"HEY!" he shouted and jumped back. He glared at the baby. Glossy strings dangled off the kid's chin. Shots grinned at hima"a grin that could only be described as evil The child had scooped some excrement out of the diaper and flung it on Rosser.

Maxine chuckled. "Oh, he's such a li'l devil, ain't he? Always throwin" his p.o.o.p around."

Rosser stood aghast The waste wasn't particularly solid, more like warm chocolate pudding, or mousse. Creamy. Smacking noises caught his attention next. He looked at Shots again and saw his little fingers playing with a few strings. The kid cackled greedily, then pointed a spermy finger at Rosser.

"Ga! Ga-ga!"

I'm... absolutely... mortified, Rosser thought.

Maxine was grinning at him. but it was a lascivious grin if anything. She was tweaking her nipples through her top. "I gotta tell ya somethin', handsome. Suckin' d.i.c.k makes me h.o.r.n.y as a b.i.t.c.h in heat, and after that blow-job, I am ALL fired up fer you. Git them pants back down. I'll get'cha hard again in a jifly, then you's kin f.u.c.k me."

Rosser's shoulders slumped as if his collarbones had turned to rubber. "You're kidding me, right?'

"Does it look like I'm kiddin', cutie? Come on, I'se serious. No charge, neither." She looked at him and licked her lips. She pulled her knees back up, raised her hem, and bared the entire nightmarish mess that was her v.a.g.i.n.a "Come'n get it"

"There is no way. There is no circ.u.mstance that exists on the surface of the earth that could compel me to have s.e.x with you."

She blinked, uncomprehending. "Huh?"

"Let me put it another way, since you clearly don't understand the English language. I would rather die than put my d.i.c.k in you."

Another blink, then the obese face reddened. When she lowered her knees, her big, corn-riddled flipflopped feet smacked the cement. The baby started crying.

"You ain't got no right to be so s.h.i.+tty ta me!" she railed, her voice rising. "I'm a respected woman round these partsa"

Rosser rolled his eyes.

"a"and I won't stand fer bein' treated like that. So you git down on yer knees right now'n f.u.c.k me!"

"That won't be happening," Rosser said nose crinkling at the s.h.i.+t-smell from his s.h.i.+rt.

"That's an impossibility."

"Then gimme more money!" she demanded.

"No. I already gave you money."

"Why you p.r.i.c.k! You a.s.shole!" she began, her face nearly crimson now. The baby was crying in force, in machine-like bursts.

"Who do you think you are!" Maxine continued, "treatin' me like common tramp!" Rosser rolled his eyes.

"Well, I'll show you, I'll show youa""

"Yeah, yeah." Rosser said. She's flaking out. I 'II just leave. It 'II only take me a half hour (o get back to Luntville. He picked up his dollar-store bag, turned to leavea"

"Oh, yeah, I'll fix your wagon, buddy." Now she was on her feet, the baby left to squall on the bench, "You just watch."

She b.u.mbled toward him, flipflops snapping, t.i.ts jumping. At first Rosser thought she was going to a.s.sault him, but instead she edged out of the shelter, maniacal. Rosser just stared at her.

"What are you doing?" he asked.

She stood in the middle of the vacant road, waving at something. That's when Rosser noticed that the vacant road wasn't vacant anymore.

The next bus was coming.

Maxine ludicrously jumped up and down in the road, waving her hands. Each time she landed, her fat jiggled in ripples.

"Help! Help! Hurry!"

Rosser was totally off guard." What-what are you doing?'

"Help! This man molested my L'il baby!"

WHAT! "I didn't do anything of the sort!" Rosser shrieked at her. "You're the one who spit my s.e.m.e.n in his mouth! Stop it!"

"Help! Hurry! Child molesterer! Child molesterer!"

The bus was getting real close, and the driver would have a radio. And call the police, he realized. "Just stop it! Here. here. I'll give you more moneya"

"Fer-GET it, ya p.r.i.c.k. I'm gonna f.u.c.k you up!"

Rosser tried to calm down. If he ran away, it would appear to the driver and pa.s.sengersa"

material witnessesa"that Rosser was guilty. If he stayed and stood his ground to dispute the allegation, he'd be more credible than she, right?

Then he looked at the baby. Shots was sitting back up in the shelter, waving pudgy arms and flinging more excrement But his little fat and thoroughly atrocious face told all.

Cloudy white blobs were still ringing his mouth.

f.u.c.k!

Rosser ran.

The area seemed so wide open but then he noticed a decline off the road. He trotted down.

He dared jerk his gaze behind him and saw the bus had already stopped, the driver and several rather rough-looking pa.s.sengers coming out the door as Maxine wailed, "He molested my baby, my poor li'l Shots, right here in the shelter. I tried to stop him but he said he'd kill mea"

Oh, that's just terrific! Rosser thought.

"Jerked off right in my baby's face, he did!"

"Look at that! d.a.m.n if she ain't right" a pa.s.senger exclaimed. "Poor kid's face is covered with j.i.z.za"

"I'm calling the police," the driver yelled and went back in the bus.

"Ain't gonna be no need fer no police," another, bigger, pa.s.senger a.s.sured, "not if we find this sick f.u.c.ker firsta"

"There! There he is!" Maxine shouted. She pointed right to Rosser, who was in the decline but his head showing. "Get him! Make him pay fer the horrible crime he done to my baby!"

Several figures began to run after him. Rosser hightailed it taster than he ever had in his life.

Lower into the decline, the woods began. He thrashed through brambles, leapt over tree stumps, tore through the forest. Deeper, it occurred to him that he had no idea where he was going, only a general inclination of direction. It also occurred to him, quite quickly, that he was not in the greatest physical condition. His heart hammered, he grew winded, and his knees and ankles began to achea" My G.o.d I've got to rest! a"but a surge of adrenalin dumped into his blood when he heard more thras.h.i.+ng behind him, the rapid footfalls of several men.

"Daggit, Jory. I'se think I see the monster, right down yonder past them trees!"

"Sh.o.r.e's s.h.i.+t do, Judd! We'se'll tune that sick b.a.s.t.a.r.d up real good!"

If those hayseeds catch me, they'll lynch me right here in the woods! Rosser kept running.

The tear through the woods seemed endless. As he progressed he felt more and more lost; he'd deliberately been zigzagging, hoping to lose them. Spider webs stretched across his face, bugs covered him, including ma.s.ses of mosquitoes. At one point he slipped on something and fell flat on his face: a rotten woodchuck. At another point when he thrashed through some vines, a yard-long green snake tell on him. Somehow, though, he managed to fling it off without shrieking. Within these woods, the humidity doubled, sucking sweat out of his skin.

Rosser kept running.

He stopped when it felt as though his heart would pop, leaned behind a tree. He wheezed in deep breaths that simply didn't seem to suffice; for a few seconds he feared he might pa.s.s out from exhaustion. The most dreadful notion told him that he'd soon be able to hear his pursuers, gaining on him, strong, young men, men who weren't winded at all but instead bent on vengeance.

Please, please, G.o.d Don ? let them get me, or if they do, please let it be quicka Hugging the tree, he held his breath.

Listened.

Nothing.

Thank G.o.d...

His pursuers had branched off in the wrong direction. A few shouts in the distance verified the absolving observation: the shouts were getting further and further away, until they disappeared.

Yes, yes. Thank G.o.d.

Finally, luck seemed to be on his side. Another thirty yards through the woods showed him an open field beyond the trees, and the modest valley in which Luntville had been built When he squinted he could even see Mrs. Doberman's rooming house!

Twenly-minute walk and I'm home!

It would be difficult, but he thought he could make it He couldn't stay in town, of course, not with crazy Maxine accusing him of child molestation, but with just a little more luck, he could get in the house, get into his room and retrieve his money, then slip out again and hike to the next town and catch a bus somewhere else.

It was the only plan he had and it didn't sound too bad. Maxine had been the only one to see him, and he hadn't told her his name, nor his address. I'll get my money and run, he reasoned. And I'll NEVER solicit a prost.i.tute again!

He was just about to exit the woods when sharp voices rose. He jumped to the ground behind a fallen log.

The voices blared with rage and urgency. Male voices.

"Kin ya believe the sick s.h.i.+t that people do?'

"Shee-h, brother. A baby, a little baby!"

The voices... were grimly familiar.

The Harkins boys.

The quadruplets...

"Maxine even said he b.u.t.t-f.u.c.ked the baby!"

Rosser nearly p.i.s.sed in his jeans.

"Yeah, boys, he's one sick piece of s.h.i.+t, but if he thinks he's sick .. .we'll show him sick..."

"Yeah, man!"

All Rosser could think after that were two things: A mallet-job...

And a d.i.c.k-swgglin'...

"Bet he went in the woods. Let's go!"

No!

"Naw, why would he do that? Bet he went up the main road, to hitch a ride."

Yes, yes!

"Anybody know what the tucker looks like?"

"Naw, not his face *er nothin'. Shouldn't be hard ta spot though, 'cos Maxine said he was wearin' a b.u.t.ton-down white s.h.i.+rt."

"Come on, yer right. Let's head to the main roada"

Rosser let out the longest sigh of relief when they stomped off. Luck kept blessing him, that or G.o.d. He'd most easily be recognized by his s.h.i.+rt (which still reeked of infant excreta, by the way) but he still had his dollar-store bag, with t-s.h.i.+rts in it.

He changed s.h.i.+rts, waited until the Harkins boys were gone, and crept back to town.

Just act like everything's cool, he thought when he got back to the house. Not enough time had gone by for police to begin canva.s.sing the neighborhood for the "child molester." Rosser did a competent job method-acting once he was back inside. Speaking briefly to other boarders, smiling and nodding, acting as thought nothing were out of the ordinary. No one gave im a second glance.

Once he'd returned to his room, he thought strategically. He'd leave town with a bare minimuma"not that he'd arrived with mucha"but it made the most sense. The money he'd stolen from the company safe and the clothes on his back were all he needed. I'll just go somewhere else, somewhere far from here. Florida, perhaps, or Texas. It wouldn't take long. And I'll wait till dark easier get out of Luntville, lower visibility. Yeah, then hitchhike out and get a bus. He'd simply start again this time having learned his lesson.

He showered and changed, put the money in an innocuous bag, and at about nine p.m., left the room.

Another tenant greeted him as they pa.s.sed on the stairs, an old man. "Night's coolin'

down, ain't it?'

"Yes, sir, it is." Rosser feigned a chuckle. "It's about time, too, hot as it was today."

The old man paused, "Oh yeah, I'se almost fergot Mrs. Doberman was lookin' fer ya"

Rosser almost shuddered. Careful, careful! But he knew he was also p.r.o.ne to overreacting. "Really? I saw her this morning. Any idea what she wants?'

"Naw. She's down in her office right now, though."

"I'll... go see her. Thanks."