15

Cray was heading south on Interstate 10, two miles past downtown Tucson, when his glance strayed to the floor of the passenger seat and he realized that it was empty.

Kaylie’s purse had been there. She had taken it, of course. That didn’t matter.

But the satchel did.

He had forgotten it entirely. Exhaustion and anger had fogged his mind.

She had carried off his little black bag, perhaps without even knowing what it was. But she would know before long. She would look inside, paw through the satchel’s contents. She would find the knife.

Cray had cleaned the knife after each kill, but he knew that microscopic traces of blood could still be found on it, perhaps in the narrow crevice where the blade met the hilt.

Sharon Andrews’ blood. And the blood of others.

The knife posed the worst threat to him, but the other items were incriminating as well. Once in the possession of the police, the bag’s contents would fairly scream his guilt.

“God damn her,” he said with sudden violence. “God damn that meddlesome girl to hell.”

He took the next exit and doubled back toward town, driving fast. There might not be much time.

* * *

Elizabeth spent less than two minutes in the motel room, long enough to put on her shoes and collect her two suitcases.

Before leaving, she entered the bathroom, switching on the vanity lights over the counter. The sink was old and yellowed with deposits of chemical residue, and there was hair, not her own, in the drain.

She cupped her hands under the lukewarm stream from the tap and splashed her face, wanting to feel clean.

When she looked at herself in the mirror, she saw sky-blue eyes and a pale, freckled complexion. She found the strength for a smile. “Still here,” she said aloud.

Cray had wanted to wipe her out. He had failed. Now he would pay the price.

She loaded her luggage into the Chevette, then remembered her gun. Cray had said he pitched it into the brush outside the motel.

She spent a few minutes combing the weeds before conceding that the gun was lost. It could be anywhere within the dense foliage. She would need hours to perform a thorough search, and even then, finding the gun would be largely a matter of luck.

Well, maybe she wouldn’t need it. Maybe her role in all this was almost done.

The hope buoyed her as she hurried to the front office, fishing the room key from her purse.

The clerk was watching an adult video on a portable TV with a built-in VCR. He glanced at her and asked perfunctorily, “Room okay?”

“Fantastic.”

He heard sarcasm and shrugged. “For nineteen a night, whatchoo expect? The Ritz friggin’ Carlton?”

On the TV, a nude woman with breasts like water balloons was urgently requesting, “More.”

Elizabeth was at the door when the clerk said, “Hey, wait a sec. You see anybody funny hanging ‘round here last night?”

“Funny?” There was nothing funny about John Cray. “No.”

“Kids, maybe? Troublemakers?”

“I didn’t. Why?”

“Some shithead busted inna our storage closet, is why. Didn’t take nothing, but they fucked up a goddamn expensive padlock. Broke it all in pieces.”

“Broke it?”

“Like it was glass. I don’t know how the hell they pulled that off.”

She thought of the cold stream hissing from the canister’s nozzle. Cold enough to freeze a padlock solid and render it vulnerable to a shattering blow.

“Me neither,” she said. “You call the police?”

“Cops?” The clerk pantomimed spitting. “All them assholes do is hassle me. You know?”

“I know. Well, good luck.”

She was glad the crime would go unreported. She didn’t want the police somehow connecting the break-in with Cray, then tying him to her.

The police. She really was going to contact them. The thought seemed strange, unreal, after so many years of evading every patrol car, every blue uniform.

Although it was only a few minutes past seven o’clock, already the morning was warm. The Chevette, unprotected from the sun, baked her as she cranked the engine. The car was equipped with air-conditioning, but that particular feature had never worked. She rolled down the window and tried to breathe.

Pulling out of the lot, she anxiously checked the frontage road, looking for a black Lexus. It was doubtful Cray could get here this fast, but she wasn’t taking anything for granted.

The road was clear. She took the 22nd Street on-ramp to Interstate 10 and let it carry her north.

* * *

Cray rolled into the motel parking lot at 7:10. The Chevette was gone. Kaylie had left.

He had expected as much. Driving here, he had pieced together her most plausible plan of action.

She would call the police. It was her best move, the one he would have made had their positions been reversed. She would call from a pay phone and identify him as the killer, offering the satchel as proof of his guilt.

Or she might simply leave the satchel outside a police substation with an unsigned note. But he didn’t think so. He expected her to call, because only by talking to another person could she be certain her message got through. And, high on the adrenaline rush of survival, she would do it as soon as possible.

From a public phone. She wouldn’t call from the motel. She still didn’t want to be identified, didn’t want to get directly involved.

Having made the call, she would need to make a quick getaway before the police responded. The fastest escape route was the interstate. Cray was betting she would stay close to I-10, either a few miles north or south of the motel.

Which direction?

South, the city turned mean. Barrio streets, crime, danger. More police cars cruising. More cops on the beat.

She wanted to be in a less populous, less heavily patrolled area.

North, then. She would go north. Past downtown Tucson, into the near suburbs.

Of course, she might have made the call already. By now it might be too late.

Perhaps he ought to run. Race for the border. He knew enough Spanish to get by. He could live in the mountains if he had to, at least for a month or two, until the urgency of the search abated.

No.

He would not permit himself to lose. It was bad enough that he had let her get away. To allow her this ultimate victory was unthinkable.

Cray found I-10’s entrance ramp and sped into the northbound lanes. The time was 7:15.