by J. B. Hawker
As they continued to sit quietly in the car, a new kind of tension was filling the space between them.
“Are you going to ask me in?” Max spoke, in tandem with Bunny’s,
“Would you like to come in?”
They laughed, but the electricity remained.
Max got out and opened the door for Bunny to climb down.
He took her arm to steady her as she misjudged the distance to the ground.
“Thank you,” Bunny said, before Max pulled her against his chest, tipped her head back and gently kissed her lips.
“Thank you,” he said and kissed her again.
Bunny’s knees went weak (“like a teenager, you idiot!”) as she breathed in Max’s familiar scent.
Her hands brushing across his chest and back were touching known territory.
Even after all the ravages of time and experience, her body recognized his as its perfect compliment. These feelings jolted Bunny and she backed away.
“You’re right,” Max said, huskily, “We shouldn’t be doing this out here. Let’s go inside.”
Bunny knew it was time to act. She must tell Max to get back into his car, before they did something they would both regret.
She knew that.
She knew, too, she could be making a terrible fool of herself, as well as being disobedient to her faith.
A small voice seemed to whisper into her ear, “God says marriage is forever...in His eyes you are still Max’s wife.”
She knew what the voice was. She recognized it as her own attempt to rationalize following her own whims, rather than God’s will.
Even knowing that, she still followed the voice of her desires, as she took Max’s hand and went with him into her house and shut the door.
Chapter 14
You have shown me the path to life, and you make me glad by being near to me.
– Palm 16:11
What a glorious morning!
The sun streamed through the kitchen window, sparking rainbows from the crystals hanging on the curtain rod. The sky was a clear periwinkle blue, scrubbed clean by the fresh autumn breeze.
Bunny sang snatches of her favorite show tunes as she prepared her breakfast.
She was not actually hungry, so she prepared small amounts of healthful foods aimed at fueling her body.
This was an unfamiliar attitude about food for Bunny, who had always been an emotional eater.
“How interesting,” she mused.
Bunny was pleasantly surprised, upon awakening, to find no cloud of guilt and gloom hanging over her. Instead, she felt unutterably content.
She paused just a moment to consider what this might mean.
Could she be one of those sociopaths she’d read about who had no conscience, at all?
No, that was ridiculous; guilt had been Bunny’s dominant emotion for as long as she could remember.
Maybe she was in some sort of pleasure-induced shock and the feelings of shame were hiding under this facade of peace and joy, waiting to leap out at her at any moment.
She chuckled at her tortured attempts at self-analysis, decided to enjoy the moment and let the chips fall where they may, and sat down to eat.
Bunny could not remember the last time she felt so well.
“Last night..,” she sighed, as a frisson of sensation washed over her.
“Last night was wonderful.”
Bunny had been awkward and self-conscious when they were first alone in the house.
She was afraid of Max’s reaction to her timeworn, middle-aged body. She wanted so much to offer him her most desirable self.
When she thought how, even in her youthful prime she wasn’t able to hold him, she felt a rush of panic, and almost backed out.
Only Max’s obviously unfeigned desire made her forget her appearance and lose herself in the moment.
After that, it was all sensation and instinct. There was nothing of the first-time awkwardness of new lovers, as her flesh welcomed his. Their passion was a homecoming and felt completely right.
Much later, Bunny’s innate prudishness reasserted itself and she sent Max home, not wanting her neighbors to see them leave together in the morning.
She regretted the hypocritical side of her nature, but knew it was probably a permanent feature of her personality.
Amazingly, this morning Bunny felt acceptance of even her least attractive features and quirks.
Was this what if was like to love and be loved in return?
Perhaps she was getting ahead of herself, but she remembered again how Max declared his love for her.
It had never been easy for Max to talk about his emotions. Last night he was the one to say it first and most often. Bunny never expected that.
She was prepared to accept the physical comfort and pleasure without any emotional commitment on Max’s part, so his words of love were even more precious.
Of course, it was always possible, when Max awoke this morning, he would regret his declarations.
Bunny supposed she would be able to tell if that were the case when she saw him at work. She hoped she could handle whatever she had to face.
Last night was worth whatever it was going to cost. In that brief time, Max had given her back her awareness of herself as a desirable woman; a desirable, albeit sinful, woman.
As a Bible-believer, Bunny always knew she was a sinner saved by grace through Christ’s sacrifice for the forgiveness of her sins. Maybe this was why her wanton behavior did not cause her more shame.
She always knew what she was capable of, and so did God. Moreover, He forgave her, anyway.
There was only one unforgivable sin, the sin of denying Christ, not sexual immorality.
Bunny was self-willed and disobedient, but she had not denied Christ and she never would, although, failing to follow Christ’s teaching was a sort of denial of His Lordship, wasn’t it?
Bunny could tell she was going to have to do a lot of thinking, praying and reading her Bible to sort this all out in her head.
Fortunately, or unfortunately, depending upon your viewpoint, Bunny’s heart was at peace about it all. She even thanked God for last night.
She prayed, now, for the Lord’s will to be done; in her relationship with Max, as in everything.
Max Banks awoke feeling marvelous.
He had a few sore muscles, but that was usual after a workout. He laughed aloud as he felt the twinges while climbing out of bed.
He sang in the shower and then devoured a huge breakfast of bacon, eggs and toast. Even the coffee was especially tasty this morning.
He hadn’t felt this good since his last divorce.
Max had to admit he had been uncertain about Bunny. He feared her religion might have changed her into a dried up, uptight prude, who would make love like a department store mannequin.
What a relief to find she was still his Hunny Bunny. She was even more uninhibited, if anything. That had been a surprise.
Maybe there was something to this “love thy neighbor” philosophy, after all.
Banks looked into the whole God-thing when his last marriage blew up.
Blind-sided when his wife left him, his world turned upside down. He semi-seriously contemplated suicide, rather than start all over again at his age.
Max was grasping at straws, reading self-help books, and even seeing a counselor.
His heavy drinking was partially responsible for the failure of his marriage, so he even dipped a toe into AA, as well. All their talk about a higher power led him to a large community church.
Rather than accept anything at face value, Max always liked to investigate for himself, so he had prayed, attended church and even listened to the sermons for almost three months.
When his prayers to restore his marriage went unanswered, and he had not felt a presence or seen any writing on the wall in all that time, he decided the whole business was a sham and turned his back on it, once again.
Finding out Bunny was sucked in by
the religious hoopla really rattled him. He was glad she apparently wasn’t taking everything too much to heart, after all.
Of course, this was going to change their relationship at work, and, until he was able to convince her to move in with him, she would be worried about “appearances.”
Once they were living together, he imagined she would put all that churchliness behind her. They could relax and just let things flow.
Max felt comfortable with Bunny. Not that she was boring, far from it. He wasn’t sure how to express it, but he felt safe with her.
He guessed maybe he just trusted her.
He said, “I love you,” last night, without even thinking. It just slipped out as natural as breathing. He hoped she was not going to read too much into it and start thinking about marriage.
Max definitely had his fill of marriage, enough for a lifetime.
Marriage was a stupid idea and did not mean anything, anyway. Two adults should be able to live as they wanted, without a lot of red tape, so long as nobody got hurt.
A customer was dictating a classified ad to Bunny when Max arrived at the Clarion Review office.
He greeted them both and walked on into his office, waiting until the visitor left to call Bunny in.
Max held out his arms to her and she melted against him. Their kiss became instantly passionate, arousing memories and sensations of the night before.
Bunny pushed against his chest and stepped back.
She took a deep, shaky breath and chuckled.
“Good morning, Boss. What else is on the agenda this morning?”
Max pulled himself together, ruefully, and spoke in a mock-serious tone.
“Well, Mrs. Elder, as you don’t seem to want to accept the assignment I just suggested, I suppose we will have to put out the paper, instead.”
Throughout the morning they worked together as before, with only the occasional discreet caress or whispered word of endearment.
Bunny was not sure her work was very accurate, though, as she found it very difficult to concentrate on the newspaper ads.
After lunch, the contest judging would begin. The business establishments came first, while the residential entry evaluations would be the following morning.
The winners would appear in the next issue of the paper.
Bunny and Max were going to accompany the judges on their rounds, making notes and taking photos.
“There. Done, at last.”
There was a grim note of satisfaction in the man’s voice as he jammed a large needle into the scarred tabletop.
The results of his handiwork lay on the table before him, massive and still.
As he surveyed his creation once more, it occurred to him that moving this body was going to be difficult now it was back in one piece.
Some of its bits had been detached and sewn back on with large, clumsy stitches, or reattached with screws and bolts, giving the body the appearance of a rather unsophisticated Frankenstein’s monster. The top of the skull sagged flat while the forehead bulged grotesquely.
This unlovely object had once been a rather innocuous man.
Our ghoulish artisan giggled unpleasantly, then, grabbing a piece of cardboard and a crayon, he scrawled “Faginstine Monster” and attached the crude sign to the body’s chest with a staple gun.
He stepped back to admire the effect.
“The perfect touch,” he murmured.
Now all he needed to do was wrestle this thing into the perfect setting.
Emitting random high-pitched giggles, he switched off the light and left the room, leaving his creation in the basement darkness, waiting.
Foxy Fuchs was frustrated. No one they spoke with had any idea where Winston Thomas was likely to have gone after leaving his friend Johnson. It seemed they were no nearer to solving this case than before.
He thought with disgust about the way the two men had chosen to raise funds. Somehow, that seemed more tolerable to them than honest labor.
It was incomprehensible to the detective two heterosexual men would choose such a lifestyle.
So...maybe they were not two straight men.
He could just about accept Kelvin Johnson might be able to disassociate himself so far from his actions and could remain untouched while allowing his body to be used by strange men. But, what did he say about Thomas? It was something about him “getting to like the job and not just the money,” wasn’t it?
Maybe this was the lead they were looking for. Perhaps it was as simple as going to the nearest gay bar and asking who had seen Thomas that night.
Wait, the “nearest gay bar” was probably in Sacramento.
Thomas’s body turned up in Clark’s Hallow. Logic and the forensics suggested that he died nearby.
So, where would a professed heterosexual go for clandestine homosexual activity in or around Clark’s Hallow?
There had been a lewd conduct arrest here, just after Fuchs had come to the county...where had it happened?
Fuchs picked up the phone and asked Sergeant
Michelson to come into his office. They just might be a step closer to the killer, after all.
The afternoon going around the business entries with the contest judges was fun for Bunny. Max got some good photos for the paper and he’d liked Bunny’s write-up, too.
It was the first time he had asked her to write anything for the paper and Bunny discovered she enjoyed doing it.
Max only made a few minor changes, too. She thought she knew him well enough to know he wouldn’t let his feelings for her influence the way he ran his business.
They would not be seeing each other that evening, as Max needed to make a quick trip to the Bay Area for some sort of newspaper publishers’ meeting.
He would be driving back early in the morning for the residential judging.
In a way, Bunny was relieved Max had gone away. It gave her space to catch her breath and try to get a handle on what was happening between them.
At the same time, she was terribly disappointed he would not be with her that night. She longed to hold him in her arms again.
Her thoughts and feelings were a jumbled mess. Bunny hoped she could sort them out a bit before seeing Max the next day.
Max took the freeway off-ramp into the Wharf district and began to look for parking near the hotel.
He had done a lot of thinking during his three-hour drive from Clark’s Hallow.
California was amazing. A three-hour drive could take you from one world into another. It was as though Clark’s Hallow and San Francisco were on two different planets. Coming back into the city required an attitude adjustment, similar to decompression in deep sea diving.
As Max shifted back into the metropolitan mindset, he began to question the wisdom of his deepening involvement with his first wife.
What exactly did he want from this relationship? With their history, there was no way to have a casual fling.
Getting out now could be messy.
Not that he wanted out, exactly. He just was not sure he was ready for another commitment.
Max shifted mental gears, again, and went into the hotel for his meeting.
Time enough to straighten out the Bunny-issue when he got back to Clark’s Hallow in the morning.
While Max Bank’s Cadillac SUV crossed the Bay Bridge into San Francisco, the late model Lexus of Yance and Sally Trainor was on its way back to the north state.
Yance and Sally were chatting about the delightful time with their old friends.
“This was such a good idea, Yance,” Sally patted his thigh as she spoke. “I can’t tell you when I’ve enjoyed myself this much. Thank you.”
“I had fun, too. We have to take these little trips more often from now on.” Yance agreed, and then added, “It will be good to get home, though. I never sleep well in a strange bed.”
“I’m tired, too.
I am glad we stopped to eat before heading home. Now, when we get there we can go right to bed. I won’t even unpack until tomorrow.”
Sally leaned back with a satisfied smile and watched the scenery whiz past in the gathering darkness.
“Too bad I couldn’t cut this thing up again and reassemble it on the site,” the killer thought as he struggled with his ungainly burden.
Bound with black plastic garbage bags, strapped with duct tape, the mutilated body was slippery and unwieldy.
By a combination of pushing, pulling and dragging, he managed to get it halfway up the stairs from the basement, only to have it slip from his grasp and thump back down the steps.
Doggedly determined to complete his plan, the man continued grappling with his bundle until it lay on the kitchen floor.
Sweating and trembling, he partially unwrapped the plastic in order to learn if his creature remained intact.
Satisfied, he resumed the struggle, manhandling the awkward load into the back of his pickup. He covered it with a tarp and returned to the house to have dinner and wait until it was time to finish what he had begun.
Chapter 15
My face is red with tears, and dark shadows circle my eyes...Job 16:16
It was nine-fifteen the next morning and Bunny stood outside the lobby of the Chamber of Commerce building waiting for the last round of contest judging to begin.
The Chamber judges were just climbing into their van.
Max was not there, yet, and Bunny was becoming agitated.
She was only mildly concerned about his welfare. She was mostly worried she might have to cover the judging on her own. She was a notoriously bad photographer, one of the type known for pictures of headless family members, blurred abstracts or exquisite shots of her own fingertip.
In no way was she qualified to take news photos.
As the van carrying the judges began to drive away, Max’s SUV pulled up next to the curb.