Desert Places: A Novel of Terror by Blake Crouch Read Free Book Online Page B

slammed the hood. The two passengers shrieked and jumped back in horror. Blood speckled the windshield. Orson lifted the hood once more and slammed it home. The driver sprawled momentarily against the hood, squirting the windshield as he sank down into the dirt.
    “Get the shotgun!” the fat one yelled, but no one moved.
    “Don’t worry about it, boys,” Orson said in that same timorous voice. “I have a gun.” He pointed my .357 at the two men. “I hope you aren’t too fucked up to know what this is. You,” he told the slender man, “pick up your buddy’s head.” The man dropped his beer can. “Go on, he won’t bite you.” The man lifted it off the ground by its long, grimy hair. “Right this way, boys,” Orson said. “Walk around the side of the car. That’s it.” The men walked by the driver’s door, and Orson walked by mine. I turned to look through the back window, but the trunk was open. He’d never shut it.
    “I’m sorry about the wallet.…”
    “In you go,” Orson said. The car didn’t move. “Do I have to shoot you both in the kneecaps and drag you in there myself? I’d rather you not bleed all over my car if it can be helped.” When the hammer cocked, the car suddenly shook as the men climbed clumsily into the trunk.
    “Stupid, stupid boys,” Orson said. “It’d have been better for you if you’d all three looked under that hood.” He closed the trunk.
    As Orson walked back toward the truck, I heard the boys begin to sob. Then they screamed, pounding and kicking the inside of the trunk. As Orson climbed into the truck and turned off the headlights and KC lights, I noticed the laboriously slow ballad still pouring from the black Ford, the steel guitar solo twanging into the desert. As my eyes readjusted to the darkness, the music stopped. The driver’s door of the Buick opened, and Orson reached into the backseat and picked up a two-by-four and a length of rope.
    He shut the door and said, “If they keep carrying on, tell them you’re gonna kill them.”
    “Look.” I pointed down the road at a pair of headlights just coming into view.
    Orson untied the handkerchief from the antenna and ran back to the truck. He climbed into the cab again, put the truck in gear, and let it roll forward several feet until it pointed east into the desert. For several minutes, Orson worked on something inside the cab. The men continued to moan, their intoxication intensifying their fear, making their pleadings more desperate. I didn’t say a word to them, and still the headlights approached.
    The Ford sped off into the desert. I watched it through the windshield and then through the windows on the driver’s side. In ten seconds, it had disappeared into the night. Orson came running up to the car, breathless. He gave me a thumbs-up and dragged the driver to the back of the car. Then he was at my window.
    “I need your help,” he said, opening the door. He unlocked the handcuffs and handed me the car keys. As we walked to the back of the Buick, I could hear the approaching car in the distance and see the taillights of the minivan, which had yet to fully disappear—a glowing red eye dwindling into darkness. I clung to that happy family. We let them go. We let them go. I looked down, but there was still no license plate on the Buick.
    Orson pointed at the driver on the ground and said, “When I tell you, unlock the trunk and throw him in there. Can you do it?” I nodded.
    “Gentlemen!” Orson yelled: “The trunk is being opened, and I’ll be pointing a three-fifty-seven at you. Breathe and I start squeezing.”
    Orson looked at me and nodded. I opened the trunk without looking inside at the men or the body I had to lift. Heaving the driver from the ground, I shoved his limp, heavy frame on top of the two men. Then I slammed the trunk, and we got back into the car.
    Orson started the Buick after the oncoming car passed us. The interior lights came on, and I gasped when I looked down at my