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“I need you, you’re my only link.” Truth.
Eyes open, I sat and tilted toward him. “To find a cure for the poison?”
“It’s not venom...exactly.” His gaze dragged from the road to briefly meet mine.
I cocked my brow and waited.
“The Cucitrice? I told you I did something with that knife. Now there’s this presence...a voice inside me.” The small muscle in his jaw ticked. “This voice knows the Cucitrice.”
“The Cucitrice speaks to me too. Somehow her memories are inside me.”
He seemed to relax a little at that and turned his attention back on the road, but I could sense he was preoccupied, mulling as his thumb tapping the steering wheel.
“I know info you don’t, and I think you know stuff I don’t?”
His shrug was barely perceptible. “I only get glimpses from the thing, but I gather this isn’t just a bunch of fairytales come to life. It’s complex. This situation we’re in is not going away. We should pool our knowledge. I want to get the big picture, see what the implications are.”
“Implications?” I drawled.
“Yes.”
“You plan to tell your employers? The government?”
He laughed, but it had no humor. “I can’t see how I’d ever convince them this is real. I can barely see these creatures. I’m not sure how they affect people. I don’t think most of them can even touch us.”
“Except Harry could.”
“Yes, Harry could.”
Theimplicationsat in the quiet between us as the night thrummed past in flickering shapes and shadows. I didn’t feel better, even if Val had confided in me. The night just got scarier.
“I’m going to find a motel here in Bakersfield.” He turned off the main road and headed deeper into the town. “We’re close to your old farm. We can visit in the morning.”
“We?”
“Yeah. I told you, we’re like glue.”
My body tensed, but if I was honest, deep down there was some comfort in having someone with me. We didn’t need to be friends.
“Meantime,” Val continued, “tonight we sit down and nut out what we know for sure, what we might think is true.”
The edges of the town approached—scattered buildings, including a drive-in liquor shop. Val bought some beer while I tried to stay in the shadows inside the sedan. Then we drove on.
An illuminated sign ahead proclaimed: “Bessie’s Motel.” Cracks in the plastic indicated someone couldn’t afford to repair the sign, unless it was recent damage. Maybe a run-down place was good for us. Val seemed to think so, since he was already turning into the driveway leading to the check-in.
He parked out front.
I looked down at my fresh shirt, shorts, and skin—we’d both quickly changed, washing the worst away in the lake with the truck near the middle, sinking.
Val ducked out his door and slammed it. He leaned in his window. “Stay there. One of us only is best. I’m not going in as me here, and you look too nervous.”
He was right. I was nervous. If anyone ever found Harry, I’d rather not have evidence I’d traveled from Houston to here on this day—the location of the corpse was a pin on the map along the way.
The motel room was on the ground floor and utilitarian—TV, double bed, a chair, a small bathroom, a small dresser, a mirror, and probably a whole village of roaches. One bed. “Are you sleeping on the floor?”
“No. Are you?”
I didn’t deign to answer. If I did sleep on the floor, it’d be ceding him control. Fuck that. The bed though...I did worry what I’d do with him inches away. Even if he stayed away, I’d be heavy breathing most of the night. Wondering.
