by Thomas Ryan
“Come on Frankie. Let’s just walk. Don’t make this any more difficult than it needs to be.”
Frank Horgan shuffled forward on unsteady legs. He recoiled in horror as he recognized the shape of the yawning hole now at his feet.
Jessica smiled.
“That’s right Frankie. You don’t mind if I call you Frankie, do you.” She swung the lever into his knee. He dropped to the ground. “Sorry. I know you’re probably thinking there’s no need for that but I think you might get it into your head to make a run for it and I can’t have that, can I? I could easily lose you in this bush.”
He whimpered. He looked up. Eyes pleading.
But Jessica was not about to spare any sympathy on Mr Smith’s murderer.
###
From the start, and unlike Matt, Jessica had been suspicious of the man calling himself Mr Smith’s son. The old man had been gentle and the son was an asshole. She could not accept they might be related and decided to check the son out. When she uncovered his deceit, she had gone to the address given by Horgan when his ID was checked at the station.
The door had been ajar.
Inside she heard shouting. A voice she recognized as Mr Smith’s begged to be left alone. Deciding there was not time to call for back up, Jessica pushed through the door and crept along the hall. Horgan was kicking Mr Smith, demanding he give up the numbers. Mr Smith, chained to the bed, was unable to crawl away. He tried to fend off the blows but his arms were weakening and Horgan’s boots were getting through his guard and striking his face.
Jessica looked on in horror.
Then memories from her past exploded into her head. She was eleven again. The images so clear, it was as if it was yesterday. She had come home from school to find her cocker spaniel was tied to the washing-line pole. Her father was beating him with a golf club. Jessica remembered Goldie’s yelps of pain. Goldie, her only really true friend. Whenever her mother was beaten, Jessica always ran to her room and climbed under the bed and held onto Goldie for dear life, waiting for her mother’s cries to stop. Now her sadistic father was doing it to her dog. She ran to the tool shed and snatched up a hammer. Her father did not hear her come up behind him. She kept hitting on his head until her mother pulled her away.
Now, as Frank Horgan beat the old man, she only saw her father. She crept up behind and hit him hard behind the ear with her baton. And, like her father, he collapsed in a heap. She cuffed him then looked to help Mr Smith. The old man lay still. Jessica took his wrist and felt for a pulse. Nothing. He was dead.
She quickly checked the rest of the house. In the second room she saw the hole in the floor and the safe.
At the station she had gathered up Arthur’s doodling and shoved the papers into her pocket. For some reason she had kept them when she changed out of uniform. Like the papers scattered about the floor, the writing on the papers she now held consisted of numbers. One set of numbers had been circled. She knelt on the floor and dialed them into the combination. The door opened. After a rough count, she estimated the wads of money amounted to more than five hundred thousand dollars. She put the money into a paper bag and tossed it into the boot of the car. With some difficulty she managed heave a now semi-conscious Horgan into the boot after it. After stuffing a rag in his mouth and whacking him back into a coma she went to the Irish Tavern to look for Matt Bronson.
###
Satisfied Mr Smith’s killer was immobile, Jessica bent down and removed the handcuffs. Hands free, Horgan tried to crawl away. Each painful movement brought a whimper. Jessica struck him on the back of the neck and he lay motionless. She then rolled him into the hole. He groaned and lifted an arm. She picked up the shovel and swung it, hitting him again and again.
It took an hour to fill in the hole. She patted down the dirt and covered it with leaves and brush. No one would find the grave. Very few people came to this part of the West Coast. There were ‘No trespassing’ signs all over the bush-covered property, a gift from her abusive father to her mother for keeping her mouth shut, and now, finally, from her mother to her.
It would never be sold, nor would she ever live on it. She would need to be careful how she spent the money. Her home needed renovations and new furniture would be nice. Maybe she would take a trip. Then she would set about laundering the money into investments. Her stint in the fraud unit had taught her some useful lessons.
Maybe, if Matt Bronson decided to vent his spleen on her again or started treating her like shit in any way, she might invite him out here for a picnic. He would jump at the chance.
Jessica threw the shovel and cuffs into the boot. No one would ever find Frank Horgan or her father.
Nor would they find the others.
The End.
The Affair
The white paint on the ceiling had yellowed. Cigarette smoke or neglect take your pick. The curtains needed a wash. The sparsely furnished room needed dusting. But Ellen did not care that the motel was sleazy. The sheets were clean and the bed was comfortable. Little else mattered. The sex had been so exhilarating. Every cell in her body had bubbled and spat static like aluminum foil in a microwave oven.
Today, Ricardo had taken their sexual journey to new heights. A level of ecstasy she had never dreamed possible. She had feared her racing heart might burst from her chest. Now, she lay on her back gasping air waiting for her breathing to steady to a slow rhythmical pant.
To Ricardo she was just a slut and he treated her like one. She didn’t mind. She loved every minute of it. She loved when he talked filthy to her and she loved talking filthy back. It was icing on their climactic cake.
Why couldn’t Larry be more like this?
Her husband was the antithesis of Ricardo. Larry was a gentle, man, with the emphasis on gentle. He treated her like a rose petal when she craved to be yanked from the ground like an obstinate weed.
Ricardo filled the gap. Her Italian stud; all looks and arrogance and as shallow as a saucer of cat’s milk. There was no depth to Ricardo, no deep conversations. He was a pleasure giver and this he did with the expertise of a Casanova. Around his neck, gold plated medallions dangled on the ends of cheap imitation silver chains. Ricardo looked more like a hooker’s pimp than the Italian movie star he imagined himself to be. The balding head and burgeoning beer-belly added a final touch of the slovenly. Ricardo encapsulated the depth of degradation she had allowed herself to sink to. And, she loved it.
Within these walls Ricardo was her walk on the wild side.
At home Larry was her normal.
From time to time she reflected on the two men in her life. Both were of the same age and physique. But there the similarities ended. How was it she could be attracted to such complete opposites?
A deep sigh left her lips. The midday liaison had drained her. How she would love to close her eyes now and sleep. Just a short nap. But it was time to leave. Ellen stretched then turned her head towards Ricardo. As always he lay on his side head on hand, watching her, ogling her nakedness. She fought the urge to pull a sheet across. Her shameless exhibitionism actually thrilled her. Brought a blush of pink to her cheeks.
But the real world tugged at her conscience. She had children.
A twist and a roll and her feet met the floor. She took a clean pair of panties from her purse and before she disappeared into the bathroom she struck a final naked pose to tease Ricardo.
She was still giggling like a naughty schoolgirl when she stepped under the shower.
###
Ellen stopped off at the supermarket. The kids would be home from school within the hour and the cupboards were bare. The thought of grumbling teenagers was more than she could bear. Also, in her haste to meet Ricardo she hadn’t taken anything out of the freezer for dinner. She resisted the urge to settle for takeaways, the usual Friday night treat. The kids might ask what’s up.
As she reached for a tray of lamb chops in the meat section she caught her reflection in the mirror.
She was aglow.
; An attempt to stifle a laugh resulted in a snort. A quick look around. No one looked in her direction. What if the children noticed? She should join a gym. Then she would have a reason for looking like she had just run a marathon.
The sound of the television met her when she walked into the house. She checked her watch. The kids had beaten her home. She dropped the shopping on the bench and turned to the sitting room door.
“Have you kids done your homework?” She yelled.
“Where’ve you been?” Her son’s voice came back at her. “I’m hungry.”
“At the supermarket. Got caught up in traffic, and if you can’t feed yourself then you can starve.”
“There was no food.”
Ellen smiled. Breathed a sigh of relief. They wouldn’t move until dinner and that suited her. She put the groceries away and went into the laundry and dumped the panties from her purse into the laundry basket. She didn’t need the kids finding them in her handbag and asking awkward questions.
In the bedroom she stripped. Did a quick pirouette in front of the mirror. Pretty good shape for a woman of forty with two teenage kids. At least Ricardo thought so. She moved closer and studied her face. Some crow’s feet round the eyes but otherwise no lines. Her mother had insisted she stay out of the sun when she was younger. How right she’d been.
Through the years her brunette hair had gone through various stages of length. Never more so than now.
Larry liked it short.
“Be neat and prim and tidy,” he would tell her. “Look your age. Nothing worse than mutton dressed as lamb.”
Ricardo liked long hair. He wanted to hold onto something when they romped about the room. Recently she had let it grow. As yet Larry hadn’t said anything. She may yet have to ask her hairdresser for a compromise solution.
Ellen threw on a mauve tracksuit and went back down to the kitchen. For the next twenty minutes she put her afternoon liaison out of her mind and concentrated on preparing dinner. While pots bubbled on the range-top she placed cutlery beside the table mats. She intended feeding the kids first, and eat with Larry later. He was working late. She always waited for him when he worked late.
It seemed she’d had quite a few late dinners recently. She didn’t complain. Once she had commented that surely a law firm as big as the one he worked for had partners that could share the workload. Larry gave her a grimace of a smile, shrugged, and went back to reading the paper.
He never really talked about his work. He knew she found it dull. And it was. When Larry chose to become a lawyer, it was not as a litigator or even property law. No. He chose a tax consultancy. In Ellen’s book tax consultants ranked alongside accountants and the security guards that stood outside banks as the world’s most boring jobs.
Sometimes over coffee with friends Ellen would listen as they discussed conversations they had had with their husbands. She always changed the subject when eyes turned her way. Debating changes to tax law was not her idea of a fun evening and certainly not a subject she would relate to her friends.
Nowadays, she and Larry hardly talked at all.
He would take his paper through to the sitting room and peruse it as he watched television over the top of the pages. She would immerse herself in a book. Not that she minded so much anymore. It was relaxing. Her trysts with Ricardo more than satisfied her needs for sexual release and companionship.
She had an ideal life, and long may it last.
###
Sally was thirteen going on thirty and John was fifteen. Where Sally was observant, curious and naturally suspicious, John was docile, non-caring and egotistical to the point of narcissism. He was interested in girls, not siblings. He tolerated Sally and her friends, and although he had to admit a couple of her friends did catch his eye, they were still only thirteen. For much of the time he mostly ignored his sister.
When Sally told him their mother was acting strangely he dismissed it for two reasons. One, he wasn’t interested and two, he really wasn’t interested.
“Parents always act strangely, that’s the world they live in,” he’d said.
Sally pouted and stormed off to her bedroom.
But she was not to be put off.
During dinner she watched her mother’s every move. When her father commented on Ellen’s buoyant mood and her mother turned away crimson-faced, Sally had no doubts something was up. She recognized a mask of guilt when she saw it. She had seen enough of them on television. Oh yes, there was something going on and Sally was determined to get to the bottom of it.
She glared at John, trying to catch his attention. He was too busy filling his face to have noticed anything. With a sigh she accepted her role as detective; a lone private eye.
###
Over the next few days, whenever Sally was home she stalked her mother. However, a daughter so readily available did have consequences. Sally found herself washing dishes and hanging washing on the line. Brother John, oblivious to her sleuthing efforts, sat in his room listening to music and playing games on his computer
On the third day Sally gained reward for her perseverance.
She was sitting on the Persian mat; the one that once lined the hallway but was now hidden behind the settee because of the hole the cat scratched in it. The morning’s chore was to straighten books on the lower shelf of the bookcase. The phone rang. Just as she made to get up her mother answered it. After a normal greeting her mother’s voice dropped to a whisper. This served to alert Sally something was up. She crawled to the end of the settee and peeped round the mahogany leg. The muscles at the bottom of her neck tensed when she saw her mother look around nervously like a bag lady guarding a stolen supermarket trolley full of aluminum cans. Her mother held a hand across her mouth as she spoke into the phone.
Sally held her breath.
“I can’t, the kids are home,” she heard her mother say. “What would I tell them?”
Sally sucked on her thumb to stop herself from making a sound.
“Okay. I’ll give them some money for the movies. Give me an hour.”
When her mother put the phone down and disappeared into the kitchen, Sally hurried off to John’s room.
###
Ellen parked. Checked her makeup in the rear vision mirror. Applied a touch of lipstick then climbed out of the car and made her way across to room sixteen. There was a spring to her step. She was a bounding antelope leaping across the veldt in search of its mate. If she was a peacock she would have preened. Her faced beamed sexual signals like cheap Las Vegas neon lights. If the motel manager saw her he would know what was up. But she didn’t care. A wild afternoon awaited.
She didn’t knock. Just flung open the door. An arm reached out, took her wrist and pulled her inside. She squealed in protest but the sound was cut short to the outside world as the door slammed behind her.
###
“Now do you believe me?” Sally demanded, hands on hips.
“I believe you. Jeez. But what do we do?” John said.
“We have to confront her. It’s the only way.”
“You’re mad. We can’t do that. Besides maybe the guy in there is much bigger than me. He might lose his temper.”
Sally thought this over. It had never occurred to her there might be violence.
“Just as I thought,” John said, sensing triumph. “You hadn’t thought that far through, had you?”
“It doesn’t matter. Mum wouldn’t let anything happen to us.”
“Look Sally, I know you think you’re doing the right thing but what is it you hope to achieve? Do we tell Dad?”
“Of course not. I just want Mum to stop whatever it is she’s doing.”
“But that’s it. I mean, what is it she’s doing? We don’t know for sure. It could be something completely different to what you think. Maybe she’s helping the police with undercover work. Maybe this is a secret rendezvous with her handler.” Sally looked confused. “I mean, how certain are you she is having an affair and not something else?”
>
“I can’t say for certain.”
“There you go. I think it best we go away.”
“No way,” Sally said. “We need to at least look through the window.”
“And how do you propose we do that? We can’t just bowl up to the window in broad daylight. Someone might see us.”
“We go round back. Where we can’t be seen.”
###
Ellen lay naked, spread-eagled, her wrists and feet tied to the four corners of the bed. Ricardo had blindfolded her and had been massaging her with a glove made of opossum fur. The touch was ticklish and at the same time arousing. She purred like a cat. He threw the glove to the floor and took up the whip made of lengths of felt. No matter how hard he hit it would never hurt, not even if Ellen had been a butterfly.
He removed the blindfold. Ellen played her role to perfection. She looked up at him in feigned horror.
“Are you going to obey me, you slut.”
“Never, you asshole. Let me go.”
Ellen struggled but her restraints held her. Ricardo swung the whip.
“Let me go. No please. You’re hurting me,” Ellen cried.
“You deserve it. Say you deserve it.”
“No. Never.”
“Say you’re a slut.”
“Let me go, I’ll never talk.”
Ellen’s arousal heightened by the second. Heat invaded her head as she neared her peak. She knew that at the moment she begged him to, Ricardo would throw himself upon her. But delaying her own gratification always made their inevitable congress so much more delicious when it happened.
###
Sally found a fruit crate by the rubbish bins. John carried it across and put it under the bathroom window. She climbed up.
“Oh my God,” Sally whispered. “Mum is tied to the bed. Someone is beating her.”
“Let me see.”
John climbed up and after a minute he jumped down.
“Maybe she really is working undercover and they’ve found out,” Sally said.
“She’s crying for help. He’s hurting her. Hell, what do we do?”