by mike Evans
Matt spent his time thinking as he drove. He kept to the speed limit and used prepaid credit cards that could not be traced to buy gas and food along the way with. He stayed on I-80, quickly becoming tired of the landscape of Nebraska. When he hit Lincoln he stopped driving to find the shittiest area of town that he could.
He’d been a street cop long enough to know where to find trouble and was less than worried about being able to deal with it. When he found the worst street he could, just as the day’s sun was kissing the earth goodbye, he saw a hooker who looked like she knew how to run her block. Matt pulled up tucking a pistol into his pocket and the kill bag behind the seat. The hooker walked up smiling, shaking and jiggling everything she had as she did. She leaned in, letting her cleavage pour over the window of the truck. “Hey honey, you looking to party?”
Matt smiled, keeping his hands out of sight so she didn’t panic and run when she saw the blood. “I’m always looking for a good time, honey, long as you aren’t a cop. I plan on being a good boy so you wouldn’t be able to charge me with nothing anyways.”
“Well, if you’s going to be good then I don’t know how to charge you. I’m use to spreading my legs, honey. If you still want to pay me, I’m sure that we can figure out something.”
Matt smiled, leaning over and pushing the door open. “You don’t have a friend you could bring along, do you? I’d like to have two girls, and I’d like to have you stay for a while.”
“Two is some money, honey. White boy like you got enough to be able to keep a lovely thing like me satisfied for that long?”
“I don’t think you care if I can keep my dick hard, so much I keep whatever addictions you have scratched. Do you have another girl you can call or are you going to waste my time? I’ve been travelling all day and the last thing I wanna do is sit around and play games. If you aren’t able to satisfy me, then bounce on outta my truck.”
She never lost her rhythm and ran down a list of pictures in her phone, finding a woman and holding it up for his approval. “I know you boys, you all love them damn Asian girls. You probably ain’t no different, is you?”
“I don’t give two shits if you’re white, Asian, or purple. In the end I don’t think it makes a very big difference. It’s all going to get me the same result.”
She punched a few buttons on the phone and a girl walked around the corner looking like she’d not eaten in a month. She came up smiling, her body screaming that it was under some type of influence. “Hey Stacey, is this the guy?”
“Yep, you wanna party for a few days, Pon?”
“You know me, does he got anything?”
Matt missed the point and said, “No, I’m pretty sure we’re going to need rubbers.”
The two of them laughed and he could already see that if he was going to be taking a break from killing it was going to have to be after these two. When he realized what they were talking about he said, “I don’t do drugs, if you can’t go straight for a few days maybe I should get a couple other girls. I have a feeling the two of you aren’t the only two hookers in the state of Nebraska, are you?”
Stacey perked right up. “No honey, we can go as long as you need us to. Besides anything we need we can get delivered to the room. You want a hotel room, right? We don’t go to stranger’s houses.”
“Yeah, you wouldn’t want to end up with some weirdo, would you?”
Pon said, “Are you sure he ain’t a cop?”
“No, he isn’t a cop. He got trouble written all over his face. I’m still not sure I can handle a boy this big.”
Matt looked in his rearview mirror seeing cars passing by and other hookers on the street. “Look, are we going to hang out or not? Fucking cops going to get me if they swing by here. No way anyone’s going to believe I’m not up to no good down here.”
Pon opened the door practically collapsing into the truck. He said, “You two know where there’s a hotel with a kitchen in it? I want to rent for a few weeks.”
The girls were trying to do the math in their head on how much they were going to make and whispering to each other so that one did not under or overcharge the other. Stacey said, “Head over to west Lincoln; just take a left on that road there and take it for three miles. There’s plenty of places we can rent, they know us up in here. You need anything else before we go? I assume you want some food if we are going to be in for a stint?”
Matt pulled out a list he’d already made and stopped by a grocery store giving Stacey two one hundred dollar bills. He trusted her to come back more so than Pon at this point. They each saw the stack that he peeled it off of and it was plenty to entice them to try and stay to get each and every one of the Benjamin’s he had into their pockets. Stacey stared at it for a minute reading the list and nodded, “Shouldn’t be a problem. Give me twenty minutes and I’ll be back. Can we get a few things?”
“I want Pon to stay with me. You won’t need anything, you’ll get some breaks and can go out and get whatever you want. Don’t worry it’ll be my treat, that sound good?”
“Yeah it does, because I don’t know about Pon, but I’d like to eat something a little less healthy. This shit is for someone trying to get in shape.”
“I'm trying to turn my life around. I figured starting with a new diet wouldn’t hurt anything.”
Stacey laughed, walking away to the store. He could hear her laughing and saying, “Hookers and health food, makes sense to me.”
Pon started rubbing his thigh and passed over his wound. She stopped when she saw the blood covering her hand. “Are you okay, honey? Do you need help, or a doctor?”
“No, I just need to rest. You two are going to get to play nurse for a few weeks. You think you can handle that?”
She nodded her head wiping her hands on his truck seat. “Yeah, we can handle anything. You just make sure that by the time we leave we get a little of that stack in your pocket moved to ours.”
Matt peeled off two hundred and handed it to her. She rolled it up stuffing it in her cleavage. She lifted his shirt slowly, hushing and looking at the wound. She smiled, looking at the blood dripping and said, “You’re trouble, aren’t you?”
“You got a problem with that?”
“Most the men I'm with are. Just don’t leave any bruises and you and I will be friends real quick.”
Matt hated lying to anyone, but knew that he needed their help and that without it his plans weren’t going to work out well. He had his next road trip planned already but needed some healing time. He figured with a few weeks of taking it easy that he’d have nothing to worry about long term, other than maybe a limp for a while from the truck accident. “I can handle no bruises; you just make sure you take good care of me.”
She bent down towards his crotch when Stacey came back out pushing a cart into the side of the truck. “Oh sorry, Pon, did I interrupt something?”
Matt said, “You saw that wound, right? It isn’t the best time to have something like that taking place. Those muscles contract and you're’ going to split my stitches open, my goal is not to get worse.”
“You sure you don’t think that it would be worth it?”
“I don’t have the time for a hospital stay. What I got going on right now is manageable. Don’t worry…I’ll show you the real me in no time. You just need to be patient. The two of you take care of me and I’ll be just fine.”
Pon showed a pouty lip patting his crotch and smiling before getting out of the truck to help Stacey with loading the groceries into the extended cab. Stacey said, “What’s in the bag?”
“My stuff…I'm from out of town. I'm going to need some extra clothes here eventually. Get in, I want to lay down.”
Stacey said, “That’s what I'm talking about, sugar.”
“Don’t get your nipples hard, Stacey. He’s got a little wound action going on. He isn’t going to be any fun for a while. I don’t know the last time I had a vacation, down there.”
Stacey tried to think of it herself and couldn’t re
member her last day off either. Tricking wasn’t something you took vacations from. That next hit and meal didn’t come from laying around a pay by the week apartment. She worked steady and knew she was going to piss off some regulars by not being around for a few days. She thought of that stack and knew if he was stupid enough to leave that sitting around the two of them would be able to outrun him and get a hell of a tip for their time.
**
Matt pulled into the parking lot of the motel. He couldn’t have been happier about the spot. It had half the letters missing on the sign’s lights and the price said negotiable. “How much is this place for a day?”
Pon shrugged and Stacey said, “This is my normal spot. I can get it for twenty five dollars a day. How long were you thinking about staying here?”
Matt didn’t answer, he pulled back out the cash looking at it and thinking a little bit longer than shorter would be best. He gave her six hundred dollars and said, “You get me a receipt saying how long I get to stay here. Don’t fuck me over. There’s a lot here that you aren’t going to see if you do.”
Pon licked her lips when she saw Stacey holding that much. “How come you don’t let me go in and pay for the hotel?”
“Because I don’t think that I'm going to see you again if I give you a stack of cash.”
“Are you trying to break my heart?”
“Just keep in mind that I don’t put up with any shit from anyone. You’ll be paid well for your time but you need to focus on getting me better. You look like you’ll be good at that. I need clean bandages and triple antibiotic cream put on this regularly. You can handle that, right? This has to be better than whatever you are doing on the street.”
“Do you need me to get you some drugs for the pain that has to hurt like a bitch, you aren’t going to be able to lift nothing for a while.”
Matt smiled and she believed him when he said, “I like the pain.”
Pon said, “At least I know what to expect when I'm out there. You got trouble written all over you, sweetheart. Just about everything in me tells me that I need to turn my ass around and bounce out of here.”
Matt shrugged, holding his hands up. “You can leave; you can stay… I'm not your boss, so you do what you want to while you can. If you can get a sweeter gig than this…then be my guest.”
Stacey came back out a minute later with change and a key. She earned a brownie point in Matt’s mind. The idea of change from a hooker had never even crossed his mind. She pointed to the corner of the second floor and the trio headed for the stairs after he parked the car.
The women carried the bags and Matt carried the mask. When they went in he looked around impressed that there were clean sheets. He said, “Did you tell them that we don’t want to be disturbed?”
Stacey was putting away the food in the kitchenette area and nodded her head. “Yeah, he knows who I am. No one will bother us. He said if you wanted it for any longer to just let him know.”
Matt looked out thinking about the stolen truck and made a note that he would need to get rid of that truck very soon. He sifted through the items on the table grabbing the peroxide, the bandages, the rubber stitches, and gauze. He threw a box of gloves to Pon, “Put these on and come here.”
She laughed as she opened them, “You going to give me something if I don’t wear these?”
“Just put them on. I want this as sterile as possible.”
He watched her like a kid in a candy shop. She seemed to enjoy doing it and he had to fight his inclination to grab her neck and snap it with one hand. When she was done he inspected her work and saw it couldn’t have been cleaner. His side was beginning to turn purple and blue from the day’s activities and the crash and noticed that it was early afternoon. He set an alarm clock for two in the morning, tucked the money deep enough in his pockets that they would never get to it in time, and put the bag next to him. “I need to sleep, you two try and be quiet.”
Pon disappeared to the bathroom saying she needed a shower and Stacey turned the TV on and the breaking news report came on immediately. She looked at it with a sense of deja vu like she had never before felt wash over her. Matt leaned over looking at the television, saw his picture and sighed. He unzipped the bag, slowly pulling out the mask and sliding it on. He looked through the bag grabbed a toy and felt the hammer, blunt, and effective. He grunted quietly as he rolled off the bed and when Stacey saw the mask she cried for help.
The Stranger brought down the hammer as hard as he could in a sideways swing into her teeth. They shattered not having much in the way of resistance from drugs, and an unhealthy lifestyle to support them. Blood pooled and spilled from her mouth to cover her breasts and neck. When she looked up, trying to scream through the pain, there were only jagged pieces of teeth hanging from her mouth. She was trying to beg but he was only consumed with surviving and she wasn’t going to be able to live if he wanted that.
He brought the hammer up one more time spinning it in his hand and bringing down the claw with every bit of force he could muster. He buried it in her skull and the hands that had clenched his pants trying to beg quickly let go as blood began to squirt from the wound, covering The Stranger and the floor around her.
He let go of the handle letting her fall and he watched as her eyes cease to have life in them. She fell over and landed where she’d stay until he moved her. He stared at the bathroom door for a minute realizing that the room was going to be a crime scene when he left. He walked to the door drawing a smiley on it. He knocked lightly and said, “Pon, unlock the door?”
She laughed wiping at her nose taking a bump away from Stacey, not wanting to share. “Did you finally decide that there was something I’m more qualified to do, honey?”
She opened the door to the mask and Stacey lying in a pile on the floor. Matt started to open the door further but she slammed it in his face, locking it and looking around the bathroom wild eyed. She saw the window had a cage over it and wouldn’t have been big enough for even her tiny frame to slide through. He began knocking slowly, whistling the theme to Jaws as he did. She tried to find a weapon in the small room but there was nothing and she knew it. They had everything in this place screwed down. The whistling began to get more intense and the knocking got louder and then stopped.
She waited a few minutes, and for no reason did she have to feel optimistic…but she did. She said, “Hello, did you leave? I can keep my mouth shut, I promise. Hookers do nothing but keep secrets, honey.” When no one answered she questioned, “Hello, did you leave, honey?”
She placed a hand on the door fighting the tears that were starting and thinking about her cell phone, and trying to come up with a reason she’d left the fucking thing in the other room. Pon hit her head against it feeling like she was going to lose her shit very soon. The door seemed to disappear around her. The action happened so fast she had to look to see if it was real or not. The Stranger grasped the back of her neck tightly and her small frame could do little against his massive arms. “Let go of me, you piece of shit!”
He did not, but he did let off with the pressure allowing her to push herself backwards. When there was a foot of distance he brought her back into the door once, twice, and a third time until she saw nothing but stars. He let go and was rewarded with the thud of her head hitting the toilet bowl which sent her into a state of confusion.
The door gave as soon as Matt pushed against it with his beefy shoulder, careful to avoid his injury. As he burst through the door Pon shrieked when it hit her. She looked up and saw the mask up close and screamed, “Please don’t kill me! I want to live!”
He knelt down looking at her in the bright lights of the bathroom. He grabbed her wrist twisting it around and pointing to it. “You put poison inside of yourself. If you wanted to survive you would find a better way to do it. Being a hooker everyday isn’t any way to exist. You can’t live the same day for fifty years and call that a life.”
“I can change, I can change, just give me the chance.”
He pulled her in close staring her in the eyes. “Your only change is going to be from the living to the dead.”
Tears began to wind their way down her face. He lifted her off of the ground pinning her against the wall. Her legs began to kick furiously trying her best to free herself but there was nothing she could do, short of shooting him in the head.
Pon still tried to plead with her final breaths, “I promise, I won’t…I won’t tell anyone. I won’t tell a soul!”
The Stranger leaned in squeezing until he could hear the bones in her neck breaking beneath the pressure. The only sounds she could get out were the ones of her gurgling as she choked to death. He could feel her final breaths on his ear as she passed. “Hopefully He forgives your sins and takes mercy on you for how you died.”
When he let go he was breathing heavily. He opened his hands knowing there’d never be enough to satisfy him that the blood would never be enough. He wondered if he had killed everyone on Earth if even he would be safe from the hunger to kill. Matt cranked the AC in the room and pulled Pon and Stacey in front of it to keep decay from setting in too fast.
Matt dipped a finger in Stacey’s crushed skull then ran an index finger across both women to draw a smiley face on the two of them. He pulled out the money from between Pon’s breasts that he’d given her earlier in the day. He turned the news on to see the police working the hospital, the camp ground, and they’d recently discovered the elderly farming couple whose truck he’d stolen earlier. He lay back listening to the reports, smiling.
When the man he’d seen earlier was shown on the news he sat up wincing at the pain in his side from his gunshot wound. Jack stared like he was looking into Matt’s soul. He said, “I have been sent here with one purpose and one only, and that is to catch Matt Hardin. He is guilty, dangerous, and should be considered armed and dangerous. Please do not underestimate him. He has no fear, and he has no appreciation for the living. There are widows being made today. Please lock your doors. We have many leads that we are following and hope to have more information soon, until then please be aware of your surroundings and strangers. Please study this picture…he is not a rock star, and he should not be considered a celebrity for being on television. He would eat your heart if he had the chance. Do not give him this opportunity! I promise you that we are doing everything within our power to make sure that these crimes do not go unanswered and will not stop until he is in custody, or in the ground.”