"I need to call Lenny first." She opened her door and got out, pulling her cell phone out of her pocket.
She looked at the screen. "No service?"
"Call him after the truck's fixed."
She glared at him. "I already have a boss ordering me around, thanks."
"This isn't my fault, you know," he said, stifling a grin at her over-the-top annoyance. "Next time I steal a car I'll have the transmission checked out first."
"This isn't funny."
"No, it definitely isn't." He shielded his eyes from the relentless sun. "Do you think it's possible that it's brighter here than anywhere else on earth?"
She glanced up. "Whatever. I'll be over there."
He adjusted his sunglasses and jogged after Janie, trying to ignore the nagging feeling that somebody was watching them. She still had the map. He wasn't letting her out of his sight.
NO SERVICE
"Terrific," she said aloud. "Just terrific."
She hadn't had a moment alone since speaking with the Boss. She desperately needed to ask Lenny what she should do. Obviously, she wasn't thinking straight since Lenny wouldn't have any problem at all with the prospect of offing Quinn, but he was a good sounding board.
She wondered if Lenny and Barkley had reached Vegas yet. She felt at her neck. She never took off the turquoise necklace, and she felt naked without it on. It was her touchstone to the past, to Angela and to a much, much simpler time. Every time she was stressed out or nervous, she'd run her fingertips over it,
which helped to immediately calm her down.
She could really use it right about now.
Quinn marched up next to her and just stood there without saying anything.Dammit , being so near him was way too distracting—and not only because she found him painfully attractive, but because she now knew she had to end his life despite how she felt about him.
"Any luck?" he asked.
"Luck must be something I left behind at the motel along with my moisturizer."
"I'll take that as a no?" He glanced over his shoulder, then turned back to face her. A frown wrinkled his brow above his sunglasses.
"What?" she asked.
"Did the brochure happen to mention any reason why Semolina is blocked off to tourists?"
"You got the brochures, not me."
He nodded at her. "Read it."
She sighed, dug out one of the rolled-up brochures he'd given her earlier out of her handbag, and flipped forward through the pages. "It says that it was blocked off to outside access twenty years ago due to unusual disturbances in the area."
"Unusual disturbances?"
She nodded. "It says that in 1870 the town was abandoned when two men after the same treasure killed each other in a gunfight. Soon after that, everyone else living here just packed up and left." She shoved the brochure back into her bag. "What difference does it make?"
He shrugged. "Do you think a ghost town might actually have real ghosts in it?"
"It's called a ghost town because it's abandoned. Not because of any excessive paranormal activity."
"You ever done anyghostbusting in your career?" he asked evenly.
"Not my area of expertise."
He looked at her grimly. "That's too bad."
She frowned. "Why?"
He nodded back in the direction of the truck. "Because I think that would help right about now."
She looked over and blinked hard. Their truck was hovering five feet off the ground as if raised by an invisible hand. Abig invisible hand.
She started toward it.
"Stop," Quinn shouted, but when she didn't stop, he followed her.
She looked at the car and reached out to touch it. "That's so strange."
"Don't get too close," Quinn warned.
The car suddenly shot up high into the blue sky until it became no more than a black speck.
"Janie, get out of the way!" Quinn yelled.
He grabbed her by her shoulders and tackled her to the ground. He fell down on top of her and rolled the both of them off to the side of the dusty street and held her tight against him.
She heard a whistling sound, and the ground shook as the truck hit the earth, crushed on impact. She breathed through a cloud of dust that surrounded them. If she hadn't moved, she would be a dusty blond pancake. Quinn just saved her life.
What was wrong with her? She was normally way more alert to danger.
"Are you okay?" he asked, looking down at her, pulling her hair gently off her face.
She was about to answer, but somebody else spoke instead.
"What have we here?" the voice drawled. "I think I see trespassers. Inmy town."
Quinn scrambled to his feet, and Janie got up behind him, looking over his shoulder at the man who approached then. He had a scraggly gray moustache. Brown chaps, a dirty, once-white shirt, and a weathered black leather vest. He wore a cowboy hat and boots that had spurs that jingled as he approached. A shotgun rested over one shoulder.
His face was very white and his eyes sunken with black shadows under them despite the sunny skies above. He was chewing tobacco and spat out a long stream of brown, disgusting goo to one side.
He also had a big red bloodstain in the center of his chest.