ARE YOU IN LOVE with him?”
Clara was so surprised by Tommy’s question that she gasped. They had been sitting in the pickup, waiting for Drake to return. She’d been anxiously watching the hotel while her son drummed his fingers on the door. When he spoke, it was the first thing either of them had said since Drake left.
“I…It’s…” she stammered, not because she didn’t know the answer, but because she wasn’t sure how to talk about it with her son.
Tommy turned to look at her. “With the way you kissed, I figured that things must be getting serious…” he said, offering a weak smile.
“They are,” Clara acknowledged, speaking carefully, knowing that the situation was delicate. “Drake is a good man.”
Her son nodded, but didn’t speak.
Feeling the need to explain herself further, Clara said, “He’s smart, kind, and funny. You’ll see it, too, once you get to know him better.”
“He seems like a good guy,” Tommy added, his expression unreadable.
“He is,” Clara agreed. But then she felt like she was selling Drake short, like even if she sat here for an hour, she wouldn’t be able to tell Tommy about all the ways he had changed her life, how before the race car driver had arrived, her tomorrows were something to dread, rather than days to look forward to.
“I haven’t felt this way in a long time,” she finally explained.
“Since Dad died?”
Tommy’s words silenced her. Tears filled Clara’s eyes, but she refused to let them fall. She had already made her peace with Joe. Deep in her heart, she knew that he would have understood her feelings for Drake. It was time to face the future and quit clinging so tenaciously to the past. Now she had to convince Tommy.
“No one will ever replace your father,” she began. “He will always be a part of both our lives. Nothing can ever change that.” Clara paused. “But somehow, unexpectedly, I’ve found love again. Just when I was ready to give up all hope, Drake appeared, and while he can never make up for what we’ve lost, not completely, he can be the start of something new. The only thing I ask of you is that you don’t turn your back on him. Give him a chance. That’s all.”
Tommy turned to look out the window. Slowly, almost imperceptibly at first, he nodded his head. “I’ll try,” he said.
It was then, as she was flooded with feelings of relief, that Clara’s attention was drawn to a figure hurrying down the sidewalk toward them.
It took Clara a moment to realize that it was Amos.
The mechanic hobbled with a noticeable limp, his clothes drenched in sweat and his face as white as bone. He clutched a large bag to his chest, its strap swinging with every step. Passing in front of the truck, his eyes were focused straight ahead; he never spared them so much as a glance.
“Isn’t that…?” Tommy remarked.
Clara didn’t answer; she could only watch Amos go, too stunned to call out to him or honk the horn. The next thing she knew, the mechanic threw the bag in the back of the Plymouth, fired up the car’s powerful engine, and disappeared in a cloud of burnt rubber.
“What was that all about?” Tommy asked.
In answer, Clara started the pickup.
Whatever was going to happen next would happen fast.
Drake leaned against the wall down the hall and around the corner from the lobby, cursing under his breath. He had paid a price for running. The bullet had punctured his biceps, tearing through his skin as easily as his shirt. Blood stained the fabric and dripped onto the floor. Drake knew that it could’ve been much worse; a couple inches to the right and he would probably be taking his last breath. But as bad as the wound hurt, he had a bigger problem: the door at the end of the hallway, the one he’d planned on using to make his escape, was locked tight.
“Come on!” the thin man shouted. “After McCoy before he gets away!”
Time was running out. Drake knew that he had only two choices: he could either bust the door down or stand his ground and fight, but the odds of surviving against three men, especially when they were armed, were slim to none.
Think, damn it! Think!
But then his salvation came from an unexpected source.
“To hell with the driver!” the leader barked. “I don’t give a damn about him! I want Barstow!”
“But what about—”
“Move!”
The order was followed by the pounding of footsteps. Drake listened closely, his breath caught in his throat. As soon as he heard the slamming of car doors, he was off and running.
Outside, Drake found Clara behind the wheel of the pickup. She slid over as he got in, wincing in pain as he brushed his arm against the door.
“What happened?” she asked, staring at his blood-soaked shirt, her voice panicked. “Have you been shot?”
In answer, Drake threw the truck into gear and took off after the other cars. He concentrated on working the stick, the clutch, and the accelerator as smoothly as he could, but it still felt as if it was taking forever to increase their speed.
“Why are they after Amos?” Clara asked.
“I still don’t really know,” Drake answered, racing down Main Street; up ahead, he could just make out a Cadillac speeding toward the edge of town. “They claimed he’d stolen something from them.”
“What?”
“They didn’t say. But they seemed to think I was in on it.”
“We saw him,” Tommy said. “Your friend. The one those guys were shooting at. He walked right past us on the way to your car.”
“He was limping like he’d hurt his leg,” Clara added. “He was carrying a big duffel bag with him, but we were both so—”
“Amos was what?” Drake interrupted, his heart suddenly racing faster than the pickup truck.
“Limping,” she repeated.
“Not that. What did you say he had with him?”
“A big bag.”
Drake felt as if he’d been slugged in the gut. That bag was his. All the money he had saved over the years was in it. Thousands of dollars.
Amos was stealing from him, too…
Amos pointed the Plymouth out of town and pressed the gas pedal to the floor. He drove recklessly, drifting across the center line before overcorrecting, and took even the gentlest of corners fast enough to make the tires squeal. His poor driving made sense given how bad he felt: his hands, slick with sweat, trembled on the steering wheel; his guts ached, like they had been tied in knots; he blinked constantly, his eyes betraying him as the road wiggled like a worm on a fishing line.
“Come on, come on,” he said to himself. “Keep it together.”
In the end, the only thing that mattered was that he had the money. Somewhere, deep inside, Amos knew it was wrong to steal it like that, but what choice did he have? Morphine wasn’t free. Sweet Woods and his men were right behind him. Without enough cash in his pocket, he was as good as dead. Though he hated to have done Drake that way, in his withdrawal-addled mind, he had already begun to rationalize his actions, to convince himself that his friend would understand, even that he was running away with Drake’s blessing.
I’ll make it up to him someday…We’ll laugh about it…
Nervously, Amos looked in the rearview mirror. He had long since zoomed out of Sunset and was now barreling along a straightaway, the river out the passenger-side window. As he watched, he noticed something drawing steadily closer. After blinking a couple of times, the mechanic raised his hand to wipe sweat from his eyes and nearly drove off the road. But what he saw never changed. Tense seconds later, he understood that it was a car driving at high speed, kicking up a huge plume of dust in its wake. Just like that, all his hope vanished.
Sweet Woods wasn’t about to let him go that easy.
“There he is!” Jesse shouted, so excited that he reached out to point, his finger pressing against the Cadillac’s windshield.
Sweet smiled. He leaned forward over the front seat between the two men. His eyes narrowed, locked on the fleeing Plymouth.
“Son of a bitch didn’t get far,” Jesse continued. “As fast as we’re goin’, we’re gonna catch him right quick!”
Ever since they’d rocketed away from the hotel, Sweet had been impressed with Malcolm’s driving. He was strong and steady, his big hands clenching the steering wheel like a vise, and had quickly brought them to the Cadillac’s top speed. The man knew how to negotiate turns by taking his foot off the gas and occasionally tapping the brakes. Even as Sweet watched, the distance between the two cars continued to shrink. Barstow might have been a whiz under the hood, but behind the wheel, Sweet would bet on his man any day of the week.
“Too bad about McCoy gettin’ away,” Jesse said, too worked up to keep his gums from flapping.
“Barstow first,” Sweet replied. “Then we’ll see about his driver.”
There was a part of Sweet that wondered if Drake McCoy hadn’t been telling the truth when he said he didn’t know what Barstow had stolen. Over the years, Sweet had heard more than his share of lies, often while holding a gun, and there was usually something that gave the person away: eyes that couldn’t stay in one place for long, a nervous twitch, or a shirt drenched in sweat. McCoy had shown none of these signs. Regardless, the driver was a loose end. Sweet had seen the splatter of blood on the hallway wall. McCoy had been wounded. It would be a simple matter to go back and put another bullet between his eyes; he’d put one into the old woman who’d been behind the counter, too, while he was at it.
The road rose sharply over a hill but then, after an equally steep descent, curved hard to the left. As fast as Malcolm was driving, there wasn’t time to slow as he tried to negotiate the turn and the rear end started to fishtail. A second later, one of the rear wheels skidded onto the shoulder; rocks and loose dirt sprayed as the wheels spun. In that instant, a number of unfortunate possibilities loomed: they might flip, continue sliding down into the ditch, or even blow a tire. But amazingly, Malcolm kept them steady. Before Jesse could shout in fear, they were back on the road and again racing forward, the engine growling loudly as it tried to go as fast as its driver demanded.
“Jesus Christ almighty,” Jesse swore. “That was close.”
Sweet ignored him. “Stay on him,” he ordered Malcolm. “Catch up and knock his ass off the road.”
Malcolm did as he was told, closing the gap until Sweet could see Barstow’s eyes watching them in his rearview mirror. As if to formally announce their presence, Malcolm drove the Cadillac into the rear of the Plymouth, giving it a solid bump.
“Hey, now,” Jesse worried. “Be careful! We don’t wanna—”
“Quit your bitchin’!” Sweet shouted. Grabbing Malcolm’s shoulder, he said, “Wherever he goes, you follow! Drive over him if you have to!”
This was going to end right here, right now.
Clara watched Drake push the pickup as fast as its old engine would take them. The truck complained loudly, occasionally sputtering as its pistons misfired. Only a couple of days earlier, he’d wanted to drive it, curious about what the truck could do, had even called it a classic, but now Drake’s earlier amusement was gone, replaced by raw frustration. Even though they raced out of Sunset, in comparison to the other two cars it felt as if they were crawling. The truck simply wasn’t fast enough.
“Come on, damn you!” Drake complained, striking his palm against the steering wheel. “We’re never going to catch them like this!”
Clara put her hand on his knee. “It’s all right…” she said, recognizing the inevitable: Amos and his pursuers were going to get away.
“No, it isn’t,” he argued. Drake looked at her, his expression a mix of anger and worry. “Amos…” he began slowly, as if he couldn’t find the words. “He stole…all of my money…”
Clara was stunned. “But…but how?”
“It was in the bag he was carrying, my bag,” he explained. “It’s most everything I’ve saved. There’s a bit more in a bank in Illinois, but…”
Drake didn’t finish, but Clara knew what remained unspoken. The money in his duffel bag was the future they’d both been counting on; it was how they were going to keep Eddie from following through on his threat to take away her house. All of their hopes and dreams were in danger.
“They’re taking Baker’s Road out of town,” Tommy suddenly said.
“So?” Clara asked.
“It runs west along the river for a couple of miles, but then loops back toward town just before you reach Bill Shelton’s farm,” her son explained. “If we turn right after Walt Cornelius’s place, the back roads will lead us right to them. We might even reach the highway ahead of them.”
“Where’s the turn?” Drake asked.
Tommy showed him and the pickup roared around the corner, spraying gravel. Clara bounced on the seat as her son directed Drake past recently plowed fields, over rickety bridges, and through dense woods. As they crested a hill, the valley opened beneath them and her eyes scanned the length of road that threaded through it; her heart beat faster when she saw two cars headed their way.
“There they are!” Clara shouted as she pointed.
“We’re not going to get there in time,” Tommy said with a frown. “They’re moving too fast.”
“We’re sure as hell going to try,” Drake said as he floored the accelerator.
Even as they rocketed down the hill, the truck’s engine straining hard, Clara knew that Tommy was right; by the time they reached the highway, both cars would have already gone past. They were too late.
It would take a miracle to keep them from getting away…
Sweat dripped into Amos’s eyes, but he was so focused on the other car that he didn’t bother to wipe it away. Icy chills rippled across his skin, making him feel nauseous. His vision swam and his ears rang. He felt as if he was trapped in a nightmare from which he couldn’t wake.
Once again, Sweet Woods’s car rammed him; the jolt was jarring, hard enough to make his teeth chatter. This time, it caused the Plymouth to swerve wildly, forcing him to wrestle it back under control.
“Leave me alone!” he pleaded.
Amos glanced over his shoulder at Drake’s bag in the backseat. If he could just get away, if he could find somewhere to buy more morphine, if he could rent a room, get a fix, sleep for a few days, everything would be all right, he was sure of it.
Because he was distracted, thinking about the drugs and the money he had stolen and bracing himself for another hit from the Cadillac, Amos wasn’t paying attention to the road. He was driving fast, the Plymouth’s speedometer buried. So when the sudden, sharp turn arrived, he hadn’t seen it coming.
Even as Drake struggled to keep the pickup on the dirt road, he kept glancing at the two speeding cars. He could see that the Plymouth was going too fast as it approached the curve, the Cadillac right on its tail. He felt the sudden urge to cry out, to shout a warning to Amos, but it would have been futile. He was helpless to do anything but watch.
What happened next felt as if it occurred in slow motion.
Amos jammed down hard on the Plymouth’s brakes, as if he suddenly realized he was in grave danger. Smoke billowed off the pavement as the tires screamed. But it wasn’t enough. The car slid to the right, out of control, before flying off the road and over a steep incline. Incredibly, the Cadillac followed. Its driver had been too close, too intent on catching his quarry, and he hadn’t realized he was being blindly led to his doom.
“Oh my God!” Clara shouted.
In his many years racing cars, Drake had seen plenty of crashes, but this was one of the worst. The Plymouth sailed through the air, landing on its undercarriage hard enough to blow out a couple of tires before bouncing toward a copse of trees. It rammed nose-first into a thick elm, its front end crumpling as if it was made out of paper; metal and glass flew everywhere. A heartbeat later, the Cadillac rammed it from behind, flipping over the Plymouth’s roof to smash into the same tree. After all their furious racing, whipping down the backcountry roads, both cars fell silent and still.
Drake skidded to a stop at the bottom of the hill, a couple hundred feet from the crash. His heart felt like it was going to pound out of his chest.
“Stay here!” he shouted at Clara and Tommy before leaping out and running toward the wreck. He’d gone only a couple of steps before a fire erupted to life; Drake had no idea which of the car’s gas tanks had ruptured, though it hardly mattered. In seconds, the flames grew, hungry, spreading until both vehicles were burning, sending black, acrid smoke billowing skyward. Drake had to shield his face, the intense heat like a wall. He peered into the fire, searching the cars for something, movement, a cry for help, but there was nothing.
“Amos!” he shouted at the top of his lungs, but he knew it was pointless; his friend was dead. No one could have survived that crash.
But then, just as he was about to give up hope, Drake saw the tall grass thirty feet from the wreckage begin to move. Without any consideration for his own safety, he ran to it, silently praying that he was wrong, that Amos had miraculously survived. Sure enough, someone was trying to crawl away, both battered and bloodied, his clothes singed as well as torn.
“I’m here, Amos!” Drake shouted. “I’ve got you!”
However, when he turned the wounded man over, Drake discovered that it wasn’t the mechanic after all; it was the silent, dangerous-looking thug from the hotel. The man’s mouth moved, but no sound came out. In his eyes, Drake saw no trace of viciousness, only confusion and fear. Even though the stranger had threatened to do him and Amos harm, Drake grabbed his arms and dragged him away from the fire. By the time he lay the thug down, the man was unconscious; a quick check revealed he was still alive.
Drake wiped his brow and stared at the blaze. Amos was dead. The Plymouth was wrecked. Everything he had spent years saving, almost all his money, was now nothing but ash. He glanced up at the truck; Clara and Tommy stood beside it, mesmerized by the fire. What was he going to tell her? Without his money, how were they going to build a future together? What hope did they have of getting rid of Eddie now?
Try as he might, Drake couldn’t come up with a single answer.
Clara shivered in the wind, rubbing her hands on her bare arms, but she had no desire to get back in the truck. Dusk was fast approaching, the sun slowly settling for the night. Smoke still drifted lazily toward the sky, the sharp smell burning her nose. The fire department had long since come and gone, leaving behind two charred wrecks that had once been cars. The only survivor of the crash had been rushed to town in an ambulance; she didn’t know what would happen to the remains of Amos and the other men. Right then, she couldn’t bring herself to care.
All that mattered was Drake.
He stood with Sheriff Oglesby, talking about the crash. Clara was too far away to hear what was being said, but she guessed that Drake was telling the lawman the truth: that he didn’t know why the men had been after Amos, not exactly, only that the mechanic had been accused of stealing something. Drake’s expression was calm, he was nodding a lot, but Clara expected that he was torn up on the inside; even if Amos had robbed him of his money, they had spent years together traveling from race to race, under the Plymouth’s hood, building a friendship as close as family. She worried how he would react to such a huge loss. Clara imagined that the worst part was that Drake would never have the chance to talk to Amos about his betrayal. He would die a thief.
And he took the money with him when he went…
Earlier, Clara had watched Drake walk the tall grass around the wrecks, hoping that his bag had been ejected as the survivor had, but he’d come up empty. Left with nothing but ash, she couldn’t help but think of Eddie. How could they fend him off now? If the banker went through with his threat, then in addition to losing the Plymouth, Amos, and all of Drake’s money, her home would be taken away. Once, she’d considered surrendering to Eddie’s demands; now her love for Drake made it impossible. But what else could they do?
“Penny for your thoughts.”
Clara jumped at the sound of Tommy’s voice. She had been so preoccupied that she hadn’t heard him approach. He hadn’t said much since the crash, wandering up and down the ditches, watching from a distance.
She shook her head. “I’m just tired,” she answered, then nodded toward the wrecked cars. “It’s been a long day.”
Tommy was silent for a bit, kicking rocks at his feet. “I’ve been thinking about something,” he finally said. “What was in Drake’s bag? Must have been important, as mad as he was that his friend took it.”
Clara considered lying, but when she saw the way her son was looking at her, when she thought about their recent reconciliation, she couldn’t.
Isn’t his life in as much trouble as mine?
She took a deep breath. “There’s something you should know…” she began.
By the time she’d finished, Clara had told Tommy everything. She explained that Drake had intended to help them, but that plan was now in jeopardy.
“It isn’t fair,” Tommy spat angrily.
“You’ll find out that plenty in life isn’t,” Clara answered. “Sometimes, there isn’t anything you can do about it.”
“But he’s blackmailing you!”
“Eddie doesn’t see it that way,” she explained. “He’s in love with me and means to have me whether I want to be his wife or not.”
Tommy balled his fists in anger. Clara was reminded of Joe; he would often rail away against things he found unjust, furious at a newspaper article or a radio program. Life father, like son, she supposed. But just like then, when Joe complained about there not being enough jobs to go around, the price of a pound of flour, or even about Hitler’s march into Czechoslovakia, there was nothing that could be done. They were helpless.
“I’ve got an idea.”
Clara turned to look at Tommy; for a moment, she thought she’d misheard. “There’s nothing we can do now,” she told him. “The money’s gone.”
Her son shook his head. “If my idea worked, we wouldn’t need it.” From the look in Tommy’s eyes, Clara could see he believed what he was saying.
“It’s too late. We don’t have—”
“Just hear me out and then decide,” Tommy interrupted, his excitement showing. “Besides, what do we have to lose?”
Clara knew the answer: nothing. Amos’s thievery and death had placed their backs against the wall. At this point any idea, no matter how odd or impractical, should be considered. After all, they needed a miracle…
“All right,” she said. “Let’s go talk to Drake.”