Two took longer to register, and that was the knowledge that the temperature had dropped about thirty degrees from the day before. This didn’t come as a revelation so much as a series of contractions. The muscles in his legs cramped. His abs cramped. His arms cramped. Other things started to shrink from the cold, too.
But none of this distracted from number three, which was the real killer. The Mustang was not his Mustang. It was likely a ’68, and it had the same mixture of faded paint and primer, but his Mustang was sitting exactly where he’d parked it last night.
Somehow, Not-Shayna had stolen the wrong car.
He slowed to a jog.
The Mustang that wasn’t his Mustang was turning again, this time into the adjacent parking lot. Another Alpine hotel. Another German word for its name. He checked over his shoulder. The moon was squinting over one lone peak, blue early morning sky casting an ominous shadow over the full parking lot. Every pant of breath out of his mouth showed a puff of air in front of his face.
The Mustang slowed as it weaved through the next door parking lot. Not-Shayna looked distracted, which was good because he ran parallel to the car, head low as he shielded himself behind a bunch of other cars. He ended up crouched at the front wheel of a big blue school bus that must have belonged to the missionaries because it too said ASK ME ABOUT BEING A MISSIONARY FOR JESUS.
The Mustang turned a third time, heading down an alleyway that separated the Schussel Mountain Lodge from the Schloss Linderhof, which was done up like a cardboard castle had thrown up on a Motel 6.
Footsteps.
A young black man holding a steaming cup of coffee was leaving the Linderhof lobby. He tipped his Cleveland Indians hat at Jeffrey as he continued down the sidewalk. You didn’t see many Cleveland fans in Helen. Or black people for that matter. He nodded back like it was perfectly normal to be crouched in a parking lot wearing one sock and one shoe and orange underwear in a town built like an Alpine village.
He waited until the man was out of sight, then kept his knees bent low as he headed around the back of the Schussel Lodge on the opposite side of the alleyway. Without the parking lot lights, he could barely see more than a few yards in front of him. His entire body shuddered from the cold. The grass was wet because of course it was wet. His one sock got soaked, basically becoming a cube of ice as he made his way to the rear of the building. He saw the nose of the Mustang peeking out from the alley. Maybe fifty yards away. There was a dip in the pavement, a downhill dive to three giant green Dumpsters that stood sentry. The entire area was bathed in light from the xenon bulbs overhead. His ears tensed in that weird way that reminded him that Darwin had been right.
In the alley, there were some familiar sounds, not a car door opening or closing, but the dragging of a metal Auburn keychain across the rear panel of a car as a key clicked into a lock and clicked and clicked, because for whatever reason, the key to his Mustang had worked in the ignition of the Mustang that was not his, but it would not work in the not-his-Mustang’s trunk lock.
But then it worked.
The trunk opened, the hinges squealing the same way they squealed in his car.
He moved fast because all he had was the element of surprise. He wasn’t worried about getting shot. There were far, far worse things that could happen. Three months he’d had a gold shield. Three months he’d been in suits and ties instead of short-sleeved polyester uniforms with sixty pounds of equipment around his hips that beat into his legs and abs like a pile driver every time he chased some idiot perp through the streets of Birmingham.
He loved his gold detective’s shield more than he’d ever loved a woman. Taken better care of it, too. And his lieutenant hadn’t wanted to give him the promotion because he didn’t trust Jeffrey, and Jeffrey didn’t trust his lieutenant because he was an asshole.
Forty yards away.
He heard the solid thunk of a car door closing. He clip-clopped on his one tennis shoe, the cold in his socked foot working up his leg like a python. The sunrise was two scant hours away, but the temperature felt like it was dropping by the minute. How was that even possible? Two days ago, the thermometer had been in the seventies and now he felt like he was standing inside a commercial freezer.
Thirty yards.
Suddenly, he dropped flat to the ground, face and palms pressed to the asphalt.
Muscle memory.
His body had reacted faster than his brain could process the sound of a gunshot cracking like thunder in the thin, cold air.
Had Not-Shayna found a gun?
And accidentally fired a shot?
The reports he’d have to fill out on that one. Not that he didn’t know how to fill out those reports in his sleep because he was a fucking vice detective and for the last three months, at least once a day, he’d taken a report from a stupid John who’d had his shit stolen by a hooker.
He pushed himself up.
Twenty yards.
Ten.
He crouched again, this time in front of the Mustang. He put his palms flat against the hot metal, trying to soak up the warmth. She had a gun, and the gun had been fired, and he was a cop so he had to do something about it.
Tires screeched in the alley.
He stood, shoulders hunched, so he could sneak a look over the top of the car. A blue Ford pickup, older model, peeled backward up the alley, leaving smoke and burned rubber in its wake.
He looked down.
His left foot was no longer freezing cold. Blood streamed around his sock, forming a lake, wicking into the material, soaking everything in its wake.
Steam came off the hot liquid.
He lowered himself down into a push-up and peered beneath the car.
Not-Shayna stared back, but not really.
She was caught in the in-between where life or death were the only questions going through her mind.
He’d seen the look many times before.
He scrambled around the car, head down as he made his way toward the woman because she had stopped being Not-Shayna the thief and had started being the victim of a gunshot wound.
He scanned the empty alley as he ran into the open. The woman was gut shot, one of the worst kinds of injuries. His Glock was in her hand. He touched the muzzle. Cold as ice, so she hadn’t shot herself. He took the gun and pointed it around the alley again, looking up for fire escapes or bad guys climbing into open windows.
The blue Ford truck.
Two people in the cab, one obviously the shooter. He’d seen them both—not their faces, but their shapes. One of them was wearing a baseball cap.
“Help. Me,” the woman begged.
The hotel windows were closed, but there were guests inside who must have heard the gunshot.
He raised his voice, “Somebody call the police.”
“Help,” she repeated.