Maybe she was assigning way too much power and skill to him, but she didn't think so. If she had any skill at all it was in reading men, and her gut said he was capable of finding her. It also said he was the most dangerous man she'd ever met, and while she'd met some stone-cold killers who could curdle your blood, he was head and shoulders above them, which was why he scared the shit out of her.
Mrs. Pearson opened the file folder and removed several sheets of paper. "Fill these out, sign them, and everything's set."
Drea took the papers, giving one more long look around. "Keep an eye out while I'm reading. He's tall, about six-one, good-looking, and in very good shape. Short dark hair." The thumbnail description seemed very inadequate for a man whose very presence seemed to suck all the air out of a room, as if he not only commanded his space but everyone else's, too. But how could she describe the way he moved, the grace and speed, and at the same time get across how very still he was? Saying his eyes were like dark opals was useless, because you couldn't see all those colors unless you were very close, and then it was too late.
Mrs. Pearson took her job as lookout seriously; she didn't say anything while Drea turned her attention to the papers, but Drea was aware of the almost constant movement of the older woman's head. People came and went in the parking lot, but they were mostly harried mothers, wilting in the heat, usually with a kid or two dragging behind to the accompaniment of flip-flops slapping on the pavement.
The paperwork took only a few minutes. Drea scribbled her signature, then replaced the sheets in the folder. "I can't tell you how much I appreciate the trouble you've gone to," she told Mrs. Pearson, returning the folder to her and taking a long look around as she did so. There was still nothing out of the ordinary, and she still had that worrisome tingle running up and down her spine.
"You shouldn't have to live your life in fear," Mrs. Pearson said, her kind gaze a little sad as she looked at Drea. "I hope you can finally get free."
"I hope so, too," said Drea.
After Mrs. Pearson left, Drea sat and watched the traffic for a few more minutes. She hadn't parked at the curb but rather in an open-ended slot, so she wouldn't have to waste time backing up if she had to leave in a hurry. From where she sat in the parking lot she could see behind the store, see the vacant lot, overgrown with weeds, that separated the store from some residences. Was that a dead-end street, or could she use it to come back onto the main drag at a different point?
Once again, she hadn't done her homework, and fury at herself shot through her. How could she expect to get out of this alive if she didn't start paying more attention to detail? She should have bought a map of the town as soon as she got here, studied it, acquainted herself with every street and road. He probably knew exactly where that street went.
She looked at the vacant lot, wondered briefly how much broken glass was hidden by the weeds, then gave a mental shrug and put the car in gear. Steering it around the back corner of the store, she threaded between two parked cars that probably belonged to store employees, jolted over one of those movable concrete forms that had once blocked the end of the parking slot but had now been pushed half out of the way, and plowed across the lot. The ground was uneven, bouncing her around, and the tall weeds whipped against the side of the car. Then there were two hard jolts as she shot over the curb and into the street, the back wheels fish-tailing a little as they tried to grab traction. Then the rubber grabbed the pavement and the car gathered speed, hurtling toward the end of the street two blocks away where, hallelujah, she could see a stop sign and another street.
FROM WHERE HE was parked down the block, facing the store, Simon watched her circle to the back of the building, then cut across the vacant lot in the rear before heading north on the short side street. The truck was in gear, so he briefly checked for on-coming traffic-none-then let off on the brake and pulled away from the curb, executing a U-turn in the street and heading west.
The side street ended after a couple of blocks; she could go either east or west. He bet on west. The closest Federal Reserve bank was in Denver, and she'd be in a hurry to get that two million converted to cash. Not only that, the farther west she went, the emptier the country was, at least until she hit the West Coast. People could and did disappear all the time in the vast emptiness of the region, but they were people who lived outside the system, without bank accounts or cell phones, or even electrical service unless they happened to rig up a generator. He couldn't see Drea living that lifestyle. If possible, she'd go for comfort.
If he miscalculated and she headed east, locating her again might take him a couple of days, but there weren't that many secondary roads out here that she could use. Not that they didn't exist, but they tended to wind around for miles and then just stop, and you had to either backtrack or cut across country, in which case you better know where in hell you were going and have a four-wheel-drive vehicle with heavy-duty suspension. Her middle-aged car wasn't capable of going cross-country, and Drea was too smart to try.
She might deem it worthwhile to ditch the car and get something more durable, though, if she had squeezed out enough cash to give her some reserves. In fact, he'd bet on that. As soon as she got to Denver, where she'd feel safer because she could blend in with the much greater population, she'd change cars.
He had a full tank of gas; he was ready to go in any direction she chose. But how much gas did she have? If she had to fill up, she'd likely stop at the Exxon station on the western edge of town. It wasn't a huge station, but it was at an intersection and had four pumps on each side of the station, so she wouldn't feel hemmed in.