Read Online After Her by Joyce Maynard - Free Book Online Page B

might see half a dozen people heading up the trail on a Saturday. Or only two.
    There was a parking area a half mile down our street, and a second parking area with a ranger station partway up the mountain, but it was also possible to access the trails—miles of them, going out in all directions—from behind our house. The day after they’d found the body, two officers appeared in the neighborhood, canvassing the residents of our development to ask if anyone had seen a suspicious character two days earlier, heading toward the trails, or away from them. Nobody had anything to offer from the looks of things.
    After that one call he made, following the discovery of the body, in which he’d told us to stay away from the mountain, Patty and I did not hear from our father for many days—and knowing how busy he’d be with the case, and how seldom he called even when he wasn’t busy, we didn’t expect to. From our neighbor Jennifer Pollack, whom we’d run into when she was pushing Karl Jr.’s stroller shortly after the police had questioned her, we learned they appeared to have no description to go on. But a man wandering down from the mountain alone would have stood out, so it was worth asking around.
    It was not lost on Patty and me—in fact, we dwelled on this realization—that we spent more time on the mountain than just about anybody. Maybe the murderer was someone who knew Charlene Gray and had a particular reason to want to harm her, but if this had been a random killing, I pointed out to Patty, we could have been the victims.
    Suppose we’d chosen that day to hike up to the ranger station, or venture into the eucalyptus grove on the mountain not far from our house for a game of Truth or Dare or spies, or to sled down the hillside on a piece of cardboard as we liked to this time of year when the grass got brown and dry enough to slide on. The picture came to me of the two of us, holding hands and running as fast as we could down the steepest part, until one of us tripped and we fell down on top of each other, rolling and laughing. Looking up then, into the face of a man, staring down at us.
    What would we have done if he’d nabbed us? From the jujitsu moves our father had taught us, we knew that a kick in the balls was one sure way to throw off a male attacker, at least momentarily, but very likely he’d recover well enough to carry on with his assault after a few seconds. Unless she could deliver a hard blow to her attacker’s Adam’s apple—not likely in our case—a person would need more than one good kick to stop a murderer.
    We were fast runners—and there were two of us. But suppose he caught up with one. Me, probably, since Patty ran faster?
    â€œI’d throw poison oak leaves on him?” she offered. Patty was fearless about physical challenges, but not always the best problem solver.
    â€œWhen he had me in a headlock, I’d bite him,” I said—a tactic I’d learned from Charlie’s Angels . “You’d come up from behind with a rock and bash him.”
    â€œThen once we had him unconscious we’d run home and call Dad.”
    â€œToo risky. The guy might come to and get away while we were off making the call.”
    â€œI’d keep an eye on him while you were gone,” Patty said. It was like her to disregard any thought of danger in a situation like that.
    â€œWe’d take his clothes first, so he’d be too embarrassed to go anyplace,” I told her, not that being naked ever stopped my sister. “Then we’d tie him up with vines.”
    â€œI wouldn’t want to look at his bare butt,” Patty said. The rest—those even more alarming or more likely comical body parts—was more than she could speak of, though on other occasions (when the object of our curiosity seemed sexy enough) we had been known to contemplate them. Tying up someone like Peter Frampton with