Death by Denim (9 page)

“You’re not going to believe this; the train ahead of us hit a cow and several cars derailed.”

“No way. A cow?”

“That’s what the man said. Line’s closed from here to Omegna until they can clear it off.”

“How long will that take?”

“Emergency crews have been summoned, he says, but no telling how long it will be until they arrive.”

“So what do we do?” I tried to sound calm, but inside the panic was rising again. The whole operation could be thrown off if I wasn’t on my mark by morning. Caraday had said that The Mole hadn’t found the Mulos
yet
, but I didn’t doubt that he would, and that he would hurt Seth’s family if I wasn’t there as the sacrificial lamb.

“First thing we do is clear the train. They’re ordering everyone off.”

There was nothing to be done but to join the rest of the grumbling passengers in our car filing down the narrow aisle and out the door. A uniformed train worker stood on the platform, directing people into the station. If his haggard face and drooping posture were any indication, he was as tired as we were and just as irritated by the inconvenience.

Apparently, the station itself was not prepared to accommodate travelers in the middle of the night. The lights were on, but nothing was open—not the ticket booths or the stationmaster’s office or any of the small shops that lined the perimeter. The only place to go was into a small lobby area, where there weren’t nearly enough chairs for everyone to sit.

I wasn’t worried about the seating arrangements, though. I kept glancing at the huge round clock on the far wall, calculating and recalculating how much time we had left before showtime. Impatience buzzed through me. I paced. The room was too small, too crowded. I was suffocating. And I had to get to Varese.

Ryan wandered over to the ticket counter and grabbed a train schedule printout. He brought it over to me and we scanned it together, looking for an alternate route or some other alternative that would get us to Varese on time.

And then I smelled it. The strange sour stench I noticed every time I caught the Marlboro Man following me. My heart lodged in my chest like a chunk of ice. I turned slowly, scanning the crowd. I couldn’t see him, but I knew he was there.

I grabbed Ryan’s hand. “We need to get out of here,” I hissed. “Now.”

He leaned close, a sleepy smile on his lips, but I saw the way his eyes became sharp, alert. “What is it?” he whispered.

I didn’t have time for explanations. “We need to
go
,” I insisted.

To his credit, Ryan didn’t press me again, but quickly steered me toward the tall wooden doors at the front of the station. I don’t know what made me turn my head. Premonition, maybe? All I know is that just as I reached for the metal bar handle of the door, I felt an uncomfortable tingle at the back of my neck and glanced behind me.

The room went black—or so it seemed. All I could see for that awful moment was the angry face of the Marlboro Man as he fixed his cold eyes on me. Ryan must have noticed him, too, because he tightened his grip on my hand and yanked me with him as he pushed through the door and out into the night. It didn’t occur to me at the time to wonder if Ryan recognized the man or why he would have been alarmed to see him.

Ryan slowed for a heartbeat as he turned his head left and then right, assessing the escape routes, I figured, since he pulled me to the right and down a short flight of stone steps and into the shadows. Behind us, I heard the door bang open again. I didn’t have to look back to know it would be Marlboro Man, but looking was the immediate reaction to the banging door. Sure enough, it was him. And he was carrying a gun. Suddenly, my back felt like an open target. It spurred me to run even faster, to push my stride longer to keep up with Ryan so I wouldn’t slow him down.

Ahead to one side lay a huge open field, backed by a deep stand of trees. On the other side, a two-lane road wound down a hill, presumably into the town, lit at regular intervals by the soft glow of streetlights and fading away into the gathering mist. Either route would leave us vulnerable, exposed, but at least the field was cloaked in darkness, and if we made it across the field alive, we might be able to hide in the trees. I pulled on Ryan’s hand this time, veering into the field. He adjusted his course without question. I wondered if it was because he trusted my instincts or because he had the same idea himself.

We bounded through the field, high-stepping over the rows of some kind of vining crop. Weak moonlight skittered ahead of us, along straight, narrow rows of stubby vegetation that caught on our feet and threatened to trip us if we weren’t careful where we stepped. By the time we were halfway across the field, my muscles felt like burning rubber, and my chest was a hot, tight vise, forbidding me to catch my breath.

I could hear heavy footsteps crashing through the field behind us. We were close, so close to the cover of the trees, but close wasn’t going to cut it. I wondered who Marlboro would try to take down first. Probably Ryan. I would be easier to catch. But the guy never fired a shot. Maybe he preferred to do his work at close range.

When we reached the safety of the tree trunks, I could have cheered, but I knew I had to save my breath. The chase was not nearly over. Ryan took the lead again, dodging around trees, trailing me behind him like a child’s toy. Moonlight filtered through the leaves above us, casting Rorschach shadows on the ground, and camouflaging the terrain so that we couldn’t tell if we were about to trip on a rock or step into a hole. I twisted my ankle more than once and nearly fell on my face, but Ryan held me up. Ryan kept me going.

The moonlight faded as we pushed deeper into the woods, and at first I thought it was because the trees were so much thicker, but as it grew darker and darker, I glanced up to see that heavy clouds had swept across the sky, blotting out the moon and whatever light it might have offered. Which was good because it meant we would be hidden in the darkness, but not so great because it was getting to the point that we could barely see three feet in front of us.

From behind—I couldn’t tell how close—came a sharp crack as if someone had stepped on a very large twig. I tugged on Ryan’s hand to signal him to stop. We pressed our backs up against a tree trunk and waited. I wanted to gulp in great rasps of air, but I forced myself to breathe silently, easy in, easy out, until I thought I would choke. There wasn’t much I could do about my thundering heartbeat, though. I closed my eyes, wincing with every
ba-bump,
quite sure that Marlboro Man would have had to be deaf not to hear it.

I heard him pass by. I didn’t dare turn my head to visually verify it was him, but I didn’t really have to. I could smell—the burnt-tar stench, now mixed with pungent BO. That was enough for me.

Ryan shifted so that his body was shielding mine against the tree and he stood there, pressed up against me, until Marlboro Man was long gone and his odor faded away. It made me feel, if not exactly safe, at least protected. Grudgingly, I had to admit that I was actually glad that Ryan had insisted on coming along. I would have preferred it to be Seth pressing me up against the tree, but that was a thought for another time. Our only concern at the moment was getting out of the woods undetected and finding our way to Varese.

Suddenly, Ryan was gone from me. He sprang into the darkness and I heard scuffling to my left. Someone grunted. It didn’t sound like Ryan. And then I heard a heavy thud and the ground vibrated beneath my feet.

Ryan returned, out of breath. “Let’s go. Quickly.” He took my hand again.

“Is he . . . ?”

“He’s out, for the moment.”

“What about his gun?”

Ryan grinned as he held the weapon up so it could catch the faint moonlight. “No worries,” he said, and tucked the gun into the back of his waistband underneath his shirt. He led the way through the trees double-time. I had to practically run to keep up with him, but I wasn’t going to argue. I kept thinking that Marlboro Man could wake up at any moment and when he did, he’d be plenty angry. I didn’t want to be anywhere in the vicinity when that happened.

Eventually, the trees thinned and spilled out of the woods near a paved road. Not the same road we had seen that led into town, I guessed, since this one was flat and straight, whereas the other had curved away from the station.

“What now?” I whispered.

“We keep moving.”

“How close are we to Varese? Can we take a taxi?”

He snorted. “We’re not that close.”

“Can we take one to the next station? Beyond the cow on the tracks?”

He nodded. “That’s the idea. We just need to figure out how to get there.”

“There was a taxi stand back at the station. . . .”

“No good,” he said. “Our friend back there could be waiting for us.”

“The city center, then. It can’t be far from the station, can it? Do you think this road connects with the other one?”

Ryan hitched his hands on his hips and peered through the darkness. “Only one way to find out.”

We followed the road, walking on the pavement because it was easier than navigating the uneven ground. A breeze had picked up and I, in just the tank and shorts, started to shiver. Not horribly, but enough that Ryan noticed.

“Here. Take this,” Ryan said. He peeled off his jacket and draped it over my shoulders. I tried to give it back—I was beginning to feel just a little too much like a damsel in distress—but he glowered at me. “Put it on.”

I figured it probably wasn’t worth the argument, so I slipped my arms into the sleeves. Just then, two beams of light swept toward us down the road.

Ryan grabbed me and pulled me off to the side. “Stay low,” he warned. “We don’t know who it might be.”

I ducked low as he was doing until the lights drew nearer and a delivery truck came into focus. “A ride!” I jumped up and waved my arms madly to flag it down. The truck passed slowly, but then rolled to a stop just a few yards ahead of us, the red taillights glowing like hot coals. I ran toward them.

“Wait!” Ryan yelled after me. “Be careful!”

But I had already reached the cab. The trucker powered down his window and asked if we needed a lift.
“Volete un passaggio?”

“Sì, fantastico. Grazie!”
I said. Yes, please!

Ryan was at my side before I could reach the door handle. He grabbed my arm. “What do you think you’re doing?”

I pulled away from him. “I’m going to Varese. Are you coming?”

The driver leaned toward the passenger seat and said in English, “I don’t go to Varese. But I can take you as far as Cassano Magnago,
sì
?”

I didn’t know where Cassano Magnago was, but it must have been on the way to Varese if the driver said he could take us “as far as.” And it would be farther away from Marlboro Man than we were at the moment.
“Sì,”
I said, and climbed up to the cab.
“Grazie.”

Ryan made an exasperated growling sound, but he climbed up behind me just the same.

The cab of the truck had obviously not been designed for three passengers and the fit was tight. Still, our driver appeared to be very pleased to have company for the long, dark drive ahead. He shoved a couple of notebooks and paper bags that had been sitting next to him underneath the seat and brushed the bench free of any crumbs there might have been—though it’s not likely he could have seen them in the dark.

“I am Salvatore,” he said, touching a meaty hand to his chest.

“
Buona sera
, Salvatore,” I replied. “I’m Donna and this is John. Thank you so much for offering us a ride.”

“Ah, Donna!” He grinned broadly, gold tooth catching the light from the dash. “An Italian name, yes?”

I nodded slowly, settling onto the seat. “Uh . . . yes. Of course. I am named for my grandmother who lives in Varese.”

“Wonderful, wonderful,” Salvatore exclaimed. “You are American?”

“Canadian,” I said, giving him a winning smile.

Ryan slammed the door shut behind himself, and Salvatore released the emergency brake. “I have been to Canada once.” As tight as we were in the cab, I was practically straddling the gearshift, but it didn’t seem to bother Salvatore. He ground the gears into first. “Many years ago. I see the Niagara Falls.”

Ryan fell easily into our fictional personas. “My cousin lives near Niagara Falls,” he said. “Plays for the Bills.”

“
American
football?” Salvatore sounded genuinely mortified.

“He’s big,” Ryan said, “but he doesn’t have the speed to play regular football.”

“Sì, certo, certo,”
Salvatore mused. “One must have speed for the football.”

“I hope to see Inter Milan play while we are here,” Ryan said.

That was all Salvatore needed to hear. He launched into a lengthy description of the soccer team’s strengths and weaknesses. I had no idea what he was talking about, but Ryan seemed to be getting into it.

Between the drone of their voices, the darkness outside, and the hum of the tires on the road, I began to feel drowsy. I fought it; even though I didn’t know when I might sleep next, we were in a stranger’s truck and I knew I should stay alert. But then I figured that Ryan was alert enough for the both of us and I let my eyelids shut longer and longer each time I blinked. I kept drifting in and out of their conversation. By the time I heard the gears shift down as the truck slowed, I was nearly catatonic.

Salvatore pulled over to the side of the road. “Only five kilometers that way you will find the Cassano Magnago station,” he said as we climbed down from the cab.

“Thank you very much.
Grazie!
”

We stood and waved as he pulled back onto the main road. My brain was so tired I couldn’t even think straight.

“Five kilometers . . .” I asked sleepily. “That’s how far again?”

“Just over three miles,” Ryan said.

“Then we better get walking.”