Skin the Cat

by R Sean McGuirk

  “What you-know-who’s involvement was with this whole cluster-fuck.” She looked at me with suspicion, and scanned the room behind her shoulders, confused about what she did or didn’t say. I tried again, keeping everything very vague. “Come on Carlina,” I sighed. “I know you want to live another day. Who is in the center of this whole thing.”

  She stared at me, and I stared back, the silence gaining weight, inflating like a balloon. Debbie didn’t budge, still as a security camera, observing everything, soaking it in. Carlina’s chin dropped, auburn hair interspersed with bleach-blonde locks fell into her face. She was gorgeous. Her lips and breasts were outsized compared to the size of her petite frame, an obvious fan of plastic surgery. She clearly married the right guy.

  “Charles Greymore?” She asked it rather than stated it. If she’d ever been a decent physician, she’d never been a good actor.

  “Liar,” I said. Debbie flinched, and raised her eyebrow’s at me. The physician’s eyes welled with tears. “Maybe my husband,” she sucked a great breath of air and suddenly sobbed into her wrist, battling herself. “Sure- he hates me. But he loves me. So much.” Small spasms of tears flowing now. “God, I don’t know. I got back on the junk and everything just came apart.” She let off a loud sob, and then muttered under her breath. “Fucking needles.”

  I put my hand on her forearm, slid into her personal space, allowing my voice to decompress into that of a caring friend. “I have my own demons.” Debbie threw me a glance, trying not to arch her eyebrows with surprise. “So come on already.

  Carlina let off into a full blaze of tears, then just stopped. Quiet as a field mouse, staring blankly at the empty wall over my shoulder. “He said…my husband Svidi said, he was going to kill everyone.” I glanced at the camera in the corner at the ceiling, to make certain it was rolling, red light on and recording. Out of nowhere, I slid the photo in front of her. Carina’s eyes widened with wonder, giving a light gasp. Her voice stopped-started. “How- I mean where…where did you get this?”

  Doctor, how do you know the folks in this picture?” Then before she could answer, I put my index finger in her face like a threat, not moving it. “And don’t tell me you stumbled into it by accident.”

  Carlina’s eyes flicked at me, then back to the photo. She rubbed her hands up and down her arms while biting her lower lip, mind churning, thinking how to play it. So I threw back in. “Look, we can’t protect you unless you validate your ability to testify in this case. And that requires real information. Otherwise we set you back out on the street like a piece of meat. And trust me, that little meth-head, stick-boy that sprinted for his life at the convenience store? He’s going to save you, what? Next time?”

  She pointed. “Those two. I-I never saw those boys before that night or afterward. But this guy is called Tadpole. He and I grew up together just outside the Peabody Coal Mine. A lifetime passed. Out of nowhere he showed up that night. I think it was fundraiser.”

  Debbie squirmed in her seat, and joined in. “Those little pricks don’t look like the kind of guys that would attend a fundraiser.”

  “Greymore’s fundraiser. He hired them to set up. This was taken before the evening began,” she said.

  “What about you?” Debbie asked.

  “What about me?” Her eyes narrowed.

  “Were you setting up too?”

  “I was one of the fucking hosts,” she sneered, bristling now, throwing her head to the side. “I don’t need this shit.”

  “Oh yes you do,” Debbie’s face darkened.

  “Everyone in this photo is dead,” I inched down in my seat a until I sank below Carlina’s eyes to give her the false power of height advantage. “Except you and Greymore. Now we have another person dead.” With this Carlina froze, eyes going wide, some fear coming on. “But you already know that,” I nodded. “And you’re too in the middle of this thing not to be next.” She started squirming in her seat. “So tell me about Greymore.”

  “I know him from the club,” Carlina said looking around. “Can I smoke in here?”

  “No,” Debbie grunted.

  “Carlina,” I paused. “Who wants you dead? And why?”

  “Maybe this was a mistake,” Carlina said, rising to her feet. Debbie started to get up, but I waved her down.

  “You know, Carlina,” I leaned back in my seat, to see her better standing there. “This is not a fucking field trip. We want to offer you assistance. But the information you’ve given us so far? We don’t owe you shit. Go on and try to walk out that door. I’ll arrest your ass. Public intoxication. A quick blood test right now? I’ll throw your ass in the slammer. Right now.” She sank back down into her seat.

  Debbie couldn’t hold back, her square jaw flexing on and off. “So just out of curiosity, who wants to kill you the most?” Carlina shot her an eat-shit-and-die look. Debbie came back again. “Boss, this is a waste of time.” Good cop bad cop and Carlina was waiting for the good cop to save her but he vanished.

  I drummed the table with my fingers. “Debbie, you’re right. Cuff her ass.” Debbie was on her feet like a bulldog, handcuffs out, going for her.

  Carlina threw her palms up like I surrender, mascara-stained eyes brimming with tears. “Greymore supplied me drugs,” she blurted. “Greymore gave us all drugs. He likes to party too. Those motorcycle boys lost their ability to pay. They were into him big. And Adrianna Silk’s husband? William Silk? Rich as he is, he was into Greymore for a massive gambling debt.” Debbie and I shot each other a look. “And people who don’t pay Greymore show up dead. Now my clinic is gone. You all know this. I’m broke. I owe Greymore a little cash.” Her head dropped into the seat of her palm with exasperation. “Okay,” she sniffed. “A lot of cash.”

  “Then will you work with us?” I asked not knowing the extent of her involvement in this fiasco, but knowing this was our only living witness and we were still grasping at strings.

  She lifted her head and gazed at me, eyes bleary, her mouth sagging open with exhaustion and defeat.

  Within an hour we’d obtained a drug test for a public intoxication charge on Carlina that we could make stick or go away based on her level of cooperation. The emotional collateral of being scared for one’s life also worked heavily in our favor. She didn’t want to die anytime soon. Legal paperwork drawn up, we ferried Carlina under police escort to an undisclosed hotel on the outskirts of town where we received confirmation she had been safely placed, and where an assigned cop would stand guard twenty-four hours per day until we got a handle on this shit. I had no idea if anything Carlina said so far was true. But it fit. At least enough to peel back another layer of the onion, a picture now emerging where we had none before. Her husband was a man from a traditional Indian culture overwhelmed with shock at his wife’s behavior. Yeah, all these crazy, drugged-out hillbilly Americans, Svidi split. Took off. Headed for the hills. I would too. And yes, he said he’d kill everyone. When I found that stupid naked boy in bed fucking my wife, I also said I’d kill everyone. But it didn’t make me a murderer. It didn’t make Svidi a murderer. On the other hand, the homicide was methodical, the incisions exacting, performed by someone with a steady hand. Possibly a surgeon just like Svidi. He was a suspect of great interest. Sure we’d send cops out to search for him. But for now, with Carlina in our pocket, Debbie and I could finally give some attention on a name that kept coming up over and over again, someone we wouldn’t have to chase down because he sat in the open like a king, in the center of everything: Charles Greymore.

  28

  Skin the…

  Catching a dose of me is like catching cancer. I seep in, take the path of least resistance, devouring every cell, finding you, until I hook my scalpel into your face, me watching you go all wild as you scream for your life. Trust me when I say it, the tummy tuck and the facelift is little more than a lie. An illusion. But my work? The new you will look much more honest
to the world, these skilled hands giving you a makeover that matches the monster inside. Don’t worry about fear or anticipation. You wont’t see me coming. You can’t. Your ego won’t let you. People that live in castles can’t see over their wallet, the wealth short-circuiting the primate brain like some sort of botched frontal lobotomy, where human empathy is exchanged for disrespect. I wonder how many drinks has your waiter has spit in. Don’t get me wrong. I don’t hate you. Some part of me even loves you, finding me humbled by your blindness. I worship your blood as I take back all your cosmetic beauty. I’m only trying to make you human again. To bring you back to reality. Blood is the great equalizer.

  It was very easy to follow Cynthia Greymore home without being detected. Because I was laying directly behind her in her Land Rover, with my scalpel strapped to my belt and my black canvas kill-kit in my grip. Aching with exhaustion in fetal position on the backseat floorboard, the road vibration nearly massaged me to sleep. I’d been up for days, hypervigilant every minute to avoid being seen. At certain times, the world seemed to be closing in on me, just on the brink of discovering me, a vast field of landmines stretched out in every direction, waiting for me to stumble. I refused to get caught. I’d made plans for a life after Story Mount. I had dreams. The phone rang and I jumped. Cynthia answered. “Hey, Meredith. Yes darling, I know.” Throat constricting, she cracked her window to breathe a little better. “Yes my dear, me too.” Her conversational tone deteriorated, full sobbing now. “I miss her so too darling. Adrianna will always be with us. Yes, I love you too.”

  Don’t worry about missing Adrianna. You’ll be seeing her soon enough. The truck took on easy curves, bending my bodyweight side to side. The soft wind flowed in through open windows and I caught a whiff of fresh hay, horse manure, wild roses and honeysuckle. A creature of habit, whenever Cynthia Greymore got stoned on cocktails, she returned to her estate to sleep it off with a beauty nap. The benefit of also being a member of Chumley’s before they kicked me out. The Land Rover slowed, tired slushing into smooth decorative pea-gravel. I’d been here for a few parties, those popularity contests disguised as fundraisers, and I could place where we were, in the parking area surrounded by English gardens adjacent to the eight-door garage located to the side the mansion.

  “Madam,” a man greeted Cynthia, clicking her door open. “May I assist with any bags?”

  “No thank you Gilbert,” she answered. “Any idea when Mr. Greymore is due back?”

  “He flies in about seven this evening, Madam.”

  “Very well,” she slid out from her seat. “Wake me by five.”

  Cynthia got out, and the servant named Gilbert got in and unknowingly shuttled me into the garage, the door folding down into darkness. I waited in the cool shadows, visualizing the layout painstakingly one more time- before heading upstairs to slice the bitch to ribbons. I snapped open the car door and slipped out. Footsteps ticked across the ceiling as I went against the edge of the walls, slinking along to a set of narrow service stairs that led to the kitchen which I followed all the way to the third floor where stained-glass windows bathed the marble landing in alien shades of red and orange. Two doors down, I slid into an exotic bedroom suite that overlooked groomed lawns, where ornamental shrubs graced a waterfall that cascaded into a circle-shaped swimming pool where submerged statues of Greek gods and goddesses appeared to be walking on water. Her voice cracked. It was so close I froze in my tracks.

  “Monique,” she called out into the hallway, “In about thirty minutes bring me an avocado, bacon, lettuce, tomato- on that Italian sweet bread, sesame oil on the side, and unsweetened grapefruit juice. I’m drawing a quick bath.”

  A bath. Thirty minutes. I tucked in, peering from the closet, door cracked, the loaded syringe of Vecuronium ready in my hand. Cynthia put down her phone and turned the faucet handles. Steaming water poured into the tub. She scooping a handful of potpourri from a silver bowl, she pitched the dry petals and flakes forward, where they scattered on the water surface. She pulled off her silk blouse and slipped off her bra, admiring her aging yet very athletic form in the mirror. Fifty-eight years-old. No. Not bad at all. Her breasts were ample, jutting out, full and round, but hardly believable by any sense of the word. Swollen. Disproportionate. But what can I say? The work looked good. Only a trace of hail damage on her rear. Hardly noticeable. Most excellent clinical work if I might say so myself. Into the mirror, she flittered her fingertips long ways over her ribcage, smiling at her reflection.

  When Cynthia shut off the water, the room went dead quiet. Too quiet. Cover blown if I so much as rubbed my palms together. My shoulders went rigid with the idea- I may not be able to pull this one off. Plus there was no exit, no means of escape. The heiress pulled down her thong, toe-flicked them off, all things below shining. Brazilian waxed-bald. My gut jumped. She’d turned right toward me. I pulled my blade from my belt clip, and almost lunged. With a quick motion of her fingers on a wall-mounted digital pad, and two electronic chirps, the water jumped alive and bubbled under the soft hum of water-jets. Somehow, she hadn’t spotted me, like I might be a ghost. But no. I was real. And this was really about to happen. She stepped into the water one foot at a time and slid in all the way up to her chin and quickly drifted into deep relaxation, eyes closed. Karma’s a bitch.

  My heart climbing with an adrenaline rush, I slipped on my gloves and moved forward with the syringe and sank the needle into her neck, squeezing the plunger down but only halfway. Her eyes popped open and no scream. Presto. That fast. Blood is the great equalizer. Limp as a noodle, she sank beneath the waterline her eyeballs filling with a shining terror. I leaned in, going all casual, like I might be giving a lost stranger directions. “So,” I smiled. “I have just injected you with a waking paralytic called Vecuronium. But not so much that you can’t enjoy what’s about to happen. I want you to see, taste, feel and experience everything I am about to do to you. But you are chemically restrained. Paralyzed head to foot. Go on. Try to move your pinky toe.” I smiled, and waited patiently. Two bubbles inflated from her nostrils underwater and one escaped to the surface where it popped in her eye. “See?” I chuckled. “Now you’re thinking, help, help, dear God, help, is it all going to end like this? Am I going to drown here? And I say, no Cynthia! Absolutely not. Yes it’s all going to end for you now. But not like this.”

  I reached in, hugging her limp body like a great fish, flopping her onto the floor bare-ass naked, the skin rubbery and wet sliding with effortless ease across the tile. I hoisted her into a chair facing the vanity, where a dazzling array of makeup bottles, perfumes, skin conditioners and tonics sat at attention in perfect rows beneath studio lights. I zip-tied her wrists and ankles to the chair, ball-gagged her mouth, yanked the leather strap tight, her head rolling to the side. I checked my watch, noting the shrinking time frame, and the fact an employee would soon be bringing a bacon-avocado sandwich to the room. That child’s poem began to play in my mind.

  This is this and that is that...

  “So Cynthia,” I said bringing out the glinting razorblade, flashing the refracted light into her pupil. Her eyelids went wide, a short kick of dread hitting the wrists, a faint tug against the bindings. I whispered up close, my lip touching her earlobe. “You can’t own everything. Don’t take any of this personally,” I let the blade dance about her face. “This is only a transaction. All riches and wealth, even your husband has to pay his debt.” I ticked my head to the side, reflecting on it. “Did you know he really enjoys sodomy? Yes, the starring lead role. The silver-haired devil himself. I’d show you the dedication video but,” I glanced at my watch. “A bacon-avocado says we don’t have enough time.”

  But there’s more than one way-

  I nosed the blade against the suprasternal notch beneath the throat, without breaking the skin, her breathing going fitful and sporadic. “Your beauty is within you Cynthia,” my hand hesitating, me owing her the explanation. “See, all this pl
astic must be undone. Blood is the great equalizer. Your heart pumps it. Just like mine. No different from the blood coursing in your husband’s arteries right at this very moment. I worship your mortality because I know the sum of your death will be much greater than all its parts. For faith without works is dead.” Then I pushed the blade in. Cynthia’s eyes were wild and pleading. “Then I am coming after your fucking husband.” As I pushed the blade deeply into her throat, she let off a soft moan.

  …to skin the cat

  29

  Reverse

  “It’s hard to believe people actually live like this,” Debbie huffed her way up the marble steps, head tracking in great circles, marveling over the opulence of lavish wealth. “It’s like one of those fancy libraries in New York City or a museum in Paris that I saw on YouTube.”

  My fucking hip socket protested the entire ascent, of what? Like forty steps? I guess we had to climb halfway to heaven to find our hell. At the top, we greeted a few officers and stretched beneath a band of yellow crime tape to get into the new nightmare. In a sprawling bathroom beneath an enormous glass atrium, the massacre glistened greasy-purple in the dying sunlight, the tile floor slathered in one large puddle of blood. The mutilated corpse of Cynthia Greymore sat strapped to a chair in front of a blood-soaked vanity. Same signature. Same M.O. Zip-ties. Ball gag. Skinned. Beauty stripped away. The flesh cut and hanging off the bone. Debbie covered her mouth but didn’t heave this time, as Stan Gadford watched her.

  “Thank you for not mixing your internal fluids,” pointing at Cynthia’s corpse. “With hers.” Debbie brought up her hand and slowly extended her middle finger. Gadford didn’t break eye contact giving her a wicked grin, taking Cynthia’s hand and making it wave at Debbie. The truth is, the pathologist made me uncomfortable, something that had always been there, subtle at first, but certainly materializing with time, now almost glaring. I couldn’t exactly pinpoint it. Maybe it was his disregard for context: A loved-one left dead, hacked to pieces, the silence surrounding the body still so heavy and fresh. The remark came off like something damaged, a man with a missing part. The suspicion he carried for me, his empty place, I didn’t like him.