Deadliest Intuition

by E. Raye Turonek

  Meanwhile, Tom whispered into Gertrude’s ear. She could feel his hot breath as it seeped through the tiny holes in the sack. “It’s almost time. Your boyfriend should be arriving any minute, unless, of course, he left you to die like he did his little sister. How much do you really know about him anyway? I’ve got a feeling it’s gonna get exciting tonight.”

  A shuddering Gertrude whimpered as she cringed at the feeling of the pistol barrel poking into her side.

  Then Tom heard it loud and clear, the aluminum structure around him shifting. He turned just in time to see Ronald climbing over the ledge.

  “That’s not playing fair,” Tom grunted before shoving Gertrude down the slide.

  Unfortunately, she couldn’t scream as her mouth remained gagged with a handkerchief.

  “Gertrude,” he yelped, his heart dropping to his stomach as he witnessed her go over.

  The old man slid down afterward, taking the slippery hills with agility he hadn’t previously shown.

  Missing him by seconds, Ronald darted to the edge without a sack to ride down. He watched in terror as his love tumbled and flipped like a sack of potatoes. Ronald assumed her arms were bound together because she hadn’t struggled to break free.

  Tom reached the bottom. “Come on down!” he dared Ronald to take the plunge.

  To which Ronald answered with confidence. Gertrude’s heroic lover sat down, pushing himself off with his hands to get a bulletlike start on the aluminum slide, riding down with only his jeans covering his buttocks. The ride was hot, but he would never allow the expression on his face to tell it. Faux green carpeting at the bottom of the slide barely stopped him from crashing into the fence that surrounded the perimeter of the attraction.

  “Come on now, boy! Get up. Get up and face the music,” Tom menaced.

  Ronald stood up, headed right for them. The gun Tom raised to Gertrude’s sacked head caused him to stop dead in his tracks. Did he have enough balls to blow her head off right there? Ronald mulled it over as he stood no more than six feet away.

  Tom knew that look. His mind had already begun flirting with the idea of going for it. “You should stay where you are if you want her to live. Now, let’s cut to the chase. I don’t like you. You don’t like me. I know a lot about you. You seem to think you know about me. Nothing we have to reveal about ourselves would paint us in a favorable light. I’ve put measures in place to ensure that if a hair is harmed on this silver fox’s head—if anything tragic should happen to me—not only will sugar tits know about you, but so will the entire world. I don’t think either of us wants that to happen. So, do I kill her?” Tom teased, poking her in the head with the pistol as he waited for a reply.

  Ronald couldn’t risk another minute of Gertrude’s life. He spoke up without hesitation. “Just leave us alone, and we won’t say anything about this,” he reluctantly agreed.

  Tom studied his miscolored eyes for the truth.

  “Let her go, Swine,” Ronald demanded with more aggression, unwilling to wait.

  The old man sucked at his teeth in disdain at his heroics. “Holster your weapon, lover boy,” he continued with his ultimatum.

  Ronald countered with one of his own. “Take your gun away from her head.”

  “Do you love her?” Tom inquired.

  “I do,” Ronald admitted. The revelation caused Gertrude’s eyes to stream like a river under the bag.

  She had never felt so frightened, yet so touched all at once. Gertrude prayed whatever crimes Ronald had committed, whatever foul act he had been a part of, was not so heinous she could no longer bear the sight of him.

  Both lowered their weapons slowly but in unison, having agreed to each other’s terms. “He’s bluffing,” Ronald finally heard Cecelia’s voice. She hadn’t abandoned him after all.

  Despite her presence, Ronald controlled his twitching arm as Tom backed out into the darkness, leaving Gertrude there on her knees.

  “Don’t let him go. Kill him. Kill him, now,” Cecilia shrieked.

  Ronald ignored his twin’s outcry as he approached to uncover, then help Gertrude to her feet.

  He pulled the sack from over her head. Black mascara ran down her face, painting her dimpled cheeks.

  “Oh, baby, I’m so sorry this happened to you,” Ronald apologized as he pulled down the bandanna between her lips before unbinding her arms.

  Gertrude started in on him immediately, “What is he talking about, Ronald? Why would he say those things to you?” she cried, rubbing her bruised wrists.

  Ronald let out a long sigh. It was apparent he had to tell her something. There was no way she would be willing to go on, not knowing why she had been taken.

  “Tom saw me kill a man.”

  “You killed somebody?” Gertrude’s eyes bucked. “Ronald, why? Who?”

  “Do you remember the guys I had it out with the other day?”

  “The men who Brenda claims kidnapped her?”

  “They did. They also followed us to the cabin to get rid of us. I had no other choice but to get rid of them first. In actuality, it wasn’t even me who killed Joey. I assume it was Tom who did it.”

  “I don’t understand.” She shook her head in denial of it all. “You killed a man while we were at the cabin? And why is Aunt May’s friend doing all this?” She untied the sack covering her bottom extremities, then stepped out of it.

  “Tom is a pedophile, and I know his secret. Unfortunately, he will do anything to keep it, including hurting the person most important to me.”

  “I’m the most important to you?” her voice softened as she gazed into his eyes, hoping to see the truth she had heard.

  “You’re the only one,” Ronald confessed with teary eyes.

  Gertrude wrapped him in her embrace. His admission having been exactly what she had been waiting to hear, Gertrude tucked her head into his chest. She wanted to feel secure, but even then, she couldn’t deny that they were still in very grave danger. “Ronald, I’m petrified. What are we going to do?”

  “We’re not going to do anything. He’s threatening to tell people everything, and I just can’t risk it. I can’t risk losing you.”

  “Losing her?” Cecilia seethed, appalled by what her brother had said.

  “Let’s get you home.” Ronald lowered his head, wincing from the pain of the headache that seemed to hit him all at once. He squeezed his eyes shut. “Gertrude, you’ll have to drive.” He handed over the keys to her, feeling as if his head were about to explode.

  “Come on, baby. Let’s get out of here.”

  As the couple headed to the car, Ronald tried his best not to see what was breaking into his psyche. His breaths became panicked, his stare deliberate.

  Cecilia refused to let him get away again.

  “Ronald, your eyes. They’re both gray.” Gertrude couldn’t believe what she was seeing. In fact, as she stared at him, she didn’t recognize him at all.

  Ronald backed away from her, darting off into the darkness.

  Gertrude stood there, confused. “Ronald, where are you going?” she called out to him.

  Ronald neglected to respond. He had left Gertrude there all alone to fend for herself. She rubbed her hands up and down her shivering arms, the Detroit River nearby sending a crisp breeze over the landscape. “What the hell is happening?” She frantically spied her surroundings in fear of Tom coming back for her.

  I have to get to the car. She thought about pressing the button on the car alarm to show her the way.

  Beep! Beep! The headlamps of the cherry-red Chevy Caprice illuminated, ushering the frightened woman forward in a hurry.

  Once she made it to the car, she climbed inside the driver’s seat, locking the doors immediately.

  Ronald, on the other hand, was on the hunt. Cecelia had taken over, and the only thing that mattered at that moment was killing the man who had been responsible for past transgressions against the little girl. He hiked through the park, ignoring the couple making out atop a blanket in the gras
s. As he rounded the corner by the casino, he spotted Tom attempting to climb back into his car to scurry away. Ronald charged full speed ahead across the grass. By the time Tom noticed, he had come face-to-face with Ronald. The old man’s body was being jammed between his door and the frame. Ronald let up a little, then slammed the door back into his wedged body.

  Tom choked down the yelp he wanted to let out.

  Over and over, he took the blows. But something had to give. His weapon was stuffed into his waistbelt behind him. He’d have to use one arm to push the door off and the other to grab his .45-caliber pistol. Tom decided it best he accepted the brutal blows as punishment for letting his guard down.

  He quickly pulled his gun from his belt, holding it over the door to shoot, but on second thought, he remembered the park did have one or two couples there roaming about. He had seen them with his own eyes on the way back to his vehicle. Instead, he crashed the butt of the gun down against Ronald’s skull. Once, twice. By the third time, Ronald was staring directly into his fear-stricken eyes. The old man couldn’t believe he hadn’t knocked him out. It scared him a little more than he liked. The emotion was seen plainly in his dilated pupils.

  Ronald kept him pinned there in the door while he grabbed Tom’s wrist, twisting it down toward him. For a moment there, the old man thought his arm would snap right in half, at which point, he dropped the weapon. Ronald flung him to the ground by his arm. Tom crawled backward on hands and feet across the grass.

  “Now, hold on, now. Think this over. If you kill me, your secret’s out. Then you’re a dead man,” he barked.

  “I’m already dead,” Ronald responded but in Cecilia’s voice. Then he proceeded to kick the man in his head, knocking him flat on his back. He pressed the sole of his boot against Tom’s stoma. Ronald wanted to hear the bones in his neck snap. Harder, he pressed down against the man’s throat. Suddenly, headlamps in the distance caught his chrome-like eyes.

  It was Gertrude. She had gone riding around the park looking for Ronald, having no idea he had checked out.

  Tom coughed, attempting to heave oxygen into his blackened lungs.

  Still, Ronald refused to pardon him. He grabbed Tom’s foot, dragging him across the grass back to his car, then snatched up Tom’s gun. “Step inside,” Ronald threatened Tom with his own weapon.

  The old man got up, then climbed into the driver’s seat. Ronald sat right behind him in the back.

  “Start the car. We’re going for a little ride.”

  “Where do you want to go?” Tom asked, quaking in fear.

  “To finish what you started.” Ronald pointed toward his father’s red Chevy crossing their path at the intersection.

  “So, you don’t love her?” Tom mumbled.

  That’s when the headache hit him again. Ronald pressed the gun to the side of his own temple, wanting to end it all, but the forces that had overtaken his mind and body would not allow it to be.

  “What’s wrong with you, man?”

  “What’s wrong with you, man?” Ronald counted as the pain he winced from subsided in an instant.

  “I’ve never seen a grown man talk like a child before,” Tom admitted.

  “No talking, just touching, I reckon,” Ronald seethed, firing off a round into one of Tom’s hands that lay resting upon the steering wheel.

  “You son of a bitch,” he wailed, clutching his bleeding extremity.

  “Start the car and drive,” Ronald demanded.

  Tom started the car, pushing himself past the aching in his hand which had radiated up his arm. Although he was in excruciating pain, Tom continued to speed up the street behind Gertrude.

  The worry-stricken woman saw the headlights coming yet had no idea they were approaching at the speed at which they were. She’d since looked back down at the road in front of her by the time the station wagon slammed into the rear of her car.

  “Oh my God,” she shrieked, swerving across the asphalt as she tried to regain control of the vehicle. Gertrude gawked at the rearview mirror, noticing Tom’s station wagon. “It’s him,” she murmured. “Ronald, where are you?” Gertrude cried as he plowed into the rear of her a second time.

  The turn to get off that road was too far ahead, and she was already careening toward the curb, so Gertrude allowed the car to do its thing. The Chevy hopped the curb, crashing into garbage cans, park grills, and picnic benches. Still, it revved on.

  Tom made a hard right, hopping the curb to go after her. If he was going to die by Ronald’s hand, he didn’t mind at all chasing Gertrude down to kill her first. The old man hit the gas, then rammed into her a third time, that time almost giving himself and Ronald whiplash. When Tom’s body flew forward toward the steering wheel, he was able to grab the switchblade from inside his sock.

  Even though he’d dropped Tom’s gun, the jolt had been an advantage to Ronald as well. It launched him forward, then knocked him back so hard that Cecilia released her influence on him for a moment. He looked up, one eye gray, the other now brown, seeing his car ahead all bashed in with a frightened Gertrude behind the wheel. It all came clear to him at that moment what he had been a part of.

  While he processed what was going on, Tom took the knife, plunging it through Ronald’s wrist.

  Ronald’s reaction was immediate. He grabbed his pistol from the back of his waistbelt, unloading it into the driver’s seat. Once the old man’s body lunged forward against the steering wheel, the car veered left. Ronald put the gun to his own head, ready to blow his brains out. There was no way he could bear killing Gertrude. Just as he started to pull the trigger, the station wagon plowed into a massive boulder along the shore, catapulting the vehicle up through the air, then into the Detroit River. The car crashed into the water, headed straight for the bottom.

  A man standing out on the pier saw the car as it took a nosedive into the water. He made a heroic leap into the brisk water to save whomever he could.

  An hour later, the station wagon was fished from the river’s bottom with a cable and winch. The authorities were on the scene, as well as an ambulance. Front and center was good old Detective Barnes.

  Looming behind a tree nearby, shivering from the cold water, stood none other than his old pal Richard. His dedication had proved once more unwavering.

  “Detective, I’m surprised to see you here and without Alanis?” another officer remarked as he noticed Barnes taking in the scene.

  “Well, I’m here in a sort of unofficial capacity. The young man there”—he pointed at Ronald as he was being wheeled toward the ambulance—“that’s the late Sheriff Doolally’s son. I promised to look after him when his father died. I’ve been there ever since. I’d like to remain abreast of the happenings in this case.”

  “Sure thing, Detective Barnes. Anything for Sheriff Doolally. He was a great man,” the officer undoubtedly agreed.

  Gertrude stood in tears with a blanket wrapped over her shoulders as she waited to climb inside the emergency vehicle to sit at Ronald’s side.

  Chapter 53

  Could It Be Happily Ever After?

  After arriving at the hospital, Gertrude had to stay in the waiting room for hours, unaware of what was happening to the love of her life. “Please save him, Lord,” she prayed, hands pressed together and nestled against the front of her face. It was the hardest Gertrude had ever prayed before.

  With her head bowed, she heard his shoes first. “Yes, Doctor?” the worried girlfriend stood up, anxious to hear the news.

  “Well, it turns out Ronald had a tumor pressing against his frontal lobe. It was affecting the sensory cortex. Had he been experiencing hallucinations? Complaining of headaches?”

  “Oh my God. The headaches, yes. But hallucinations? Not that I know of, Doctor,” Gertrude replied while further pondering his inquiry.

  “He’s fortunate to be alive. We were able to remove the tumor, but during repair, he experienced some hemorrhaging. Parts of the hippocampus were damaged. It controls his memory function. There wil
l be some memories blocked or simply gone. I’m sorry. We are unable to determine which areas of his life will be affected. He’s been in recovery for the last two hours. If you would like to go and see him, he’s in room 112.”

  “Thank you, Doctor. Thank you so much for all you’ve done for him,” Gertrude professed as she rushed from the waiting room.

  Ronald lay, eyes closed, head and wrist wrapped in bandages. His body felt like he had been hit by a truck. His head throbbed. The young man had no idea how he’d gotten to the hospital. The last thing he remembered was water flooding his lungs.

  A soft knock at the door garnered his attention. Ronald finally opened his eyes to see who had come to visit him.

  She pushed the door open. “Ronald, it’s me.”

  “Gertrude,” he smiled. “My beauty. I’m so happy you’re here. I thought you would be gone.”

  “Oh my gosh,” she covered her gaping mouth, eyes filled with wonder. “Your eyes—they’re both brown.” She closed in on him, reaching out to caress the side of his face.

  “They are?” he asked. “Do you still love me?” He gazed into her pupils.

  “I do love you, Ronald,” Gertrude proclaimed with a smile. “Whether your eyes are brown, blue, green, or gray, I’ll love you.”

  “What about hazel?”

  “Hazel too.” She flashed a waning smile. Gertrude wanted so badly to talk to him about what had happened. Yet she hadn’t the audacity to burden him in such a weakened state.

  But Ronald wanted to know. He was curious about how he had gotten there. Some parts he could remember; others he simply couldn’t. One thing was for sure . . . Cecelia’s influence over him had come to an end. He couldn’t feel, see, or hear his sister anymore.