Trapped

by Jonas Saul

  They know my name.

  “It’s past midnight. We are over twenty miles from help and there’s no one here but us cats. It’s payback time. Wouldn’t you agree, Vicky?” He gestured at the woman sitting with the little girl.

  Melissa tried to contemplate what he was saying as her mind raced through options.

  They’re all in on it. But in on what? Revenge? Murder? Theft? Am I supposed to be killed? How have I ruined people’s lives? How do they know me? Could this be about what’s in my trunk?

  “Go ahead, Vicky. Tell this bitch whore who you are,” he said, the gun in his hand raising slightly.

  Whatever they wanted, they had her attention.

  Vicky got up from her seat and walked maddeningly slow. She sat on a stool beside Melissa, hip to hip.

  “I am Layton’s lover,” she whispered. “Soon to be new wife.”

  Melissa felt like she had been gut shot. She leaned forward and pressed on her stomach while moaning.

  This is a nightmare. It can’t be true.

  “That little girl belongs to Layton and I. Isn’t she beautiful?”

  The little girl had turned in her seat. Their eyes met. She looked sad, forlorn. Her hair was obviously cut at home as no hairdresser would ever do that bad of a job. She didn’t appear to have been bathed in forever. But the oddest feature of all was she looked exactly like a female version of Layton. DNA tests be damned. There was no doubt those freckles and red hair could be anything but Layton’s.

  Pain shot through Melissa’s head like a searing rod had just branded her. Vicky held a clump of her hair and brought her back up to a full sitting position. She couldn’t help the scream that escaped her lips.

  “Go ahead, scream all you want,” Vicky taunted. “No one will hear you. Here, I’ll scream for you … AHHHHHHHHH!”

  The hand released. The pain subsided equally fast but a throbbing remained. Vicky had gone over to comfort the little girl as she cried.

  “It’s okay pumpkin. That there is a bad woman.” Vicky pointed at Melissa. “She done some bad things like steal your daddy away. Your daddy is rich. He promised us a great life but that woman stole it all. Mommy just needs to teach her a lesson, okay baby?”

  The little girl wiped her eyes and nodded.

  “Okay baby?” Vicky repeated.

  The little girl nodded again.

  “Say okay, dammit. I wanna hear you’re okay with this,” Vicky shouted.

  The little girl looked up at Vicky with red puffy eyes. In a soft trembling voice she said, “Okay mommy.” Then she looked away and rubbed her eyes as if she was trying to remove an offending image.

  Is my husband be in on this? Could Layton really have a mistress?

  This was obviously orchestrated in detail. Someone went to a lot of trouble to get her there at that moment. Could the woman have done it?

  No, it had to be the guy holding the gun.

  His blind ruse and sign language bit. He knew stuff about her. Stuff, only Layton knew. He had a gun. He had the brains. Diffuse him and this could all fall apart and go away.

  The driver of the van was getting up from his chair. Everyone seemed to stop what they were doing to watch him. He adjusted his pants and walked to the door.

  “Mark, did you take care of the bodies like I asked you to?”

  “Yes. They’re in the cooler.”

  “What bodies?” Melissa asked.

  “The truck stop closes at nine in the evening. The owners wanted us to leave but we couldn’t as we had to wait for you. May they rest in peace.” He said the last part with so much sarcasm, it dripped. “Their ultimate customer service was exemplary. They offered us their establishment to set a trap for the fly.” He made a buzzing sound. “That’s you, caught in the fly trap.”

  Vicky grabbed the little girl’s hand and walked her to the door where she unlocked it and stepped outside. The driver followed, but stopped at the door, leaving it slightly ajar.

  “Mark, clean the joint up. Leave no traces that we were here. Then, follow us to the cabin.” He looked at Melissa. “Get up. You’re coming with me.”

  Melissa crossed her arms and leaned on the counter. She had never considered what looking tough was supposed to be like. The last fight she had was in grade school. Leaving here and going to some remote cabin meant certain death. She’d seen their faces. The owners of this establishment were dead. Melissa had no choice but to refuse to go.

  “I would rather clean my ears with an ice pick,” she said.

  The driver stared at her, dumbfounded.

  Clearly, you didn’t expect that, eh, asshole?

  The blind gunman moved his weapon higher. The boy stepped back.

  “What did you say to me? Repeat it, because sometimes I don’t hear right?”

  “I said, fuck you. I’m not going anywhere.” Melissa remained seated, arms crossed, a look on her face that would’ve defied Medusa.

  “So you like to play?” the driver said as he closed the door. “Mark, go start the cleanup. Trent, put your weapon away and go wait in the van.”

  “Do I have to? I wanna watch.”

  The driver looked back at him. “You did your part perfectly. Your share is as good as in the bank. Don’t fuck that up by not listening to me. Go wait in the van.”

  Trent lowered his weapon and re-holstered it. He turned to the table they had been sitting at and retrieved his white cane. With only one backward glance, Trent left the restaurant, the door clanging behind him.

  She realized how wrong she had been. The blind man wasn’t in charge. The mastermind was the driver. Taking him out was going to be nearly impossible. She didn’t even know how to throw a proper punch. But going to a random cabin somewhere, or letting this guy beat her up, or worse, was not an option.

  This was fight and flight. She had no choice. The cornered animal had to strike out even though it knew it was going to die.

  She would be no one’s fly in a fly trap. No one would own her.

  Make the first move. There’s no turning back.

  The driver edged closer. “Last chance to comply.”

  The best way to attack him would be when standing. Melissa uncrossed her arms, leaned forward and made to get up.

  “Too late,” he whispered.

  She felt something strike her left cheek. She had no idea the pain would be so great. Her face felt broken. She fell to the tiled floor and writhed there, held under the grip of an agonizing pain.

  She caught movement above. Her brain took over and reflex attempted to move her head away, but she wasn’t fast enough. The driver’s boot hit her in the forehead, whipping her skull back like the worst roller coaster ride from hell. Stars filled her vision. Pain filled her mind. She lay moaning and crying, waiting for the next blow.

  When it didn’t come, she opened her eyes and looked through the tears.

  The driver was gone.

  She moved her head to look at the counter but her neck protested too much. She felt around the muscles. Nothing protruded or seemed broken.

  The driver reappeared from the back room. He came from around the counter and walked toward her. Light from the moon came through the window and glinted off something in his hand.

  A butcher knife.

  He smiled at her.

  “Now we’re going to have some fun. Reach in slowly and give me your car keys or I’ll remove a finger. You’ve got five seconds.”

  A simple carjacking? No one knows what’s in my trunk. I will never give up my keys.

  In the precious seconds she had, Melissa rolled to her back and slowly reached for her pocket, attempting to stall as long as she could.

  “Come on,” he said. The knife edged closer to her hand. He held it just above her stomach as he kneeled over her.

  The loop of the keyring wrapped around her index finger within her pocket. She pulled the keys out and gripped them in her palm. Then she threw the keys at the driver’s face. He blinked and turned his head in reflex. Melissa used he
r other hand to grab his wrist, spin the knife around and jab at him, using the floor for leverage.

  She was surprised at how easy the knife entered his chest. It missed the bones of his rib cage as it effortlessly sliced sideways all the way to the hilt. The knife was long enough that the tip would be close to protruding out his back.

  The look on his face was indiscernible. A mixture of shock, anger and surprise. He looked down at the handle sticking out of him. His balance lost, the driver fell back onto the tiled floor where blood seeped out of his body. Blood formed on his lips. It began to bubble.

  He was dying and she had killed him. Yet she felt nothing other than one step closer to freedom.

  The boy was still in the back. The rest of them were outside. She had to deal with the boy.

  Melissa snatched her car keys off the floor, pocketed them and stepped over the dying driver. He moaned and rested his head back. Resignation covered his face. He knew it was over.

  Melissa quietly tiptoed to the front door and turned the thumb lock to secure it. She peeked outside. Trent was in the van with the woman and the little girl. Trent had a gun. She would have to deal with that later, she reminded herself. First, the boy.

  She walked back to the driver hunched over low so no one could see her from outside. He wasn’t moving. She looked up at the counter to make sure the boy wasn’t watching and then rifled through the driver’s pockets looking for a weapon. He had a gun in a holster under his left arm. She unclipped the holster and yanked the gun free.

  “Get up and turn around slowly.”

  The boy. He must have been in the kitchen. Now he was standing behind her.

  “How did you do it?” The boy was sobbing. She heard it in his voice. “How could you?”

  She eased the gun toward her waist area and started to stand.

  “Hands where I can see ‘em.”

  “Listen,” Melissa said. She was surprised how much talking hurt. The area where she got punched was still throbbing. Only using as little of her mouth as she could, Melissa continued. “We don’t have to do this. It was all a misunderstanding.”

  Blood began to seep into her vision from the kick she got on her forehead. She hadn’t turned around yet. Only one hand was in the air, the other holding the weapon.

  “No, bitch. No misunderstanding. You just killed the only man who ever loved me. He took me in when my dad threw me out. He got me this job.”

  It was easy to connect the dots. “Listen, tonight is why he got you the job. So you would be able to do terrible things to people.”

  “No, Kevin was all about righting the world’s wrongs. He told me about you. He said … wait a second. Turn around. Look at me!”

  “Do you have a weapon?” Melissa asked. “Are you going to hurt me?”

  “Damn right. Turn around or you get it in the back.”

  Melissa turned slowly, rolling the gun around by her side, protected from view. The boy held a hammer in his right hand. It was high, over his head like he was going to throw a baseball.

  “Is that the best you’ve got?” she asked. “There’s a whole restaurant in the back and you come out with a hammer.”

  The boy was shaking. She could see the hammer vibrating in the air. His eyes were wild, darting from her to the dead man on the floor. In that moment she felt sorry for him. His age hurt him in two ways. He wasn’t mature enough to have made better decisions with whom to associate with and now, the lack of maturity made this scene even more difficult to deal with and understand. She had to disarm him, but the wild look on his face made things that much more difficult.

  “Let’s talk about this. Maybe we can work something out. I know you’re frightened,” Melissa said.

  “There’s nothing to work out. There’s me alive and you dead. Once that’s done, then you and me have worked out everything we’re supposed to deal with. Do not mistake my shaking for fear. I am fucking angry. I’m so gone right now that I may need to murder Trent out there for leaving you two alone. Now,” he took a deep breath. “Step to me, bitch. Come closer so I can have a good look at what a whore is like. Come on,” he said.

  A large bang erupted at the front door about four feet behind the boy. As Melissa jumped, her hand holding the gun popped out of hiding. The boy had also jumped and spun around to see what had caused the noise. In that two second window, Melissa brought the weapon up to aim at the boy. He turned back to her.

  “Let me in,” Trent yelled from outside.

  Melissa fired. The impact of the bullet shocked him. He looked down. The hand holding the hammer lowered. Melissa held the gun ready should she need to use it again. She caught a look of absolute surprise on Trent’s face.

  Blood spread slowly across the floor outward from the boy’s foot. The wound had been a lucky shot. The bullet entered in front of the ankle. His right leg shook and buckled. The hammer fell free from his hand and smacked hard onto the restaurant’s floor, bouncing twice. The boy fell to the floor beside it.

  It wasn’t a killing wound. She only wanted to incapacitate him.

  Melissa ran past the fallen boy to the back. White aprons hung on the wall just inside the door. She grabbed two and ran back to the bleeding boy.

  “Here, wrap your lower leg with the apron’s straps or you’ll die from blood loss.”

  Trent reefed on the door behind her. Melissa came up quick and aimed the gun at his head through the window. He stepped back at least two feet.

  “Do not fuck with me!” she shouted. She had no idea where this side of her came from, only that now it had escaped she was quite happy to have it.

  “Not by a long shot,” he yelled back and pulled out his own weapon.

  As fast as he produced the gun he shot it. Glass sprayed out toward her. She screamed and ducked her head, raising her arms to cover herself. When she looked up, Trent was reaching through the broken window to unlock the bolt. An audible click told her he was in.

  It all happened too fast. Things were spiraling out of control. She spun and bolted for the back of the restaurant. Two more bullets rang out behind her. One came so close she heard the wind parting as it passed her head. Once she made it into the back room, Melissa, in a frantic gesture that must’ve looked like she was trying to put a fire out, touched herself everywhere searching for a bullet hole. Her hands came back dry.

  She ran past the fryer and a well-used wooden chopping table and ducked in beside the freezer door. The large silver handle was cold to the touch. Melissa pulled out the handle and eased the door open to conceal herself behind it near the wall. When they came into the back they’d figure she was hiding in the freezer. She peeked around the edge of the door. No one had followed her into the back yet.

  She looked to her right at the hole where orders were passed through from the front. Trent was there, grinning like a pervert with his pants down. The problem wasn’t Trent so much. The problem was his weapon. It was aimed directly at her head. In the second Melissa saw his hand twitch she dropped down and yanked on the freezer door, hoping it would move another foot to conceal her from him. A bullet punched the door about six inches above her head.

  She screamed, sprawled out on the floor and pushed off the wall with her legs. The gun extended above her head, her finger yanking on the trigger again and again. Melissa fired in Trent’s general direction. She couldn’t tell if she hit him or not. She lay spread out under the edge of a long metal table that sat like an island in the middle of the restaurant’s kitchen.

  She couldn’t hear too well after the popping of the weapons. She wondered if the woman and the girl had driven away in the van yet. Without knowing how to check the gun to see if there were any bullets left, Melissa looked around for a weapon. The closest thing she saw in the back was a knife and that wouldn’t work against a man with a gun.

  The freezer door remained wide open. From this angle she could see all the way to the back. She blinked and took a second look. She saw the head and part of a shoulder of the woman who had served h
er coffee when she had first shown up at the restaurant.

  So that’s what they did with the owners.

  She heard someone moan from the front of the restaurant. It sounded like the boy.

  “Call an ambulance,” he shouted.

  “Is Trent dead?” she asked.

  “Yes. You shot him in the forehead. It’s over … please help me.”

  Was he telling her the truth? Or did they just want her to stand and reveal her position?

  “How do I know you’re telling me the truth?”

  “You don’t.”