JOE TREFILL had to bite his lower lip to keep from swearing out loud. He was inches away from the exit to the bus, held fast from behind by a security guard who seemed half his size.
“Let me go,” he said. “I need to get on that bus!”
“You so desperate to lose your money down there that you have to knock people down?”
Trefill did not know what “down there” meant until he read the sign for the departing bus: “ATLANTIC CITY.” He was vaguely aware of crashing into someone, but he hadn’t been paying much attention. He had missed catching Lorraine by a few seconds. Now she was safely on the bus, and he was entertainment for a gathering crowd.
“Sir, I’m gonna letcha go now . . .”
Trefill didn’t cause any more trouble. There was no point in it, now that Lorraine had made her escape. But she wouldn’t get too far ahead. All he had to do was follow her. Atlantic City was a big place, but a fat little kid with black hair should be easy to spot.
He turned to walk away, and found that people were still staring at him. He wanted to shout at them, to curse them for being so intrusive, to take out the gun under his jacket and say:
Mine’s bigger than the guard’s.
But that would draw more attention, and Walter LaBerge had made him swear he wouldn’t draw attention to himself.
“Not like that job I gave you in Orlando, Joe. Remember Disney World? Remember standing up on the trolley and screaming because someone cut you off and that guy got away from you?”
Remember? LaBerge had never let him forget.
But he had a second chance now, and all he had to do was calm down and buy a ticket. Keeping his eyes fixed on the counter ahead, he pushed through the crowd. He took a quick glance behind himself to see that they had dispersed, finally realizing there was nothing left to gawk at.
He went up to the counter and pushed a bill forward.
“Atlantic City,” he said.
The man behind the glass window looked at him through wire-framed glasses.
“I can sell you a ticket,” he said, “but you missed the last bus of the night. Next one leaves seven-o-five A.M.”
Trefill’s fist clenched. The little freak had nearly ten hours’ head start!
“I’ll take it,” he said.
He paid for the ticket, then left the terminal. There was no point in spending the night in this place, among the ragged homeless and the druggies. He’d rent a room for the night, and in the morning he’d head down into Jersey. There he’d find Lorraine, and this time nothing would stop him. If he had to waste the two kids who were helping her, then he’d do it.
Trefill didn’t realize he was smiling with the idea that he might get to use his gun for real this time.
The 9:45 bus from Manhattan pulled into Atlantic City close to midnight. Sandy had shaken Lorraine awake, but the ordeal she’d been through made the child as limp as a rag doll. Grumbling, Donny lifted her up and carried her off the bus.
“Don’t be such a creep,” Sandy said. “That little kid saved our necks, and you know it.”
“We have to find a place to spend the night,” Donny said.
“We can sleep under the boardwalk,” Sandy said. “No one will see us there.”
They walked down New Jersey Avenue, heading toward the lights of the casinos. Climbing onto the boardwalk, they found themselves near the Showboat Casino. Sandy gazed around in awe at all the activity she was seeing. The boardwalk was sixty feet wide, stretching as far as her eyes could see, and it was full of people. Bright lights and laughter and loud noises were a sharp contrast to the virtually silent bus ride.
“Wow, it’s barely midnight,” she said. “And there’s people all over the place.”
“I heard they don’t have clocks,” Donny said. “That’s to keep the suckers gambling at all hours.”
They walked along the boardwalk, passing casinos with ritzy names like Taj Mahal and Caesar’s, until at last they had come to the end of all the activity. They found stairs leading down to the beach. Donny shifted Lorraine to his other shoulder. She moaned in protest.
“Where should we set up camp?” he asked.
“Anyplace,” Sandy said. “I’m exhausted.”
They walked for some distance. Then they ducked under the boardwalk, tucking themselves into a deep shadowed area so that no one passing by would see them. Donny took off his jacket. Sandy took off hers and laid it down just below her boyfriend’s. It made a small bed, but nothing big enough for either of them. With a sigh, Donny and Sandy exchanged glances. Then they laid Lorraine down on the makeshift bed.
Using the suitcases for pillows, the teenage couple cuddled together and fell fast asleep.