Three Years, Three Months Before

Drop Everything

Sometimes you just have to drop everything and go.

Theirs was an unlikely bond, Ellie and Luellen, two girls too different to be anything but friends, too similar to recognize the gulf between themselves. Country girl and townie, one whose future stretched no further than her own reflected gaze in the bathroom mirror, the other whose path roamed to the limits of her imagination. As the yearswore on, they saw each other less and less often, but it wasn’t until Luellen fled the valley that Ellie came to recognize her relationship with Luellen as a kind of sanctuary. In her friend’s absence, her life grew increasingly bounded by the inescapable disquiet she felt when Stuart returned home drunk and insistent.

Two months after the first, a second note arrived from Portland, a single short paragraph:

I’m still finding my way. This address is for a mailing center. I’ve rented a box so you can write back. As I move around, I don’t want to miss any of your letters.

Ellie needed a week to gather the courage to write to Luellen about her parents’ deaths. The response was so long coming Ellie feared Luellen might never write again.

I killed them, same as if I was driving that car myself. I waited too long to write and tell them I was okay.

Ellie wished things were different. In dribs and laser-printed drabs, Luellen admitted she wished things were different too. Details trickled in over the subsequent months, but there was no further talk of her parents or of life back in Givern Valley. Only snatches of a new life far away. She asked Ellie to burn her notes after she read them.

I’ve moved again. Things are complicated, but I’m hoping they settle down soon.

Then, a few weeks later ...

I start a job this week. It’s nothing much, answering phones and setting appointments for a small clinic, but it’s enough to help me get by.

The longest arrived right before Christmas.

I’ve rented a room in a house near a city park called Mount Tabor. I guess it was a volcano once, but now it’s covered with trees and paths and playgrounds. I like to climb to the top and sit next to this statue of a grumpy-looking old guy. I like him. People ride their bikes and walk their dogs. The whole city is laid all around you, and on clear days you can see all the way to Mount Hood. It’s beautiful. I wish you could see it.

Ellie replied, Maybe someday I will. She didn’t believe her own words. Yet now she was here in Portland, free of her cage at last. Until she saw Hiram’s man outside the Ship Shop.

Doesn’t he understand I’m not who I am? Portland Ellie, not Givern Ellie. Givern Ellie died on a railroad bridge in a dark corner of nowhere.

She couldn’t quite remember the man’s name. Ed something, last name started with a G. He’d been a county deputy until he was run out of the department for offenses rumored to include everything from drunk driving to assault and extortion. After that he served as one of the Hiram’s hired apes. Ellie had never spoken with him, though she remembered a time when he’d pulled the pickup over. It was shortly after she and Stuart were married, and as always Stuart was driving too fast. But Deputy G didn’t write a ticket. He and Stuart leaned against the tailgate and spoke in hushed tones. Ellie sat alone in the cab and wondered what the two had to talk about. All Stuart would say was what a shame it was the man’s wife refused to live in Givern, and then up and left him anyway after he agreed to commute from K-Falls.

She rose from the bench and headed for the café. People would be there, city people, Portland people, people slurping milk foam from the surface of their lattes as they read the paper or surfed the internet on their laptops. Two short blocks to safety, a brief stroll on any other rainy day. She felt isolated and exposed as she moved past the windowless brick wall at her side. She glanced over her shoulder, eyes flicking up and down the street. And hesitated.

The man was gone.

Ellie reached out to the wall beside her, but found no reassurance in the cool touch of brick and mortar. She drew a breath and tried to convince herself she’d imagined things. Weariness and anxiety after a long trip and a short night had deceived her, transformed a stranger into Hiram’s deputy. Then, she simply missed seeing hi go. He probably had no interest in her personally, just some guy staring at her breasts. All that pudding. Even Reverend Wilburn— him on the downhill tumble past sixty—paid more heed to her chest than her face when he lectured her.

But what if she was wrong?

Be smart, Pastor Sanders had told her. Go quiet. The smart response was to assume he was here for her, and that meant she had to get out of sight. If Luellen came for her mail, Ellie would miss her, but that was better than being caught by Hiram’s man.

She started moving again, eyes sliding up and down the empty street. Near the corner she came to a solid wooden door with worn plastic letters affixed beside the lock. MACHI E WORKS— NO S LICITING. She tried the knob, but it only vibrated under her touch. When she knocked, the sound was so hollow it threw a shiver through her. She darted through the crosswalk without waiting for an answer.

There was too little traffic, no one on foot. Ellie almost wished the woman with the spongy hips was still around. Or that boy on the skateboard. Someone to notice if Hiram’s man reappeared. She passed a knickknack shop and a martial arts studio, a specialty pet supply store across the street. Used furniture. Hand thrown pottery. Wine and cheese. Doors were locked, interiors still and dark. Signs in the windows indicated business hours starting later in the day. The other direction, a couple of blocks back, there was a convenience store, but she didn’t want to retrace her steps. She continued on, crossed at the next corner, then paused outside an auto shop. Through a half-open window she could hear activity: the rattle of a pneumatic wrench, the tinny whine of talk radio. She looked through the glass door, hopeful. But the face behind the counter chilled her. Blue striped shirt over a barrel chest, embroidered name Dutch over the left pocket. Razor stubble and a crew cut. Deputy G had a crew cut too.

What could she say? “Someone is following me.”

“I don’t see nobody.” He’d probably grin and direct his voice to her pudding.

The auto shop was separated from the café by a narrow parking lot surrounded by a black, wrought iron fence. A dozen paces further, no more. She hesitated at the open gate leading into the lot, scanning for movement. A car went past on Hawthorne, moving quickly, driver’s eyes fixed ahead. The lot was half full of cars and trucks with crumpled hoods, dented fenders, shattered glass. The long, cinder block wall of the coffee shop facing the lot had only a few windows of frosted industrial glass. She saw no one, continued on. Ten paces more. Six. Before she could clear the open gate, a hand clamped onto her upper arm. She gasped, twisted, dug in her heels. The grip was too strong. She looked up into Deputy G’s great round face. Mountain air and growth hormone.

“Hey, now. Slow down, little lady.”

He was six-six if he was a foot. Unlike Stuart’s compact, wiry strength, his was a boar’s power. Inexorable, rooted in its own dense gravity. With her free hand he grabbed her neck. “Let me go.” Her voice sounded remote in her own ears. I’m not who you think I am. His fingers dug into her throat, choked off her air before she could make another sound. No one nearby, no one on the street. No one to see.

He dragged her into the lot behind a minivan with missing side panels. She was a rag doll in his hand. He spun her, slammed her against the fence with enough force to bounce fluid from her eyes. A sharp ridge of iron cut into the back of her skull. His left hand remained clamped on her throat, but he eased up enough to allow her to draw a shallow breath. Her nose wrinkled against the cloying scent of Old Spice. With his right hand, he reached up and scratched at the corner of his eye. He inspected her as though trying to memorize her face.

“I’m not who—” He choked off the words before she could finish.

“You’re Elizabeth Spaneker.” Not a question. “Your father-in-law is worried about you.”

The air seemed to darken around her and she heard a sound like the rattle of a two-stroke engine. Maybe he was strangling her, or maybe she was being swallowed by terror. The man saw the fear in her face and smiled. An instant later, the sound resolved itself into footsteps on gravel.

“Heya—?”

Ellie twisted her head a fraction of an inch and saw the boy from earlier. He stood at the far end of the minivan, one foot on his skateboard, the other on the ground. Hands loose at his sides, shoulders still wet. Hiram’s man turned his head and suddenly released her, jerked his hand back as if from an open flame.

“Fuck off, kid.” His voice resounded in the narrow space between the buildings. “This isn’t none of your business.” Ellie thought of what Pastor Sanders told her. Do the last thing he expects. As Deputy G turned toward the boy, she shot her foot out, felt it connect with muscle and bone. The big man responded with a howl and eased his grip. Ellie scrambled along the fence, ducked a wild backhand slung her way. Her feet skidded on loose gravel as the boy kicked the back of his skateboard. The front end shot forward into Deputy G’s gut, chopping off his howl. As Ellie fled past the minivan she caught a glimpse of the two entangled, boy on his back, big man above with one knee on the ground and his arms splayed in a spread eagle.

“You little son of a bitch—”

Ellie bolted through the open gate and up the street, then crashed through the coffee house door. Just inside, she pitched up against a round table. For a moment she hung there, hands flat on the tabletop. The shop was half-full, customers seated at tables or on couches against the walls to either side. Ellie sensed them more as abstract shapes than human forms. Her gaze fixed on an Asian man behind the counter. Next to her stood a young woman who could be the sister of Raajit, the boy from the Ship Shop. They stared at her, openmouthed.

“Someone is after me. Please.”

The man hesitated for only a moment, then raised a hinged section of countertop. “This way.” Ellie followed him through a doorway into the kitchen. The sound of a dishwasher filled the compact space. She could smell lemon cleanser and ground coffee. The man continued through another door into a tiny office. Desk, computer, file cabinet, bulletin board pinned with calendar pages. Somehow he’d managed to fit a straight-backed wooden chair into the corner between the desk and the door.

“Wait here. I’ll call the police.” Ellie moved to the chair, but didn’t sit. The man studied her, sharp-eyed and concerned. Black hair shot through with silver framed his long, hard face. After a moment, his brown eyes fixed on a point below Ellie’s chin. “Did he hit you?”

“I—” Ellie had no breath. A sharp pain flared from her neck to her shoulders and down her back. She nodded.

From the other room, they heard shouting. Ellie recognized Deputy G’s voice, but not the words.

“Stay here. You’ll be safe.” The man turned and went back into the kitchen, closed the door behind him. Ellie sank onto the chair. From beyond the door, she could hear him attempt to reason with Hiram’s man.

You’re a smart girl, Pastor Sanders had said. What was the smart choice now? Sit here and wait for the police? That might save her from Hiram’s man, but in the long run, it wouldn’t save her from Hiram. Cops were the last thing she needed. They’d have questions, would make calls. They’d know how to get at the truth, even if Hiram wanted to try to hide it.

She crept to her feet, cracked the door an inch or two.

“—don’t have time for your bullshit. Now get that bitch out here, before I—”

“Sir, the police are their way. You’d be wise to keep that in mind.”

The man’s voice was calm. He sounded like he could handle whatever Deputy G threw at her. Ellie didn’t want to stick around to see what that might be. The hinged counter wasn’t much of a barrier.

Across the kitchen she saw another door, pebbled glass panes suggesting a way out. Ellie peeked through the opening to the front of the shop, saw the Asian man’s back, his assistant at his side. Hiram’s man loomed on the other side of the counter, hands balled at his sides. His eyes seemed to pulse with red energy. Then somethingcaught his attention, a sound or movement behind him. As he turned Ellie dropped low, almost to her hands and knees, andscampered across the kitchen to the door. She heard new voices, but didn’t wait to see who they belonged to. The doorknob stuck for a second, then turned. She tumbled out into a narrow passage between the café and the auto repair lot, and nearly flattened the kid with the skateboard. He smiled at her, a broad, boy’s grin. “If you want, I’ll help you get away.”