Resurrection Dreams (10 page)

Coming to an intersection, he glanced both ways. No sign of Ace’s car.

He kept heading west on George Street, figuring he might as well stick with it for a few more minutes.

On the next block, he found the red Mustang parked at the curb in front of a two-story brick apartment house. No sign of the girls.

He stared at the building.

That’s gotta be it.

He drove on.

That night, a little before ten, Melvin parked around the corner from the apartment house. His heart pounded fast as he walked toward the entrance. The pounding made his right hand throb.

He needed a new gal. He wouldn’t use Vicki for that, though. Someday. Once he got it right. But it’d be awful to mess up with her and have to bury her like the others. She’d just have to wait.

In the meantime, he’d settle for looking at her.

He stopped at the door. Peering through its glass, he saw a small, dimly lighted foyer with a panel of mail boxes on the wall. On the left was a narrow stairway to the second floor. To the right of the stairs, a corridor stretched the length of the building. He saw no one.

He tried the door. It opened, which was hardly surprising. In Ellsworth, nobody gave much thought to security.

He stepped up to the mailboxes. There were a dozen, each labeled with the apartment number and name of the renter. The first box had an extra label that read Manager. Melvin moved his finger down the row, touching each name label.

No Chandler.

But the name on the card taped over the mail slot for 4 had been scratched out with a blue pen.

That’s gotta be Vicki’s, Melvin decided.

She’d only been here a few days, probably hadn’t bothered to put her name up yet.

The hardwood floor of the corridor creaked under his shoes. He winced at the noise. But he didn’t have to go far. Apartment #4 was the second door on the right. As soon as he spotted it, he turned around and hurried outside.

He crossed the lawn. At the corner of the building, he found a narrow lane of grass. Light spilled out from the windows of apartment #2, slanting down and casting a glow on the hedge that bordered the property. Melvin ducked below those windows, and made his way through the darkness to the windows of #4.

He peered through the glass. The curtains seemed to be open, but the room beyond was so dark that he could see nothing.

Either Vicki had already gone to bed, or she was away somewhere.

If she’d gone to bed, he wouldn’t get to see her unless maybe she woke up to use the john, or something. Not much chance of that.

He wondered if he should stick around, just in case she was out.

He didn’t want to waste the night, though. It’d be worth waiting for, if he knew for sure that she’d come in pretty soon. Just spying on her would be great, and even if she shut the curtains there might be a gap so he could see her undress.

But she might already be asleep.

And maybe this wasn’t her apartment. After all, her name wasn’t on the mailbox.

Waste tonight, he thought, and it’ll just be that much longer before you can do things with her.

I’ll try again tomorrow, he decided. I’ll come earlier.

He crept away, ducked under the lighted windows of the neighboring apartment, then thought he might as well take a peek. Slowly, he rose from his crouch. The curtains were open. The woman on the reclining chair looked familiar. He couldn’t place her at first, then realized she worked as a check-out girl at the Riverside Market. Melba, that was her name.

A fat pig.

She was sitting there, leaning back in the chair with her feet propped up. Her hair was in rollers. She wore a beige bra and panties. She held a paperback book in front of her face, so she couldn’t see Melvin. An open bag of taco chips rested between her legs, and a can of Diet Pepsi rested on the lamp table within easy reach.

She looked like a bloated, bulging wad of raw dough.

Melvin considered killing her. She was repulsive. At the store, she acted like a snot.

It’d be nice to kick her swollen belly till she puked up blood.

Don’t be dumb, he told himself. You don’t want to mess around with someone you won’t use.

He wouldn’t be able to get her body out to the car, even if he wanted to.

Besides, he’d have to touch her to kill her. He could just feel his fingers sinking into that puffy white skin.

Melvin ducked down below the window, and headed for the street wishing he hadn’t looked at Melba. He wished it had been Vicki sitting in that chair. Vicki, for sure, wouldn’t wear cruddy beige undies. Maybe red. Maybe black.

He imagined her sitting there in nothing but her white doctor jacket. It was unbuttoned, hanging open.

He climbed into his car, and began the forty mile drive to Blayton Memorial Hospital.

A little after midnight, they started coming into the hospital parking lot. The area was brightly lighted. Melvin, sitting low in the driver’s seat, watched them through the windshield.

There were both men and women. Some wore street clothes, but others were dressed in white. He supposed they were doctors, nurses, lab technicians, orderlies, janitors, all ready to head home now that their shift had ended.

Melvin settled on a tall, slim gal in a white dress. Probably a nurse. At this distance, he couldn’t see her face too well. But she had short blonde hair like Vicki, and her figure looked good. She looked better than any of the others.

She walked with a stocky woman who was likely another nurse, and a man in overalls. The three of them stopped beside a van. They chatted for a while. Melvin heard the quiet sounds of their voices, but he couldn’t make out what they were saying. The man soon climbed into the van. The two nurses stayed together as they passed several cars in the area of the lot reserved for staff. Then, the slim one climbed into a VW Rabbit and the stocky one kept walking.

Melvin backed his car out of its space, joined the small line of other vehicles waiting to exit the lot, then rolled onto the street and swung to the curb. Peering over his shoulder, he watched the Rabbit VW turn onto the road.

It turned right, just as he had.

A good omen, he thought.

The Rabbit passed him. He quickly moved out behind it, then eased off his accelerator and let himself drop back a ways. No point in hugging the gal’s tail, even though she probably assumed he was just another hospital employee heading home.

She might not be easy to get.

The ones who stopped at his gas station were always easy. A couple of those, he just did them while they sat in the driver’s seat, all set to pay him for the gas. Some, he followed them into the john and took care of them there. Others, they’d stop at the full-service island and he’d make a slice on the fan belt while he was under there checking the oil. After they drove off, he would shut the station and head up River Road in his tow truck. He’d find them stranded on the roadside a couple of miles out of town, and they’d think it was a miracle that he’d happened to show up. Easy.

But this was a lot different. He wasn’t sure how to handle it.

He’d given the matter considerable thought while he was waiting in the hospital lot. He knew how he wanted to get her. He wanted to just follow her home, wait till she was inside, then sneak in and take her by surprise. That way, he would have all the privacy and time he might want. For all he knew, though, the gal might be married or staying with her parents or have a roommate. In fact, he had to admit that it was most likely she didn’t live alone.

He could go in and get her, anyway, but he wasn’t sure he wanted to bother with that.

The other choice was to nail her before she got home. Either figure a way to stop her on the road, or try to get her after she parked, while she was on her way to the door. Those methods would only work if nobody else was nearby.

Just play it by ear, Melvin told himself.

The Rabbit turned left. Melvin followed. He checked his rearview mirror. None of the cars behind him made the turn. The road ahead was empty, with only a few houses in sight up ahead. He knew this road. It led to Cedar Junction, eight miles west of Blayton. Soon, there would be a long stretch through farm land before the outskirts of Cedar Junction. If she just doesn’t pull into one of these driveways…

She didn’t.

Headlights appeared in the distance, so he held off. The lights drew nearer. He squinted against their glare. A pickup whooshed by, and the glare was gone. Melvin watched the tail lights in his rearview. When they were tiny red specks, he swung across the center line and stepped on the accelerator. He gained on the Rabbit, sped past it, then eased back onto his side of the road.

Nothing ahead except the moonlit road and fields.

He studied the Rabbit in his rearview mirror. It seemed to be about three car lengths behind him.

Melvin grinned at his craftiness. He knew he could’ve swerved into the car’s path while he was passing it, but a weird maneuver like that would’ve put the woman on guard. This way, she might not be suspicious at all until it was too late.

He braced, left hand tight on the steering wheel, arm locked straight, pressing himself against the seat back and the headrest.

And jammed down on the brake pedal.

His tires grabbed the pavement, skidded and shrieked.

The Rabbit bore down on him.

He heard its squeal.

His car lurched with the impact. Not much of a jolt, really, but enough. He heard no breaking glass, so he doubted that either car had been damaged.

He swung onto the hard dirt shoulder of the road, and stopped. The Rabbit moved slowly past him, both its headlights still working. For a bad moment, he feared the nurse might keep on going. But she turned her car onto the shoulder and stopped a few yards in front of him.

Her door opened. As she climbed out, Melvin slumped against the steering wheel. He heard the quick scrape of her shoes on the road. The sounds stopped beside him. He slowly sat up straight, shaking his head.

“Are you all right?” the woman asked. Her voice was trembling.

“I guess,” he muttered. He rubbed the back of his neck.

She was standing close to his door, bending down to look in at him. He wished he could see her better, but the light was too faint. What he could see looked good. He guessed she was in her early twenties. Her white dress had a name tag over the left breast, but he couldn’t read it.

“What happened?” she asked. “Why did you stop?”

“Something…ran out in front of me. Maybe a cat. I don’t know. It all happened so fast. Guess I should’ve gone ahead and hit it.”

“I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t have been following so close. Did you hit your head?”

“I don’t know.” He rubbed his forehead. “I’m all right, I guess.” He turned off the engine, and took out the keys with his bandaged right hand. He slowly opened his door and stepped out onto the road. Pretending to ignore the woman, he wandered to the rear of his car.

“I don’t think there’s any damage,” she said as she followed him.

The tail and brake lights glowed red.

“Don’t look like it,” Melvin mumbled. “I got a flash in the trunk. I’d better get it.”

“I’ll give you my name and number,” the woman said. “If there are any problems, I’d be more than happy to pay.”

He unlocked the trunk. Its lid swung up.

“We don’t have to get the insurance companies involved, do we?” she asked. “I’d rather take care of this just between us, if it’s okay.”

“Sure,” he said.

“Great.” She sounded very relieved.

Melvin took the flashlight out of his trunk. He turned it on, and shined it on the woman’s hands as she searched her purse. She found a pen and notepad. He watched her hands shake as she tried to hold the pad steady and write on it.

“You may develop some stiffness in the neck,” she said as she wrote. She sounded a lot like Vicki talking about his bite. “That wouldn’t be at all uncommon in a situation like this. But if you’ll come to the hospital and ask for me…”

“Fine,” Melvin said.

“I’ll see that you’re taken care of. We have a fine physical therapy department.”

“Okay.”

She tore a page off the pad. It fluttered as she gave it to him. He held it under the flashlight beam. Her name, Patricia Gordon, was scribbled in shivery ink. Beneath the name was a telephone number. Melvin tucked the paper into his shirt pocket.

As she slipped the pad into her purse, he aimed the light at her face.

She squinted and turned her head.

Not bad looking at all. A cute little nose. Freckles. Sandy-colored hair sweeping across her forehead.

The name tag read, Patricia Gordon, RN. The dress had a zipper down the front. It was low enough to show a small wedge of bare skin below her throat.

“Could you…?” she started to say, but her breath exploded out as Melvin rammed the flashlight into her belly. Pain bolted up his own right arm. He cried out and dropped the flashlight at the same moment Patricia doubled. He drove his knee up into her so hard she was lifted off her feet. Before she could fall, he wrapped his arms around her waist. He hoisted her and flung her into the trunk. She landed on her back, legs in the air. The slamming trunk lid knocked her legs down. The trunk latched.

Melvin picked up the flashlight with his left hand. He thumbed the switch back and forth a couple of times, but the light was dead.

The red rear lights gave enough brightness for him to check the area behind his car. While he looked around, he heard bumps and muffled shouts from the trunk.

The purse, he decided, must’ve gone into the trunk with Patricia. It had been on a shoulder strap. He didn’t see anything on the pavement or ground.

He walked over to her car. The engine was still running. He opened the driver’s door, leaned in, pulled out the ignition key and punched off the headlights with a knuckle. When he shut the door, the car rested in darkness.

He wiped the door handle with the hanging front of his shirt.

Back at his own car, he removed the key from the trunk lock. Patricia shouted, “Let me out of here! You can’t do this!”

“Wanta bet?” he muttered.