Kurt was sitting in the market parking lot as Sarah pulled on her jacket and stepped out into the spitting rain. Her keys jingling in hand, she waved as she headed across the empty lot toward her car and Kurt started up the dented police cruiser. Driving down the deserted highway with the town's only police car behind her, Sarah felt a little silly hunched forward over the steering wheel, her knuckles white as her breath fogged up the inside of the windshield. Nothing was going to happen. That lunatic was miles away.
She slowed as she passed the spot where she had found Harold. A blurry chalk outline and a single piece of crime scene tape fluttering from a post at the side of the road were the only clues to the horror that had occurred just twenty-four hours ago. Had the police found any evidence? After last night's storm, she didn't imagine there was much to find.
About a mile from her driveway, Kurt's red and blue lights flashed on in her rear-view mirror and Sarah's heart nearly stopped. What was wrong? She saw Kurt wave his hand, motioning for her to pull over, and he drew up along side of her sedan. Cold, damp air blew into her face as she rolled down the window.
"I just got a call," Kurt said, leaning into the passenger's seat. "Some kind of trouble at the gas station. Will you be all right if I head back?"
Sarah nodded immediately. "Yeah, it's only a mile." It was silly of him to have followed her all the way out there in the first place. He made a U-turn and headed back, waving to her as he hit the flashing lights and sped away. "It's only a mile," she repeated as she pulled back onto the road, and not even the devil himself was going to stop her from getting home.
Around the very next corner, though, Sarah had to slam on her brakes, her tires squealing across the damp pavement, as that damned red horse darted out of the trees and into the road in front of her. It stopped, blinded by her headlights, and stood pawing at the ground and tossing its head. "You son-of-a-bitch," she gasped, her heart pounding. If she had hit the thing, she would have killed them both.
Turning off her lights, she hit the horn, her eyes straining to see out into the near pitch-black night, hoping to see the horse run back off into the trees. In the silence that followed, her ears still ringing with the echoes of the horn, the hair on the back of her neck stood on end as she realized she was sitting alone in the middle of the road, no more than a mile from where Harold was killed. "To hell with this," she muttered, and turned her lights back on.
The horse blinked at her, his ears pricked forward. Unnerved, Sarah double-checked her door locks and bit the edge of her lip. After a moment, she gripped the steering wheel and lightly stepped on the gas. The engine revved and the car rolled forward, but the horse refused to move. "Get outta the way, get outta the way," she whispered as her bumper pressed against the front legs of the horse.
The car stopped moving. The horse laid back his ears and seemed to glare in at her. Her foot twitched and the car leaped forward. The horse stumbled back, hooves sliding on the pavement, and fell to his knees. Sarah's hands leaped from the steering wheel, covering her mouth as the front of her sedan slammed into the horse's shoulder and knocked him on his side.
"I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry," she said, her stomach churning as the horse screamed and thrashed on the ground, his hooves smashing one headlight and plunging the right side of the car into darkness. Tears streaming down her face, Sarah cranked the wheel and stomped on the accelerator, the car lurching around the crippled animal.
On the other side, Sarah stopped the car and glanced in the mirror, the horse lit by the red tail lights as he struggled to climb to his feet. His front legs had to be broken, his knees shattered. She needed to go home, call the police, get them to come out and put the poor creature out of his misery, but she couldn't tear her eyes off the pitiful sight in the road behind her.
Exhausted, the horse lay still, every now and then raising his head and letting out a thin, frightened whinny. She wanted to do something, to help him, but there was nothing she could do--her cell wouldn't work out there and she didn't carry a gun. "I'm sorry," she said again, lowering her eyes to her purse as she reached for a tissue to dry her eyes. It was an accident. She hadn't meant to hurt him.
With trembling hands, Sarah dried her face and blew her nose. She had to get home; she had to get somebody out here. With one last glance in the rear-view mirror, she lifted her foot from the brake and the road was swallowed by darkness.
"Wait--What the hell?" She braked again, and turned in her seat, staring out the back window at an empty road. The horse was gone. Had he gotten up and limped off somewhere to die? How horrible. Turning back around, she reached up and braced her hands against her steering wheel, taking a deep breath and letting it out slowly.
Something moved outside her driver's side window and her head snapped around, a scream rising in her throat as the red horse stared in the window at her, his nose black as soot, his mane like ebony, and his big, brown eyes fixed on her. He squealed, the sound filling her car and rattling inside her head, and then reared up, his front hooves slamming down on the roof of her car.
The driver's side window exploded as the roof buckled, showering her with squares of safety glass. Sarah screamed and shielded her face with both arms as she planted both feet on the gas pedal and shoved it to the floor. The car roared and leaped forward, tires squealing. Or was it the horse? Sarah grabbed the steering wheel as the car squirreled down the wet road.
She saw the curve, she knew she was going too fast--Sarah hit the brakes--she screamed again as the sedan fishtailed, hit the gravel shoulder and flipped into the ditch.
