by R. K. Latch
Chapter 12
Luthor woke in the weak light of a cloudy Sunday. He found he was alone in bed and a look at his watch showed him noon had come and gone over an hour ago. Groggily, he got to his feet and pulled on a housecoat. He saw he his hands had not come as clean as he’d thought before getting in bed last night.
Last night. A thin smile grew on his lips thinking about the old man out in the shop and grew wider as he thought about Gabby after they came back to the house. The woman had amazing abilities and even for a man of his age, she could bring out the true animal in him.
Sex had never been an important part of his life. Sure, through young manhood it occupied his mind on occasion but nothing like he suspected it did for the average guy. Even throughout his twenties and early thirties it never assumed a place of prominence in his priorities. When he met his wife, his life partner, he was not a virgin, and he had a handful of experiences to fall back on but all that changed after his first moment of intimacy with Gabby. After a successful and extremely exciting kill, their lovemaking had been nothing short of rapturous, transforming everything he had once believed about sex, companionship and yes, even love.
It had just gotten better and better from there.
Last night was no exception. However, after, as he held her, her mood had dived into melancholy as they discussed the boy. Luthor, himself, was disappointed. But what did he expect? He accepted Gabby and her ways, and she accepted him. In hindsight, Luthor took a chance he shouldn’t have. No matter the reason, he had made a true error in judgement.
An error he would have to correct.
Outside the bedroom the air was filled with brewing coffee. Most likely, Gabby would have been up for hours cooking breakfast for herself and waiting on him for the coffee. He did not deserve her and felt that only by grace he had found her.
After a few minutes in the bathroom, he dressed in the master bedroom and headed downstairs.
The wonderful aroma of coffee swam through the air. He found Gabby in the living room, sitting in her favorite chair reading a book while a record played low.
“Morning,” she said as he leaned over and kissed her temple.
“Afternoon, you mean?” She nodded.
“You missed quite a storm. Did it not wake you?”
“Didn’t hear a thing.” He took a seat in the chair on the opposite side of the room. There was a chairside table where he kept a book for himself as well as his pipe and smoking tools. He loaded the bowl of his hand etched pipe and struck a match, letting the flame burn off the match’s chemicals before touching it to the tobacco and puffing. Soon, the smell of cherry tobacco intermingled with the coffee. Like the mind reader she was she’d placed her book to the side and went for two cups of coffee and handed his to him just as the pipe was going well.
“I’ve ate. Would you like something now?”
“No,” he said. “I’ll take my coffee. I might make a sandwich in a bit. Not much of an appetite today.” Gabby looked at him. He knew what she was thinking. Like her, the day after his appetite was no less than voracious. He saw a tinge of worry tease at the corner of one eye through the pale grey smoke filling his side of the room.
There was no newspaper on home delivery on Sunday in Farmington, so he picked up the book at his side. It was a thin volume, Hemingway’s In Our Time. Luthor was an avid reader but always found himself drifting back to Hemingway and his easily digestible stories. He appreciated the writer’s brevity, and the short pieces were great when he had a hundred other things running through his mind.
“Record player seems to work fine, now.” Luthor said.
“Yes,” Gabrielle answered. “Seems Halsey did the trick with the socket.” Luthor nodded. Overall, the wiring in the old house was pretty good. Yet, the socket Gabby used for her record player had died and Luthor, while handy at many things, didn’t trust himself with electricity and used a local electrician, Gerrick Halsey, to do the work. It was out of character for Luthor, but he knew how much Gabby enjoyed her records.
After a while, he noticed his wife was watching him, even as she tried to appear to be lost in her own reading. He set the book down after Nick Adams escaped an ex-prizefighter that all of a sudden wanted to beat him senseless after poor Nick got kicked off a train in the middle of nowhere.
“You’ve something on your mind?”
“You know I do.”
“The boy?”
“Oh, he’s the boy now. He has a name Luthor,” she said calmy. They never raised their voices to each other. Luthor nodded. He knew this was coming. The only way to settle was to get through it, dancing around it would resolve nothing.
“He does. It could be Wade or it could be Mickey Mouse for all we know.”
“You weren’t talking like that yesterday.”
“Yesterday, he hadn’t let us down.”
“Let us down.” She was sitting with one leg crossed over the other. The foot suspended in the air began to hop, just a little. “That’s how you see it, is it?” Luthor furrowed his brow.
“Is there any other way to see it?” he asked.
“He’s a boy, Lou. A child. Maybe he just needs time. Did you think of that?” She was not being crass. Her voice was still calm and possessed of that silken luxury that he could fall asleep listening to at night. But the annoyance in her words was only thinly cloaked.
“I did think of that, darling,” he said. “I thought about it immensely. I think we made a mistake in taking him in, as I said last night.”
“A mistake that you intend to correct, right?”
“That’s usually the wisest choice. Is it not?” This is how they argued. Calmly and politely but each understood the other pristinely.
“It’s usually what you do. I’m not sure how correct it is.” Oh, here we go, Luthor thought. This is going to take a while.
“What would you have me do?” Luthor asked, setting his pipe to the side, and sitting up straighter in his chair.
“I would like you to give him another chance.”
“That would be a—”
“A mistake,” she finished for him.
“Exactly.”
“Tell me why.”
“The longer the boy—Wade—is here, the more you’ll get attached to him. If it doesn’t work out even then, it will only serve to upset you more.”
“Do I sound upset now?” she said, but much louder than normal, or warranted. A storm might have passed outside but now one resided in her eyes.
“As a matter of fact, you do.”
“I’m sorry, Lou. I’m so very sorry. But I like the boy. I still think he could fit in here, perfectly.”
“I’m not so sure.”
“You don’t have to be. You just have to trust me.” Luthor began chewing his lip, unconsciously. He knew as soon as he did it, she saw it.
“Am I getting on your nerves, Lou?” she asked, saccharine sweetly.
“No, of course not.” He was not convincing. He exhaled, placed his hands on his knees and leaned down slightly. “Okay. One more chance. Tonight. When we finish the old geezer.”
Her smile was both immediate and shining. “I love you, Luthor.”
He shook his head in frustration but winked as he spoke. “And I love you.”
+++
The hours passed slowly in the dark space. Even his limber, flexible body ached from the constant stooping, kneeling, and squatting. He’d worked at the wire until his fingers bled and the soreness was too much an impediment to continue. The food was gone, the plate licked clean, and the glass Coca-Cola bottle drained of every last drop of sugary splendor.
All in all, Wade was defeated by the cage which held him. Sucking on his fingers had brought them no relief. He laid down on the grimy blanket beneath him and rested. A few times over the hours, Larry made sounds. Thankfully, the gag was still in place and whatever the hobo tried to convey was mumbled beyond all recognition before reaching Wade’s ears.
No, that wasn’t completely tr
ue. Wade might not be able to discern the words the man chose to use, or attempt to use, but the overall idea was unmistakable. He was in pain and needed help. Well, he wouldn’t be getting it from Wade.
Sure, Wade felt bad for the guy, but he felt plenty bad for himself too. As the last of the day’s light faded away at the corners of the blacked-out windows and the few loose corners of the shed, Wade knew that blackness would soon envelop him completely. One might think that slipping from murk into ink black would be less concerting than from full light to full dark. One would be wrong, Wade reckoned.
He lay there, looking into the darkness long after Larry fell silent once more and he thought of many things. He thought of the adventures, or rather misadventures, of his young life and the close calls and the sharpest scrapes he’d come through, sometimes by the skin of his teeth. All that effort, all that fighting felt like such a waste now. Why had he tried so hard to survive, just to end up here, penned up like an animal waiting to be led to the slaughterhouse floor?
Just before drifting off, he thought once more of the little crummy house beside the tracks where he and his mother last lived together. He thought often that if he wished hard enough, thought just right, when he closed his eyes and dreamed that dream that haunted him all the years and all the miles, he would find her not dead, having not taken her own life, but awake and alive and waiting for him to tell her he loved her. Before he knew it, he had slipped across the precipice into slumber.
+++
Luthor pushed the door open and switched on the light. The feeble light flooded all across the shop, pushing the deepest of the shadows into the farthest reaches of the building. Wade came awake with a start and scrambled back into the rear of his cage. Larry, across the workbench without benefit of the sheet covering him, was awake and slowly turned toward Luthor and Gabby as they moved into the building, Gabby shut the door behind them.
The way the old man’s bleary eyes widened as he recognized his tormentors was particularly pleasing to Luthor.
It was just after sunset, though the sun had been hidden the entirety of the day, as they decided the time had come to attend their unfinished business. Tomorrow was a workday and Luthor would have to make a quick trip to dispose of the body, or bodies, whatever the case may be. He would not go back to the pond he visited two nights ago. No, he would go in a completely different direction this time. No more than an hour away, there was a marshy bog where the wildlife would make quick work of a human cadaver. Luthor had always spread out any evidence or proof of their crimes. They enjoyed the life they led, neither he nor Gabby had any notion that life in prison or a one-way trip to the electric chair would be a good thing for them.
“Wakey, wakey, sleepyhead,” Gabby called.
Larry, weak with injury and loss of blood, was slow to react as Gabby rounded the table on him. She grabbed him by his hair and lifted his head as far as she could from the table—only a few inches because of the tight bindings—and then slammed it back with all the force she could muster, which was quite a lot.
“Awake now?” Luthor asked, sniggering. He reached to the overhead light and yanked it on. So stunned was Larry, he didn’t react to the sudden increase of light.
“I think he is, lover,” Gabby said. She turned to Luthor’s tool chest and passing over her mallet, and even the pliers, pulled out a long file with a wooden handle.
Luthor watched in curiosity. This was new for her. He had an inkling of an idea of what was to come, but that only increased his interest. Again, with one hand, she pulled his head up by the hair. To Luthor she said, “Lou, be a dear and take this gag out of his mouth. Poor thing, it must be quite awful.”
“But my dear, he’ll scream his lungs out for help.” Luthor said, but not meaning it, only playing along.
“Oh, I do hope so,” Gabby said. “I like it even better with music!”
And it began.
Larry screamed as loud as he was able after all the dehydration, hunger, exhaustion, and ruthless, eviscerating torture. It was not very loud and a hole, that was now ringed with puffy, infected flesh in his chest burbled pink bubbles. Even if it had been the scream of a healthy adult, it would have carried out beyond the shed, but not past the perimeter of the property. That was not by chance. As with everything else in life, Luthor had selected his home and built this shed with many things in mind, not least of that was isolation.
Gabby grabbed the vagabond by his gruff chin and squeezed. The man struggled, but Gabby was much stronger than she looked and truly stronger than Luthor could believe. By squeezing his chin and lower jaw she forced his mouth open. Against her strong hand at one of the weakest points in his life, the hobo could not resist.
He did plead. “P-p-please. No!” he implored. “Let, let, let me go,” he managed before he started coughing.
“We will,” Gabby said. “When there’s nothing left of you.” With that she turned her attention to her work. With his mouth held wide with her one hand, she inserted the metal file’s tip into his mouth. His teeth were in disgusting condition. It was almost a disservice to call them teeth. The remaining stubs, the very few remaining stubs, looked more like pitiful tree stumps and matched their dead grey color. As the thick file slid over them, Larry shook like electricity was pushed through him. An awful mewl, and an awful sloshing sound in the back of his throat caused Gabby to smile in a sadistic and evilly endearing grin and the way the light danced in her eyes, Luthor felt the stirring of something exciting and enticing beginning.
Slowly, Gabby worked the file back and forth as if brushing an elderly father’s teeth for him except her technique lacked any aspect of gentleness or tenderness or care. Instead, she took it slowly only because she wanted it to last, to prolong the beautiful sound of the metal scraping over the softened enamel and the wounded, forlorn moans of the man as he struggled, albeit negligibly, at his bindings.
The stubs of teeth hung to the gums by delicate roots and before long, the back-and-forth motion sprung them from their shallow recesses. Blood flowed freely from his mouth. Not enough to drown him, thankfully, but enough to keep him mum.
When every tooth was displaced, Gabby pulled back and looked at her work. Larry lay there, crying, his mouth, slowly contorting, perhaps finding a position that hurt less than another. The tears were big and flowed like a river. Luthor was so proud. He made sure to not stand between the boy and Larry. He wanted him to see. The boy needed to see.
Luthor had worked hard on the table in his typical meticulous fashion, and it was much more than it seemed. Not only was it a very sturdy thing with iron loops to secure the ropes, but it was also a multidirectional, pivoting platform.
There was a collection of levers on the side, near one end, far away from where it could be reached by anyone secured to its surface. Gabby moved and grabbed one of the levers. She shoved it down and the table clicked and slowly one end lowered, and the other end rose. The whole thing could be turned and faced in any direction.
Larry flopped forward, the tight ropes keeping him from either slumping down or falling further forward. His change of gravity obviously pained him, and he whimpered loudly.
“You’re turn my love,” Gabby said, stepping back from the table.
Chapter 13
It was terrible and it was horrible. Wade didn’t look at first. He closed his eyes and covered his ears. It worked, a little. The sounds he could hear even through his hands though, they tugged at his mind. He knew, deep down somewhere that bad things were happening but yet and still…
Wade cracked his eyelids, just a little, just enough.
Old Larry was still attached to the workbench, only now the workbench was upright. Wade could see the entirety of the old man’s body. It was not the geriatric sagging or the folds of loose skin where muscles had once been but eroded into nothing that Wade found the most disgusting and disconcerting, though certainly they were.
No, it was the egregious mutilations sliced across his chest, his arms, his face, the
blood that flowed from his mouth and his bleary, bloodshot eyes that gave Wade cause to start.
When the old man screamed or attempted to it was really a weak echo of a scream, Wade watched as the blood bubbled up through his ruined chest. Wade wanted to look away, but apparently the want was not sufficient to overcome his need to watch.
Perhaps it was because he felt the need to know what to expect when they tired of the old man and moved on to him. Or maybe, just maybe it was something else. Wade wasn’t sure but he knew he could not turn his eyes away. He’d unblocked his ears as well as he sat there, still as a statue watching the horror unfold before him.
And it went on and on for what seemed hours, but surely it wasn’t. The old man was in awful shape and his body surely couldn’t contend with hours of this. Whose could?
The two of the took turns, Mr., and Mrs. Duncan, as the other stood back and watched, seemed to appreciate the other’s macabre handiwork. It was an odd show of respect and the other goaded on the other as they took turn after turn, trying to outdo the last.
Then after a particular gruesome assault on the old man by Gabrielle, the man no longer even fighting the pain inflicted, they both stepped back and wordlessly, both turned to Wade.
The pair looked at him for a very long time. Wade felt the air in the room grow still and then thick.
“Like what you see, Wade?” Luthor asked. Though his face was a mask of insanity, his voice was calm and even. Wade said nothing. Handing a very mean tool to his wife, Luthor came his way.
Wade dared not move or risk the man’s ire. Luthor pulled a key ring from his pocket and deftly unlocked the padlock of his little cage as if he’d done it a hundred or maybe a thousand times. He pulled the door open wide and waved Wade out.
At first Wade did not move. “Out with you, boy.” The voice was still even and calm but bore the slightest edge. Slowly, Wade moved toward the opening. Different thoughts tumbled through his mind. He could attack Luthor and make for the door, but he had nothing but his bare hands to attack with. Maybe with the element of surprise he might have some chance. Not of defeating the man, no that was nonsensical, but of getting past him. But even as Luthor squatted just outside the door, he was coiled serpent-ready to attack. Wade knew the best he could do was try to scratch his face, his hands, maybe his eyes, but even if by some secret, invisible grace he could get past Luthor he knew Gabby, despite the affection she’d shown him would pounce like an enraged lioness. He had no choice but to obey.