by Bill Hopkins
Surprise spluttered to the surface of Eddie Joe’s fear and confusion. “You,” he said to the killer, “and … this?” He pointed to Babe. “What shit.” Eddie Joe’s fear sweat stank.
Babe turned her anger from the killer and said to Eddie Joe, “You liked me a lot when I couldn’t resist.”
“Shut your pie holes,” the killer said to both of them, then to Eddie Joe, “When you have as many secrets as you do, you can’t keep track of all of them. And you have one hell of a lot of secrets.”
Eddie Joe said, “You’re not making sense.” A yellow jacket buzzed around his face, attracted by his perspiration.
The killer said, “You never did know what I was talking about, did you?”
Eddie Joe said, “I don’t know what you’re talking about now.”
“Neither do I,” said Babe.
The killer ignored Babe. “That doesn’t matter anymore,” speaking to Eddie Joe. “You’re dead now and welcome to it.”
Excitement roiled inside the killer. There’s a taste of anticipation that comes before sex and killing. Savoring the taste, the killer stroked Eddie Joe’s stubbly cheeks. Eddie Joe had forgotten to shave.
“That does it. I’m leaving,” Eddie Joe said and stood on the ground. Babe kicked her shoes off and tagged Eddie Joe with her Taser. Then she pinned him in a full nelson. Babe may’ve been stringy, but she was tough for a woman. And a stun gun softens up everybody.
Eddie Joe tore at Babe, managing only to seize air with his hands now formed into claws.
“Where is it?” the killer said.
“It’s on the floor,” said Babe. “Get it.”
The killer snagged the knife off the car’s floor and held it up where all three of them could see it.
“Jesus! Jesus! Jesus!” Eddie Joe said when the thing appeared. Then silence. Maybe a real silent prayer.
“That’s right,” the killer said. “You’d better pray. This is your last chance. But I don’t think it’ll do you any good.” The killer spit on Eddie Joe. “Jesus doesn’t recognize you and the Devil hears no prayers, only resignations. You’re going to hell.”
Not loosening her hold on Eddie Joe, Babe said, “Give it to me.”
The killer clutched the knife with the ferocity of a miser’s hand in rigor mortis grasping an earthly treasure.
“No,” the killer said, drawing the knife back. “It was my idea, I’ll do it.” Showing teeth and curling lips upward, the killer mimicked a smile. “You,” the killer said to Babe, “hold this filthy trash and I’ll do it.”
Eddie Joe said, “Stop! Don’t do this. I don’t deserve killing. My God, what did I do wrong?”
“Don’t listen,” Babe said.
“You,” the killer said to Eddie Joe, “are filthy and I’m through taking filthy trash off you.”
“What … what?” Eddie Joe said. The killer said, “Don’t act like you don’t know what you did.”
“Stop lecturing. Do it,” said Babe. “I can’t pin this sucker forever. Do it.”
Eddie Joe said, “Jesus! Jesus! Jesus!”
The killer said, “Forever.”
Eddie Joe said, “My God. Please don’t. Please don’t. Please don’t.” Not very memorable for famous last words, but it was all he could manage.
Babe said, “Do it. Do it. Do it.”
The killer said, “With pleasure,” and, leering, sliced Eddie Joe’s throat.
Babe unpinned Eddie Joe.
His fluttering hands clutched his nonworking throat after trying speech and finding it impossible. Damn near popping from sockets and spurting tears, his eyes bugged out cartoon-style. Eddie Joe’s forehead beaded sweat, which collected and ran in streams down his face, which grew whiter. The streams of sweat ran further down his neck, which grew redder. The sweat did little to pinken the red goo.
Coppery and bright, the aroma of blood cascaded around the three of them. The killer sucked in the smell with deep breaths. Eddie Joe bubbled and sputtered, unable to catch a single good breath.
The dying man scratched at his scudding heart, gripping under an aching rib cage. He fought to hold the wildly pounding muscle in his burning chest.
As death shambled toward him, Eddie Joe bared his teeth as if growling at the stranger, the old man hulking down the road, the final visitor, coming, coming, coming. If not with speed, then surely with certainty. The final visitor for the final appointment for this flopping thing growing greasy with blood.
Eddie Joe’s breathing sounded gritty, as if death had poured a bucket of finely ground sand into his flaming lungs. He thrashed, escalating into convulsions. At one point, he fell on a small log, hugged it, and jerked his arms and stomped his feet. A fat and purple thing that was his tongue jutted from between his white teeth stained with red. He pulled at that fat thing, ripped at his mouth wet with blood and spittle, and then tore at a throat that had given up.
There was no air.
There was no life to be had. As the killer had planned, the condemned man tumbled into the Great Void, tripped by the old bastard Death who never ever loses. Never.
The killer spoke the words breaking the hush after the execution. “Our friend here got some of his precious blood on the Caddy. Messy, isn’t it?”
“What the hell did you expect? Murder is messy.”
“I told you not to call it that.”
“It’s that excitement thing,” Babe said. “Sorry. I forgot.”
“Shit for brains is what’s sloshing inside your skull. Don’t forget again.” The killer then ogled the body. “Messy, but worth it. Executions are bloody messy, aren’t they?” The killer clapped. And laughed. And it felt good.
“Right,” Babe said through the not-funny laughter. “An execution can sure be messy.”
The killer cut off the laugh attack to direct Babe, “Clean it up.”
“Wait one minute,” Babe said, holding both palms facing out and up. “What was that talk about betrayal? About playing around? What did that mean?”
“Crazy talk. People talk crazy when they’re about to be executed.”
“You were making it with Eddie Joe after you told me you were through with him.”
The killer spit on Babe. “You want me?”
Babe trembled. “I need you.”
“Then stop with the accusations. We’re in it up to our breathers. We can’t afford your asshole allegations about me and someone who no longer walks the land of the living now, don’t you agree?”
Babe agreed. “What about this?” Babe held up the knife. Filthy stinking stuff from Eddie Joe’s throat dripped from the point of the knife onto a patch of clover. Buzzing insects circled the knife, sensing food.
“Pitch it.”
Babe didn’t pitch it. She handed it to the killer and said, “Don’t be careless with evidence.”
“I’m going to change clothes and go back to work. If we don’t stay in our daily routine, someone could notice. Someone might notice my bloody clothes even if I did stick to my routine.”
“Everybody thinks I’m gone.”
“Don’t screw up.”
Babe said, “You’ve got fancy moves, but you’ve got cheese for brains.”
“Must’ve got them from you. Whore.”
Babe said, “I hate you. You were still doing favors for Eddie Joe. You liked it, didn’t you? You lied to me when you said you were through with him.”
The killer didn’t speak.
Babe stood, yet made no other movement. After a moment she launched herself, knocking the killer to the ground. The killer fell back- wards, a rock slamming into backbone. The pain in the spine caused a momentary blackout. Babe punched the killer in the gut. That brought the killer around, although breathing was impossible for a few seconds. A damned girl punch. A man would’ve beaten the killer’s face until all sensation was gone. Babe had found her Taser, which headed for the killer’s face. The killer shoved a hand into her face and pushed her away. When she fell, her Taser disappeared into the brush
. She jumped up and kicked the killer’s butt, landing a couple of blows on each cheek. The killer rolled away. Babe staggered backward when a kick she’d aimed missed. There was no way the killer could get up. Rolling toward her feet, knocking her to the ground, the killer screamed. Babe lay panting in the dirt with the killer straddling her.
Babe said, “Won’t be long before you join Eddie Joe and me in hell. We’ll be waiting.”
The knife was within reach. The killer grabbed it and stabbed her in the heart.
“To quote me, ‘After the first execution, the second one gets easier’.”
No more Eddie Joe. No more Babe. The killer would learn to get along without them. Shit happens. People bleed. People die.
The killer arranged their bodies. No one would ever notice the ingenious pattern used. Some Fast Orange would clean the killer’s hands. “You always need clean hands for any kind of work.”
The killer cradled the knife. The second part of the plan, the part Babe knew nothing about, the part that just sprang into the killer’s mind, needed a knife. The killer let out a howl of victory and a laugh of triumph.
Something crashed in the woods behind the scene. Whatever it was snapped dead branches that had fallen to the ground. The killer thought a deer must’ve been scared.
Lightning flashed and thunder rumbled. Black clouds rolled across the sky.
The killer’s tongue flicked in and out, catching the first drops of rain.
“It’s nice of Mother Nature to clean this mess up.”
Chapter Four
Monday morning, continued
Rosswell stumbled into the sheriff’s station in Marble Hill, his eyesight haloed by lightning, hearing thrumming from thunder, and clothes dripping rainwater. Frizz and Neal followed him.
Tina Parkmore sat at a desk behind a long plywood counter, varnished and shiny, that served to keep the public in its place.
For Tina’s sake, Rosswell hoped the drenching rain had washed away his stink. He didn’t want to offend her. He always found a reason to talk with her. The perky dispatcher, in Rosswell’s mind, looked the same as when she’d reigned as the head cheerleader in high school ten years ago.
Slender and tall, the strawberry blonde’s job was to handle all the phone calls and radio traffic, as well as to give information to the pubic. Her green eyes saw everything, her delicate ears heard everything. She wore the hint of a perfume scented like lilacs. Her mouth never opened unless she said something worth hearing.
Her two-tone brown sheriff’s department uniform wasn’t as sexy as her cheerleader outfit. Rosswell knew that because he’d seen her wearing it on occasion lately. In private.
“Rosswell?” Tina Parkmore queried when he sloshed through the door, then she noticed the other men. “I mean, Judge Carew.” Their relationship was no secret; although during work hours, they tried to keep it professional. “What’s wrong?”
Frizz didn’t wait for Rosswell to answer Tina. “Two people were murdered up at Foggy Top.”
“Who?” she asked, swiveling her chair around to face the sheriff. She was interrupted by the radio. An officer was trying to find the owner of a flock of chickens whose hen house had been flattened by the storm. Tina transmitted the owner’s address, then turned to Rosswell. “Anyone I know?”
Neal said, “Go ahead, tell her, Judge.”
Rosswell wanted to say Thanks, Neal, for making me look like a stupid jerk in front of Tina. Instead, all he could come up with was, “No thanks. That’s the sheriff’s job.”
Frizz pointed at Rosswell. “You’re so all-fired ready to be part of this fiasco. Go ahead and tell her.” He shook his hat and water flew across the room.
The three males, their machismo deflated, hung their heads, each of them reminding Rosswell of an embarrassed lion trying to regain his pride. The single bright spot in this sorry picture was Tina, who grew more beautiful every day.
Tina said, “If it’s a secret, then never mind.” She turned her attention to a stack of papers on her desk.
Rosswell cleared his throat. No one else was in the place but the four of them. “We don’t know who it was.”
“Ah,” she said. “Neal has to identify the bodies? Is that the secret?”
Neal said, “We lost the bodies.” Tina’s eyes widened. The phone rang and she answered it. Rosswell listened to a conversation about a stray cat digging in some old lady’s garden, preparing a place to poop. “We’ll check into it,” Tina said and then hung up. She again turned to Rosswell. “How did you lose the bodies?”
“We had the bodies,” he said. “From a preliminary examination, we think they were murdered. When the big storm came, it washed them down the bank into the river. They must’ve floated away down Cloudy River.”
“Ah,” Tina said again. “The bodies flushed away during the storm? What are y’all going to do now?”
Again pointing at Rosswell, Frizz said, “Judge Carew is not going to do anything. I’m calling out the search and rescue volunteers.” He smoothed the wet brim of his hat. “I guess that they’re really just going to be the search volunteers. Going after corpses. No live people, so there won’t be any rescue.”
Neal said, “We’d best be finding them today.” Frizz said, “Or there’s hell to pay this weekend.” From Thursday until Sunday, the Harley Spring Ride—Hogfest—would inundate Marble Hill with a couple of hundred hog lovers. The courthouse would be closed Thursday, Friday, and Saturday to keep citizens from using the toilets and generally messing up the place. Foggy Top State Park would be crammed full of campers. The small town’s streets would be packed with folks attending the street fair that accompanied the deluge of riders. Saturday night would be a full moon.
They had to find the bodies and solve the murders quickly. Today. Tina began calling out the volunteers.
Without bothering to close the door, Neal and Frizz conferred in the sheriff’s office, a place the sheriff called “headquarters.” Rosswell relinquished the Nikon to Tina so she could download the pictures of the crime scene to the sheriff’s computer.
“Nice mushrooms,” she said, winking at Rosswell. He hoped Neal and Frizz didn’t catch her flirt. She whispered, “I wrote you a letter.”
Before he could answer, the volunteers began drifting in. Tina finished the download and handed the camera to Rosswell.
He said to her, “More later.”
“Yes.” She winked again.
Beep. A MISSED CALL message popped up on Rosswell’s phone. It was a call from Frizz early that morning. Beep. A VOICEMAIL notice. Rosswell clicked to play. “I’m finishing up at home and then I’ll call Neal,” Frizz said. “Stay right there at the park.”
“Great service,” Rosswell muttered.
Frizz appeared and instructed the assembled searchers. Most were local farmers and ranchers, with a healthy dose of teenage boys driving four wheelers. All of them were high on testosterone, searching for adventure.
Rosswell hoofed it across the courthouse square to Merc’s Diner, hoping to find a certified genius, the town drunk, and his personal snitch, embodied in one person. Ollie Groton. Several of Ollie’s jail stays could be credited to Rosswell, but Ollie never took it personally. A judge needs a snitch to keep himself informed on the activities of the criminal classes. Ollie promised Rosswell that he’d spill the secrets he found and Rosswell promised Ollie he wouldn’t ask where the secrets came from. Information was handy when sentencing a perpetrator. Clearly, Rosswell wasn’t supposed to have a snitch, but no one need ever know.
The restaurant coffee shop, operating in a refurbished hotel, served as the headquarters for the local gossip mill. Folks traipsed back and forth, carrying tales like ants carrying sugar. The interior of the cedar-sided building was as crusty and ancient as most of its customers. The rumor was that the booths were built from the wood of barns torn down before the Civil War. Merc Leadbetter kept the place immaculate, although no matter what he did in the way of cleaning, he couldn’t hide the floors worn
slick or the graffiti carved into the booths. Such things, according to Merc, “gave the place character.”
For gainful employment, Ollie had built a healthy business installing, maintaining, and repairing computers. When not busy at his job, he sat eating, drinking coffee, and sopping up the local chatter at Merc’s. He soaked up tidbits of information like a dry sponge thrown into a rainstorm. Ollie was the gossip’s gossip.
Some of the less charitable folks in the county said that “Merc’s” actually meant “mercury,” which described the taste of the tuna sandwiches. If there was mercury in Merc’s tuna, then Ollie’s brain was as full of it as an old-time thermometer.
Ollie kept his entire body shaved and boasted a star-shaped tattoo on his bald head. The purple tat beaconed his location in the coffee shop, especially since he’d given his skull its daily sheen of Vaseline. He sat alone. Rosswell slid into his booth.
Ollie said, “You look like shit.”
“You have a purple tattoo on your bald head and you say I look like shit?”
Ollie squeaked, a high-pitched sound a mouse might make after the bar of a trap slammed across its spine.
“I feel like crap,” Rosswell said, rubbing his face. He could still smell the corpses. He suspected that he smelled like them also. “I need to stand in a shower for a couple of hours.” His eyes were more blood-shot than usual.
Without asking him, the waitress brought his standing order, a 20-ounce cup of the strongest coffee this side of New Orleans. He snagged the sugar jar and shook it, working the lumps loose, stirring ferociously.
Ollie said, “The coffee danged near melted the spoon.”
“The way I like it.” The coffee was blacker than midnight on a cloudy night at new moon and thick enough to need two hands for stirring. Rosswell heaped in sugar until the jar ran empty and the liquid became syrupy. The brew smelled sweeter than an angel. He dipped his forefinger in the boiling sludge, then touched it to his tongue.
The waitress tapped her pencil on her order pad. “Anything else?”
Rosswell said, “No, thanks.” He waited for her to leave before he spoke to Ollie. Without so much as a You’re welcome, she sauntered off. Her manners ranked right down there with Ollie’s. Rosswell would’ve crossed her off his Christmas card list, but he didn’t send Christmas cards.