A Longer Fall (Gunnie Rose #2)(44)

Eli bent over laughing.

I shook my head, smiling a little myself. “All right, you’ve had your fun. Let’s think about where to dump Rogelio,” I said.

“If the sheriff and Moultry hadn’t seen us here, this would be a good place,” he said. “I’m tempted to use it anyway.”

“No, that’s a bad idea. Let’s drive a bit and see if we can find a place that’s better.”

I made sure there weren’t any blood smears on the outside of the car before we took off on the road east, the direction the sheriff had taken, which I assumed would go past Bergen.

We came to a sign telling us Bergen was three miles ahead, but we took a road north before we reached the town. We were in the middle of nowhere, and it was hot, hot, hot. My hair was blowing every whichaway since the windows had to be open, and I felt dust all over me. But I was with Eli, and the country was green, and we had learned something from Rogelio. Pluses.

After a while I spotted a large culvert in a ditch, over which a gravel road had been built to get tractors into the field. We listened and looked, and couldn’t hear or see anyone approaching. To get caught in the midst of moving Rogelio’s body would be a very bad thing.

Eli got out and opened the trunk, and we waited a bit again. When nothing kept happening, Eli nodded. I leaped out of the car, grabbed Rogelio’s feet, and yanked. We went down the side of the ditch faster than we’d wanted to, and nearly all ended up in a heap at the bottom, but we kept to our feet with a struggle. At least, since it hadn’t rained in a while, the ditch was dry.

It is harder to feed a body into a culvert than you would think, and it took more time than we wanted, even with Eli making the body lighter with magic. Our luck held: no passersby. And no snakes, which I’d thought of the minute my unprotected legs were surrounded by high weeds.

When the messy job was done, I scrambled up the slope of the ditch and back into the car. Eli stood by the driver’s door catching his breath before climbing in. We returned to Sally on a road so hot and still and dusty that my mind went numb.

I had to at least wash my face and hands before I did anything else, and Eli agreed.

The car needed gas, so we stopped at a garage and I went into the women’s room with no expectations. It was very clean and had a lock on the door, and I was glad of a chance to wash as much of me as I could and dry those bits with the white hand towel hanging on a rack. There had been towels made of paper in the train toilet, which had been a surprise. Who said travel wasn’t broadening?

I felt refreshed but my skirt and blouse looked awful. No matter how I shook the skirt and brushed at the top, there were bits of leaves and grass seeds and stains. If I’d been wearing my usual clothes, that wouldn’t have bothered me. Well, only a little.

Eli had washed too. His face was the right color and the hair at his temples was wet with water.

When I looked at the clock inside the gas station, I saw that five hours had passed since we ate breakfast. I wasn’t hungry, but Eli’s earlier mention of ice cream suddenly dashed across my mind, and I said, “You promised me more ice cream.” Maybe I could have chocolate again.

“So I did. I saw a different place earlier, in a drugstore.”

We parked on one of the two streets that comprised the main shopping area of Sally. The drugstore was dark inside, and the ceiling fans were whirring. There was a fan on a stand, too, and it was blowing down the line of stools in front of the counter. A girl was leaning on the cool marble, bored and vacant, but when she saw Eli, she perked right up.

“Good afternoon!” she said, with a big smile aimed at Eli. I got a little corner of it. “What can I get you? You two?”

“What kind of ice cream do you have?”

She had chocolate, vanilla, strawberry, and blueberry.

“I can’t decide,” I said.

“You can get two scoops,” she told me, her eyes never leaving Eli. “Two different kinds.”

“Chocolate and blueberry,” I said.

“Vanilla and strawberry,” Eli said.

So we got to taste all four, and it was the happiest fifteen minutes I’d had that day.

The girl’s name tag read EDITH. Edith’s gaze never left Eli. I was not the only one who found him… what did I find Eli? Attractive. He attracted me. I liked his grit and his skills and his little accent. I liked him clothed and awkward. I liked him naked and limber. I knew he would leave again when this was over. He’d go back to his world, and I’d return to mine… if we lived. And maybe I’d never see him again. If I got lonely enough, maybe I’d marry Dan Brick, since he seemed to be carrying a torch for me I hadn’t ever noticed.

“What are you thinking of?” Eli asked quietly. “You seem so serious all of a sudden.”

“I was thinking about Dan Brick,” I said. “I was thinking that if he was my boyfriend, maybe I should have known that.”

Eli grinned at me. “Especially now that we are married.”

But it wasn’t the right moment for that joke, which was getting worn out in a hurry. I turned my face down to the remainder of my ice cream and finished it off. No matter how down I got, ice cream was good, and I should enjoy what I could since it wouldn’t last forever.

Like that wasn’t a timely reminder.





CHAPTER SIXTEEN