Chain Letter by Christopher Pike Read Free Book Online Page B

guy this
     well dressed not be carrying a wallet? Someone must have raked him over, already.
     I tell you, we didn’t kill him.”
    The sand was working its way under Tony’s collar. The wind was warm and dry, a desert
     wind, uninterested in human affairs, hard to breathe. Like giant web-weaving spiders,
     dark tumbleweeds scraped the edge of their tiny circle of light. The man stared on,
     fascinated with what they couldn’t see.
    “It may have fallen out,” Tony said. “Let’s look for it.”
    Kipp was the only one who searched for the wallet. He found nothing. He hiked back
     to the car to check the fender. That piece of evidence was crucial. Had the man been
     standing or lying down when they had hit him?
    There was a dent in the fender, Kipp reported when hereturned, but he said it was the same dent that had always been there. Tony could
     have sworn that there had not been a scratch on Kipp’s car when the evening had begun.
    Fran and Brenda began to cry. Joan started to pace. Neil maintained his motionless
     stance outside the glow of the flashlight and Alison continued to kneel by Tony’s
     side, her head bowed. Kipp finally closed the guy’s eyes. Not a car came by, not a
     person spoke. Tony checked his watch. They were running out of night, running out
     of time to . . .
    Get rid of the body?
    “We’ll put him in the trunk,” he said finally. “The authorities will be able to identify
     him.” He waited for an objection and he probably would have been willing to wait till
     tomorrow night to get one. Kipp did not disappoint him.
    “No way, you’re not putting him in my car.”
    “Kipp, we can’t just leave him here.”
    “Sure we can!” Joan cried, stopping her pacing and taking up a defiant stance on the
     other side of the body. She was no longer a sexy seventeen year old. She was a desperate
     woman. “My old man’s a cop. I know those jerks. They’ll question us separately. Fran
     and Alison will blab their mouths off. The cops will put the story together. Look,
     I admit it, I was the one who turned off the lights. I could be laid with a real heavy
     rap. Let’s just get out of here. Let’s just forget it.”
    “I agree completely,” Kipp said. “Tony, someone else killed this guy. He was probably
     killed miles away and dumped here.Listen, there’s no parked car in the vicinity, there’s no wallet, there’s no dent . . . ”
    “There is a dent!” Tony exploded, and perhaps it was a last grasp at sanity. This
     craziness they were talking about, he knew, would follow them from this spot. But
     it was so tantalizing, so easy.
    “There already was a dent!” Kipp yelled back. “I should know, it’s my car. Don’t you
     see, it’s my car. Even if I was too drunk to be driving it, I’m as guilty as you are. We all are.”
    “I’m not,” Fran whined.
    “Shut up, or we’ll run you over next!” Joan snapped.
    “I’m for splitting,” Brenda said. “He’s already dead, what can we do for him?”
    They thought about that for a minute and at the end of the minute, nothing had changed.
    “I was driving,” Tony said, forcing the ugly words out. “This was my fault. I should
     have . . . I shouldn’t have drunk . . . I say we . . . We have to . . . ” His throat
     was so dry, he couldn’t finish. It was this damn wind, blowing straight up from hell.
     Kipp grabbed his arm and began to plead. He was given a sympathetic ear.
    “You’re eighteen, legally an adult. I know the law. You’ll get manslaughter. And for
     what? Something you might not have done? Brenda’s right, he’s dead, we can’t help
     him. We can only ruin our lives. Listen to me, Tony, I know what I’m talking about!”
    Tony did not answer. He was waiting for Neil to speak. A word from Neil and he would
     turn himself in. But Neil trusted him to do what was right. Neil had always thought
     he was one super hero. Neil did not give him the word.
    “If we won’t go to the