Day at the Beach Ch. 38

Chapter 38

“Okay, Spike.” Bill said into the cell phone. “We have the jewelry box. Where shall we meet you?” Bill and his partner sat in their SUV in front of Susan's darkened house as he spoke on the phone.

“Get on highway17 going into the mountains and turn on Bear Creek Road just after Lexington Dam. Do you know where that is?” Spike asked.

“Yeah. I've seen the turn-off.” Bill responded. “That's kind of out of the way, isn't it?”

“No. It's just up the hill a couple of miles from where you are right now. We don't want a lot of people around who can identify us or put us together. Discretion is our goal, Bill.”

“Okay. So, what do you want us to do at Bear Creek Road?”

“Turn left and go about a hundred yards. You'll see a large clearing. Pull over and park there and wait for me. I'm on my way right now and will be there within a half hour.”

“It's pitch black dark up there. There isn't a human around for a mile.”

“What's your point?” Spike asked.

“Well, I've been told that there's bears up there.”

“Not as many as there was when Bear Creek Road got its name. Plus, what the hell do you care? You both have guns.”

“You're the boss, Spike, but I just don't like it. I don't like being out in the middle of bumfuck-nowhere in the middle of a forest where animals might look upon me as a meal.”

“I thought you were a tough guy.” Spike said tauntingly.

“I'm a city boy, and that's where I like to be. I'll be as tough as you need with people and buildings around.”

“Yeah. Well, you're getting paid real well for following orders, and your orders are to meet me on Bear Creek Road.”

“Yeah. I've got it. We'll be there when you arrive.” Bill hung up and mumbled as he started the SUV.

“Dude is treating me like I'm some kind of wimp because I don't like to out in the middle of the wilderness. Woods just aren't a natural place for humans to be. You can fucking die out there. That's why we have cities.”

“Jesus, Bill. Lighten up. Are you saying you've never gone fishing or hunting or even hiking?”

“Yeah. That's exactly what I'm saying.”

“Well, just stay in the fucking car, man. It's like a capsule of civilization out in the middle of nowhere.”

“Okay. Yeah. That will work.” Bill said with a tone of relief.

The lights of Los Gatos gave way to only the lights of the freeway as they passed the famous Cat's restaurant, it's facade lost in decades of wild vegetation and at the moment, containing Brad and Susan who sat inside enjoying oak fired cooked steaks and margarita’s.

The pitch black of a moonless night left Lexington Dam an unknown mystery to their left as they passed it. On this dark night only the impatient rushing of headlights offered any illumination and sense of civilization for Bill. The cement highway was existence. All else was a mystery, an illusion that drew upon ones childhood fears and imagination. Bill's eyes clung to the passing dashes in the middle of the highway as if they stitched the earth together in a world lost to blackness.

For once, his partners ramblings were more appreciated, as it helped take his mind off the fear in the surrounding darkness. Bill wasn't sure what he feared out there. Maybe it was as simple as fearing the dark – contemplating the unknown with a vivid imagination. There could be things out there right now, on the either side of the road, waiting for someone to break down and get out of their car. He glanced to the side of the road, looking for golden, carnivorous eyes. Afraid they would see his eyes looking at them and start a chase, like a lion chasing a pack of herd animal. Looking for weakest one, seeing the sense of loss in the eyes of his next victim. Seeing the eye as nothing more than meat looking back at him.
He felt like a Wildebeest, quickly growing old and slow in the heard of rambling car. and the lion would catch him, catch the entire car, tear it apart – open it like it was nothing more than candy bar wrapping, Bill the meal inside that the lion wants.

Bill turned his head from the darkness at the side of the road and focused on the lights of the highway. “What do you plan to do after this job is done?” He asked his partner as a distraction from the darkness. He didn't really care what the crazy son-of-a-bitch was going to do.

“I'm going to take my twenty grand and go back to Miami. Though this doesn't freak me out as much as it does you, it's still a little too much wilderness for me. I don't like steep, high mountains and forest so tall that you have to look straight up to see the sky.”

A sign illuminated in the headlights on the ride side of the road, 'Bear Creek Road'. “Here we are.” Bill stated as he slowed down for the turn.

The off ramp turned sharply into a steep U as it came up to Bear Creek Road. Here, there were no passing headlights to offer Bill or his partner the comfortable illusion of surrounding civilization, the safety of numbers. Bill fondled the butt of his pistol in the shoulder holster as if it were a security blanket.

“This is bullshit.” Bill said irritably. “Spike could have picked any of a million spots to meet us in the valley that was secluded.”

“Yeah. Well, he didn't, though. Did he?” his partner said. “Look, we give the box to him, get our money and get the fuck out of here. This is almost over for us.”

“Yeah. I guess you're right. The whole thing just feel a little weird to me. This part – this meeting in the sticks just doesn't make sense. I don't feel good about it.”

“Okay, let's be cautious. Nothing wrong with that. If you think Spike is going to pull a fast one, keep an eye out. If he does something weird, we'll kill him.”

“You had better reconsider a move like that. You're talking about killing Alberto De La Cruz's main henchman, which is a guaranteed death sentence. We protect ourselves if we have to, but we can't just whack him.”

“Okay, let's play it by ear and see what happens.”

The narrow road wound it's way through a blackness as dark as death. Bill could feel his heart pounding in his throat. He tried to swallow it down as he saw the clearing appear in the minimal world of his headlights. He touched the butt of his pistol again, but it offered no sense of security. No amount of weapons could help him at this point, for his fear was of the supernatural that he felt dwelt in the forest. Weapons were useless against such things, because his dangers were made of fears.

“Here it is.” he said with a calmness he didn't feel.

Pulling off into the clearing he shut off the engine and turned the lights off. Almost immediately he turned the lights back on and started the engine.

“What are you doing, Bill”

“What the hell does it look like I'm doing. I want the headlights on. I want to see what's around us, plus it will be easier for Spike to see us.”

His partner laughed. “What the hell you talking about? We're the only ones out here. There isn't another human being for miles. He can't help but see us.”

Bill's soul jarred with the statements, 'only ones out here', no one for miles.' Bill feared the concept as much as he feared death, which one could consider odd, since distributing death was his occupation. Bill knew he would die in a place like this. A place that didn't exist, was nothing but blackness, an endless silence punctuated only by the occasional sound of screams of those being eaten by monsters, and the roars and snarls as they devoured any and all who entered their world.

Bill removed his gun from the holster and placed it on the seat next to him, safety off, a round chambered.

“You seem a little nervous, Bill. That isn't like you.”

“Yeah. I am a little nervous. I'll be okay once we give this damned box to Spike, get paid and get back to the city.”

In the rear view mirror, Bill could see climbing headlights capture the branches of redwood trees on the road behind him. The lights twisted across the bottom of the trees, getting brighter as the car ascended the steep road. As the lights came into view, the car pulled directly behind Bill and his partner. “Bout fuckin time.” Bill mumbled. He did not get out of the car, but rolled his window down as Spike slammed his door and walked up to the drivers window.

“Hey, Spike.” Bill said nervously. “I gotta tell you, man, this is one weird fucking place to have our meeting.”

“Yeah.” Spike said casually. “You know the rule, Bill. No witnesses. Where's the box?”

His partner reached in the back seat and handed Spike a paper bag. Spike pulled the box out and turned a flashlight on it. He inspected the sides and pressed on the bottom until he heard a dull click. The false bottom slid open, revealing an extremely well done fake of the most expensive and dangerous memory stick in the world.

“That's what you wanted. Right?” Bill asked.

“That's right.” Spike said, reaching under his jacket at the back of his belt.

“Great.” Bill said with a slight sigh of relief. “Give us our money and we'll be heading back to Florida.”

“It would be my pleasure to do that, Bill, because you guys did a pretty good job for a couple of idiots. But, you know the rule.” Suddenly there was a semi-automatic in his hand pointed at Bill's shocked face. “No witnesses.” He fired directly into Bill's forehead, moved the weapon slightly and made another head shot to the passenger. “But, I'll hold on to the forty grand for you two.” He said with a smile to the two dead men.

Spike turned off the headlights of their car and the engine also. He removed their weapons, their I.D.'s, and everything else that could possibly identify them. He then wiped all parts of the car down that might carry his fingerprints. Once he was satisfied that the scene was sanitized enough to slow an investigation to a crawl, he reached across Bill's lifeless body and put the car into neutral. The pullover where they were parked was on fairly flat land, and Bill's car did not roll back. Spike got into his rented Ford sedan and eased the car into the bumper of the one before him. The car gave to the nudge quite easily and slowly started rolling to the edge. Spike gassed the Ford a little harder, making the one holding the two bodies move more quickly to the edge. It went over silently, only complaining as it tore branches from trees and crushed against rocks as it pummeled to the darkest depths of the deep forest. Before morning, it will have been discovered the wolves, bears and coyotes, Bill's most terrorizing nightmare becoming a reality, but, fortunately for him, one that he would never realize. It was also fortunate that Bill was oblivious of what happened to him, because not only did he and his partner offer some local carnivores what would probably be a culinary treat in the wild, carnivorous animal world, he spent a year in what would been a frightening abyss of darkness.

When they were found it was by a group of college students on a nature hike to experience God's creation. They discovered that sometimes God's creations come in frightening forms and rusted car.

The bodies had been well picked over by local diners, and the skull of one had obviously been removed as a remembrance souvenir by one of them, and now probably graces the creatures, liar, or den, or burrow, or whatever the hell they live in,

The first assessment the police made of the situation was that a couple of tourists lost control of their car and went off the side of the road into the steep canyon. It happens more than the local cops would like to admit, but it had all of the right signs. It seemed odd that they couldn't find anything on missing persons about them, and not knowing where they were from literally brought things to a halt, but modern technology being what it is, they knew it was on a matter of time and patience before they would have an identification.

Because the police thought it was an accident, they took their time running any forensic studies, but once they did their interest perked up measurably. The remaining skull contained bullet holes, one entering, one leaving in a big spread. They guess it was .45 caliber. The damage looked as if the bullet was a hollow point. Big boom and very messy.

It was eventually discovered that the two men were a couple of minor criminals from the east coast. The case was never solved.

All content - poems, posts & images - are ©2010 by John Evans. No permission is given to post, share, copy, print, e-mail, reproduce, distribute or link to. All Rights Reserved. Please contact John Evans at JohnEvansPoet.Com for licensing inquiries.