by Todd Ohl
Marco did his homework. He knew that she was unhappy in the city, and she wanted to go home. She now knew why her mother told her not to talk to strangers; she had shared personal information that he was using against her. The idea that she told him so much about herself irked her. He held all the cards when it came to leveraging knowledge.
Kim closed her eyes and shook her head again. She breathed deeply through her nose and cleared her mind.
Thinking back to the bathroom again, she remembered Marco’s little speech. He was proud of the way he engineered his plan. There was shock value, and a touch of irony that kept people from looking too close and seeing what was really going on. People had a way of ignoring the unpleasant things they did not want to hear.
Her mind moved to what happened when he came at her—the plunger. While adept at removing clogs in the toilet, it did nothing to stop Marco. It did make him angry, though. With a malicious glare in her eye, she thought, “The bastard didn’t like that, did he?”
If she could, she would tie him up and suffocate him with that plunger. She would watch the horror in his eyes—that same horror she saw when she bounced the toilet tool off the side of his head. She would let him know what it felt like when you were a victim of something terrible. Then again, maybe she would just hang him upside down, dip his fecal-phobic head into a cesspool, and let him drown.
She suddenly knew what she had to do to get out of this. Her eyes rolled in disgust. She wondered if she could, but knew what would happen if she failed.
Chapter 24:
Morning Mail
The sound of the shower broke John’s train of thought. Amy had apparently found the bathroom, which meant they would probably be there a little while. He holstered his gun and decided to find her some clothes.
While both women were beautiful, Amy was undeniably bigger on the top and slightly smaller on the bottom than Kim. Looking for tighter pants, he limped over to Kim’s closet. There, he took a pair of jeans from a shelf, and snagged a pair of sandals from the closet floor. Turning to her bureau, he found that the top drawer held underwear. He forgot about the bras and took a pair of briefs that might cling to Amy’s hips. From the next drawer down, he procured one of Kim’s oversized sweatshirts.
He hobbled his way to the bathroom door and found his sport coat hanging on the doorknob. As he bent down to lay the clothes on the floor, he heard Amy crying in the mist of the shower. He took his jacket and decided to give her some time.
Amy’s shower would give him time to check his email account and see if Janice sent a list of Dunglison’s calls. Though his smartphone was fully capable, he still feared that Mezzalura might have someone inside the department that could track him. He decided to use Kim’s computer, which meant he had to head back to the bedroom.
Once there, he noticed a poster of Tournée du Chat Noir on the wall above the monitor. It was the only piece of artwork in the entire apartment. John tried to ignore Kim’s poor taste in decorating as he hobbled over to the computer and then hit the power button.
The computer booted up and displayed 5:20 AM on the desktop. It would be light soon, and Kim was still gone. John knew that if Kim had met with foul play, the apartment might not be a safe place; they would want to make their stay here short.
John opened his email account and scanned down the list in his inbox for the name “Foxy Babe,” which Janice used on her personal account. He constantly had to tell his junk email filter that the letters were “not junk” because the program figured, with a name like that, it must be from a porn-related spammer. He once wondered how shallow someone had to be to refer to himself or herself as a “Stud” or a “Babe.” Now, he knew.
He opened up the email from “Foxy Babe” to see a little reminder from Janice that read, “I’m so excited about Kazuki’s! Give me a call tomorrow and let me know the date so I can put it on my calendar. You know how I LOVE sushi!”
John knew this meant, “Call me and give me a firm date, so I know you are not screwing me over on this. By the way, to entice you, allow me to mention that I will probably be horny after eating sushi, and since you will most likely be the closest male, you will probably benefit.”
After shaking his head, he inspected the list of numbers Janice found. There were two columns. One column listed calls into Dunglison’s office, and the other listed calls out of Dunglison’s office.
There was definitely a problem; there were no names. Janice had only sent him numbers. John knew she was holding the names that went along with the phone numbers until he called with the dinner information.
If he were in the office, he could have someone cross-reference the phone numbers against departmental directories in a matter of minutes. That would at least tell him if a cop was dumb enough to use an official number, or a personal number known to the department. Unfortunately, he was not in the office. If John wanted to find this guy, he might have to start calling each number, one by one. There was just not enough time to manually make his way through the list right now.
Thinking back to the hotel, and Hallman’s stack of papers, he decided he had learned a valuable lesson about drawing conclusions before thoroughly examining the information he already had in front of him. He would give the numbers one more careful look before he either gave up or started a call-o-thon. About half way down the list, there was a number that rang a bell in more ways than one.
John needed to be sure, and he thought his cell phone held the answer. He decided to turn it on for a short amount of time. He had already made up his mind to get out of the apartment as soon as possible. If Mezzalura’s goons located him on the cellular grid right now, he would be on the move before they arrived.
He ran a search for the number in his address book. It matched the one he had saved for Ben Shalby.
As the cop on duty, Shalby could read the facts at Dunglison’s house in any way he wanted. He could interpret the surface facts to indicate a lover’s rendezvous ending with the vengeance of a drug-crazed kid. Letters discussing Erv Fullman could be hidden or ignored. Should Harry Mulgrew find something at the scene, Shalby would just laugh at Harry and dismiss the item as unrelated—as Shalby always did. Should Shalby’s fingerprint be found somewhere odd, he would just play dumb and say he accidentally touched any particular object that happened to bear his prints. The case would then be closed.
John pondered Ben Shalby for a minute. Shalby looked incompetent on almost every case. John had always considered the man a prime example of the Peter Principle; the idea he actually might be the evil genius of the Fraternal Order of Police was a bit hard to believe.
John wondered whether he could trust these phone records. Someone had been a step ahead of him all night, and that might be the case now. He had been wondering whether Mezzalura had someone inside the phone company. If she did, that person could do more than trace a cellular connection. Someone with access to the company records could easily add Shalby’s number to Dunglison’s bill.
Implicating the detective on call last night would be a good move; it would be easy enough to construe that Shalby had killed Dunglison and timed it so he would get the call to investigate. The department would then spend time raking Shalby over the coals while the truly corrupt cop went about their business and helped feed Internal Affairs false evidence as needed.
John was not sure what motive would be pinned on Shalby, but was sure that it would be something inventive. Perhaps a love triangle between Hallman, Dunglison, and Shalby would be created. That would fit the details in place up until now. It would be easy to pin the whole thing on a cop who might be dumb, but not guilty.
There was only one way to find out if Ben Shalby was the guilty party, and John was more than happy to go there.
The hiss of the water in the shower stopped. He then heard the door to the bathroom open and close. His mind turned back to Amy; he needed to figure out what to do with her.
She could not stay here, she could not go home, and she definitely could n
ot go with him to confront Shalby. She had seen enough ugliness for one night, and there would be a limit to what she could take. John would have to apply enough pressure to be certain Shalby was clean—that would get ugly. Amy did not need to see that, and John did not want her to see that.
The bathroom door opened again, and Amy mewed, “John?”
“I’m in here.”
She appeared in the bedroom doorway, looking soggy and tired. “What’s going on?”
He turned off his cell phone, and since he did not know what to do yet, he changed the subject.
“If there is a cell phone in your purse, you’ll want to turn it off. Those people from last night will be able to track us if you leave it on.”
Amy retrieved her purse from the hall and dug through it to produce a smartphone. After turning it off, she dropped it back in her purse. Her gaze seemed to stay fixed there, as if she was staring into a void and trying to determine what she should do next.
John wanted to keep her mind off what happened to her last night. She seemed to function best when her mind was focused on a good story, and he had one that she wanted to hear. He figured he would share it; the narrative might keep her functional.
“I wanted to help people,” he blurted out.
“What?” she queried, with a furrowed brow and teary eyes.
“It’s why I became a cop. Last night, you asked why I wanted to become a cop. That’s why; I wanted to help people.”
He knew from the blank look on her face that he would need to do better than that.
“I grew up in south Philly. My mother was Italian, and my father Irish. So, according to the holier-than-thou snobs from Society Hill, I was the Mick that lived with the WOPs. Anyway, one day Tony Pinetti is playing out in the street and this rich guy runs him over. The guy doesn’t even stop, because, well, who cares about the plebes, right? I’m sitting there, crying, looking at my best friend whose bleeding on the street, and this cop appears out of nowhere and picks Tony up. He puts Tony in the back of his car and tells me to get in. So we’re riding off to the hospital, the siren wailing, and we drive past the old rich drunk. Another cop had him pulled over and handcuffed to him to the door of Vincenzo’s Market. I was looking at the old drunk when the cop says, ‘that jerk will pay plenty, but right now, we’ve gotta worry about your friend.’”
John took a deep breath to distance himself from the memory.
“Anyway,” he continued, “one cop saves Tony’s life by getting him to a hospital fast, and another gets the bad guy. That was cool. That was a job worth doing. That’s when I knew I wanted to be a cop.”
Her blue eyes were open wide, and she waited for anything else he had to say.
John figured it was time to shut up.
“So, was Tony OK?” she asked.
“Tony, yeah he’s fine. He runs a fish market over on the water front.”
“I’m glad he made a full recovery.”
“I wouldn’t say it was a full recovery. A few years later, when everyone was getting microwaves, Tony’s mom discovered she had to give hers away.”
“Why?”
“Tony passed out every time she turned it on. He still does to this day, whenever someone starts a microwave in the same room. He always blamed it on the accident, but who knows, it wasn’t until years later that anybody had one.”
Amy chuckled. She looked him in the eyes, tilted her head, and smiled. “Well, you saved me,” she sighed. Amy crossed the room, sat on his lap, and hugged him.
He knew it was wrong, but he let himself enjoy the feel of her body as it pressed against him. After a few seconds, his body started to respond, and he patted her on the back to signify that was enough.
Amy started to draw back, but stopped. Their eyes locked. Her warm breath washed over his face. She slowly brought her hand up to the back of his neck. Her mouth opened slightly again, in the same tender way it always did, and she began to move closer.
John wanted to give in but realized it was too dangerous. A childhood full of slasher flicks told him that someone would break into Kim’s apartment and kill them both just as they reached climax. If that played out, Shalby would probably be assigned the case and blame Kim for their murder—cleverly manufacturing the idea that it was a lover’s triangle. They had to get out of here.
“I can’t,” John sighed. “Not until this is over. Besides that, the longer we stay her, the more dangerous it is. We need to move.”
She let out a heavy sigh, rolled her eyes, and whispered, “You’re killing me with this duty shit.” She stood and took a deep breath. “Well, let’s at least see what’s in the kitchen before we go. I’m starving.”
John raised an eyebrow and said, “I have a better idea.”
Chapter 25:
Monkeyshines
Even though the sun had not yet begun to break over the horizon, Marco Vinzetti already knew that he was having a bad day. Kim’s small Sentra was less than comfortable for a man of his size. He had to hold his leg at an odd angle to fit it under the steering wheel and still be able to reach the accelerator. That angle was now beginning to cause cramps in his calf. The seat felt as if there was no padding between his back and the coiled metal springs that were digging into his lumbar region. He was also mildly nauseous because the car smelled somewhat like a gym locker; Marco surmised this was due to the slightly moldy t-shirt lying on the back seat. On top of the physical pain and nausea inflicted by the less than stylish automobile, he suspected he would need to go to the bathroom soon.
On top of all of his discomforts, Marco was also extremely annoyed by the fact that he was running late. First, he lost almost an hour washing the plunger residue from his face and hair. Next, there was the issue of waiting for the street to clear enough to allow him to slip out of the building with Kim’s anesthetized carcass, and stow her in the trunk. He then lost time packing a few bags for her, and making sure he had her purse, which was important if he wanted to make it look like she was actually going home to Madison.
What slowed him down the most was the lack of toll-free highways that ran from Philadelphia to Wisconsin. Kim’s car lacked a toll-paying RF transponder, which most modern Pennsylvanians used at tollbooths. This meant Marco would need to stop to pay the tolls if he went that route.
Stopping at tollbooths was a bad idea for someone carrying a kidnap victim in their car. If he did so, he would run the risk that Kim might make noise and attract the attention of one of the toll-takers. At the same time that happened, a camera would probably record his face. To avoid the dangers associated with lugging his kidnap victim through a tollbooth, Marco used his handy smartphone GPS to select a route that avoided tolls altogether.
While the path he took might have been the safest choice, it was far from the fastest. Instead of humming steadily west along the Pennsylvania Turnpike from Philadelphia, he had to wind north along back roads and smaller highways. While US 422 moved quickly enough, he slowed down along US 222, and crawled along PA 61. He wound along these roads for hours until he finally picked up Interstate 81, which he then had to follow northeast to get to Interstate 80.
Now that he had finally hit I-80 and was starting to make headway, it was becoming increasingly evident that he would need to stop to ease that last aspect of his discomfort. For the last fifteen minutes, he had been straining to hold the contents of his bladder, and the pain was becoming sharp. He saw the sign for the Danville exit and took it.
At the bottom of the ramp, he saw several shops. These shops included a few restaurants that seemed to be open. One of them, Dutch Kitchen, seemed too far removed from Pennsylvania Dutch Country to be legitimate.
Even though the open restaurants would have a bathroom, Marco knew that leaving Kim in the parking lot would be risky; any noise she made was likely to get the attention of some do-good trucker that strolled through the parking lot. He turned right and headed up over a ridge. After a few minutes, he turned onto a dirt road and followed it into a cornfield.
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br /> When the road dipped down into a hollow, Marco pulled over and hurriedly jumped out of the little Nissan. He danced to the side of the road and exposed his member without even noticing the cold morning air. He heaved a sigh as he felt the pain slowly drain out of his pelvis.
The weakening of his urine stream brought some clarity back to his mind, and he took the time to run over his plan one more time. He knew he would have between six to eight hours of driving before he reached Indiana. That was the place he had chosen to leave Kim; it was far removed from Philadelphia, and rural. It would accentuate the dramatic point of a girl being killed during her flight from the city. However, because he needed to loop up over southern Michigan to continue avoiding toll roads, he knew that his ETA of six to eight hours might be optimistic.
Marco turned from his steaming puddle and looked at the trunk of the small Nissan; he wondered if Kim had to urinate as desperately as he did. Should a cop find her clothes soaked in her own urine, it would bring up the question of abduction from Philadelphia, rather than broadcast a sad case of bad luck in a remote place. In addition, he simply held no desire to rape her after she had been lying in a puddle of her own waste.
Marco decided it would be best to pull her out of the trunk and give her the chance to make water. He inserted the key into the lock and opened up the trunk.
From inside the trunk, Kim looked up at him and blinked, trying to adjust her eyes to the dim morning twilight.
“Time for you to pee. I don’t want you going on yourself.”
Marco knew that, with her hands still tied behind her back, he would need to extract her from the trunk. He leaned down, grabbed her shoulders, and sat her up. He then took the coil of rope that Kim had been staring at earlier, and fashioned a noose around her neck. When that task was complete, he reached around her torso and lifted her out of the trunk.