After Darkness Fell Read Online Free Page B

others could have gone looking for more victims. Judging by the cramped quarters in the wagon, I strongly believed there were only two of them.
    “I guess we just pile them in back and leave them here,” she said.
    “I have to see what’s in those coolers.”
    “Are you sure about that?”
    “No ...”
    “Why do it, then?”
    She was right. There could be something even worse than scalps floating around in them.
    “You’re right. We don’t need to know.”
    Fifteen minutes later, after I’d pulled the two out of the truck, dragged them back to their ride and stuffed them in back, I closed the tailgate and we went back to the open doors see what else we could find. While Fields checked beneath the driver’s seat, I opened the glove box. It was crammed with wallets. I counted seventeen. They must have taken them from their victims.
    “Nothing here but a crack pipe and six or seven bottles of drugs,” she said.
    “What sort of drugs?”
    She read the labels. “All sorts of meds.”
    “Same person?”
    “Different people. Uppers. Downers. Tranquillizers. There are even some poppers here.”
    I opened two wallets. The second one caught my attention. The driver’s license photo was of the man I’d shot. His name was Willis K. Simpson, he was 29, and lived in Saxonburg. I pulled out his registration, insurance card, and a few other cards. Suddenly things seemed much worse.
    “What is it?” Fields asked.
    “The man I shot. His name was Willis K. Simpson, and he was a doctor. He’s got a card here from Saxonburg Regional Medical Clinic.”
    Fields just shrugged.
    “You don’t seem surprised.”
    “Nowadays I’m not surprised about anything.”
    I didn’t know why this bothered me so much. Maybe it was because I didn’t want to think a doctor capable of doing such horrible things. Or maybe I just didn’t want to admit that I’d shot a doctor in the head. But I had to face facts. He might have been a doctor once, but he’d spent his last days breaking into people’s homes, robbing them, killing them, and taking their scalps as grisly souvenirs.
    “It really puts a new light on things.” Fields laughed a humorless laugh. “A doctor robbing, killing, and scalping people. This plague sure has brought out the worst in everyone.”
    “This keeps getting more and more difficult.” I didn’t want to know about the other guy; the fact that he was a kid was too much to handle as it was. I dropped the wallets on the seat and slammed the door shut. I wanted to get away from here, drive back to the farm and have a big glass of bourbon.
    “Personally, I think...” Fields suddenly stopped.
    I froze. We both heard it.
    The distant sound of a moving vehicle was coming from the east, down the long hill.
    If my guess was right, it would be passing us in less than a minute.

THREE
    “Get the truck doors closed! Now! ”
    While Fields ran for the truck, I closed the doors of the station wagon and ran up to her just as she pushed the driver’s door shut. Grabbing her by the arm, I pulled her across the dirt road and through the bushes, to the six-foot ditch on the other side that ran parallel to the main road. We slid down the weed-choked slope, landing on the muddy bank just above the creek running through the culvert. The ground was damp and cold. Fields disappeared in the wild growth of the grassy slope and lay on her stomach. I stayed close to her, on my left side, my right hand tightly gripping the .357, which was aimed at the road less than ten feet away.
    The sound of the approaching vehicle grew louder.
    “What’s the plan?” she whispered. Although most of her was hidden in the tall grass, I could see her eyes, which had grown quite large. She was frightened, as was I.
    “If the vehicle stops and someone gets out and comes over to the truck, we drop them, no questions asked.”
    “Gotcha.”
    Luckily, the high weeds hid us from view, but by pushing some of the heavy growth aside we could see the road