"Get it yourself," Bob replied.
"I'm driving," Ted complained.
Mumbling, Bob reached for another drenched can. He handed it over to Ted.
Ted tried to pop the top but couldn't. He was already at least a sheet and a half to the wind and had a difficult time manipulating both steering wheel and can. After a moment of awkward fumbling, he turned to the others.
"Open it for me, will you?" he asked.
"Screw you," Bob said, slurping at his beer.
"Give it here," Evan offered.
Ted passed the can over.
Apparently, while attempting to open it, Ted had shaken the can more than he thought. When Evan pulled the tab, beer began spraying up through the opening.
"Shit!" Evan yelled, holding the can away from his khaki hide-in-the-woods shirt.
"Shit!" Bob echoed, spitting out his own beer. "You're dumping it all over me!" Beer dribbled down his chin. He mopped at it with his sleeve.
"Gimme that," Ted insisted urgently. He hadn't had a beer in twenty minutes and, as a result, his driving skills were suffering.
Evan dutifully handed the can over, still overflowing.
"Get that frigging thing away from me!" Bob screamed as more beer fizzed out onto his lap.
"Calm down," Ted told Bob as he took the offered can.
"You calm down," Bob griped. He sniffed the tail of his untucked shirt. "Great. Now I stink like beer."
"No more than always," Evan commented.
Ted spit beer out his nose. Choking on his drink, he began laughing hysterically. He laughed so hard Evan joined in. They howled and guffawed in delight as they turned off 117 onto a long side road.
"That wasn't funny," Bob said morosely.
Evan wiped tears from his eyes. Behind the wheel, Ted sniffled happily.
"Guess you had to be there," Ted said.
"It wasn't funny," Bob insisted, angrier. A furious hand wiped the damp spot on his lap.
While Bob continued to groom himself, Ted stopped the truck. He took a few rapid gulps on his beer, emptying the can. Belching loudly, he tossed it through the sliding window at the rear of the cab. It joined the growing pile of empties.
The three men climbed out. As they were collecting their shotguns from behind the seat, Evan glanced around. Cornfields rose high on either side of the road. There was evidence that some of the fields had been trampled by trucks. Evan looked at the ruined sections of field through boozy eyes, wondering why someone would drive over perfectly good corn.
"Why are we here, Ted?" Evan asked as his shotgun was passed to him.
"This is where she killed a bunch of guys," Ted informed them. He handed a sullen Bob his shotgun.
"That tiger broad?" Bob asked. He balanced his beer on the roof of the cab as he fumbled with the safety switch. It took three tries to flip it off.
"Duh," Evan commented.
"Why are we looking here?" Bob pressed, squinting at the cornfield. "Everyone else is in Boston."
"Exactly," Ted said proudly. "If you were a tiger lady everyone was looking for, would you go where everyone was, or where everyone wasn't?"
"Wasn't," answered Bob with only a moment's hesitation.
"And where's the last place you'd think people would be looking for you?"
"Bob's bed," Evan offered, giggling.
"Shut up," Bob barked.
Ted was looking at the wide expanse of field crushed by police and rescue vehicles that had gone in after the HETA bodies.
"You think she'd come back here?" Bob asked.
"Let's find out," Ted replied. He had a tingling sensation below his belly that for once had nothing to do with his bladder.
They took the path of least resistance into the field, following the tracks made by authorities. The toppled corn stalks were still fresh enough that they didn't crackle underfoot. Deep tire treads had torn into rich earth, creating muddy pools. Several hundred feet in, the men took a left into the more dense field. Several even rows lined this vast section. A lot of ground for only three of them to cover.
They split up. Bob went alone down a long path. Evan took another. Ted struck off in the same direction as the others but several rows down.
As he walked along, he idly felt the safety latch on his shotgun with his thumb. Forward. The safety was off.
Ted pulled the switch back, just to make certain. It slid with a tiny click.
The metallic noise was answered by a rustle of movement somewhere up ahead.
He glanced to his right. The others were far away. Neither Evan nor Bob could have made the noise. Carefully, Ted slid the safety off once more. With cautious steps, he closed slowly in on the spot from which the sound had originated.
The green stalks were dense and high. While bright sunlight streamed down from above, not much reached the ground. But beyond the stalks of corn to his left, the light seemed brighter.
It was the same impression Ted got standing at the last line of trees before a wooded lake. A sense of emptiness not present in the rest of the field. From this area, there issued a persistent humming.
Peering carefully, Ted noted an expanse of brightness beyond the nearest stalks. Like the area trampled by vehicles farther back in the field, someone had knocked over the corn here, as well.
Cautiously, slowly-adrenaline pounding in his ears-Ted eased apart the two nearest corn stalks. The source of the humming noise became instantly apparent. A mass of black flies swarmed around the open area. Their collective buzzing was akin to the drone of a persistent, tiny motor.
The corn had been trampled flat in a circular area about the size of Ted's truck. As he stepped into the bowl-shaped zone, flies swarmed up around him.
Ted recoiled, stumbling backward. As he did so, his foot snagged in something.