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PROCEED
WITH
CAUTION
Chapter One
4:00 am
A storm was coming. Dark, menacing clouds were hanging above the desert plains, like a group of vultures hovering over a dying animal. Unlike those scavengers, the clouds did not foretell death to the life down below, but they were certainly the bearers of bad news. Distant, faint light illuminated the sky as the finger of God reached down from the heavens to pierce the earth below. The fierce weather was coming in from California, having traveled all the way from the coast to unleash its fury on the gambling tourists of Las Vegas.
A highway, nearly desolate in the early hours, stretched along in between the rocky hills and dry landscape of Nevada. Few cars were traveling on it, due in part to the wintry weather and the fact that dawn was still two hours away. Those that were brave enough to face the thundering skies and wet roads were scattered about, miles apart from each other and all the more comfortable for it. A white Firebird bolted along the road, perhaps a little too fast for the current conditions, but determined nonetheless. Its inhabitants were racing against time, in more ways than one.
“I don’t think you should be going this fast,” the passenger commented with a hint of nervousness in his voice.
“Relax,” the driver insisted, “I grew up in London, remember? I think I know how to drive in the rain. Besides, the storm isn’t even here yet.”
“Yeah well, that’s what worries me, actually. Being driven around by someone that learned how to drive on the wrong side of the road, and the car might I add. Look, there’s even snow on the roadside, meaning the roads are becoming icy. If you don’t drive more careful, we’re going to slide,” the passenger said.
“I’m not even going to debate the rules of driving with you,” the driver argued, looking at him with an annoyed expression. “Just look at the damn map and tell me where we’re going.”
“We’re heading south on the 15 and we’re being hunted,” the passenger said, not bothering with the map, folding his arms over his chest. “Not to mention the fact that we’re heading into a storm that looks to be the size of Texas and we have no chains. Does that calm your nerves any?”
“You’re not scared, are you Alex?” the driver asked tauntingly with a mischievous smile. “Fear is a luxury you should’ve left behind, my friend.”
He accelerated and the Firebird raced on toward the approaching storm. Alex, the passenger, searched the side mirror for any sign of a following vehicle and could find none. No cops, no badly camouflaged government vehicle, no company were in sight. The back of their trail was even darker than the road ahead, the lights of Vegas fading fast behind them. He thought he would find peace in this discovery, but alas, he found only despair. While Raine preferred the solitude and reveled in the darkness, Alex only felt doomed by it. The vast emptiness of the landscape filled him with a greater fear than any prison could. At least in jail you are not alone, like they were out here. In jail, you could fight your enemies. Out here, your enemy was Mother Nature. Alex was old enough to know that he was no match for that threat. If his partner could see his eyes right now, he knew the gloom in them would be overwhelming. However, Alex kept his eyes turned away, staring out of his window at the rolling hills in the distance. Cold, lifeless, rolling hills were all he could see.
“Come on, Chrissy,” Lisa said, as though her friend could hear her. “When I say four o’clock, I mean four o’clock.”
Glancing around the dark street, she didn’t give much thought as to whether or not she was being a nuisance to the neighbors. She was currently more interested in the sky. The storm had not reached them yet, but it was on its way. She had made sure to listen to the weather report as she had dressed that morning. The news had not been that good, but she had decided not to cancel the trip despite the warnings. Apparently, the forecast was predicting a big drop in temperature and more rain than Vegas had seen in the last two years. There was even chance of snow. Lisa knew that if they were predicting that for Vegas, then their path to California would be just as bad, if not worse. Driving through rain was not that difficult, it was the snow that could present the problem. She didn’t have much experience with the ice. That was why she thought she’d leave the driving to Chrissy if they came upon it. She beeped the horn again and decided to wait for a reaction from her friend.
Within minutes, the front screen door of the house opened and a petite, blonde wearing a heavy windbreaker emerged carrying a purse and bottled water. She walked with her head down, no doubt shielding her face from the freezing wind. Lisa unlocked the doors as Chrissy opened the passenger side to throw in her coat. She then wordlessly dropped her items on the front seat before returning to the house for the rest of her stuff. Lisa, anxious to get on the road, popped the trunk for her friend and played with the radio until Chrissy could join her.
Raine knew the conditions they were in were far from extreme, but he suspected that the weather would take a more radical turn soon enough. He would just cross that bridge when he came to it. There was no use fretting over his choice of transportation now. He would just have to be resourceful, to which he was accustomed. Resourcefulness was something he prided himself on. He had learned to use what he could get and never look back with regret or focus on what might have been. Just look to the future, discard the past. He was the type of man that never had a second thought about anything. Unlike Alex, he’d never wished his life had turned out different.
“Does nothing work in this piece of junk?” Alex fretted as he furrowed his brows, pointing at the faulty dial.
“The radio does,” Raine answered with feigned cheer in his voice. He switched it on, only to have Alex switch it off instantly.
“I don’t want to listen to the radio. I don’t want to hear all the news alerts about us and the warnings to travelers about weather conditions,” Alex fumed with apparent anxiety.
“You should be thankful,” Raine started before being interrupted.
“Thankful?” Alex cut in. “Thankful that we are driving a stolen car? Thankful that people are dead because of us? Is that what I’m supposed to be thankful for? Jesus, Raine, how the hell did we get into this fucked up mess?”
“First of all, Alex, if I hadn’t stolen the car, you’d be sitting back there in Vegas behind bars with a bunch of drunk yanks crawlin’ up your ass. Be thankful I didn’t leave you there. Second, yes, people are dead. Accept it and move on. It happens everyday. It’s kill or be killed, Alex. If that wannabe cop hadn’t pulled his piece out on me, I wouldn’t have shot him. He’d still be alive. He made a choice to play hero and he lost. What was I supposed to do, let the trigger-happy bastard take you down and fire one off an inch from my head? I wasn’t gonna go out like that. Not if I can help it. If I see a shot, I take it. You’re problem is, you analyze everything to death. Stop trying to figure out why the sky is blue or why we’re traveling in this car, on this road and maybe you’ll be more content, because you’re beginning to drive me crazy.”
“Well, we can’t all be like you, Raine,” Alex said, contemptuously. “Besides, I know full well that you’re not as content as you’d like to think. You’re slinking through life in a poorly masqueraded fashion, hypocrite.”
“Thanks for the analysis, doctor,” Raine returned with as much sarcasm as he could manage. “Will you be doing a full book tour and lecture after you write your bestseller about the brilliant psychology of criminal minds?”
“Shut up,” Alex demanded, seemingly frustrated by the whole conversation.
The drizzle began to intensify and soon the rain was pouring down in large drops, pounding the car with the intent to drench everything in sight. Raine turned the wipers on full speed, but it didn’t help much. He was forced to slow the car down from eighty miles per hour to forty-five, and turned on the bright lights. He cursed the weather, knowing that soon the storm would force them into a crawl. A flash of lightning came from the right, and lit up the road for about three seconds. Then, everything went dark again. The thunder roared overhead in a deep growl as the winds kicked up.
Raine drove, intently watching the road for any surprises. From what he could see, which was not much since the windows were beginning to fog, the road led on in a straight pattern. That was good enough for him. He did not want to deal with any twisty roads. Moreover, he was grateful Alex had stopped whining. However, his peace did not last long.
“So, what exactly is the plan?” Alex asked.
“First, we’re going to get through this damn storm. Then we’re going to make our way to California to catch a plane and get out of dodge before the alert reaches the coast,” Raine explained.
“Don’t you think we should ditch this car soon?” Alex inquired.
“No, there’s no need, really. I don’t think it will be reported stolen anytime soon,” Raine said as he drove, ignoring Alex’s next inquiry.
“Why not? The guy you took it from is going to wake up in a couple of hours to find his car gone. If there are any witnesses, they’re gonna tell the police and they’ll put two and two together. They’re stupid, but not that stupid.”
“You still have no confidence in me, do you?” Raine sighed. “There were no witnesses around, I checked. I am able to steal a car quietly, Alex. The guy who owned it will not be getting up in a couple hours. With any luck, no one will miss him for a day or so. That gives us enough time.”
“Did you…did you kill him?” Alex asked quickly. He sounded fully alert now and more than a little alarmed.
Raine said nothing, but shifted gears. When he had stolen the car, he had not even spotted the owner. He had caused nobody harm during the theft and had hotwired it without much trouble. It had been too late, or too early, for anyone to be outside of the residences at that point, so he had been alone. He decided not to tell Alex all of the details and let him think what he wanted, since his partner was gullible at times. He saw it as a source of entertainment when Alex got all riled up about things. He decided to have fun with it. Alex apparently thought he had killed the owner of the car for he was sitting there with his head in his hands. After a few seconds, he looked up at Raine with bewilderment.
“How can you be so nonchalant about it?”
“About what?” Raine asked, acting dumb.
“About murdering someone! ‘Oh, I killed him, no big deal. Just couldn’t leave any loose ends behind’,” Alex mocked. “Is there nothing in you that says maybe there’s a different way to do things? Maybe killing everyone we come across isn’t the right thing.”
“Don’t act innocent, Alex. Let us not forget who started this little fiasco,” Raine turned his head to look at Alex. “Let us not forget whose idea it was to take down that bank in Phoenix.”
“Shut up,” Alex’s eyes blazed with anger. “Don’t you bring all that up now. That was years ago, Raine.”
“Back then, when we pulled off that job and you got away clean with the money, and no one got hurt, then it was alright, wasn’t it?” Raine accused. “When you didn’t get your hands dirty, you’d take money from anyone. What’s more is you liked it. It gave you a high, didn’t it? An adrenaline rush that you needed so badly that you couldn’t get from your precious smack. After awhile, you missed that, didn’t you? You wanted the power trip back. The feeling that you could walk into any store, bank, home and take whatever you wanted, with nobody standing in your way. This time, though, someone stepped in and tried to stop you. What did you do? You stood there, like a wimpy-ass kid ready to piss his pants at the sight of the neighborhood bully. You didn’t do anything. You chickened out, Alex. I saved your ass. Don’t you ever forget that. You’d be dead, most likely, if it weren’t for me. So, next time you question my motives, think back, and remember…”
Alex was not listening though. In the last moments, he had glanced at the road ahead. Another flash of light had brightened the path.
“Raine, the road!” he pointed frantically in front of him.
Raine’s head whipped around, but a few seconds too late. Twenty feet ahead, the road curved sharply to the right, and despite Raine’s quick reflexes to turn the car along the winding road, it was not quick enough. The left tires caught a patch of ice on the roadside, and since Raine had hit the brakes to try to make the turn, it sent the car out of control. The rear side careened off the side of a small rocky hill and the car spun into the slushy patch of land between the north and south highways. Running over small bushes as the tires slipped in the mud and snow, the car finally came to rest after smashing into the steel divider near the northbound side of the highway.
