There are no answers I can offer; not without making things worse than they are right now, and that's saying something, given that he's standing over his own corpse and I'm waiting for the bogeyman to descend. I close the last few feet between us, reaching for his hand. "Please, Chris. We don't have time."
"I don't know, Rosie my girl," says the voice behind me. It's cool and crisp, California accent painted over something sweeter and slower, something out of the deep Southern states, where the nights are long and wise men know the cost of a crossroads bargain. Maybe if he'd stayed at home, he would have known better. Maybe. "There's a case to be made for your having run shy of time some sixty years gone. Can't say I think much of granting you time on top of that just because you got all dressed up for me."
The graveyard chill that sleeps inside me when I cast my coats aside melts away, replaced by a tight, hot ball of fear. I take one more half-step forward, until I'm almost touching Chris, and whisper, "Stay behind me. If you value your soul, stay behind me."
Chris doesn't say a word, nothing but terror in his eyes. I don't care. Let him be afraid of Bobby; let him be afraid of me. I have other matters to worry myself about. So I turn, squaring my shoulders.
"Hello, Bobby," I say.
And Bobby Cross--Diamond Bobby, Hollywood legend, gone but never, never forgotten--smiles.
***
This is Bobby Cross, has been Bobby Cross since that night in 1941 when he drove out of the daylight and into the dark:
Short by today's standards, five foot eight and compact. A dragster's build, the kind of man who makes hearts melt and panties dampen. Dark hair. He used to wear it sleeked and slicked and shaped to within an inch of its life, but not anymore; unlike the ghosts he leaves in his wake, Bobby is among the living, and still allowed to change. Now it hangs loose and careless, that tousled style that's so popular with the kids I see at the races, or lounging on the beaches. He looks as young as they do, as effortlessly carefree and strong, and it's been long enough since his day that he doesn't even get the "hey, aren't you...?" reactions anymore.
It's his eyes that give him away. They aren't remarkable. They're pale brown--plain, even--but something about them makes people take a step back and give him a wide berth. The living aren't meant to see the things he's seen, or ride the roads he's ridden.
The smile that slides across his lips doesn't reach those eyes as he looks me up and down, and offers a cool, "Same old Rosie. You trying to play the hero on me? You should know better. All those years of running away, you're going to make your stand here and now?"
"Got a better idea?" Chris's hand is on my shoulder, and oh, I just met him, and oh, it doesn't matter; he's every driver I couldn't save, and if I don't at least try, I may as well give in right now. "Why did you do this? These people didn't hurt you."
"Why do you take rides when people offer them to you? Why do you take their coats, drink their coffee, suck their cocks?" Bobby's smirk is painful to behold. "We're not so different, Rosie girl, except that I admit what I am--and you, I'm afraid, are about at the end of this road."
"Let them go." I take a step forward, watching Bobby all the while. I'm faster than he is. He's got powers I don't understand and weapons I can't touch, but I'm faster. If I can get the ghosts out of here, maybe I can drop into the twilight before he catches hold of me. Maybe. "They're all fresh ghosts. They can't be what you really want. I've got a lot of miles on me."
"What makes you think that makes you worth more, and not less? A lot of things call for virgins in place of whores."
"But the road treasures the things that have travelled the furthest." The thrift store fashion of the routewitches; the battered, duct-taped shoes of the ambulomancers. Distance is just about the only thing that's universally respected on the road.
Bobby's smile this time is slow, dark, and horrifying. Whatever it is he does to the dead, it can't be painless; not if he's looking at me like that. I stand my ground, the tattoo burning hot against my skin. Apple said the tattoo would protect me, that the Ocean Lady was allowing me to take it away because the routewitches feel responsible for Bobby's darkness. I have to believe her. There's no choice; not here, and not now.
"I've been tired of you for decades," he says. "I'll take you and let them go...but not, I think, in the order you're hoping for. First you give yourself to me, and then, once I'm sure you're not going to pull any little hitcher 'tricks,' I'll let them go."
The sky is getting darker. I want nothing more, right now, than I want to run. "Why should I believe you?"