Page 11 of Hell Bent
“What’s cold feet?” she asked. “Be sensible, now, and tell me. It never has to leave this room.”
“It’s all been feeling … like it’s closing in on me,” I finally confessed. You’d think it would make me feel better to tell somebody, but instead, the panic was rising. “School. Work. Stuck in an office for seventy or eighty hours a week as a new financial analyst. Moving into Ned’s place. Being married. I’m just … it’s not … it’s somuch.It feels like too much. And I know, I know, I’m turning thirty. Plenty old enough to know my own mind. I alwayshaveknown my own mind. How old were you when you got married?”
“We’re not talking about me. We’re talking about you. If you’re not ready, if it’s not right—you walk out the door now. You leave. Your father will explain.”
“I can’t. Ned?—”
“You can.”
“No. Ned doesn’t deserve that. At all.” I was rubbing my sweating palms against the dress, leaving marks, I was sure, but I was past caring.
A knock at the door. Emily, that would be. My grandmother said, “Answer it.”
Oh, my God. I was still in a dream, but it was a different dream. I pulled the door open, and there Emily was, bright and shiny in her dressy blue jumpsuit, asking brightly, “Are we ready to begin?”
“No,” I said. “Not quite. Please go find Ned.”
“He’s already standing at the front,” she said. “Can it wait?”
“No,” I said. “I’m afraid it can’t.”
5
HIDING IN THE DOG FOOD AISLE
Sebastian
I pulled into the rest area north of Redding in the dark, thinking about not much. Aiming for an open mind, I guess. Ten hours more to Portland, but that was all right, because they didn’t want me until Monday, and I was a high-energy guy whose stamina had been honed by eleven years of pro soccer. Besides, I never felt like I’d really arrived someplace new unless I drove.
The only thing in the back of the SUV was a duffel with clothes, because the movers would do the rest, and a furnished apartment was waiting for me in Portland, thanks to the Devils staff. I hummed a few bars of “Free and Easy Down the Road I Go” along with the radio and relaxed into my situation, because nobody in this world would pity a guy in my place.
This was my sixth team in my second sport. I didn’t spend time thinking about whether I’d stay awhile or be on my way again next season, because that way lay anxiety. I’d beat anxiety before, and I was going to keep beating it. So I didn’t think about the new job or about my life. I just pulled up nottoo near the restrooms and hopped out, did some jumping and some arm and leg swings, keeping loose, glad I wasn’t playing tomorrow and hadn’t had to fly.
A car pulled in at the edge of the lot with a serious rattle, and I glanced at it, still swinging my arms in circles, loosening up my shoulders and back. A guy got out with a big dog on a leash, the dog moving slow. They passed under a light for a minute, which let me see that the guy was big and the dog a long-haired thing, and then they were beyond the pool of light and I went back to leg swings, then decided to do a few sprints, because I still had a long drive ahead of me and was feeling a little jumpy.
That was why I was coming back from all the way over by the truck parking lot when I saw the guy again, leash in hand, walking fast toward the car and opening the door. No dog.
Oh. There was the dog, trotting toward the guy. I was a few yards away when the guy said, “Stay,” and the dog stopped. Whereupon the guy jumped in, turned the car on, and backed up fast, the rattle increasing.
“Hey!” I yelled. “Hey!”
A quick image of the guy’s head turning, then he stepped on the gas and peeled out. A flash of taillights, and he was gone. The dog stood, hesitated, stared after the car, took a few tentative steps forward, and stopped.
The rage was right there, blooming in my head. I wanted to chase the car down, but the guy was long gone. The dog kept watching, tail wagging faintly, and something in my chest hurt hard.
“Hey.” I went over to the animal and, since it was wearing a collar, held it by it. No tags, but that wasn’t a surprise. The dog glanced at me, then kept looking toward where the car had been. Still staying. Still being good, like that would matter.
“Hey, buddy,” I said, crouching down beside it andrunning my hand over its body. Thin. Long hair. Golden retriever, maybe, and female, but the hair felt rough, and there was a lump over its ribs. A good-sized one, like a baby’s fist.
Right. Think.I pulled my phone from my pocket and did some checking. Animal shelter back in Redding, but they were closed. Of course they were. It was Saturday night. Vet? Would they hang onto the dog and take it to the shelter on Monday? They were all closed. I thought a minute, then typedemergency vet redding ca,and got a listing for one.
In Chico, over a hundred miles east.
OK, what next? Police. I looked up the non-emergency number, then called it and explained.
“That’s out of our jurisdiction,” the woman said. “You want the county sheriff.”
Another call. This time, a man answered. Another explanation, and he said, “Take it to the shelter in Redding and call us, and we’ll send a deputy to put it in a kennel.”
