Cooked Goose by G.A. McKevett Read Free Book Online

fill the vacancy before Valentine’s Day.
    “Hey, you’re weaving all over the place,” she told him when he missed a particularly tight turn on Forest Hill Road . There weren’t any forests—just smoldering brush, compliments of the afternoon’s fire—and not much of a hill, but Forest Hill Road was the best route for getting across town if you’d had a few too many. Oh, it was poorly lit and fairly curvaceous, winding its way between lemon, avocado and orange ranches. A challenge to drive. But for the most part, cops didn’t patrol this stretch after nine in the evening, so it was the choice of the inebriated.
    “Slow down, Brett,” she said, gouging him in the ribs. “Remember what happened to those sophomores last
    semester.”
    “They were idiots. They deserved to die.”
    Brett had a real way with words, she decided, not to mention his sensitivity.
    Yes, he was definitely going to get dumped come January. Being a blond, blue-eyed varsity team quarterback only got you so far.
    They rounded a curve and at the edge of the headlight’s beams, just ahead on the left side of the road, Angie thought she saw something move. Something white. An animal maybe? A big animal.
    It was crawling. Slowly. As though it were hurt.
    “Brett. Look at that. Over there.”
    Brett looked, but he seemed to be having trouble focusing. “What? I don’t see nothin’. What are you talking about?”
    “There. At the edge of the grove. I think it’s a dog that’s been hit, or...?”
    They drew nearer. Another twenty feet and she could tell what it was.
    “Oh, my god, Brett. It’s a person. A woman. And she’s naked!”
    Ordinarily, she would have expected Brett to exhibit an acute interest in a nude female. But instead of stopping, he stomped on the accelerator and his father’s ancient Oldsmobile shot forward.
    In half a second they had left the naked, crawling woman behind.
    “What are you doing? Couldn’t you tell she’s hurt?” Angie turned in her seat and craned her neck, but she couldn’t see much in the red afterglow of the taillights. “Brett, go back! We have to help her!”
    “No way. I’m not getting involved in anything like that. Who knows what happened to her? It could have been anything, any kind of trouble.”
    “That’s right. That’s why we have to help her. She looks hurt. She may need to go to the hospital!”
    Angie punched him in the biceps and tried to grab at the wheel, but Brett shoved her hand away. “I’m not stopping; do you hear me? We’ve both had too much to drink and I’m driving. If I get another ticket, the judge said he’d suspend my license.”
    “But—”
    “No buts. If that woman got herself in trouble, it’s her problem. It’s not going to be mine.”
    At a fork in the road, he slowed a bit and Angie yanked her door open.
    “What the hell are you doing?” he shouted. “Close the damned door before you fall out!”
    “Stop the car! I’m going to go back and help her, even if you won’t!”
    He slammed on the brakes, throwing her against the dash. “So, go ahead and get out. I want you out of my car!”
    She jumped out before he could change his mind.
    “You’re stupid, you know that?” he yelled. “You’re really, really stupid.”
    “Yeah, and you’re an asshole.”
    It was only after she had closed the door behind her that Angie realized her predicament, standing there on a dark road in the middle of nowhere.
    “At least call the cops!” she shouted as he pulled away. “Brett, please! When you get home, make a phone call! One lousy call, please!”
    But he had already peeled out and amid the squeal of his tires and the roar of the Oldsmobile’s eight-cylinder engine, Angie wasn’t sure if he had heard her or not.

    Even in the dark, with only the light of a half moon, Angie could tell that the woman was badly beaten. Her face was horribly swollen and smeared with something black which Angie assumed was blood. The victim lay on her side at the edge