Free Ride the Lightning by John Lutz

robbers, like the cops, were taking the advice of their attorneys and thinking about a potential trial even before the crime was committed. Nudger wondered if, in this pragmatic society, crime would someday become respectable because of all the jobs it created.
    Nudger looked at Tom. “Is there any way you can prove you were across town at the time of the murder?” he asked, staring at the two miniature Nudgers gazing back at him from the mirror lenses.
    “There’s just my word,” Tom said, rather haughtily.
    Nudger didn’t bother telling him what that was worth when it came to checking the momentum of the wheels of justice; why antagonize him?
    “I just want you to believe Curtis is innocent,” Tom said with desperation. “Because he is! And so am I!”
    And Nudger understood why Tom was here, taking the risk. If Colt was guilty of murder, Tom was guilty of being an accessory to the crime. Once Curtis Colt had ridden the lightning, Tom would have looming over him the possibility of an almost certain life sentence, and perhaps even his own ride, if he was ever caught. It wasn’t necessary actually to squeeze the trigger to be convicted of murder.
    “I need for you to try extra hard to prove Curtis is innocent,” Tom said. “I’m asking you please not to give up on this case.” His thin lips quivered, as if current were already singing through them. He was near tears; he’d thought he was a big boy, but now he was scared. He might be only in his early twenties behind those disguising lenses, really just a frightened kid trapped by time and circumstance. Nudger felt sorry for him; he should have felt sorrier for the old man and woman who’d been shot, but Tom was here, in front of him and looking into the black abyss. Every crime created its multitude of victims.
    “Are you giving Candy Ann the money to pay me?” Nudger asked.
    “Some of it, yeah.” Tom sniffed and wiped his bony wrist across his nose, touched a finger up inside the mirror lenses as if scratching an itch. “From what Curtis and me stole. And I gave Curtis’ share to Candy Ann, too. Me and her are fifty-fifty on this.”
    Dirty money, Nudger thought. Dirty job. Probably a hopeless job. Still, if Curtis Colt happened to be innocent, trying to prove it against the clock was a job that needed to be done. It would be a particularly tough job, considering the political climate; the powers-that-be wanted to send someone out via high voltage, and Curtis Colt was all but strapped in the chair for the final ride.
    “Okay,” Nudger said, “I’ll stay on the case.”
    “Thanks,” Tom said. His narrow hand crept impulsively across the table and squeezed Nudger’s arm in gratitude, like the tentative hand of a lover. Tom had the sallow look of an addict; Nudger wondered if the long-sleeved shirt was to hide needle tracks as well as the tattoo.
    Tom pushed away from the table and stood up, bravado in his exaggerated actions. The play he was starring in was good for at least another act; he was the desperado man of action again. These guys were all alike. He stood poised like a macho movie star about to spring into action on the “Late Show,” a young Burt Lancaster but without the muscles and in ill health.
    “Stay here with Candy Ann for ten minutes while I make myself scarce,” he said. Not a bad line. Where was Denise Darcel? “I gotta know I wasn’t followed. You understand it ain’t that I don’t trust you; a man in my position has gotta be sure, is all.”
    “I understand. Go.”
    Tom gave a spooked smile, like a wary animal sprung from a trap, and slipped out the door. Nudger heard his running footfalls on the gravel outside the trailer. Nudger was forty-three years old and ten pounds overweight; lean and speedy Tom needed a ten-minute head start like Sinatra needed singing lessons.
    After a few minutes, the crickets began screaming again outside, a shrill expression of everybody’s desperation. Tom had gotten clear, but he would