Dungeness and Dragons

by William Cook

  “Yowza, woman! That is big news. Here’s wishing you the best.” He gave her a thumb’s-up sign. “Got vermouth?”

  “Nope. Need that, too.”

  He grabbed the bottles from the shelf. “Anything else?”

  “I better get a six-pack while I’m at it. Maybe a Ninkasi IPA?”

  “You got it.” He rang up her purchases.

  “Guess I’m good to go.”

  “Drive safe now.”

  “Count on it.”

  She was not on a friendly basis with the couple who ran the pot shop. They were strictly business, and she preferred it that way.

  Fifteen minutes later, after a quick stop at a grocery store, she was on her way back home, an ounce of weed on the passenger seat, nestled beside the beer, the liquor, and the chocolate chip cookies.

  As predicted, she didn’t sleep much that night, but was finally able to doze off when the rain started in earnest around 4 A.M. She leaped out of bed at noon, from a dream that she had missed her audition but was strangely glad about it. “This is my day,” she reassured herself aloud. “I’ll nail the part.” She showered and primped for the next two hours, and then spent the next hour picking out the right outfit. Her stomach refused food.

  She decided to leave early enough to give herself plenty of time for a coffee en route. She was reluctant to pull her beret over curls it had taken her so much time to prepare, so she used her umbrella to get to the car. No hat hair today! She launched the Prius down 101 at 3:30.

  In Driftwood, she pulled into the Reef and ordered a large soy latte.

  “How do I look?” she asked Darby, chuckling at his pirate hat and black eye patch. She closed her umbrella, did a graceful pirouette, and bowed.

  “Pretty as a picture,” he said with a smile.

  “That’s the idea. I’m on my way to an audition.”

  “Then the coffee’s on me, honey. Hope it brings you luck.”

  “Thanks, Darby,” she said as she turned and left.

  The rain seemed unable to make up its mind, first pounding so hard it sounded like hail on the roof and windshield, then easing off to a mist so gentle she didn’t need to use the wiper blades. Then back to the downpour. The hot beverage kept her alert and focused.

  When she reached Depoe Bay, she slowed to the speed limit, unwilling to face the officer who had given her a speeding ticket the month before. Paul had told her the warehouse was just off the harbor and behind the row of shops that lined the main street.

  She was surprised to see only one car parked in front of the large, windowless building. Faded red paint on the gray side wall announced, MID-COAST SEAFOOD/FINEST IN OREGON.

  She pulled in next to the black SUV and took her umbrella from the floor of the passenger side. The rain had eased up again, so she was able to get out and open the umbrella without damaging her curls. She walked to the only door she saw in the gathering dusk. A single bulb in a fixture that looked like an Asian conical hat hung above the entrance, highlighting the keypad entry. Switching the umbrella to her left hand, she removed a scrap of paper from her coat pocket and keyed in the long alphabetic code. The lock clicked.

  “Hello?” she called, as she walked into the twilight inside. The building appeared to be mostly empty, except toward the far end, where three large lights were trained on a tall stool, and a camera was perched on a tripod. An unpleasant smell greeted her nostrils.

  She folded her umbrella and dropped it by the door. “I’m Patricia Carmody. Is anybody here?” A feeling of dread began to tighten her throat. Where’s Meryl Streep? Steven Spielberg? Just as she was about to turn and run out the door, a man emerged from the shadows to her left. She shrieked.

  “Ms. Carmody? I’m so sorry to startle you. I’m Paul.” He looked at his watch. “You’re early. Our director has just taken a short break. Meryl drove him crazy today. She can be such a nuisance. Ah, the egos of Hollywood. Come, let me take your coat. We can snap a few preliminary stills of you while we’re waiting, and I’ll find a copy of the script so you can look it over.”

  “Let me catch my breath, Paul.” She leaned over and inhaled deeply. “You scared the crap out of me.”

  She studied the man before her. Sandy hair framed a face that suggested he had spent far more time outside in the elements than inside behind a desk. He was neatly dressed in a white shirt and tie, with the collar button undone and the knot of the tie loosened. Shirt sleeves were rolled up to the elbows, giving the impression he had been working a long day and was tired.

  “I guess I expected more people.”

  “As did we. Some look so good on paper, and then in person…” His voice trailed off. “We dismissed most within the first few minutes of opening their mouths. Steven knows exactly what he wants and won’t waste his time. Come. Let me get you some water. Sit up on the stool.”

  He escorted her to the lighted area and then stepped away. “I’ll be right back.”

  She got up on the stool and tucked her legs discreetly to the side, glad she had opted for the pants suit instead of the short skirt she had originally selected.

  Paul returned in moments and handed her a plastic cup with water and ice in it. “This should help.”

  She drank the cold water, relishing the way it loosened her throat so she would be able to give a proper reading.

  “Just be casual,” he called, as he began to snap pictures. “Turn your head to the right. Perfect. Now back to the center. Good. You’re a natural. I didn’t see modeling on your CV, but you certainly have the poise.”

  “Paul, let me come down off this stool for a minute. I’m feeling a little dizzy.”

  “Bright lights all at once can do that to you. Here, let me help you.” He grasped her hand as she slid down from the seat.

  “My tongue feels funny.” She blinked her eyes. “My vision’s getting blurry.” She flailed with her arms, striking him ineffectually on the chest. “Was that…? Did you…?”

  He grabbed her by the shoulders as her knees buckled. “Why, yes, Ms. Carmody. It was, and I did.” He lowered her to the floor and gently laid her down. “Pleasant dreams.”

  20. The Apprentice

  THURSDAY NIGHT, DECEMBER 27TH, 2018. “Lift her feet. I’ve got her shoulders.” The bearded man barked orders at his smooth-skinned brother. At thirty-six, Gideon Drake had the face of a fifty-year-old, burned by constant exposure to sun and wind into a leathery mask. His long, black hair was pulled into a tight ponytail. The long beard was just beginning to show streaks of gray at the muzzle. His dark eyes were those of a predator, constantly scanning his surroundings, alert to food or potential danger.

  His brother Paul grunted as he struggled with the weight of the girl. Younger by three years and thirty pounds, Paul had been their mother’s favorite. His sandy hair and somewhat effeminate ways had endeared him to Sophie, an attraction fostered by his years of training in ballet and modern dance. The boys’ father, Bryton, had little to do with Paul but everything to do with Gideon, pushing him to be an athlete, living vicariously in the victories of his son’s high school football team.

  “C’mon! Put your back into it! Let’s get her in the closet so we can get out of here.”

  “She’s a lot heavier than she looks.” Paul grunted again.

  “Wimp.”

  They carried Patricia’s unconscious body into the closet and laid her in the center of the floor. Gideon closed the door and turned the key in the lock.

  “I’ll bring her purse and drive her car. You take the Honda. Follow me up to the pond.”

  He shooed Paul out the warehouse door and locked it. Then he started the Prius and pulled around the building out onto 101. The only traffic light in Depoe Bay maintained its lonely vigil over empty streets. Within a mile, he led Paul beyond the aura of town to the dirt road that climbed to their private dumping ground. The rain had begun again, darkening the black of night even more. Twin pairs of headlights stabbed holes in the gloom, igniting the raindrops like sparks. The car
s bounced along the logging road in bone-jarring jolts, over washboard ridges carved into the dirt by the heavy trucks that sped into the forest empty and raced out, burdened with logs from the clear-cut hills.

  The trip always seemed to take longer going in. As they drove deeper into the woods, Paul imagined that the night resented their incursion into its domain—that it wanted to overpower their headlights and swallow them. He fiddled with the radio in nervous desperation, pounding his hand on the steering wheel when he couldn’t find a clear signal.

  She’s pretty, he thought, this girl from the pizza shop in Neskowin. He snorted in disapproval. The prettiest ones were always the hardest to manage. Sometimes it was all he could do to keep his brother’s hands off their merchandise. “I just want a taste,” Gideon would say, but it was always more than that. The one time he had relented and let Gideon have his way, his brother had hurt the girl, and their client had deducted twenty-five percent from their commission. He’d be damned if he would let that happen again.

  He let Gideon maintain the fiction of being the boss of their operations, all the while manipulating him from the shadows. His mother had taught him how to do that, showing him the skills she used with her husband, the father who wouldn’t give Paul the time of day. “Patience and persuasion,” she would say. “Plant seeds that grow into ideas that Gideon thinks are his own. You don’t have to be stronger than Gideon, just smarter.”

  It was Paul who had suggested that they diversify their business, buying more boats, branching out into whale-watching and charter-fishing. It was a strategic way to launder their new-found cash. Hiring extra staff who knew nothing of the real source of their income also helped. The Facebook ad was his brainchild. And, of course, it was Paul who found their “discerning” client, the one who paid top dollar for just the right girl or boy. Absolute secrecy and absolute discretion were rewarded handsomely.

  Paul hadn’t always been in charge. Gideon had told him what to do as a child—how late he could stay up, what friends he could have visit, what toys he could play with. Gideon was the one who checked his homework, who grounded him for any infraction of the laws his father had laid down. But that changed with adolescence and with his father’s increasing surrender to alcohol.

  The fight had been going on for the last twenty minutes. Gideon had barricaded himself in his room, but Paul stood in the hallway, fascinated by the volatile choreography of his parents’ latest “conversation.”

  His father staggered against the wall, shrieking at his mother. “You crazy bitch! You can’t talk to me like that! I’m leaving!”

  As the door slammed behind him, Sophie said with a smile, “Drive carefully, Bryton.” She brushed the front of her blouse and walked out to the kitchen.

  Paul ran after her. “Aren’t you upset, Mom?” Tears were streaming down his face.

  “Oh, gracious, no. Your father didn’t bathe this morning. He smells. I decided I didn’t want him pawing me in a drunken stupor tonight, so I provoked him until he left. Now I’ll get a good night’s sleep.”

  His eyes went wide. “You started it? To get him out of the house?”

  “It’s OK. He’ll be back,” she confided. “He needs me more than I need him.”

  Paul didn’t know what to think. “So it wasn’t a real fight?”

  “It was real. It’s just that I was the one in charge, and your father didn’t know that. That’s how I got what I wanted.” She turned to the pantry. “Can I get you a cookie?”

  He was speechless.

  His mother looked at him and wrapped her arm around his shoulder. “Didn’t you ever do something just to get a rise out of your brother? To tease him?”

  “Only if I knew you were around to save me if he came after me.”

  “Well, this is a little like that, but much better. Much smarter. Let’s take your brother, for instance…”

  His apprenticeship had begun.

  They were almost at the pond. It was an obvious choice for disposing of unwanted things since it was deep and because it had steep banks on both the north and east sides. The rain fell harder now, drumming an eerie tattoo on the roof of the SUV, promising to pummel anyone who ventured out into it. Paul would leave that job to Gideon.

  They were miles from any town, in a darkness so thick it was almost tangible. Entering a clear-cut area, their headlight beams caught on the short stumps of Douglas firs, like guillotined ghosts haunting the hills on either side of the road.

  He saw Gideon stop the Prius on the flat area above the north side of the pond. Pulling the hood of his coat up over his head, his brother got out of the car and ran back to the waiting SUV. Paul rolled down the window.

  “Turn on my seat warmer,” Gideon shouted, competing with the downpour. “I’ll go feed the pond.”

  He ran to the Prius and slid into the driver’s seat. Zipping Patricia’s purse closed, he wedged it under the seat to prevent anything from floating to the surface. When he had rolled down all the windows, he released the parking brake and exited the vehicle. He pushed it from behind. As the front wheels slid off the staging area, the car angled down the slope. Gideon watched the car gather speed. It disappeared into the darkness, fleeing from the lights of the SUV. A loud splash was followed by an enormous belching sound as the air was forced from the hapless automobile. Then silence, but for the rain.

  “Bon appetit,” Gideon muttered. He jogged back to the waiting Honda and clambered inside. “Jesus! This rain!” He pushed off his soaking hood and looked at his brother. “How do you suppose Ms. Pizza is doing?”

  “I’m sure she’s still sleeping like a baby.”

  “Let’s go back to my house and get warm. I could use a good stiff drink.”

  21. Ms. Pizza Fights Back

  FRIDAY, DECEMBER 28, 2018. She opened her eyes to almost total darkness, except for the tiniest sliver of light from under the door. Her head throbbed. The last thing she remembered was getting her picture taken while she waited in a warehouse for Steven Spielberg. The glass of water! The sonofabitch drugged me! The thought terrified her. She ran her hands over her body and was relieved to find that she was still fully clothed. Maybe he doesn’t intend to…She couldn’t allow herself to finish the thought.

  She was sure she had never seen the man before, though her glimpse of him had been so brief she couldn’t recall his face now. She sat up, drew her knees to her chest, and rocked back and forth. A wave of panic washed over her. Her heart began to pound. Oh, God! she pleaded. Help me!

  Her mother had told her not to leave school, not to move out West. “You belong here, honey, with me and your sisters. You’re an artist. Hugh said they were considering you for a partnership in the gallery, the youngest one ever. That’s how good you are. Please stay.”

  Her mother didn’t know about Leo—his escalating jealousy, his threats. The bruises he left were always in places that were hidden by her clothes. And his anger was getting worse. He didn’t want her to have any friends of her own. Didn’t want her to leave the apartment except to go to school, and then she had to come straight home. He was encouraging her to drop out—telling her she didn’t need a degree or a career, that he’d support her. She wasn’t stupid. She knew all the signs. She had to get away.

  From the frying pan into the fire.

  A faint odor, a musty kind of smell, hung in the air, as though this room had been used for some kind of storage. She reached out her left hand and felt a wall. Leaning against it, she stood up, but sat right back down, as her head began to spin and her stomach turned. She extended her arm to the right, but felt only empty space. With the determination of someone who had run in last August’s Hood to Coast Relay, she crawled on hands and knees in that direction, raising and reaching with her right hand every foot so she wouldn’t head-butt into the opposite wall.

  “There you are,” she whispered aloud as she touched the wall. She estimated the space to be about eight feet across. Fixing her eyes on the light under the door, she backed up, still
on all-fours, until she came up against the rear wall. I’m in what amounts to any empty closet.

  A voice from outside. “If you’re awake, get away from the door. I’m coming in.”

  She pulled herself against the back wall and shielded her eyes.

  The door opened. “I’ve got some vegetable soup in this thermos, a piece of gluten-free toast in this plastic bag, and a bottle of water for you.”

  All she could see was the silhouette of the man, outlined by a corona of bright light behind him.

  “I’ll skip the damn water, you sonofabitch. Who the hell are you? And where am I?”

  “This is bottled water, my dear. Never opened before. You have to stay hydrated.”

  “And why is that?”

  “Our client accepts only healthy specimens.”

  “Your client?”

  “We’re getting ahead of ourselves. We have you somewhere safe. We’ve rescued you from your boring life.”

  “I didn’t need rescuing. And you didn’t answer my question. Who are you?”

  The man chuckled. “I’m your savior. We’ve saved you from working that dead-end job, Ms. Pizza.” He chortled again. “That’s what my brother calls you. Now you have a whole new life ahead of you.”

  She could see him now—his sandy hair, his windburned face, the pouty way he pursed his lips. “I don’t want a new life. I want to go home.” Although her eyes misted over, she would not allow herself to cry. “Are you going to hurt me?”

  His oily voice grated on her. “Hurt you? Don’t be silly. Our client insists on perfect merchandise. You’re going to a new home. Away from all this…” He swept his arm around in a wide arc. “…this mediocrity. Now eat. I’ll turn on the overhead light for ten minutes. I’ll come back later with your medicine.” He set the food down and backed out of the room, closing and locking the door. The light above came on.