Suki swallowed back a sour taste, sought to guide her thoughts to the bar at Egret Key Marina. She'd always liked the place. Funky, friendly, a locals' retreat the tourists hadn't found. She thought about the thatched roof, the mismatched glasses. A drink, an hour, and then she really had to call this whole thing off. She was pushing her luck. It wasn't worth the way she felt.
Lazslo drove. Egret Key was just a speck of land across a stubby causeway, and she tried hard to keep believing they were really going there. The brutish set of Lazslo's jaw, the hard clench of his hands around the steering wheel, made her fear they weren't. Two hundred yards ahead, a hand-hewn sign, propped crookedly in limestone gravel, pointed out the turn. Suki shut her eyes a moment, prayed that she would feel the car begin to slow and veer. She didn't feel it.
Halfway through the dark and tiny intersection, she said, "You're missing it."
Lazslo didn't turn and didn't touch the brake. His eyes straight forward, he said, "I don't feel like a drink. Let's just go somewhere and talk."
Suki struggled with her voice, tried to keep it normal. She told herself she was from Jersey, she could handle this. "I feel like a drink," she said.
He moved his head just slightly on a neck that seemed mechanical, unoiled. He said, "It's always your way, Suki. Not tonight."
He drove. The road got bumpier and narrower. The mangroves leaned in closer, squeezed down like a funnel. Suki said, "I don't like this, Lazslo."
He didn't answer.
She firmed her voice like she was training a dog. "Take me home."
His lips pulled back for just an instant in a travesty of a smile. "And not talk about Russia?" he said. "About the Russian Mafia that interests you so much?"
"I don't care about that anymore. Let's turn around."
"Don't care?" he said. "After all your hard work pumping me? All your flirting? All your teasing?"
The paved road ended, gave onto a tunneled byway of coral powder and honeycombed gray rocks that crunched beneath the Caddy's tires and clattered against its groaning undercarriage. Looking back, Suki saw rising swirls of dust infernally shot through with a red gleam from the tail- lights. She was wearing sandals. She worked her toes against their insoles, straining for a solid grip. She wondered if she would have to run away, if she would have a chance to.
"Don't care?" Lazslo hammered on. "After all your questions, all your stringing me along? ... Crime excites you, Suki. Are you excited now?"
He drove. The car rocked crazily, nauseously, through holes and over rocks. Suki's mind, cradling its sanity, dosed out fear in increments but still stopped short of believing he would murder her. His object, she imagined, was hideous unwilling sex; his desire had sickened over into monstrous rage, his intention was to force himself on her. She willed her body far away. She thought with pity of her clothes, the soft thin dress with the pattern of apples and pears. Her voice let go at last, became a pinched despairing moan. She said, "For God's sake, Lazslo, turn the car around."
He continued straight ahead. Mangrove leaves threw light back at his distorted face. His eyes flashed a vacant silver, the corners of his mouth were flecked with dried saliva. The car rocked so violently that his foot lurched off the accelerator. At a sudden curve he slowed still more. Suki flicked her door handle and rolled out of the car.
The ground was sharp and hard but she didn't feel the impact, only tasted coral and noticed grit against her cheek.
She clambered to her feet and started running through the dark, back along the dusty road. At the second step she lost a sandal, jagged nubs of limestone bit into her arch. She heard the Caddy crunch to a stop, the clicking open of Lazslo's door. She ran. Crickets were rasping and tiny panes of sky, triangles and diamonds, showed between the mangrove leaves. Her ribs were bruised, her breath came short and cramped.
She heard the steps behind her, pounding, crunching. If the mangroves opened up for her, perhaps there'd be a place to wriggle into, to hide; but they didn't open up, just loomed ragged and impenetrable, scabby trunks clustered close as strands of hair. She ran. She heard his breathing, the wheeze and catch of it. She heard a grunt as he lunged and grabbed her shoulder, his dreaded weight dragging her to the ground.
She pivoted as she fell, went down kicking and clawing. Coral rubble slammed against her back, hammered air out of her lungs, but still she bucked and flailed. Her knee found Lazslo's groin; her fingernails bit into the skin of his cheek, raked down deep and hard. She pummeled his sides and kicked at his ankles, but his thick torso and thighs crushed down, exhausted her.
He leaned and fended until her arms grew rubbery, her legs went numb. Then her body understood that it was over, and she was visited by the mercy that descends on doomed animals when pain and panic are no longer of use, and sad peace rolls back the eyes and stops the flanks from quivering. Her arms came up around her face like palm fronds blown back by the wind, but they offered only faint resistance as Lazslo's hands locked down around her throat.