Chapter 10 Houdini #2
“OK, OK, don’t tip over, don’t tip over,” Nicki said shakingly.
She held her breath, activated her core, and pushed the paddle into the pebbled sand, sending her away from the shore in one smooth motion.
She looked back once more before she paddled quickly, heading to the neighboring estate.
Cliff shooed Boon into his pen.
“How did you get out, buddy?” he asked the dog.
Cliff looked around the empty backyard. The sun was high and hot.
He glanced toward the lake; a tranquil, peaceful view.
“Hmmm.”
Nicki kept her eyes on the crystal-clear water and the lake floor, which the kayak hull was almost touching. She ignored the vast lake to her right to prevent her from panicking and focused only on her destination a few more yards away.
Almost there, almost there.
She checked her watch frantically and saw that she was a couple minutes behind arriving at the estate, where the pre-ordered taxi was waiting for her on the road.
The hull grumbled against the stones of the shore and Nicki wasted no time jumping out, wetting her sandals as she did. The cold water punctured the warmth of her skin.
Nicki dragged the kayak out from the water and threw it to the side of the beach.
She ran through the thick wooded private property toward the road.
The idling taxi had had enough of waiting and started to drive off, just as Nicki made it to the front of the estate.
“Waaaaait!” Nicki shouted, waving both hands in the air. She chased the taxi with all the remaining power in her legs that she had.
The taxi driver halted, catching her breathless in his rearview mirror.
“I’m here!” Nicki shouted as she opened the back door and jumped in. “The airport, please,” she said, out of breath.
He chuckled. “You got it, Miss.”
Nicki ducked into the back seat. Her heart pounded as the taxi drove off. Her legs were scratched up from the thick bush of the private property she just trespassed through. But she made it.
Nicki sped through airport security with her boarding pass clenched in her hand and rushed straight to her gate.
FINAL CALL TO BILLINGS, the gate monitor read in flashing blood red.
She was the last to board, with five minutes to spare. The urge to check her phone as she plopped down on the airplane seat was interrupted by the reminder that she had purposely left her phone in her office desk drawer so that she would not be tracked.
Nicki took a deep breath as the last plane of the day to Billings took off.
Tommy, you better be out there…
Tyler walked up the basement stairs from a long working session and headed to Nicki’s office.
When he opened the door, the room greeted him with an eerie silence and the usual meticulous order.
He glanced up at the camera dome on the ceiling. The tape still covering it from their office desk sexcapade. And then another one on the couch after that.
Tyler grinned to himself and went back downstairs.
He made his way out to the front lot to see if Sasha’s car was there. If it wasn’t then he would be out on an errand with Nicki. But it was parked, as usual, beside Tyler’s Revuelto.
Baby, where are you? Let’s grab some lunch XXX, the text to Nicki read.
The message was delivered, left unread.
Two states over, Nicki climbed up the narrow steps and into the relic of a bus that was bound for the most southeastern corner town of Montana, wedged between South Dakota and Wyoming.
As soon as the airport was out of sight, Nicki took one more impulsive phone check but this time her nerves sizzled at the great escape she had pulled off, and how upset Tyler would become once he found out she was gone.
All she had now was the printed map, coordinates of Tommy’s last approximate cell tower location, and a prayer.
Am I actually that delusional that I will find him? What if he was just passing through when his phone hit the cell towers? He could be in Miami for all I know by now! Nicki thought to herself as her head leaned against the glass window.
The bus—which she assumed must have been from the 1970s— rolled along, out of the townscape and further onto a dusty, single country road, with the horizon hitting some mountains in the far distance.
He has to be there… he must be at that Montana Ranch, chasing wild horses.
The sun passed across the hot, smoggy sky and the unsettling feeling of a few more hours to go crept in.
Tyler is going to kill me.
It seemed the more southeast the bus drove, the hotter it got. It was now clear there was no air conditioning on the bus and the passengers resorted to their own makeshift fans to cool themselves.
Nicki checked her watch and matched the 5:37 PM time to the lowering sun.
She took off her button-up navy cardigan, throwing out her cares about the look of her scars out of the half open that-did-nothing window.
She exhaled.
Her eyes fell onto the side of the road and the beige grassy ditch that seemed to drag on for tens of miles.
It became almost hypnotic. The mundane line continued over the bumps of the old road, interrupted by the grunting of the springy bus and the flapping of some papers above the driver’s head, barely affixed to the sun shade with a rubber band.
The bus was full, given the rarely scheduled small town route, but everyone was quiet. Too hot to talk.
Nicki allowed her eyes to rest for a moment, but the vibration of the bus wouldn’t allow it. She gazed along the beige grassy line, until her eyes darted to a bright red dot sticking out from the ditch.
Nicki’s gasp interrupted the peace of the bus and she pressed herself against the window to see closer.
A motorcycle. Rear-wheel up, leaning forward into the ditch, with a red bandana—just like the one Tommy always had—attached to the back of the licence plate.
The bus drove past it as quickly as it approached it.
That’s Tommy’s bike!
“Stop the bus!” Nicki exclaimed uncontrollably, standing up. “Please, stop the bus!” she repeated, grabbing her bag and cardigan and pushing her way through the passengers toward the front.