IT WAS THE AFTERNOON, and the sun was beginning to dip to the level of the horizon. Frank pressed down heavily on the accelerator, gunning the car smoothly along the highway. Just a few more miles, he thought. Just a few more miles and he’d be home, if you could call an empty room in a run-down hotel home. Just a few more miles and he could take a hot bath and drink himself to sleep.
Then he saw the girl. At first glance he took her for just another hitchhiker, and speeded up to pass her by. Then his eyes took in the long hair and the swell of the breasts, and his foot found the brake pedal and slowed the car to a stop. He reached across the front seat and opened the door.
“Hop in,” he said.
She climbed into the car and sat down beside him. He took a good look then, and he liked what he saw.
She was wearing a pair of faded blue dungarees and a man’s shirt, open at the throat, but even the shapeless clothing couldn’t conceal the shapeliness of her figure. Her breasts were large and full, and they pressed against the flannel fabric of the shirt. Her hair was long and jet black; her face very attractive, with high cheekbones and large brown eyes. As he looked at her, Frank felt the blood surging through his veins. He’d been a long time without a woman.
“Going to Milford?” she asked, naming a town a few miles the other side of Frank’s destination.
“Sure,” he said. She leaned back in the seat and closed the door, setting her small black purse on her lap.
He put the car in gear and eased back onto the highway again, watching her out of the corner of his eye. Pretty, he thought. Almost beautiful. And so very young, too—she couldn’t be over nineteen.
“Been waiting long?” he asked.
“Not too long. About fifteen minutes or so.”
“Funny how some guys won’t stop for a person, isn’t it?”
“Yes,” she said. “They read about people getting robbed and all, and they just drive on by.”
He stole another glance at her. It took a lot for a girl to look like that in men’s clothes. He pictured her in a dress, in a bathing suit, and finally in nothing at all. He turned his eyes back to the road as the perspiration began to form on his forehead.
If only he could have a girl like that! Then he wouldn’t mind those damned trips all over the country, not if he had something like that back at his room, waiting for him to come home. But he couldn’t have luck like that, not him. He never had.
He was forty-one, and his hair was starting to go. Slowly but surely, his life was slipping by, without anything real or important ever happening to him. The only love he ever had he bought for three dollars in a little room over Randy’s Bar. And he knew that he would go on like that, coming home every night to an empty room and passing three dollars to a prostitute every Saturday. And someday he would die without ever doing anything.
“Mind if I smoke?” Her voice broke into his reverie and stopped his train of thought.
“Go right ahead,” he said. He took a lighter from his pants pocket and turned toward her, offering her the flame.
She leaned forward to take the light. The shirt fell away from the front of her body, and Frank got a quick glimpse of smooth white skin and rounded flesh.
Again the desire surged through him. He replaced the lighter in his pocket and gripped the wheel as tight as he could in his large hands. He was breathing fast, almost panting.
“Thanks,” she said, softly.
The sun dipped lower, and he passed a sign which indicated that his town was only two miles further on down the road. Just two more miles, then three or four to Milford, and she would be gone from his life. She would leave, and he would be left with her memory and nothing more.
He looked at her again. She seemed so soft, so warm and peaceful. She yawned and stretched her lush body before him. And then he decided that he was going to have her.
The decision came in a flash. He couldn’t let his whole life disappear without doing something about it. He would take her, swiftly and violently; and the freshness of her would let him live again like a full man.
The realization of what he was going to do calmed him. At the same time, he was tense with anticipation. He could practically feel the soft pressure of her body against his, could picture her nude in his arms.
“Just a few more miles,” she said.
“Won’t be long now.” He turned and smiled at her.
“I really appreciate this. It’d be terrible out on the road at night.”
I’m glad you appreciate it, he thought. You’ll get a chance to show just how grateful you are. A good chance.
He didn’t really want to hurt her. He glanced over at her again. Hell, he thought, she was no virgin. It wasn’t as though he were taking something away from her. She might even like it. He chuckled inwardly, remembering the old saying, “If rape is inevitable, lie back and enjoy it.”
Well, it was inevitable. He was going to take her, and nothing was going to stop him. He wouldn’t hurt her anymore than he had to, of course. Maybe she would tell the police, but he was willing to take the chance. He couldn’t stop himself now, even if he wanted to.
Besides, there was little chance that she would tell. He had read somewhere that ninety percent of the rape cases were never reported, because the girls involved were ashamed of it. And he could always say that she let him—no one could prove otherwise.
“It’s a nice day,” he said.
“Very nice.”
He spotted a turnoff, a rutted, two-lane road that went nowhere and was rarely used by anyone. He slowed down the car and cut over onto it.
“Where are we going?” she asked. There was a touch of alarm in her voice.
“A shortcut,” he replied.
“I never went this way before.”
“It cuts out Herkinsburg. Not many people know about it.”
He was amazed to hear himself lie so easily. He had always had difficulty in lying, but now he was so set on his goal that the words came from his lips with no trouble at all. Evidently she believed him, for she relaxed in the seat.
After a few hundred yards on the turnoff, he cut the motor and pulled the car over to the shoulder of the road. It was time, now. No one would disturb them.
“Why are we stopping?” There was panic in her voice now, as she sat up rigidly and gripped the black purse tight in both hands.
He didn’t answer. His right hand encircled both her wrists in a tight grip; his left shoved the car door open. Then he forced her out of the car. The purse flew from her hands as he sent her sprawling to the ground and flung himself upon her.
“No!” she pleaded. “Don’t!” His face was so close to hers that he could feel her breath against his cheek, just as he could feel the warmth of her body through the thin shirt.
“You can’t stop me,” he said. “No one’ll hear you if you scream.” He smiled. “You might as well lie back and enjoy it.”
At last it was over. The girl remained motionless.
“There,” he said. “That wasn’t so bad, was it?”
She didn’t answer. He walked slowly back to the car, taking deep breaths of air and savoring the taste of it in his lungs.
He had one hand on the door handle when he heard her say, “Stop!” There was something in her voice that compelled him to release the door handle and turn around.
She was holding the small black purse in one hand and a small black automatic in the other. The gun was trained on him.
“You bastard,” she said. “I was just going to take your car, I would even have left you a little money to get home on, but not now.”
His mouth dropped open in shock. “Wait,” he stammered. “Wait a minute.”
“You can’t stop me,” she said, levelly. “I’m going to kill you. You might as well lie back and enjoy it.”
The bullet made a small, round hole in his stomach. He fell on the ground and lay there moaning while she straightened her clothes and took the wallet and keys from his pockets. He watched her get into the car, blow him a kiss, and drive away down the road.
It took him twenty minutes to die.