“The Time of Your Life…how may I help you?”
“This is Gabrielle Lincoln, and I need to speak with Ms. Heidi right now,” I said, hoping the apprehension in my gravelly voice would make an impact on the receptionist since trying to get through to Heidi was next to impossible.
“One moment please. I’ll see if she is in.”
I stood in the center of the grungy sweatbox, staring at years of graffiti on the nasty, dirt-covered walls, reading the filth that was written years ago, trying to occupy my mind while I waited impatiently, but unable to stand still as the anticipation was killing me. I was shocked when I heard Ms. Heidi say, “Ms. Lincoln. Perfect timing. I was just going to call you with some exciting news!”
I stopped moving around and stood perfectly still, unable to respond with much except a shocked, “Oh?”
“Yes, yes! Your venue is open. A cancellation was made this morning. You are going to get your dream wedding at The Castle!” she said, her excitement immediately calming my nerves and making me feel like an utter fool for my distraught visions of some conspiracy only seconds ago. I felt my body relax a bit at this news, knowing the lunacy of the day led me to fear for my life as I said, “Oh, thank God! Did they just call you?”
“Oh no, my dear, that is why I apologized earlier. The manager, Rosemary, called this morning and left me a voicemail, telling me that they just had a cancellation, but after the morning we’ve had dealing with the cops, police reports, and cleanup crews, I failed to call you. I am sorry, but maybe this great news will make up for it?” Heidi said, her words peppy and bright, her tone forced a bit to sound apologetic.
I hung my head down in shame for thinking that poor Ms. Martin was some crazy lunatic that basically just kidnapped me, wanting God only knows what from me. My lips curved into a grin as I just shook my head, mentally giving myself a kick in the ass for being so overly dramatic. God, Jeff was right. I really needed to lay off the horror movies.
“No apology needed, Ms. Heidi. Diane has been a Godsend, rescuing me this morning when my tire was flat and offering to bring me up here to sign the contract. She is a gem; you should give her a raise,” I said, the burning in my throat still affecting the sound of my voice. God, I sounded like a ninety-year-old woman.
But then it finally dawned on me what she just said, “…called this morning….” I recalled that I was inside this dirty bathroom because Ms. Martin, only moments before, received a call from The Castle, telling her the venue was not available. My heart sank once again.
“But, I don’t understand. Ms. Martin just talked to them, and they don’t have any openings,” I said as fresh tears began to slide down my cheeks.
“Who?”
I cleared my throat. “Diane…Diane Martin…the lady from your office that is driving me up to the Castle to sign the contract,” I said, my voice trembling now.
There was a long pause before Ms. Heidi responded, “Gabrielle, what are you talking about? We don’t have anyone here by that name.”
“Well, then, who is she?” I whispered, my voice trailing off as fear instantaneously ran up my back in the form of cold shivers, my hands trembling once again and the heavy cloak of dread enveloping me. Before Heidi could respond, my senses picked up—unfortunately a split second too late—that I was no longer alone in the bathroom. I could hear faint chattering from my phone, but it didn’t register as I quickly spun around and came face to face with Ms. Martin.
She was no longer wearing her sunglasses and for the first time on our trip today, her eyes bored through mine. They were ablaze with anger, so much so that I could almost feel the heat shooting from them, her fury etched deeply across her face as she said, her voice gravelly and low, “Name’s Piper, bitch.”
Before I could even blink my eyes or release the scream in my throat, I felt crushing pain explode in my head, followed by a flash of bright, intense light.
FROM THE MINUTE SHE sat her sorry ass in my passenger seat, it took everything in me—every ounce of mental restraint, muscle control, and strength—not to reach across the console and knock those bright white teeth out of that lying mouth of hers, driving their jagged edges down her scrawny throat. Just having her this close to me, after all my months of planning, stalking, and preparing for this moment, was a delicious fucking high. My body ached for me to kill her from the minute the door shut. Instead, I smiled widely after I noticed my white knuckled grip on the steering wheel, realizing that my thoughts of ripping her to shreds were getting the best of me. I decided to concentrate on my role, but I couldn’t help but ask the little disheveled tart about Olin, even though I knew that was dangerous territory for me.
She coyly tried to evade my questions, doing her best to turn the conversation in the direction she preferred to go, but I was relentless. Something inside me wanted to hear her say his name since I knew it would be the last time that sensuous word would be spoken from her deceitful lips.
I tried to focus my attention on the road in front of me as I zoomed in and around the traffic, enjoying the fact that she looked a bit nauseous. I was doing my best not to stare too long at her, fearful that my eyes might betray my true emotions toward her, for even the large sunglasses on my face would not be able to contain my outrage at being in such close proximity to this evil whore. To think that this little hairball caused physical harm to my Olin made the bile rise up my throat, and my anger rose as I listened to her ramble on about how excited she was to have her “dream” come true by getting married at the Castle. Her persistent jabbering was making my stomach churn with every little giggle and smile she emitted. Good God, could she be any more obnoxious?
I steadied my resolve to continue with my plans for her, rather than succumbing to the intense, animalistic emotions now obscuring my vision. I kept both my hands firmly clasped around the leather-encased steering wheel rather than around her neck, focusing all my energy on playing the part of “Diane Martin, Wedding Planner.” There were still ten miles to go until I reached the designated spot where I planned to stop along the isolated stretch of road to shut this bitch up, but every single moment was excruciating, and I wasn’t sure I held enough intestinal fortitude to control my faculties that long.
I wanted this bitch dead, now.
I held myself in check pretty well, all things considered, until the little ringleader called. I could hear that bitch’s voice through the phone, and it made the anger inside me ignite, like tossing fuel on an open flame, so much so that the road in front of me literally disappeared, replaced by a dark, red haze of fury. My foot pressed the gas pedal down harder, accelerating quickly, eating up the miles in a blur of speed.
Finally, both of the lying whores shut up, and I knew I couldn’t wait any longer to execute my plan because at the rate I was going now, I would end up killing us both in a fiery car crash. While li’l Miss Priss fiddled with shoving her phone into her pocket, I reached down and hit “send” on the cheapo Wal-Mart phone, hidden nicely under my left thigh, and called my other cell, faking the call from “Rosemary” at the Castle. It didn’t require much acting chops range to pull off sounding angry and perturbed as I was well beyond those meager emotions. As I reamed out phantom “Rosemary” on the other line, my voice took on the pitch it takes when I am about to blow, so I immediately pulled the car off on the shoulder of the road before I smashed it into a tree. Of course, before I could even finish my “conversation,” the bitch basically jumped out of my car and began puking all over the ground. As annoyed as this made me, since I was planning to knock her lights out with the heavy flashlight lying at my feet, I was glad she hurled her insides out onto the dry ground rather than my car, since riding back to her new temporary home would take a few hours, and I really didn’t feel like smelling her vomit the entire way.
Besides, she would be weaker now and most likely would not be able to put up much of a fight; actually, giving her a nice rap on the head out here was a much better plan than my original one, for she wouldn’t bleed a
ll over my seats before I had the chance to bandage her wound. Rule number one of plotting someone’s death: always be ready to respond to any last minute change of carefully laid plans.
For a few seconds, I sat in the cool confines of my car enjoying myself while watching her pale lips eject the contents of her stomach, relishing her tormenting heaves and pathetic sobbing. I finally pulled my attention back to the task at hand since I knew she wasn’t going to drop over dead from just throwing up or having a crying jag, so I opened the car door, only to be met with a rush of hot, bone-dry air. I quietly snatched the flashlight off the floor as I stepped out onto the hot pavement and carefully concealed it in the folds of my ample skirt, my heels sinking a bit into the heat-softened asphalt. As I came around the back of the car, I almost laughed at her feeble frame as she wobbled back over to my car, almost falling down as she tried in vain to lean against the hot steel for support. I tried my best to hide my amusement while I blurted out some random comment about not having any tissues as I made my way over to her body, now seated haphazardly in the front seat of my car. For a moment I stared at her, drinking in the helplessness that was exuding out of her, taking in the last moment she would see me as “Diane Martin” and enjoying her crackling voice as she begged for water, when her fucking cell phone rang, startling us both. I cringed on the inside as she started sniveling into the phone, breaking the “bad news” to the poor groom, furious with myself for wasting those precious seconds staring at her rather than bashing her skull in.
Fuck!
I really had no choice now but to get back into the car and drive the little whiny bitch to the gas station, since I couldn’t really do much now. Damn! As I pulled out on the road, my mind was already working out the solution to this newest twist in my plans. I forced myself to remain calm and not just reach over and grab her by that knotted mess on her head and slam it several times into the dashboard. No, no, I needed to wait, but my body was reacting to my apprehension and started to shake. I needed a pressure release, now.
While the little bitch whimpered on and on into the phone, I pulled into the single pump gas station. Miss Happy Pants didn’t say a word as she immediately jumped out of the car and headed to the building, I assumed so she could find some blessed water that she craved. I watched her disappear inside the door, and as she did, I reached into my pocket and pulled out the small compact I kept with me at all times for such emergencies. I lifted the long folds of my skirt up enough to reach my inner thigh and started slicing quickly. Oh God, that rush of painful pleasure that greeted my brain caused me to shudder as the intense pressure in my head finally evaporated. I was still leaning against the doorframe of my car when the bitch walked back out, carrying what looked like a key. Covering my mouth with my free hand, I stifled the cackle I felt in the back of my throat at that site—li’l Miss Priss, forced to use an outdoor bathroom! Ha!
Inhaling deeply, letting the hot, parched air fill my lungs as I slid the blade back into my compact, I began the task of filling my car up, waiting for the little troll to finish pampering herself so I could introduce her to the next chapter of her short life. After a few minutes and a fully topped off tank of gas, the uneasy feeling that something was wrong crept up my back, immediately making my hair stand up on end as the sensation slithered its way up to the top of my head. What the hell was taking her so long? Then my stomach dropped like I was on some sort of crazy ride at an amusement park as the thought hit me—what if she figured out who I was?
I replaced the gas nozzle and walked toward the store to pay, ignoring the little counter rat as I threw the cash on the counter. I was almost to the door when I heard from the back of the counter, “Is your friend all right?”
Shit, now I had to converse with said rat.
I turned around and said in my most chipper voice, “Oh sure…she just has had a rough night…you know, drinking away the memory of her cheating boyfriend,” I said, eyeing this little dirt mite heavily, wondering if she would fit in the small cooler by the door and exactly how hard it would be to stuff her in there.
“Ugh, men! Who needs them? I was just wondering since she looked pale when she came in, and she’s still in the bathroom,” the counter-rat replied.
Damn, I wish I brought the flashlight with me. My eyes quickly scanned the almost empty space, looking for something I could use to render her unconscious as I still stood by the door and replied, “I’ve tried telling her before that she’s killing brain cells, but does she ever listen to her aunt? Nope, she just calls me to rescue her after she goes on a bender,” I said, biding time while I scoped the place out.
“Gosh, I wish my aunt would do that for me!”
I finally found my weapon of choice by the counter; a tire iron was leaning innocently against it, right next to a display of Fix-a-Flat, with a handwritten note that said, “Please Return Once Finished.” I was relieved to know that it was there in case I needed to use it on the dusty, miserable waste of energy if she got too nosy, but before I felt the need to really worry, she said, “Just tell her to leave the key in the bathroom; I have a spare here, and I bet she just wants to crash in a soft bed.”
I smiled at the little waif who unknowingly just saved her own life and said, “Sure thing. Thanks!” I pushed the glass door open and rounded the corner to the bathroom. Once out of site of the counter-rat, I slowed down and stopped under the tiny window, listening. I heard the water running and then stop, what sounded like crinkling paper, and then the door cracked open just a bit. Assuming she was coming out, I stood up quickly, pressing my back as hard as I could against the wall, and I waited for her to walk back to the car. Suddenly, she shut the door and stayed inside. I heard her pace back and forth as she made the phone call I was hoping she would not make.
The sense of foreboding overtook me again. She must be mulling over the events of the day and finally put the pieces of the puzzle together since I could now hear her garbled voice crackling into the phone, obviously talking to Rosemary, or at least someone at The Time of Your Life. I slid my shoes off and quickly turned the other direction as I sprinted back into the store, yanking the door open so hard that I almost tore the decrepit handle off.
Counter-rat was going to have to die today after all.
I didn’t say a word as I barreled through the front door and headed straight to the tire iron that I had no intention of “returning.” In one swift move, I slid past the edge of the counter and grabbed the ancient piece of metal. Spinning around, I split the skull of the young thing almost in two before she even had a chance to open her mouth and question my frantic moves, and as I watched her convulse for a few brief seconds, the thud of the metal making contact with her fragile skull played over in my head. Her twitching body and most of her brains leaking out onto the ancient Formica were enough evidence for me that she wasn’t long for this world, but just in case, I reached over and yanked her tiny little plastic cell phone out of her bloodied hand and threw it on the ground, demolishing it with the iron, just like her head. I scanned the small store interior for any evidence of a phone line but didn’t see one. I took one last look at the pathetic crumpled mass of blood, brains, and matted hair and decided that I just did her, and the world, a favor. She was released from years of hardship and eating dust, working in this barren hellhole. She wouldn’t have to live her sordid life bouncing from one stained lover’s sheets to another, her several litters of baby rats growing up and, in turn, living the same life. Thanks to me, I just obliterated them all before they even took a breath.
I smiled and thought Good work, Piper.
That completed, I trotted back out the door and padded quietly over to the bathroom door again, just in time to hear her feeble voice, drenched in fear, reply, “Well, then, who is she?”
I was right. She did finally catch on that something was wrong. She wasn’t as stupid as I originally thought; I guess it just took longer for her brain to process information since it was too tied up in practicing what horrid lies about
my love she would regale the jury with on Monday.
I could literally smell the fear from her as I quietly opened the bathroom door and slid inside, my bare feet moving me silently across the filthy, stained floor toward her. Her back was to me and she stood there, rigid as a board, shaking like a frightened animal as she finally sensed my presence. I smelled the sweat dripping from her, intermingled with the stench of her horror as I raised the heavy piece of iron in the air, high above my head, and planted my feet for a good, solid swing. She spun around and stared at me, her eyes bulging huge with terror, and I could see her struggling to process what was really going on. In that split second between seeing something with her eyes and her brain deciphering what it was, I introduced myself to her.
As well as the tire iron.
“WE are live outside the entrance to Folton Farms, the ranch owned and run by Robert Folton of Summerset, and a former partner at Winscott & Associates in Phoenix. Mr. Folton is the lead witness in the capital murder case against Olin Kemper which is scheduled to begin on Monday morning. But sources tell us that Mr. Folton’s wife reported him missing after his horse wandered back to the ranch in the wee hours of the morning, without its saddle or rider. A search is currently underway for Mr. Folton through the coordinated efforts of the Summerset Police Department and various other county and state agencies. Mounted and air patrol units have the daunting task of covering over 20,000 plus acres in the soaring heat, beginning their search around four o’clock this morning.
As you can see from the scene behind me, family and friends of Robert’s have gathered here in what seems to be a show of support for the family—some of them even bringing horses of their own to assist in the search, as we have seen several take off in groups.
Eviscerating the Snake - The Complete Trilogy Page 25