Page 17 of Montana Delta Rescue
They rode in silence, Marilyn mulling over how someone had cut her break line while she was in the gas station.
Had no one seen him cut her brakes? Maybe the police would find someone who had seen him.
Despite what the policeman had said, she hoped they would catch him.
After the taxi pulled into the truck stop, Marilyn paid the taxi driver. She had just taken her bags into her hands when a dark sedan pulled in on the other side of the parking lot.
She tried not to look at the car but knew a man got out and lit a cigarette. He leaned against the car, smoking, anonymous behind his sunglasses.
Marilyn went inside and headed to the ladies room hoping that when she came out, the sedan would have gone on.
But when she left the ladies room and went over to the restaurant, she saw through the outside window that the sedan hadn’t left. The car was parked a little way off in a direction where the man inside could sit and watch the front of the building.
Damn. Is he watching and waiting for me to come out?
She turned away from the window and ordered a salad with grilled chicken strips and a lemonade though she had little appetite with him sitting out there watching.
Still, she needed to eat something. Toast and honey for breakfast hadn’t lasted long and her stomach had been growling in the taxi.
After she got her food, she sat at a table where she could watch out the window.
Two can play this watching game. Do the cloak and dagger thing. If that guy stays out there the whole time watching, then I’ll know this is serious.
She wanted to wish him away, to wish everything about the last two days away, to make everything right in her world again.
Halfway through her meal, the man was still at his car, watching.
The whole thing felt surreal. Instead of acting in a suspense movie, she was living in a real-life suspense. One that could get her killed.
Not tasting her food, she just took one bite after another, chewing and then swallowing. The tart lemonade helped her get the food down and was the only thing she really tasted.
She couldn’t take her mind off of what was happening to her since seeing Tony and Cleo kill that man.
It’s really happening. Tony put a tail on me.
A trucker sat one table over using his phone. She overheard part of his conversation. “I’ve got the air compressor and two tires in the back of my truck. I’ll stop again near Eagle Rock and then it’s about an hour more from there.”
He said Eagle Rock. She sat up a little straighter.That would beEagle Rock, Montana. At the foot of the Crazy Mountains. That’s where I need to go. If I can just make it to Sadie and Hanks place . . .
Marilyn glanced over at him.
I wonder what he’s driving.
She hurried to finish her salad and was done before the trucker left. She walked out the front door and then stopped, snapped her fingers and with a forgot something look and behavior, went back inside. She hoped the man watching bought her little performance.
If he kept watching the front door for her to emerge again, he would miss her going out the back. She’d seen the trick done in a movie once, by the lead actor. In the movie, it had worked.
In the store, Marilyn grabbed a pink hooded sweatshirt, which said ‘Montana’ in white lettering, off the rack and then grabbed a pale blue ball cap that said ‘Country Girl’ in silver rhinestones.
The farthest thing from what she was, having been raised in L.A. by a single mother who worked as a seamstress for the movie studios in Hollywood.
She bought the items and then went into the restroom to change clothes, hurrying to be done before the trucker finished eating. She pulled off her white blouse with thin blue stripes, rolled it up and stuck it in the trash. Then she pulled the sweatshirt on.
The hooded sweatshirt was too warm inside the store but would be better in the night air once she was outside. Once on, it was soft and comforting.
Looking into the mirror, she tried stuffing her blonde hair under the cap, but she had too much hair to stuff it all under. So, she settled for covering as much of her hair as she could. Sunglasses would hide her green eyes. She put her sunglasses on and then left the ladies room.
Moving through the store again, she spotted the truck driver in line with a candy bar.
