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late."
    Andrew Carlisle didn't have to wait long for a ride. The fourth car to whiz past him on the entrance ramp, a green Toyota Corolla, slowed and pulled over the side to wait for him. The set of yellow lights trapped to the top told him the car was an oversized-load pilot car. The driver, a woman, leaned over and rolled down the passenger window just as he reached the car.
    "Where to?" she asked.
    The woman, a faded, frowsy blonde in her late thirties or early forties, was moderately attractive. She wore shorts and a halter top and held a glistening beer can in one hand while a lipstick-stained cigarette smoldered in the ashtray.
    "Prescott," he said.
    Over the years, lying had become such a deeply ingrained habit that he never considered telling the truth.
    She tossed her purse into the backseat, clearing a place for him. "I'm only going as far as Casa Grande," she said, "but it's a start. Get in.
    Care for a beer? Cooler's in the back."
    Andrew Carlisle hadn't tasted a beer in more than six years. "Don't mind if I do," he said, reaching around behind him to grab a Bud from the cooler. Personally, he would have preferred Coors, but beggars can't be choosers.
    He took a long swig, then held the beer in his mouth, savoring the sharp bite of flavor on his tongue. Beer wasn't all he hadn't tasted in six years, he thought. Not by a long shot.
    He stole a surreptitious glance at the woman. He'd heard stories about these pilot-car women, about how much they made on the job itself and how much they made moonlighting on their backs. Andrew Carlisle had spent so many years fantasizing about Diana Ladd and her swollen belly and what he'd do to her when he finally got the chance that he had almost missed this golden opportunity when it all but fell in his lap.
    "Why Prescott?" the woman was saying.
    "My dad's in the hospital up there," he said. "He isn't expected to make it."
    The woman clucked her tongue in sympathy. "That's too bad."
    "My car broke down in Lordsburg," he continued. "The mechanic said it would take at least two days to get parts and another day to put it back together. According to my mom, Dad doesn't have three days. So I decided to hitchhike there and go back for the car later."
    Carlisle let his index finger stroke around and around the smooth lip of the can, sensuously wiping the beads of moisture off it and wondering how many places besides the door handle, the cooler, and the beer can he had touched.
    Where else would he have left prints? He would have to remember all those places later so as not to miss any when he wiped the vehicle clean.
    The woman set the beer can between her legs and reached for the still-burning cigarette. A few stray ashes rained down on the seat as she took a long drag, but Andrew Carlisle was conscious only of the cool beer can resting unselfconsciously between her deeply tanned legs.
    Looking at it caused a sudden, insistent stiffening between his own.
    "Do you do it for money?" he asked.
    She looked at him and laughed. "Drive pilot cars? Of course I do it for money. Even with air-conditioning, working for mobile home-toters is a lousy job, but it's better than no job at all, which is where I was after they laid me off at Hecla."
    Andrew Carlisle hadn't been talking about driving pilot cars. He had meant something else entirely. He liked the fact that she was too dumb to pick up on the double entendre. Women were stupid that way.
    Sometimes you had to hit them over the head just to get their attention.
    Ahead of them, Picacho Peak loomed in the distance, its rugged gray silhouette shimmering in the heat waves that rose off the freeway's pavement. Carlisle knew the mountain's name as well as he knew his own, but he didn't let on. "What's that?" he asked, pointing.
    "The mountain?" the woman asked, looking at him dubiously. "I thought you said you're from Prescott. How come you don't know Picacho Peak?"
    "My dad's in Prescott," he said. "In the VA hospital up there. I'm from El Paso.