“But it was an accident!” Hank said, lying on the grimy gray floor in the gas station bathroom, somewhere between Bakersfield and Fresno. He stared up into the shotgun of the toothless man with the sandpaper complexion, bony frame, and that glass eye that wandered left to right and back.
“You pretty Ohio blond, you’re getting justice for what you done killed back in that Motel 6,” the man said. Hank wondered how he could’ve known – or tracked him down, two hundred miles away, and followed him into the bathroom at a Getty station somewhere just off Route 99.
The man took aim, put his finger on the trigger, and then the steel door opened behind him and knocked him off balance. The gun went off and Hank felt the air pressure pop somewhere to the left of his ear. The man hit his head on the sink and the gun fell out of his grasp – Hank grabbed it, scampered up against the wall behind him. The woman stood at the door, screaming. Hank glanced at her – some plastic surgery job, probably from Malibu or Santa Barbara, probably driving a Mercedes or Jaguar.
He aimed the shotgun at the man with his head in the sink, groaning unintelligible words. The man slipped to the ground.
“Call the police,” Hank ordered the woman. “This man tried to kill me.”
Hank panicked – no, she couldn’t call the police. And he needed to kill the man, because he’d talk and they’d come and get him. He stared at the plastic surgery job. He’d have to kill her, too – and the gas station attendant who’d probably overheard the whole thing. But no, the Motel 6 … that was enough.
He ran out of the bathroom, jumped in the ’76 Plymouth Valiant, and headed north on Route 99. He needed to get out of state, and fast.
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