Jeffery Deaver - Twisted - The Collected Stories of Jeffery Deaver

Then Manko laughed. He studied me critically. “I can be honest with you, Frank. I feel I’m close to you.”

So I was no longer Frankie boy. I’d graduated. My pulse quickened and I was moved.

“Fact is, I look tough. Am I right? But I get scared. Real scared. I never saw any action. Grenada, Panama, Desert Storm. I missed ’em all, you know what I’m saying? I was never tested. I always wondered what I’d do under fire. Well, this was my chance. I was going to rescue Allison. I was going up against the old man himself.

“I called his company and told his secretary I was a reporter from Ohio Business magazine. I wanted to do an interview with Mr. Morgan. We tried to find a time he could see me. I couldn’t believe it — she bought the whole story. She told me he’d be in Mexico on business from the twentieth through the twenty-second of July. I made an appointment for August 1, then hung up fast. I was worried somebody was tracing the call.

“On July twentieth I staked out the house all day. Sure enough, Morgan left with his suitcase at ten in the morning and didn’t come back that night. There was a security car parked in the driveway and I figured one of the goons was inside the house. But I’d planned on that. At ten it started to rain. Just like now.” He nodded toward the window. “I remember hiding in the bushes, real glad about the overcast. I had about a hundred feet of exposed yard to cover and the security boys would’ve spotted me for sure in the moonlight. I managed to get to the house without anybody seeing me and hide beneath this holly tree while I caught my breath.

“Then it was dues time, Frank. I leaned against the side of the house, listening to the rain and wondering if I’d have the guts to go through with it.”

“But you did.”

Manko grinned boyishly and did a decent Pacino gangster impersonation. “I broke in through the basement, snuck up to her room and busted her out of the joint.

“We didn’t take a suitcase or anything. We just got out of there fast as we could. Nobody heard us. The security guy was in the living room but he’d fallen asleep watching the Tonight Show. Allison and I, we got into my car and we hit the highway. Man, Easy Rider. We were free! On the road, just her and me. We’d escaped. We were on that adventure Allison’d always wanted. At last, we were both happy.

“I headed for the interstate, driving sixty-two, right on the button, because they don’t arrest you if you’re doing just seven miles over the limit. It’s a state police rule, I heard somewhere. I stayed in the right lane and pointed that old Dodge east-southeast. Didn’t stop for anything. Ohio, West Virginia, Virginia, North Carolina. Once we started crossing borders, I felt better. Her father was sure to come home from his trip right away and call the local cops but whether they’d get the highway patrol in, I had my doubts. I mean, he’d have some explaining to do — about how he kept his daughter a prisoner and everything.” Manko shook his head. “But you know what I did?”

From the rueful look on his face I could guess. “You underestimated the enemy.”

Manko shook his head. “Thomas Morgan,” he mused. “I think he must’ve been a godfather or something.”

“I suppose they have them in Ohio too.”

“He had friends everywhere. Virginia troopers, Carolina, everywhere! Money is power, we were saying. We were heading south on Route Twenty-one, making for Charlotte, when I ran into ’em. I went into a 7-Eleven to buy some food and beer and what happens but there’re some good ole boys right there, Smoky hats and everything, asking the clerk about a couple on the run from Ohio. I mean, us! I managed to get out without them seeing us and we peeled rubber outta there, I’ll tell you. We drove for a while but by then it was almost dawn and I figured we better lay low for the day.

“I pulled into a big forest preserve. We spent the whole day together, lying there, my arms around her, her head on my chest. We just lay in the grass beside the car and I told her stories about places we’d travel to. The Philippines, Thailand, California. And I told her what life’d be like in Florida too.”

He looked at me with a grave expression on his taut face. “I could’ve had her, Frank. You know what I’m saying? Right there. On the grass. The insects buzzing around us. You could hear this river, a waterfall, nearby.” Manko’s voice fell to a murmur. “But it wouldn’t’ve been right. I wanted everything to be perfect. I wanted us to be in our own place, in Florida, in our bedroom, married. That sounds old-fashioned, I know. You think that was stupid of me? You don’t think so, do you?”

“No, Manko, it’s not stupid at all.” Awkwardly I looked for something to add. “It was good of you.”

He looked forlorn for a minute, perhaps regretting, stupid or wise, his choosing to keep their relationship chaste.

“Then,” he said, smiling devilishly, “things got hairy. At midnight we headed south again. This car passed us then hit the brakes and did a U-ie. Came right after us. Morgan’s men. I turned off the highway and headed east over back roads. Man, what a drive! One-lane bridges, dirt roads. Zipping through small towns. Whoa, Frankie boy, I had four wheels treading air! It was fan- tastic. You should’ve seen it. There must’ve been twenty cars after us. I managed to lose ’em but I knew we couldn’t get very far, the two of us. I figured we better split up.

“I knew that part of the state pretty good. Had a couple buddies in the service from Winston-Salem. We’d go hunting and stayed in this old, abandoned lodge near China Grove. Took some doing but I finally found the place.

“I pulled up and made sure it was empty. We sat in the car and I put my arm around her. I pulled her close and told her what I decided — that she should stay here. If her father got his hands on her, it’d be all over. He’d send her away for sure. Maybe even brainwash her. Don’t laugh. Morgan’d do it. Even his own flesh and blood. She’d hide out here and I’d lead ’em off for a ways. Then...”

“Yes?”

“I’d wait for him.”

“For Morgan? What were you going to do?”

“Have it out with him once and for all. One-on-one, him and me. Oh, I don’t mean kill him. Just show him he wasn’t king of the universe. Allison begged me not to. She knew how dangerous he was. But I didn’t care. I knew he’d never leave us alone. He was the devil. He’d follow us forever if I didn’t stop him. She begged me to take her with me but I knew I couldn’t. She had to stay. It was so clear to me. See, Frank, that’s what love is, I think. Not being afraid to make a decision for someone else.”

Manko, the rough-hewn philosopher.

“I held her tight and told her not to worry. I told her how there wasn’t enough room in my heart for all the love I felt for her. We’d be together again soon.”

“Was it safe there, you think?”

“The cabin? Sure. Morgan’d never find it.”

“It was in China Grove?”

“Half hour away. On Badin Lake.”

I laughed. “You’re kidding me?”

“You know it?”

“Sure I do. I used to go skinny-dipping there eons ago.” I nodded that it was a good choice. “Hard to spot those cabins on the western shore.”

“It’s a damn pretty place too. You know, I was driving off and I looked back and I remember thinking how nice it’d be if that was our house and there Allison’d be in the doorway waiting for me to come home from work.”

Manko rose and walked to the window. He gazed through his reflection into the wet night.

“After I left I drove to a state road. I pulled right in front of them and made like I was heading back to her, but really leading the hounds off, you know. But they caught me... man, everybody. Cops, the security boys... and Morgan himself.