Chapter IV

It had only been six hours and about 400 miles since Kate had left home, but she made relatively good time.
That is, of course, until she ran out of gas. In her hurry to leave for Lake Charles, Kate failed to remember that gas stations were pretty much useless. She had pushed her Accord to its breaking point, and it had given out on her for good.
“Damn it, Kate!” she yelled out as she struck her fist against the dashboard, which was quickly followed by a sharp jolt of pain. She cried out and looked down at her hand. She’d let her frustration get the better of her again. Already, the knuckles were starting to swell.
“Great, just great,” she thought to herself as she rubbed her stinging hand.
She slumped down into the driver’s seat and stared out the window. More thoughts of suicide slipped through her mind and were quickly replaced by the urge to make contact with Olaf.
She grabbed her purse, took out the page torn from the atlas and began to mark where she was. It didn’t take her long to mark her spot on the map as “lost and fucked.”
Kate got out of the car and looked down the lonely highway. She stretched her arms, walked to the back of the car, popped the trunk and laughed at herself as she looked at the piles of luggage she had stuffed into her tiny vehicle.
“God, I am such a typical woman. Why the hell did I bring all of this? …”
She did a mental inventory of what exactly was in the suitcases and totes. Figuring that she should at least have some clothes on her journey, she pulled out her rolling suitcase and set it next to the car. She glanced at where it had been: lying next to her makeup bag. Another laugh escaped her. She really didn’t have a good reason as to why, but she shoved the bag into a nearby tote that was filled with food.
“At least I’ll look good for old Olaf,” she thought as she chuckled to herself.
At this, she paused and truly contemplated the seriousness of the “…if you were the last man on Earth” statement. God, she thought, I hope it doesn’t come down to that.
Kate knew what she was going to have to do. But she was exhausted, and - for now - she wasn’t going anywhere. She would spend the night in the Accord, and tomorrow, she’d resume her journey - on foot.
Thirteen hours later, road weary and drained from carrying so much for so many miles, or so she thought, Kate was praying that she would find some type of vehicle that might still be functional. She’d passed only two cars since she had to leave her car behind. Both were in some state of disarray: one with two flat tires and the other without gas. As she approached the next vehicle on her way, she had given up hope for something that would work in her favor. She actually started wondering just what would be in store for her this time.
The steering wheel is probably missing, or some other crap like that, she thought.
As she approached the vehicle, a Honda Civic, the first thing she noticed was the smell of rancid meat. She kept going forward, very cautiously, she noticed bloodied hand prints on the inside of the back window.
Kate stopped cold in her tracks. She’d seen this before, many times, in fact. She was a crime reporter, and her work had been her life. There was no scene she wouldn't visit, no cop she wouldn't sass. Most times, she could get close enough - be it by hard-nosed insistence or fluttering eyelashes - to get what she needed for her stories. Kate had always felt that the social obligation of the media was to deliver the truth, and if the truth was gruesome, so be it.
Truth was her job. She'd been damn good at it.
This time, though, the situation was different. It was here, now and right in her face. It was mocking her for being able to write with a steady hand a closed heart when it involved someone else but being so frightened that she wasn't even able to scream when she was actually involved. After a moment that seemed like time had perpetually stopped, everything rushed in at her in full speed to make up for the delay. All the thoughts that were in her head tore to the surface like a tsunami, when a second ago they were but a slow drip.
She let go and screamed for all she was worth.
But, yet, she still couldn’t move, she couldn’t bear to take her eyes away from the horrible imagery. Slowly, very slowly, Kate started walking to the door, afraid to open it and just as scared to leave it there. She stopped again before she reached to point of no return: the point in which she would actually be able to see what lies in the vehicle.
She collected herself and thought about how many different murder scenes she’d been at; and how often she had been at the morgue after the police made her leave, looking at the bodies and talking to the coroner about the cause of death.
She forced herself to forget that each of those times officers had been present. Even though they had usually been uncooperative assholes, their presence always lended an air of calm and protection - something Kate desperately needed.
Steeling herself, she took another step, looked inside the window and shuddered.
Inside the car was a young girl, maybe no more than fifteen. She was completely nude and bruised all over, especially around her pelvic bone and chest, and her face was so black and blue that the features appeared to collide. Nevertheless, Kate's experience in dealing with corpses led her to believe that this girl was once beautiful. And also due to her expertise in situations of this sort, she knew that this was a murder-rape.
Kate fell to her knees because she could not hold herself up any more, but she was glad of the fact because it took away the horrible imagine inside the car. She let the tears of frustration and fear come to her. This girl was the only other person she'd seen in the flesh in days, and she was dead.
Then, a thought struck her, a curious one that came unbidden: She remembered a time when she was covering a story similar to this; another murder-rape of a juvenile. She had spoken with a psychiatrist about the behavior patterns of pedophiles, rapist, and murders, and there was one thing from that conversation that vividly stuck out in her mind.
“The person in question rarely leaves the scene of the crime for too long, especially if they feel they have no fear in returning,” the shrink had told her.
Kate bolted up, and looked around nervously. It hit her just then that it was past dusk and there was very little time left with the progressively more precious sunlight. She hadn't realized how long she'd been there, but she knew that it'd been too long. She started to gather up her things then and began walking hurriedly in the opposite direction from where she had come. She needed to find shelter of some sort, and she needed to find it fast.
Harry Long watched her walk away from his art. With a content smirk, he decided to hang back far enough that, with the dim light, she wouldn’t be able to see him. He preferred his women to be sixteen and younger, but with the apparent lack of choice that had just recently taken place, he thought that he could make an exception at least once. He too, made his way easy on Interstate 10.