two A.M., then moved the celebration to the clubhouse for the rest of the night.
Chapter 5
It had been three hours since he'd picked her up along the interstate, forty miles outside of Phoenix. She hadn't spoken a word, then or now. The white lines of the road held her with a hypnotic effect. Ed Mulligan, an independent trucker since '68, could stand it no longer.
"Do you talk, kid?" he asked.
"Sure I talk. What do you want to talk about?"
"How about the usual bullcrap? Where are you from? Where are you going? Some simple conversation, for crissake. We still got six hours before we get to Brawley. It would go a lot quicker if you'd lighten up a little, sweetheart. You said your name was Christy, right?"
The girl sighed.
"Right. I'm from Phoenix. I just got out of the Saint Agnes Home for children. I have no idea where my parents are and they don't give a fuck about me anyway. I'm going to California to get a job and enjoy myself for a while. You know—sun, fun, all that good shit. Okay?"
The tone of her voice sent a clear message: Leave me alone. Mulligan decided not to push it. The pretty, mysterious teenager could remain in her private world.
Christine Glidden, seventeen years old, born in Phoenix. She was the younger of two girls. She still remembered that day when she was eight years old. The screams. Her sister lying dead in the driveway, crushed by the wheels of her mother's car. Her mother being restrained and taken to the mental hospital. It was more like a dream now than a real memory. The months of being tossed around between relatives while her mother recovered and her father struggled to make a living as a bus mechanic.
She pulled an old photo from the pocket of her denim jacket, then quickly returned it. She massaged her temples as she thought of the day her parents had left her at Saint Agnes'. It had been a cloudy morning, just two days short of her ninth birthday. "I'm sorry, darling," her weeping mother had said. "Seeing you every day, I can't get over what happened to Laura. It won't be long."
She spent the next eight years yearning for a family, never understanding why her mommy and daddy had left her. Never understanding why they never came back.
Mulligan pulled into a truck stop twenty miles outside of Brawley. It was a mecca for drivers taking southwestern routes into California. A gas station, diner, and tavern, it was the most popular trucker's spot in Southern California. The Henchmen-owned establishment also catered to the honest trucker's need for a little boost to help him drive through the night. And it catered to the dishonest trucker's need to dump a load of hot TV's or stereos.
"Wait here," Mulligan ordered the teenager.
"Hey, where you going, man?" she asked.
"I have to talk to a couple of people inside. You just sit tight. Here, light up." He handed her a joint and a book of matches.
"Shit, man, you should have told me earlier you had smoke. Thanks."
Mulligan smiled as he shut the door to the cab. Once inside the bar he ordered a beer for table number six.
"Sure thing," said the bartender, as he wrote a note on a small tablet and placed the sheet of paper on the waitress's tray. "There's two ahead of you."
"This one's too hot to wait," said Mulligan.
"I'll see what I can do."
Victor "Crazy" Crawford and Henry "Savage" Rivers were sitting at the rear table with a trucker from Wisconsin. The trucker rose abruptly and left with his two hundred dollars of methamphetamine as the waitress handed the note to Savage.
"It better be worth it," said Savage. "Tell him to come over."
The waitress waved him over and Mulligan sat down with the expressionless bikers.
"What you got?" asked Crazy. The clean-shaven biker had piercing green eyes that looked deep into Mulligan's. It was like looking into the eyes of Lucifer.
"I got a sweet young thing sitting in my rig. She can't be no more'n seventeen or eighteen. I told her I could take her as far as Brawley.
Chapter 5
It had been three hours since he'd picked her up along the interstate, forty miles outside of Phoenix. She hadn't spoken a word, then or now. The white lines of the road held her with a hypnotic effect. Ed Mulligan, an independent trucker since '68, could stand it no longer.
"Do you talk, kid?" he asked.
"Sure I talk. What do you want to talk about?"
"How about the usual bullcrap? Where are you from? Where are you going? Some simple conversation, for crissake. We still got six hours before we get to Brawley. It would go a lot quicker if you'd lighten up a little, sweetheart. You said your name was Christy, right?"
The girl sighed.
"Right. I'm from Phoenix. I just got out of the Saint Agnes Home for children. I have no idea where my parents are and they don't give a fuck about me anyway. I'm going to California to get a job and enjoy myself for a while. You know—sun, fun, all that good shit. Okay?"
The tone of her voice sent a clear message: Leave me alone. Mulligan decided not to push it. The pretty, mysterious teenager could remain in her private world.
Christine Glidden, seventeen years old, born in Phoenix. She was the younger of two girls. She still remembered that day when she was eight years old. The screams. Her sister lying dead in the driveway, crushed by the wheels of her mother's car. Her mother being restrained and taken to the mental hospital. It was more like a dream now than a real memory. The months of being tossed around between relatives while her mother recovered and her father struggled to make a living as a bus mechanic.
She pulled an old photo from the pocket of her denim jacket, then quickly returned it. She massaged her temples as she thought of the day her parents had left her at Saint Agnes'. It had been a cloudy morning, just two days short of her ninth birthday. "I'm sorry, darling," her weeping mother had said. "Seeing you every day, I can't get over what happened to Laura. It won't be long."
She spent the next eight years yearning for a family, never understanding why her mommy and daddy had left her. Never understanding why they never came back.
Mulligan pulled into a truck stop twenty miles outside of Brawley. It was a mecca for drivers taking southwestern routes into California. A gas station, diner, and tavern, it was the most popular trucker's spot in Southern California. The Henchmen-owned establishment also catered to the honest trucker's need for a little boost to help him drive through the night. And it catered to the dishonest trucker's need to dump a load of hot TV's or stereos.
"Wait here," Mulligan ordered the teenager.
"Hey, where you going, man?" she asked.
"I have to talk to a couple of people inside. You just sit tight. Here, light up." He handed her a joint and a book of matches.
"Shit, man, you should have told me earlier you had smoke. Thanks."
Mulligan smiled as he shut the door to the cab. Once inside the bar he ordered a beer for table number six.
"Sure thing," said the bartender, as he wrote a note on a small tablet and placed the sheet of paper on the waitress's tray. "There's two ahead of you."
"This one's too hot to wait," said Mulligan.
"I'll see what I can do."
Victor "Crazy" Crawford and Henry "Savage" Rivers were sitting at the rear table with a trucker from Wisconsin. The trucker rose abruptly and left with his two hundred dollars of methamphetamine as the waitress handed the note to Savage.
"It better be worth it," said Savage. "Tell him to come over."
The waitress waved him over and Mulligan sat down with the expressionless bikers.
"What you got?" asked Crazy. The clean-shaven biker had piercing green eyes that looked deep into Mulligan's. It was like looking into the eyes of Lucifer.
"I got a sweet young thing sitting in my rig. She can't be no more'n seventeen or eighteen. I told her I could take her as far as Brawley.
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