Finally he decided to go home.

When he got to the parking lot, his was the only car left. That made it easy to see the long dark smear trailing out from underneath. “Great,” he muttered to himself, “the end of a perfect day. Must have spun up a stone through the oil pan.”

He got down on his knees to look. It was after eleven o’clock, and even though the parking lot was well lit, he could see only darkness under the chassis. A deep darkness, a black lump blocking out the light that should have been visible on the other side of the car.

Jesus Christ, he thought, I hit something. A dog. I must have hit a dog. Nothing else could be that big except... no, it had to be a dog.

He looked again at the smear on the pavement. The parking lot’s blue-white streetlamps bleached out most of the color, but he could convince himself the smear was red.

Howe didn’t want to touch the body, but he couldn’t drive off with something stuck under there. Standing up, he walked to the edge of the parking lot and back to build up his nerve, then squatted at the rear of his car and reached under.

It was like reaching into a freezer: cold and a bit clammy. The night was warm and he couldn’t imagine how it could be so cold under there, but first things first. Pull the damned body out, then worry about thermodynamics. He swept his hand back and forth, trying to grab some part of the animal, trying to do it blind because he really didn’t want to look at it any sooner than he had to. Nothing, nothing but the cold. The dog must be farther under than he thought.

He went down on his knees again and looked. From this angle, the light was good enough that he could make out a running shoe.

For a moment, he couldn’t breathe. He’d known all along, hadn’t he? It had been too big for a dog, he just hadn’t let himself that... that he’d killed someone. He’d killed someone. It wasn’t possible, but he’d killed someone. Run a person over, dragged the corpse under his car. Almost without thinking, he reached out to touch the shoe.