He never slept at night. The dead came to him anyway. There was nothing he could do to stop them, but he stayed awake and watchful, willing them to leave. An exhausting vigil that was never rewarded.
He watched her cross the yard toward a small foreign car, his heart galloping, a dozen hammers pounding against the plate in his head. The fine lines of the sight crossed her chest. His cheek rested against the stock of the Remington 700 rifle. Half a breath settled in his lungs. His heart rate slowed in conditioned response. His fingertip remained still against the trigger.
There was no killing a ghost. He knew that better than anyone. He could only pray for it to leave and not come back to his mountain.
If only there were a God to hear him…
CHAPTER 2
COME ON, come on, you big gear-jamming son of a bitch! Oh! Oh! OH!”
Mari focused an exasperated, exhausted glare at the wall beyond her rented bed. There was a starving-artist-quality painting of a moose in a mountainscape hanging above the imitation mahogany Mediterranean-style headboard. The painting bucked against the cheap, paper-thin wallboard in time with the heavy thumping going on in the adjacent room. The clock on the night-stand glowed 1:43 in pee-yellow digits. She had gotten the last room in the place.
“Ride me, Luanne! Eee-hah! Ride me! Ride me! Christ all-fucking mighty!”
The verbal commentary disintegrated into animal grunts and groans and panting that rose in pitch and volume to a vulgar crescendo. Blessed silence followed.
Mari cast a glance heavenward. “Please let them be dead.”
Heaving a sigh, she bent her head and pinched the bridge of her nose between a thumb and forefinger. She stood slumped back against the imitation mahogany dresser, half sitting, half leaning, still dressed in her wilted jeans and wrinkled T-shirt and vest. She couldn’t bring herself to take her shoes off and walk barefoot on the grungy carpet, let alone undress and crawl between the sheets.