Lot Lizards (12 page)

"You feeling okay, Jon?" Doug asked.

He jerked as if startled by the question and said, "Yeah. Yeah, I'm fine." He turned his gaze to the window and peered between the open blinds. As he ate, his eyes darted back and forth between the window and that space behind Doug, as if there were something back there distracting him, tugging at his attention.
 

Doug decided it was the wreck; what had happened— what
might
have happened—was probably just now hitting Jon. It had struck Doug earlier; he'd been standing at a payphone thumbing through the Yellow Pages in search of an all night towing service and garage when he'd realized, quite suddenly, as if it hadn't occurred to him before, that they'd had a car accident and that they could have been terribly hurt, even killed...
all
of them. The thought made his scalp tingle.
 

After two calls, Doug realized that there was no chance they'd get the car towed before daylight, let alone get back on the road by then. No one, in fact, was going anywhere. The freeways were closing, the lights in the truck stop were flickering and the snow was falling harder than ever, so hard that the plough couldn't keep up with it and the parking lot was getting buried in the white powder. He'd finally given up and replaced the receiver with a long weary sigh, hoping Adelle's mother could hang on until they got there...whenever that would be.
 

They ate in silence for a while. The girls' concentration was focused entirely on their food while Adelle ate slowly and thoughtfully; Jon, on the other hand, continued his mysterious staring. It was so annoying that Doug even looked over his shoulder a couple more times, expecting to see something interesting. Finally, he asked, "Jon, what are you staring at?"
 

"Staring? Nothing. Nothing. I'm not staring." Jon's response was quick and breathy, trembling with guilt, and Jon was about to pursue the question when a timid female voice spoke over the P.A. system:
 

"Your attention, please? Your attention? We're sorry for the interruption, but... if there are any doctors or nurses dining in the restaurant, could you please come to the register? We have two injured men who are in need of attention. If any medical personnel dining in the restaurant could please come to the register, we'd really appreciate it."
 

Adelle sighed and put down her fork, glancing at Doug.

"C'mon, honey, you're tired," Doug said. "Let someone else—"

"That could've been us, you know," she said quietly. "We got off lucky tonight." She looked around to see if anyone else was getting up. A short, well dressed middle aged man was leaving his table and heading for the front, dabbing his mouth with a napkin. Patting Cece's knee, she said, "Let me out, hon. I'll be back in a while."
 

"Want me to come?" Doug asked.

She smiled tiredly and shook her head. "I doubt they'll need X-rays."

As Doug slid back into the booth, he said, "It's probably nothing serious. Probably just a—" He stopped and stared across the table.
 

Jon's cheeseburger lay scattered on his plate where he'd dropped it; a piece of lettuce hung from his lips and his face had lost all color as he stared open-mouthed after his mother.
 

"Jon, what's the matter?"

"What...what do you think...happened?"

"Oh, it's probably nothing. Remember that guy we saw when we came in? The guy who was bleeding? Probably him. Probably a couple guys knocked each other around, is all."
 

Adelle returned to the table and leaned over Doug. "I need my coat," she said. "One of the guys is outside."

As she walked away, Jon wiped his mouth quickly on his napkin and stood.

"What’re you doing?" Doug asked.

"Going with her."

"No, you shouldn't—"

But he was gone.

"He is so gross," Dara sneered. "He gets off on seeing people
bleed
."
 

"Well, girls," Doug said, "I guess if s just us." He started twirling his fork in his spaghetti, but his fingers slowed down a bit and he cocked his head to one side when he heard urgent, hissing whispers from the booth behind him.
 

"—whatta
you
think? What would happen
then
, huh?"
 

"It coulda been
anything
! A heart attack, a-a-a,
I
don't know, a kid with a bloody
nose
!"
 

"I don't care what it
coulda
been. Get off your ass and check it out."
 

A utensil clattered angrily against a plate. "How come
I
gotta do all this
shit
? I'm haulin' the fuckin'
queen
!"
 

"Whatsat give you, seniority? You think that's some kinda
privilege
? You're haulin' that fuckin' thing because I don't wanna get
near
it. Now get
out
there, Goddammit!" Keys jangled noisily. "An' here. Take these and get my cigars outta my truck."
 

Doug felt the back of his seat shift as the man sitting directly behind him got up.

There was something odd about those two men, something beneath their soiled, lumpy exteriors that was equally repulsive. Doug jerked his head from side to side once, as if shooing a fly, and continued eating his spaghetti.
 

As he followed the small group through the shop at a distance, Jon heard the short man introduce himself as Dr. Phillip Kane. Jon's mother walked beside the doctor hurriedly, led by the woman from the travel store and one of the mechanics. They went down a narrow corridor at the back of the shop and through a doorway. Jon slowed his pace and approached the door cautiously, not wanting to be seen.
 

All four of them joined a police officer and the janitor from the restaurant and hunched over a man on a sofa. There was a great deal of blood on the man's bare legs.
 

"Good God!" the doctor snapped. "This man's lost a lot of blood!"

"Yeah, that's obvious," Deputy Cody murmured.

"No," Dr. Kane said, "more. I mean more blood than there is here. Was he stabbed? Did you
bring
him here? Was he—"
 

"Somebody bit him," the black man said.

"
Bit
him? You're kidding?" To the man on the sofa, the doctor said, "Sir? I'm a doctor. Could you tell me what happened? Sir?"
 

The man simply groaned.

After watching for a few more minutes, Jon turned and went back down the corridor, through the shop and out into the cold. He jogged to the corner of the main building and leaned against the wall. It was more than just the temperature that made him shiver. He knew what was wrong with the bleeding man in that small dark room, but no one would believe him if he told them.
 

No one but his dad...

She smiled in the dark of the basement beneath the restaurant's kitchen, sitting on a crate, hugging her knees to her chest. Her name was Amy.
 

Things were working out much better than she'd expected.

Months ago, she'd decided it was time to break away. The problem was
how
. She couldn't do it alone. She needed someone to watch over her during the daylight hours, someone to protect her while she slept. But she wanted someone...nice. Someone besides that hideous slob who drove the truck. He smelled, and not just of body odor; his obese body reeked of ill health and decay. But worse than him was the creature that rode in the other truck, the thing that called itself her master, the monster that had made her what she was and now claimed ownership of her soul. The others feared her, would never think of trying to escape her. But Amy was different than the others. She'd
always
been different than the others.
 

Amy had been fleeing people who claimed ownership of her long before she'd been bled. She'd fled her cold, affluent parents when she was thirteen; her father's business and her mother's social life had left no time in their lives for Amy. She'd remained a stranger to them no matter how hard she fought for their attention and love; their money, belongings and friends always came first. Since she was a little girl, Amy had had a gnawing fear that she would grow up to be like them, and nothing frightened her more. She'd decided, finally, to leave the luxurious surroundings with which they'd provided her just to keep from catching whatever disease of the soul had made them so empty, so ultimately lifeless. Even now, she reminded herself often that she would not allow herself to become like them. She'd fled an abusive boyfriend who'd threatened to kill her if she ever tried to leave; and she'd escaped the law when she was nailed for prostitution at the age of fifteen.
 

Now she planned to flee the thing that stayed in the cool darkness of that trailer. She'd seen it only a few times, but once was more than enough. Although she could not change what had been done to her, what she had already become, she was determined—just as she had been with her parents—not to become like that creature. Perhaps it had lived so long— centuries, maybe
thousands
of years—that it had simply stopped resembling the human it had once been...if it had ever been human. If Amy was doomed to live as long, she would not follow suit. She'd avoided becoming the walking mannequins that were her parents; she would avoid becoming like the monster that never left its dark shelter.
 

It was true, the Queen
did
have a powerful hold on her, a psychic grip that would be difficult to break. Her invisible presence never left Amy, never allowed her to feel alone. But she was certain the hold
could
be broken. With distance. Distance was her goal.
 

And Kevin was going to help her reach it.

"Not me," she whispered to herself, as she often did, eyes closed as if she were praying. "Not me. I'll never become like that. Not me."
 

But her eyes snapped open wide suddenly and she stared into the dark trying not to shudder.

She felt the Queen's presence within in her. As always when she voiced her planned independence, Amy could feel that presence laughing...
 

CHAPTER 11

The snowfall had become almost as thick as fog and the back lot was a shadowy forest of long silent trucks with darkened lights and snow covered hoods. Bill wandered between them cautiously, following the shadows with the silence of a cat, blending into the darkness whenever someone walked by. He'd heard the man's scream coming from the shop and considered investigating, but thought better of it; others would be there in seconds and he didn't want to be seen. If it was what he thought it was—and he had little doubt—there was nothing he could do about it now; this was more important.
 

He found the black Carsey Bros, trucks easily. He walked the length of the nearest one slowly, running his palms lightly along the side, head cocked, listening. There were no sounds inside, not so much as a breath. The trailer was empty. He moved toward the next one, stopping three feet away.
 

Something in his gut twisted and, for a long moment, he couldn't breathe.

Staring at the side of the trailer, Bill sensed—
knew
—that he was being watched. No...not watched: observed. And not with eyes...
 

Something on the other side of the trailer's long white wall was aware of him, tracking him, sizing him up. A solitary something, alone in the trailer's darkness, still and silent. Something he could almost
see
with his mind's eye, with the senses newly awakened in him, senses he'd been discovering slowly over the past months...
 

Footsteps.

Bill tensed but could not move, held for a moment in the invisible grip of whatever hunkered inside the trailer.

The footsteps drew nearer and Bill stepped back into darkness, became invisible.

"Some kinda bullshit," a gravelly voice mumbled as a short fat man walked into view, kicking slush with his boots.

Bill inclined his head forward and sniffed the air delicately. The man smelled dirty.

He walked between the black trucks and stopped, facing the first one Bill had approached. He knocked three times on the trailer—one...two-three—then waited. Silence. Then he turned to the other trailer, lifted his hand, knuckle crooked, and—
 

—he froze. His raised hand trembled and he licked his dry lips anxiously, then repeated the knock. Two knocks responded from inside and the man took a quick step backward, shuddering as he stuffed his hands into his coat pockets. Turning, he walked toward the back of the trailer, muttering, "Goddamned freak, anyways."
 

Bill backed further into the darkness and watched the man step into the aisle behind the trucks and look in both directions, head bowed against the snow. As the man turned, Bill gathered all his strength—which, even in his weakened condition, would be superior to that of this fat, huffing man—and moved.
 

The man was face down on the slushy ground between the trailers in a heartbeat with Bill straddling him, clutching his soft round shoulders.