At Close Range by Marilyn Tracy Page B

long black skirt, the veiled hair and the ghostly pale face turning to look over her shoulder at the car behind her.
    â€œFor a minute, I thought she was a ghost,” Corriesaid on a breathless little laugh that sounded more a gasp.
    â€œI have to admit, the hair on my neck is still sticking straight out,” Mack said.
    The woman in black, alone on a thirty-mile stretch of empty road, turned away from the car and continued walking toward the ranch. Again, Mack felt a frisson of reaction creeping down his spine. Every childhood ghost story about La Dolorosa’s lonely wanderings flitted through his mind.
    â€œNo,” he said aloud, then felt foolish as Corrie hesitated in inching the Bronco forward. He felt his face flush. “I didn’t mean stop. I just meant she couldn’t be a ghost.”
    â€œYou’re thinking about La Dolorosa, too, aren’t you?”
    He gave a ragged chuckle. “Bingo.”
    She echoed his laugh but with none of her usual abandon. She drove the Bronco forward until they flanked the woman in black. The woman flicked them a glance from beneath her veil and continued walking.
    Corrie nosed the Bronco farther still, pulling to a stop just a few paces ahead of the woman.
    â€œWe have to see what she’s doing way out here,” she said, as if he needed an explanation. “It’s freezing. And supposed to get colder before dawn.”
    Mack lowered his window, glanced at the back seat to make sure Pedro was still sleeping, then called out softly in Spanish, “Are you okay, señora? ”
    The woman approached the window at the same even pace she’d been employing before. As she got closer, Mack again suffered a pang of doubt. Would she prove real?
    Corrie felt shivers of superstition working their way up her spine. A woman walking the ranch road, thirty miles north of Carlsbad, was impossible enough. Dressed all in black on a fitful night in an unseasonably cold spring, the woman sparked a whole universe of fears that had lived deep within the little girl Corrie had once been.
    â€œCan we help you, señora? ” Mack asked.
    The woman shook her head.
    â€œDid your car break down?” It was a patently ridiculous question; they’d have seen such a vehicle.
    The woman shook her head again. Her dark eyes fathomless and unreadable, she looked into the back seat of the Bronco. She stared at the sleeping child beneath the blanket.
    To Mack, her eyes looked hungry.
    â€œDo you need a ride?” Mack offered. Say no, he pleaded silently. Just shake your veiled head and disappear into the night.
    The woman moved to the back door and reached for the handle. Her hands seemed ghostly pale, then, as she extended one, tinged with red in the glow cast by the taillights.
    Corrie couldn’t stop herself from reaching out for Mack’s shoulder. Whether she’d intended to stop him from unlocking the door, or simply for human contact, she didn’t know. All she understood was the need to feel his solid male body.
    Mack threw her a quick glance, then lifted the lock on the rear door, and swung it open. Amber light spilled across the woman’s angular features, softening them as she stared in at the boy snoring softly. In the light, Corrie could see the woman hadn’t been wearinga black funereal veil, but had simply pulled her long woolen shawl up and around her head. She lowered it now, drawing it tightly around her neck, and lifted her long black skirt to step into the car.
    She closed the door after her and stiffly sat back against the seat, apparently careful not to disturb the child beside her.
    Corrie envisioned Jeannie and Leeza mourning at a three-way funeral. Jeannie would ask why their friend would pick up a hitchhiker when she had a little boy in the car. Leeza would shake her head and say the police said they couldn’t find a weapon; they’d all apparently died of fright.
    But the woman staring straight ahead