
isn't rolling in five seconds."

"I don't think a chief of police is supposed to be threatening
private citizens like that."

"One."

"What's going on up there?" Wes's voice squawked through the
two-way
radio.

"Two." Dutch depressed the button on his receiver and spoke
into it.
"Cal's considering the best way to approach the incline." He clicked
off. "Three."

"Dutch, you sure about this?" Wes sounded worried. "Maybe you
should
reconsider."

"Four."

"Bull can barely keep this Bronco on the road, and that's with
driving on sand. We can barely see beyond the hood and—"

"Five." Dutch drew his pistol from the holster.

"Shit!" Cal ground the gear stick into first.

"It's okay, Wes," Dutch said into the radio with what he
thought was
remarkable calm. "Here we go."

Cal let out on the clutch and pressed the accelerator. The
truck
rolled forward a few feet.

"You're gonna have to give it some punch or it'll never make
it,"
Dutch said.

"We got a heavy load, don't forget."

"So compensate."

Hawkins nodded and shifted into second. But the moment he
accelerated, the rear tires began to spin uselessly. "Ain't gonna make
it."

"Don't let up on it."

"Ain't gonna—"

"Keep trying! Give it more!"

Hawkins muttered something about Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, then
did
as Dutch ordered. The wheels spun but then found traction, and the
truck lurched forward.

"See?" Dutch said with more relief than he was willing to show.

"Yeah, but we gotta make that first hairpin."

"You can do it."

"I can also drive us both straight into Hell, 'cause I can't
see
shit. I don't fancy tumbling ass over elbows down the hillside in this
thing."

Dutch ignored him. Beneath his clothes, he was sweating even
more
profusely than Hawkins. He concentrated on the glare of the headlights
just beyond the hood. In fairness to Hawkins, he didn't dispute the
danger of driving a truck this size up an icy mountain road when
visibility was limited to a few feet. The heavy precipitation had
already covered the sand that the rig had just applied. He noticed that
Bull had driven the Bronco no further than the turnoff. The two inside
it—his best friend and one of his subordinates—were
probably discussing
his blind stupidity. He couldn't let their opinions worry him.

Grumbling and groaning, the truck labored up the twenty-degree
incline. It was slow going, but Dutch kept telling himself that every
inch it won moved him closer to Lilly. And Ben Tierney.

Of all the men she could be stranded with, why did it have to
be
that guy? The thought of her being alone in the cabin with any man was
enough to make him crazy. But she was up there with a man she'd been
gawking at just yesterday.

Dutch had seen other women, old and young alike, sizing up Ben
Tierney, going all atwitter over his hard body and chiseled jaw. And
you could bet that he damn well knew he caused a stir among the ladies.

He must fancy himself some sort of superstud. Thrill seeking,
exploring, getting his picture in magazines. It all added up to a free
pass into the sack with any woman he chose.

Kayaking, my ass.

Pushing his bitter thoughts aside, he said, "Heads up,
Hawkins.
We're getting close to that first switchback."

"Yep."

"Another ten yards maybe."

"We ain't got a snowball's chance of making it."

"If you know what's good for you, we will."

For several seconds Dutch believed they were actually going to.

Maybe he was willing it to happen so hard he saw it happening.
But
positive thinking couldn't override the laws of physics. In order to
make the switchback turn safely, Cal had to downshift. When he did, the
truck didn't have enough speed to propel it up the incline. It stalled
and seemed to remain motionless for eternity and a day. Dutch held his
breath. Then the rig began to slide backward.

Hawkins squealed like a woman.

"Give it some gas, you idiot!"

Hawkins complied, but it seemed to Dutch that his efforts
weren't as
aggressive as what were called for to combat the inexorable pull of
gravity. In any case, nothing Hawkins did was success
ful,
except the gradual application of brakes that eventually stopped their
downhill skid and prevented them from going off the road.

When the truck finally came to a halt, Hawkins expelled a long
breath. "Fuck me. That was a close one."

"Try again."

He turned his head so fast it caused his neck vertebrae to pop
like
bursting corn kernels. "Are you
nuts}"

"Put it back in gear and try again."

Hawkins shook his head like a wet dog. "No way, uh-uh. You can
take
out your pistol again and shoot me right between the eyes, but at least
that'd be a quick death. Better than having my guts squashed by tons of
truck and sand. No thank you, sir. You can wait till this stuff clears
out, or get yourself another driver, or drive it your own self. I don't
give a fuck, except I ain't doin' it."

Dutch tried staring him into submission, but Cal Hawkins's
bloodshot
eyes glared back at him. His stubbled jaw was thrust pugnaciously
forward. They were both surprised when someone knocked on the passenger
window.

Wes peered in at them. "Y'all okay in there?"

"We're fine," Dutch replied through the glass.

"Like hell we are," Hawkins yelled.

Wes stepped onto the running board, pulled open the door, and
immediately sensed Hawkins's fear. "What's going on?"

Hawkins pointed a shaking finger at Dutch. "He pulled a gun on
me,
told me he was gonna kill me if I didn't get him up this mountain. He's
crazy as a shithouse rat."

Wes shifted his disbelieving gaze to Dutch, who said in a
tired
voice, "I wasn't going to shoot him. I just wanted to scare him into
giving it his best effort."

Wes regarded him closely for a moment, then addressed Hawkins
in a
quiet, confidential voice. "His wife's up there in their cabin with
another man."

Hawkins assimilated that, then looked at Dutch, seeing him in
a new
light. "Aw, man. That sucks."

What sucked was being pitied by the likes of Cal Hawkins.

Wes said, "Cal, think you can back your rig down to the main
road?"

Hawkins, inspired by sympathy into a more agreeable mood, said
he
would give it a shot. With them guiding him, he got the sanding truck
back onto the highway and turned in the direction of town. Dutch
ordered Bull to ride with Hawkins, warning his officer to keep a sharp
eye on him and not let him do anything that would sabotage the rig's
future use.

"Wouldn't put it past him to wreck it on purpose so he'd get
out of
trying again tomorrow." Following in the Bronco, Dutch ground his
teeth. "That gutless, drunken son of a bitch."

"The demise of Cal Hawkins Jr. would signify no great loss. I
give
you that," said Wes. "But Jesus, Dutch, weren't you a bit over the line
to draw a gun on him?"

"Did you have to tell him that Lilly was with another man?
It'll be
all over town by daybreak. No telling what they'll be saying she and
Ben Tierney are doing together up there to keep warm and while away the
hours. You know how the minds of these people work."

"I see how yours is working."

Dutch shot him an angry glance.

"Besides," Wes continued, "I didn't mention Ben Tierney by
name. For
all Hawkins knows, she's holed up with some old coot."

"Hardly."

"Look, I told him because that's a situation he can relate to.
Driving up this mountain during a blizzard to rescue a stranded
citizen? He can't understand a sense of duty like that. But going after
your woman who's with another man, now that would justify any rash
action. Even threatening someone with a gun."

They said no more until they reached the garage. Dutch told
Bull to
return to headquarters and see if his help was needed anywhere. If not,
he could go home.

"Will do, sir." Looking down at the floor, the officer said
awkwardly, "I'm sorry about, you know, not being able to get to your
wife."