Very gently, she ran her fingers down his tie before pulling him closer. ‘It’s a pity you’re not looking for a party girl,’ she whispered into his left ear.

Carl’s smile evaporated into a confused look.

‘I could’ve given you my pimp’s number, he’s right over there.’ She pointed to the VIP area with a sarcastic smile on her lips.

Carl half opened his mouth as if about to say something but no words came out.

Jenny drank the rest of her champagne and gave him a sexy wink before moving away from the bar and into the ladies’ room.

The eyes still followed her.

It won’t be long now. The drug will soon show its effect.

Jenny was re-applying her lipstick when she started to feel faint. She knew something was wrong. All of a sudden she felt hot and feverish. The walls seemed to be closing in on her. She found it hard to breathe and moved towards the door as quickly as she could. She needed to get out of there.

As she stumbled out of the ladies’ room the entire place spun around her. She wanted to go back to D-King’s table but her legs weren’t responding. Jenny was about to collapse on the floor when a pair of hands grabbed her.

‘Are you OK, babe? You don’t look so good.’

‘I don’t feel too well. I think I need . . .’

‘You need some air. It’s too stuffy in here. Come with me, I’ll help you. Let’s step outside for a while.’

‘But I . . .’ Jenny had started to slur her words. ‘I need to tell D . . . I have to go back to . . .’

‘Later, babe, now you just need to come with me.’

No one noticed Jenny and the stranger walking towards the club exit.

One

‘Morning, Sheriff. Morning, Bobby,’ the plump, brunette waitress with a small heart tattoo on her left wrist called from behind the counter. She didn’t have to check the clock hanging from the wall to her right. She knew it would be just past 6:00 a.m.

Every Wednesday, without fail, Sheriff Walton and his deputy, Bobby Dale, came into Nora’s truck-stop diner, just outside Wheatland in southeastern Wyoming, to get their sweet-pie fix. Rumor had it that Nora’s Diner baked the best pies in the whole of Wyoming. A different recipe every day of the week. Wednesday was apple-and-cinnamon-pie day, Sheriff Walton’s favorite. He was well aware that the first batch of pies always came out of the oven at 6:00 a.m. sharp, and you just couldn’t beat the taste of a freshly baked pie.

‘Morning, Beth,’ Bobby replied, dusting rainwater off his coat and trousers. ‘I’ll tell you, the floodgates from hell have opened out there,’ he added, shaking his leg as if he’d peed himself.

Summer downpours in southeastern Wyoming were a common occurrence, but this morning’s storm was the heaviest they’d seen all season.

‘Morning, Beth,’ Sheriff Walton followed, taking off his hat, drying his face and forehead with a handkerchief, and quickly looking around the diner. At that time in the morning, and with such torrential rain outside, the place was a lot less busy than usual. Only three out of its fifteen tables were taken.

A man and a woman in their mid-twenties were sitting at the table nearest to the door, having a pancake breakfast. The sheriff figured that the beat-up, silver WV Golf parked outside belonged to them.

The next table along was occupied by a large, sweaty, shaved-headed man, who must’ve weighed at least 350 pounds. The amount of food sitting on the table in front of him would’ve easily been enough to feed two very hungry people, maybe three.

The last table by the window was taken by a tall, gray-haired man, with a bushy horseshoe mustache and a crooked nose. His forearms were covered in faded tattoos. He’d already finished his breakfast and was now sitting back on his chair, toying with a packet of cigarettes and looking pensive, as if he had a very difficult decision to make.

There was no doubt in Sheriff Walton’s mind that the two large trucks outside belonged to those two.

Sitting at the end of the counter, drinking a cup of black coffee and eating a chocolate-coated donut, was a pleasantly dressed man who looked to be in his forties. His hair was short and well kept, and his beard stylish and neatly trimmed. He was flipping through a copy of the morning’s newspaper. His had to be the dark-blue Ford Taurus parked by the side of the diner, Sheriff Walton concluded.

‘Just in time,’ Beth said, winking at the sheriff. ‘They’re just out of the oven.’ She gave him a tiny shrug. ‘As if you didn’t know.’

The sweet smell of freshly baked apple pie with a hint of cinnamon had already engulfed the entire place.

Sheriff Walton smiled. ‘We’ll have our usual, Beth,’ he said, taking a seat at the counter.

‘Coming right up,’ Beth replied before disappearing into the kitchen. Seconds later she returned with two steamy, extra-large slices of pie, drizzled with honey cream. They looked like perfection on a plate.

‘Umm . . .’ the man sitting at the far end of the counter said, tentatively raising a finger like a kid asking his teacher’s permission to speak. ‘Is there any more of that pie left?’

‘There sure is,’ Beth replied, smiling back at him.

‘In that case, can I also have a slice, please?’

‘Yeah, me too,’ the large truck driver called out from his table, lifting his hand. He was already licking his lips.

‘And me,’ the horseshoe-mustache man said, returning the cigarette pack to his jacket pocket. ‘That pie smells darn good.’

‘Tastes good too,’ Beth added.

‘Good doesn’t even come close,’ Sheriff Walton said, turning to face the tables. ‘Y’all just about to be taken to pie heaven.’ Suddenly his eyes widened in surprise. ‘Holy shit,’ he breathed out, jumping off his seat.

The sheriff’s reaction made Bobby Dale swing his body around fast and follow the sheriff’s stare. Through the large window just behind where the mid-twenties couple was sitting, he saw the headlights of a pick-up truck coming straight at them. The car seemed completely out of control.

‘What the hell?’ Bobby said, getting to his feet.

Everyone in the diner turned to face the window, and the shocked look on everyone’s face was uniform. The vehicle was coming toward them like a guided missile, and it was showing no signs of diverting or slowing down. They had two, maybe three seconds before impact.

‘EVERYBODY TAKE COVER!’ Sheriff Walton yelled, but he didn’t have to. Reflexively, everybody in the restaurant was already scrambling on their feet to get out of the way. At that speed, the pick-up truck would crash through the front of the diner and probably not stop until it reached the kitchen at the back, destroying everything in its path, and killing everyone in its way.

A chaotic mess of desperate screams and movement took over the restaurant floor. They all knew they just didn’t have enough time to get out of the way.

CRUUUUNCH-BOOM!

The deafening crashing noise sounded like an explosion, making the ground shake under everyone’s feet.

Sheriff Walton was the first to look up. It took him a few seconds to realize that somehow the car hadn’t crashed through the front of the building.

Frowning was followed by confusion.

‘Is everyone all right?’ the sheriff finally called out, frantically looking around.

Mumbled confirmation was returned from all corners of the room.

The sheriff and his deputy immediately got to their feet and rushed outside. Everyone else followed just a heartbeat later. The rain had gotten heavier in the past few minutes, now coming down in thick sheets, severely reducing visibility.

Out of sheer luck, the pick-up truck had hit a deep pothole on the ground just a few yards from the front of the diner, and had drastically veered left, missing the restaurant by just a couple of feet. As it detoured, it had clipped the back of the dark-blue Ford Taurus parked outside, before smashing head-first into a side building that housed two bathrooms and a storage room, completely destroying it. Thankfully, there was no one inside either of the bathrooms, or the storage room.