Silk - Caitlin R. Kiernan [76]
And then she saw the gun in Tony’s shaking, coward’s hand, and Byron started the car.
The scream from the parking lot had left a gooseflesh rash on Niki’s arms and Theo was swearing, trying to get the van to start. Keith had left the van idling, but Theo had killed the motor when she’d shifted out of neutral and had forgotten to keep her foot pressed firmly on the clutch.
“Fuck, fuck, fuck…” She turned the key and the van jerked and sputtered and was quiet again.
“I think you flooded it,” Niki said, sounding almost as useless as she felt, looking past Theo, through the driver’s-side window. She followed the silver arc of the baseball bat in Keith’s hands, that strange scythe, and the big redneck kneeled at his feet.
“It’s not flooded. It’s just a worthless piece of shit,” and that time it turned over, half-hearted piston taunt, and almost caught.
But then the brown car jumped, seemed to spring forward like a hungry, pouncing animal, and the white-haired girl tumbled into the windshield. The front bumper caught the only one of the rednecks still standing, knocking him down, as the car swerved past the triad of Stiff Kitten. Halfway across the parking lot, the white-haired girl lost her grip on the hood or windshield and was tossed off, rag doll rolled a few feet and lay very still.
Niki gasped, grabbed Theo’s arm; for a second she was sure the Toyota was going to plow straight into the van, but at the last possible moment the driver cut the wheel sharply to the left and the car squealed past, only inches to spare, vanished up Morris in a fog of its own exhaust. As they had passed, she’d caught a hurried glimpse of the faces inside, fear rigid and gaudy as cheap Halloween masks.
And then the van made a painful grinding sound deep in its internal-combustion belly, backfired again, and rattled violently to life. Theo cursed and wrenched the gear shift into first, bumped over the curb and into the parking lot. Another three seconds, and they were pulling up alongside Mort and Daria.
“Thank god for the cavalry,” Mort said, closing his knife and putting it into his back pocket. “Better late than never.”
Keith was squatted down beside the guy the car had clipped, prodded him with one end of the bat.
“Is he dead?” Mort asked, and Keith shook his head, “Nah. He’s breathing,” and he looked back at the first guy he’d put down, still sitting on his butt, holding his ribs. “Better call your buddies here an ambulance,” and he picked up the revolver, flipped open the chamber and dumped the bullets out into his palm. He threw the gun into the tall weeds by the railroad tracks and pocketed the five cartridges.
“What about Spyder?” Daria asked, sliding the van’s side door open as Niki climbed down from the passenger seat.
Spyder was lying on her back a few feet away, eyes open, staring blankly up at the clouds. Keith walked over and waved a hand in front of her face.
“Hey. Spyder. Are you dead?” he said, and Niki saw the white-haired girl’s lips move, but couldn’t make out what she said.
“Spyder says she ain’t dead yet, Dar,” Keith said.
Spyder tried to sit up, and Keith helped her to her feet. Niki ran over to them, gladly seizing any chance to do something besides stand around gawking; she slipped one arm around Spyder and helped her towards the van.
“I can walk,” Spyder said, but Niki helped her anyway.
“C’mon, guys. Move your pokey butts,” Theo yelled. “I think Bert called the cops,” and immediately she was answered by the not-distant-enough wail of sirens.
“I’m just surprised you didn’t do it for him,” Mort said, climbing into the cab beside her.
“It’s snowing,” Spyder said as Niki guided her past the pug snout of the van, and she looked up into the city-bright sky, felt the snow an instant before she saw it, huge sticky flakes spiraling lazily down like Walt Disney fairies.
Spyder opened her mouth, bloodsmear-ringed like smudged lipstick or the candy-apple halo around a little girl’s mouth, and caught a single flake on her outstretched