Claudia Must Die

by Markinson, T. B.

  “What?” Claudia’s eyes grew big with anticipation.

  “His wife. She’d hung herself in the garage.”

  “Was she dead?” Claudia held a hotel pillow close to her chest.

  “Yup.”

  “So, what was the feeling?”

  “It was like déjà vu or something. I thought that one day I would come home and see my mom hanging.”

  Claudia swallowed hard. “Is that how your mom…‌did it?”

  “Nope. She shot herself in the head.”

  “Did you find her?”

  Parker shook her head. “No…‌no I didn’t find her. My grandfather did. He would never talk about it afterward, and to be honest, I didn’t ask any questions. With my mom…‌well, I learned not to ask about things.”

  “It must have been hard, living with your mom.”

  “It wasn’t really. Oh, there were times, but mostly I loved her. Then I moved in with my grandparents. My mom was in and out of hospitals, but I saw her every week. She wasn’t some crazy lady to me. She was my mom.”

  Claudia’s eyes teared up. She wanted to run over to Parker and give her a hug. She refrained.

  “When my grandparents died, I wanted to shoot myself.”

  Parker’s declaration floored Claudia. Not once had she offered information. Claudia had to probe to get her to talk. But the statement just fell out of Parker’s mouth.

  “Francis said it was a car crash.”

  “Yeah. They were coming to see me. I went away for school,” she explained.

  Parker didn’t say it outright, but Claudia could tell from her body language that Parker blamed herself for their death.

  “I threw myself into my studies. If it wasn’t for that, I would have gone insane. Then I met Ida…” Her voice trailed off.

  Inexplicably, Parker asked, “How did you meet your husband?”

  Claudia blinked several times.

  “At Taco Bell.”

  “Really? I hate Taco Bell.”

  Claudia laughed. “Me too. I used to work there. Dennis would come in every day and order four bean burritos without onions. One day, I saw his car outside, so I put his order in before he stepped inside. He stood out front on the phone for a couple of minutes, so by the time he walked in, his burritos were ready for him.

  “I don’t think he noticed me until that moment, even though I served him almost every day for four months. The next day, he asked me out.”

  Parker clicked her tongue. “Taco Bell. People in high school used to call it Toxic Hell.”

  “Oh, you don’t even want to know what they put in their food.”

  Right then, a knock sounded on the door. Parker dropped the chair down, sending spasms of pain up her body.

  Claudia looked to Parker, surprised.

  Outside, they heard a man say, “Pizza delivery.”

  Claudia clapped her hands. “Pizza! I’m starving.” Before she had a chance to hop off the bed, Francis stormed through the connecting door, brandishing his gun. He was followed by Boyd and Otis, both of whom had their guns ready.

  Fritz sat up, also in attack mode.

  Francis peered out the peephole. “That’s not a delivery man,” he whispered.

  The man held a pizza, but he wasn’t wearing any affiliated clothing for any pizza joint.

  The man knocked on the door again. “Pizza delivery,” he said, much louder.

  Boyd and Otis eyed each other, recognizing the voice. “Let me take a look,” whispered Boyd.

  Francis edged over and checked his gun. His gut told him they were in trouble.

  Boyd looked, and then let Otis take a glance. The brothers exchanged an “oh shit” look. Francis raised his eyebrows, urging them for an explanation without speaking.

  Boyd leaned over and whispered, “It’s a messenger from Dennis.”

  Francis nodded. With his gun, he motioned for Parker and Claudia to hide in the bathroom.

  Parker signaled for Fritz to join her. He was no match in a shootout. Before Parker closed the door, Francis grabbed a gun from the back of his khakis and handed it to the student.

  Claudia’s eyes grew ten sizes when she saw Parker was armed once again. Great! Now she was being locked up with an eerily calm lunatic and an attack dog loyal to the lunatic.

  The bathroom door shut. “Why don’t I hold the gun…‌because of your injury,” said Claudia.

  Parker kept her ear to the door and silenced Claudia by waving the gun. Claudia started, backed up, and fell into the bathtub. The armed lunatic turned to see Claudia’s legs sticking out of the tub, kicking. The shower curtain engulfed her, and she was desperately trying to free herself.

  “Shhh!” Parker set the gun down on the bathroom counter and helped Claudia disentangle herself. “What’s gotten into you?”

  “Me?” Claudia hissed. “You’re the one waving the gun in my face.”

  The forcefulness of her words brought a smile to Parker’s face. “I wasn’t going to shoot you. I just wanted you to be quiet, so I could hear.”

  “What did you hear?” Claudia whispered as she positioned herself on the edge of the tub.

  Parker sat down on the toilet seat. “Nothing. Guess we just wait.”

  Claudia rolled her eyes in frustration. “Jesus, when will this nightmare be over?”

  Parker put her fingers to her lips and shushed her.

  ***

  The man outside the door knocked forcefully, his patience wearing thin. He knew people were inside the room. He could sense it, and he heard the commotion.

  Francis motioned Boyd and Otis to get behind him, so he could look out the peephole again. The elevator doors opened. An older man with a limp walked out, a blond bombshell by his side. Hooker, thought Francis.

  The old man hobbled past the messenger. “That sure smells good.”

  “What?” said the messenger.

  “That pizza. Sure smells good. If they don’t want it, I’ll buy it.”

  The blond giggled.

  “I’m meeting my friends,” explained the messenger.

  “Not very nice of them to leave you waiting. Are you sure they’re in there?” asked the old man.

  The messenger bristled. He felt the urge to push the man down. Controlling his rage, he said, “They’ll be here in a few minutes. I don’t mind waiting all day if I have to.” He directed the second sentence to the occupants inside the room.

  “Listen, why don’t you come inside our room and wait?” the old man tugged on the messenger’s arm.

  The messenger pulled his arm free. “Thanks, but I don’t want to intrude.” He motioned to the young woman, whom he also assumed was a prostitute. “Time is money.”

  “Oh, her. She’s my wife.” The old man beamed. He had been telling anyone and everyone that they had got hitched the other day. That was why he had started the conversation about the pizza. One-legged Johnny actually hated pizza.

  The messenger couldn’t help himself. “Your wife? Get out of here.”

  “I know. How did a one-legged man end up with this beauty?” He tapped his metal leg with his cane then turned to Joslynn. “You tell him, dear.”

  “He’s loaded,” explained Joslynn.

  One-legged Johnny tickled Joslynn under her chin. “Yep, I am. You see my grandson wanted to marry her, but…” He leaned closer to the messenger and whispered, “But they weren’t a good match. I didn’t want him to throw away his future. When I approached Joslynn to talk some sense into her”—the old man rubbed the back of his neck—“we just kinda hit it off.”

  The messenger stared at One-legged Johnny. Ignorant rednecks gave him the creeps.

  Johnny took the man’s silence as an indication that he wanted to hear more. “We left Ohio, that’s where we’re from, before word spread. I bet those old nags at home are still yapping about it.” He let out a cackle that spurred a coughing fit. After hacking for thirty seconds, he took another thirty cle
aring his throat before he could continue. “Yes, siree, I bet all the boys back home are jealous.”

  Joslynn tried to hide her disgust.

  The man wasn’t sure whether Johnny noticed the look on his bride’s face.

  The one-legged man looked up and down the hallway. “Still no sign of your friends. Hey, I insist, why don’t you wait in our room? No reason to stand around all day.” He pulled on the messenger’s arm again.

  “Thanks, but I think I’ll catch up with my friends later. Why don’t you take this pizza.” The messenger shoved the box into Joslynn’s hands and made a beeline for the staircase. He didn’t want to spend another second with the old coot and his hooker. Not for a second did he buy that the bimbo was Johnny’s wife.

  One-legged Johnny turned to his bride. “He sure left in a hurry. Why are you young ’uns always rushing from here to there?”

  Joslynn shrugged and fished in her purse for the hotel key. As she pushed open the door, One-legged Johnny slapped her ass and said, “You ready for more?”

  Francis cringed at the thought. He hoped the hooker made a killing off the old man—pervert. And to think he had the balls to tell people they were married. No way in hell had that old man ended up with a woman like her. He would have to be a billionaire.

  Francis opened the bathroom door and motioned for the girls to come out. Claudia snatched the gun from the counter as she passed.

  “I’ll take that.” Francis put his hand out.

  Parker had to smile. Francis tucked the gun back into his khakis, and looked to the assassins, who were watching the parking lot from the window. “Do you see anything?”

  Both shook their heads. “Do you think he’s still in the building?” asked Boyd.

  “Hard to know for sure,” replied Francis.

  “What, your gut doesn’t know?” snickered Claudia.

  Everyone in the room, including Fritz, turned to her and glared.

  She put up her palms. “Sorry. No offence.”

  “Now what?” asked Otis. He directed the question to Boyd, but his brother had already turned to Francis for the answer.

  “Let’s head to Cheyenne. They’ll expect us to drive straight to Loveland from here. That way, we can wait a day and surprise them from the north.”

  The brothers liked the idea.

  Claudia loathed it. Her mom and many friends lived in Cheyenne. “I know people there. What if they see me?”

  “I don’t think we’re going out for a night on the town, Claudia. Pack your bag.” Francis turned and went into the other room to get his stuff.

  “I don’t think we’re going out for a night on the town,” mimicked Claudia, as she threw her one spare shirt and some mascara she had picked up the first night of the road trip from hell into her purse. For days now, she had been wearing the same clothes. She had actually bought a pair of underwear and a T-shirt at one of the gas station complexes a few hundred miles back.

  Gas-station underwear. How had she reached such a low point? Claudia thought working at Taco Bell was bad, but at least back then she was going to community college in Fort Collins. She had hoped to transfer to Colorado State University, before she met Dennis. Once they got married, Dennis didn’t want his wife to go to school or to work. He wanted a wife who cooked and cleaned. At first, Claudia had loved it. Dennis was loaded, and she could go shopping whenever she wanted. At least, that’s how it was for the first few months, until Dennis put the kibosh on it. Now Claudia realized the mistake she made. Quitting school was a bad decision. Even weirdo Parker had held it together long enough to graduate from college and was now in grad school. And Claudia thought she was in much better shape mentally than Parker. After all, Parker’s mom shot herself, her grandparents died in a car crash—it was amazing that Parker didn’t have Jell-O smeared in her hair and spittle dripping from her mouth. True, she didn’t have the best social skills, but Claudia wasn’t sure if that was because of her past or because she was a math geek. She remembered Parker saying that math controlled everything.

  Between Parker and Francis, Claudia was ready to get off this freak show road trip. And now the bumbling assassins from Texas. She closed her eyes and prayed to God that she would get out of this mess alive.

  “You two ready?” Francis popped into the doorway. Not waiting for an answer, he motioned with his gun for them to follow him into the next room.

  Why is everyone waving a gun in my face today? wondered Claudia.

  “Okay, Claudia I want you to go with Boyd and Otis down the left-hand side stairs. Parker, Fritz, and I will go down the opposite staircase—the one the messenger took.”

  Parker nodded. She was relieved to be on Francis’s team.

  “What? Why can’t I go with you?” asked Claudia.

  “I think it’s best that we split up.”

  “Fine. Send Parker with those two.” Claudia planted her feet firmly on the ground next to Francis.

  “You’ll be safer with them. Both are excellent marksmen.”

  “Yeah, I know. My husband hired them to shoot me.” Claudia put her hand on her hips.

  “Actually, if you remember correctly, they were shooting at Parker.”

  “Another good point, Francis. They missed.” She fumed.

  Francis didn’t respond. His face went completely calm as he gazed into her eyes. It was terrifying.

  Claudia threw her hands up in the air. “Okay, fine, I’ll go with the hillbillies.”

  Boyd and Otis didn’t take offense. They preferred that to being lumped in with East Coast gangsters. Hillbillies were honest folk, for the most part.

  Chapter Sixteen

  The drive to Cheyenne was uneventful, and Francis was thankful. When he proposed the trip to Parker, he had no idea how crazy it would end up. Not one thing had gone right, and he wasn’t used to that. His success in life was usually the direct result of planning right down to the last detail.

  Now that he was collaborating with Boyd—who was surprisingly intelligent, even if he looked like an idiot—Francis felt better. For the first time since they had left Boston, Francis felt that things were getting back on track.

  Once again, they were at a hotel. The adjoining rooms allowed the girls to have their own space, but Francis could keep an eye on Parker just in case. Claudia threw a fit and insisted that she should be able to spend time with the boys. She whined that Parker wasn’t a good conversationalist.

  The five of them sat in the tiny room meant to accommodate two people, three at the most.

  No one spoke. The only one who minded the silence was Claudia. Everyone else was lost in his or her own thoughts, including Fritz.

  Francis studied the dog, noting how close he sat to Parker. When he had brought the dog to Parker’s place, he hadn’t believed she would take to Fritz, but the two were now inseparable. Even when Parker pissed, Fritz sat right outside the door.

  “Hello. Doesn’t anyone have anything to say?” Claudia eyed each person, one after the other. When she looked at Otis, the young man turned scarlet and rushed to the bathroom without speaking.

  Claudia rolled her eyes. How had she ended up with such misfits?

  “I have an idea. I’m going to think of a number between one and twenty, and I want all of you to guess which number it is. The one who is closest has to share something about themselves.”

  She had hated these icebreaker games when she was in college, but now she was desperate.

  “Why not zero to twenty?” asked Parker.

  “Zero? That’s not a number,” stated Claudia.

  Parker, baffled by her remark, said, “Not a number. What do you think it is, then?”

  “It’s nothing. Now, I’m going to think of a num—”

  Francis butted in. “She has a point, Parker. Ancient Greeks were unsure if zero should be considered a number. They questioned how nothing could be something.”

  Parker straightened in her chair, grimacing. “Without z
ero you wouldn’t have calculus, not to mention other things, like accounting.”

  “And keeping score,” Boyd threw in. “You can’t have sports without zero. How would you keep score?”

  Francis nodded, conceding their points. “Yes, but philosophically, the issue still remains: how is nothing something?”

  Boyd scratched his chin, deep in thought. “But it’s not nothing, per se. It’s a start. Every Rangers game starts at 0–0 and it doesn’t end until someone scores more runs in nine innings.”

  “But, in football—not the NFL, but football as in soccer—a match could end at 0–0, which means no one scored. So, once again, we are back to the concept of nothing.”

  “How do they end a match at 0–0?” asked Boyd. “How do they know who won?”

  “No one won. It’s a draw.”

  “A draw. That’s the stupidest thing I’ve heard.” Boyd stomped his left foot in frustration.

  “That’s the stupidest thing you’ve heard!” Claudia jumped out of her seat. “What about this entire conversation? I tried to get something going and all you bozos want to discuss is whether or not zero exists.” She spun around and stared at Francis. “I’m surprised you didn’t throw fate into the argument.” Claudia stormed into the adjoining room and flipped on the TV. She turned the volume up loud enough to drown out the conversation next door. Parker, Francis, and Boyd continued the debate.

  Twenty minutes later, Claudia muted the TV and heard Francis say, “You cannot compare fate with karma. Two completely separate issues, Boyd.”

  Boyd started to speak. Claudia tried her damnedest to tune them out. She wandered to the window and stared down at the street below. Her heart stopped, and she started to hyperventilate.

  In the adjoining room, Francis shushed Boyd and said, “Do you hear that?”

  Otis jumped up and looked through the peephole, gun ready.

  “No, not there. Next door.”

  The three men, guns in hand, peered into Claudia’s room and saw her gasping for air. Her chest moved up and down, but she couldn’t breathe.