The Last King of Texas (Tres Navarre #3)(56)

I stopped in the middle of the street. There was no need for Erainya or me to speak. She got out, trundled Jem from the backseat, and carried him still sleeping to the sidewalk, already fishing for the gun in her purse. I punched the gas. The white van took a hard left on Mission Road and careened out of sight. I tried to match its speed on the turn and found myself skidding sideways, nearly slamming into the gates of the old Catholic orphanage across the street before second gear took hold and fishtailed me forward again.

The van was now a hundred yards ahead, speeding south on the straight stretch of Mission Road. I pushed the VW faster. On the left, the dark wooded boundaries of the public golf course raced past; on the right, picnic areas, sports fields, tiny homes and graffitied bus stops. I tore through two intersections that were mercifully empty of traffic but the van kept pulling farther ahead. I waited until third gear was about to explode, then shifted to fourth. The underbelly of the VW rattled like aluminum foil.

The golf course fell away on the left and the road widened and zigged, aligning itself with the edge of the San Antonio River basin. Fifty yards down on my left, the river made a dark, glittering streak through the center of what was basically a glorified drainage ditch. Lit by moon and city night glow, the grassy earthen walls sloped down from the guardrails to the wide marshy banks, the underbrush fleeced with paper trash from thousands of upriver polluters. I floored the accelerator, slashed through potholes of standing water as the van pulled ahead of me on Mission.

The van turned hard on the Southcross Bridge and crossed the river, doubling back north on Riverside.

I slowed for the bridge, lost some time in the turn, then followed across and up Riverside. I got the VW back into fourth gear, taking the curvier east bank at an insane sixty-five and still losing my prey. Another minute and they would be gone.

For the last time in our sixteen-year relationship, I cursed my VW. The white van swung wide for a right onto Roosevelt. I tried to follow, feeling the arc of the turn getting away from me, the VW going sideways with its own force toward the guardrail, my feet starting to skid back and forth of their own accord like a novice ice-skater's. Then there was the crumple of metal and a tilt in the horizon and the sickening feeling of weightlessness.

I expected sound — a blast or crunch or tear of metal and bones. I was wrong. There was no sound — just free fall, followed by a cold, slick blackness all around me, the feeling of tumbling, of being compressed into a smaller and smaller somersault until something that might've been my spine went snap.  Somewhere far away, I heard the rush of a large animal through grass — a rhino, perhaps.

My eyes opened. Through a smear of Vaseline, I saw the river off to my left, a huge orange-and-black beast rolling slowly and convulsively toward it. The thing heaved itself up on end when it reached the bank, poised there as if contemplating a drink, then decided it had just enough momentum to topple forward one more time. It hit the water with a resounding hollow galoosh, the wheels still spinning.

I was afraid to move, afraid any effort might cause what little life I still had to leak out. I didn't want to know how bad off I was.

I stared at the water glistening in moonlight, the dark marsh weeds and bare branches globbed with paper pulp. I smelled like someone had stirred rotten meat into a fish tank and dumped the contents on my head. Far away I thought I heard sirens. Lights of the houses on Riverside blinked on. I watched the upturned back wheels of my VW spin for one rotation. Two rotations.

I decided I was not dead yet. I tried to move my arm. I found that my sleeve was snagged on some kind of bush. In fact, all of me was snagged on some kind of bush. I'd been forcibly grafted onto a large chaparral.

I tried a foot, found it suspended from a branch by a ripped jean leg. Slowly, I managed to extract myself, then to pick the larger gobs of thick wet river garbage off my body. I inspected what I could of myself in the dark and realized with infuriating certainty that I was fine.

I cursed loudly and creatively. That felt good so I did it again.

Fueled by anger and probably a fair amount of shock, I started walking. At least, the police told me I was walking when they found me. I was half a mile or so from George's house. I don't remember talking to the uniforms, or changing into the moth-eaten but dry spare set of clothes the police kept in their trunk, or getting a ride with them back to Berton's.

I do remember my reunion with Erainya in George's graveled front yard. She was crouching down, holding Jem, trying to answer a detective's questions and Jem's at the same time.

Jem was still sleepy-eyed, pointing at the house and saying he wanted to see George.

Erainya kept saying, "Honey. Honey."

When she saw me, she closed her eyes for three seconds, muttering some kind of prayer. "Take Jem, honey. Please. Take him away just for a few minutes."

I did nothing.

I was staring into George's front door, into the living room now blazing with light. I could see a left foot — a single white Nike shoe sticking into view. Police were moving around the shoe. Cameras were flashing.

I locked eyes with Erainya. Her glance was black as ever, harder than ever, but starting to erode. Her voice trembled a little when she repeated, "Take Jem for a few minutes, honey. Can you do that?"

I looked at the detective, who nodded. "There's hot chocolate in my car — down there, third one."

I told Jem to come with me, and when he wouldn't or couldn't, I picked him up and carried him.