by Bryan Smith
And, yes, he could put a stop to it any time.
Today, he reminded himself yet again.
Right now.
Soon he would be behind the wheel of his car, engaged again in that most liberating moment of his work day routine. Ensconced once more inside his own vehicle, he would feel free again, unburdened at last of all the daily stresses that were part and parcel of his profession. He was no longer tethered to a desk. He could go wherever he wanted. Home. To the store for groceries. Or to a bar or a movie. It didn’t matter what or where, really, just that his time was his own again and he could do as he pleased. For instance, instead of heading home now, he could turn in another direction and drive to the police station. He could spill everything he knew. He could offer to wear a wire to the next Diabolical Conspiracy meeting. And he could put an end to this crazy fucking shit that had engulfed his life once and for all.
But every time he worked himself up nearly to the point of thinking he would do just that, he would remember that chillingly quiet morning drive with Marnie and shelve the idea. He suspected she had exaggerated the conspiracy’s reach and ability to anticipate and eliminate threats. The rational part of his mind told him it was ridiculous to believe they would systematically begin murdering every one of his loved ones the moment he showed up at the police station. But they had gotten their hooks too far inside him. He believed the hype, despite its surface absurdity. They had gotten away with murder many times before and had never been exposed. In the end, he simply couldn’t stomach even the remote possibility of the people he cared about being harmed.
So he was trapped.
Unless…well, unless he killed himself. Speaking of remote possibilities. But he hadn’t entirely ruled it out. If the situation ever reached the point of feeling completely untenable, it might become a feasible exit strategy.
Until then…
He started to frown as he drew closer to his car. There was something clipped behind the windshield wiper on the driver’s side. A white slip of paper, perhaps, or an envelope. There was something ominous about the way the edges of it flapped in the stiffening breeze, as if it were calling his attention. More paranoia? A quick scan of the scattering of other cars nearby showed no other white slips of paper clipped to other windshields. Of course not. Security would have chased off anyone attempting to distribute flyers on company grounds. No, whatever else this might be, it was undeniably an attempt to communicate directly with him.
Fuck.
A tight knot of dread formed inside him as he reached the car and saw that it was an envelope clipped behind the wiper. Somehow a sealed envelope felt even more ominous than a folded sheet of paper. He opened the car and chucked his backpack inside before snatching the envelope from the wiper. That knot of dread tightened several more degrees as he saw the block letters printed across the front of the envelope--TDC.
The Diabolical Conspiracy.
Mike slapped the envelope against the palm of his free hand and kicked at a pebble on the asphalt, sending it skittering across the lot until it disappeared beneath a blue Lexus. Which was what he would like to do about now. Fucking disappear.
Fuck! Fuck, fuck, fucking double goddamn fuck!
He had known it. On some level, he had known from his first glimpse of the thing clipped to his wiper that it would in some way be related to those evil fuckers. He didn’t know how he had known it, but he had, even though things had stayed mostly quiet on that front since that first horrible night. There had been a couple more meetings, but they had been uneventful, almost mundane. There had been no more murders. No more orgies. And the last meeting had been more than a month ago. Yet something within him had accurately divined the true nature of this thing almost instantly. It was almost as if something in the universe had been speaking to him. Trying to warn him. Which he couldn’t interpret as anything other than a very bad sign.
He sneered at the letters written on the envelope a moment longer.
Then he got in the car and tore it open.
The note it contained was terse and also written in block letters: GO TO FAT SAM’S ON FRONT STREET. ASK FOR JASPER. SAY YOU’VE COME TO PICK UP THE PACKAGE. TDC.
Mike read the note several times over, the crease in his brow deepening each time his eyes scanned the cryptic message. Fat Sam’s was a popular burger joint. Locally owned with two locations, one near where he lived and this one, on the opposite side of town. He couldn’t imagine what kind of business the Diabolical Conspiracy could have with Fat Sam’s, nor did he really want to know what that business might be.
He shook his head and swore softly: “Fuck me.”
For one wild, heady moment, he considered disregarding the note and just heading home. But he knew he couldn’t do that. When he failed to perform as instructed, he would be punished. Somehow. Some way. Nadia would probably flog him or some damn thing at the next conspiracy meeting. Also, Marnie was waiting for him at home. She had moved in with him at the beginning of the month. Her idea, and one he’d had little choice but to accept. It was possible she already knew of the note and the purpose behind it. Hell, it was even possible she had clipped the note to his windshield. The writing didn’t look like hers at first glance, but the block printing had been done with obvious deliberation, perhaps to disguise the author’s identity. Which begged some obvious questions. Why leave a note at all? Why not call him on his cell?
He shook his head again.
More spy novel bullshit.
Ridiculous or not, he had no real choice here. He could only do as he had been told. So after crumpling the note in a ball and tossing it aside, he started the car and headed for Fat Sam’s.
11.
Mike walked into the Fat Sam’s location on Front Street at just after 5:30 that evening. He would have gotten there sooner if not for the painfully slow rush hour traffic, which more than tripled the normal drive time. Paranoia again tinged his thoughts and made him increasingly twitchy for the duration of the ride. The big thing driving these feelings was his late departure from the call center. The person who had arranged this mystery mission would have been aware of his shift’s normal end time, but would not have been able to anticipate today’s egregious delay. What if whatever he was expected to accomplish tonight hinged on him doing so within a very tight, preset time frame? In that case, he might already be too late. Terrible things might already have been set in motion, things he would likely be powerless to stop.
His luck took a slight turn as he entered the restaurant. The waiting room was empty and there was just one couple ahead of him. The perky blonde hostess grabbed a couple of menus and escorted them to a nearby table. She returned in under a minute and greeted him with a dazzling smile.
“Hello! Just one tonight?”
Mike tried on a brittle smile of his own, but he immediately knew it was a mistake. Though she struggled not to show it, something in his expression disturbed her and the wattage of her smile dimmed considerably.
So he made the phony smile go away and said, “Um, I’m here to see Jasper?” His voice rose in pitch at the end, rendering it a question rather than a statement. He sounded nervous and unsure of himself. Ridiculous. He was a grownup. He loathed sounding like an unconfident, stammering fool in the presence of this stunningly pretty young girl. Why this should matter, he didn’t know, but it did. “I was told--”
“This way.”
A tilt of her head indicated he should follow her, so he did, his gaze zeroing in on her sumptuous backside as she lead him through the main dining area and then into the bar. The bar was a little more noisy and crowded, thanks to it still being happy hour. People were laughing and joking, but little of what he heard penetrated as he admired the sway of the hostess’s hips and the way her ass moved in those tight orange shorts. She looked so ripe, a tender, juicy fruit ready for the picking. He guessed she was a student at the university, probably no more than a year or two out of high school. Watching the way her body moved was almost painful. The urge to reac
h out and touch her--to slide his hands around her slim waist--was nearly too powerful to resist.
The erotic trance lasted until he realized she had come to a stop and was knocking on an office door. He looked around and saw that they were no longer in the bar, though they were somewhere adjacent to it. He could still hear laughter and the constant clinking of glasses and bottles. A glance over his shoulder showed him a glimpse of the bar area at the opposite end of a short passage. About halfway down the passage on the right was a set of flapping double doors. He guessed the kitchen would be on the other side of those doors. His head snapped around again when he heard the office door come open.
“That man is here to see you.”
There was the sound of someone clearing their throat, followed by a familiar voice saying, “Send him in, Angelique.”
Angelique stepped aside and waved Mike in. Mike was unable to resist a quick glance at her breasts as he walked by her. It was helpless male reflex. Nothing he could do about it. They were nice breasts, and they pleasingly strained her tight top. She caught his eye for an instant as he entered the office. Her expression in that moment was somewhere tantalizingly between a smirk and a smile. And then she shut the door to the office and was gone.
Holy shit. I want her so bad.
That throat-clearing sound came again and the world abruptly came back into crisp focus. He was in a cramped office. A laptop computer was open atop a small desk. A scattering of paperwork obscured much of the desk’s surface There was a calendar on the wall behind the desk, with the picture for this month showing a group of smiling restaurant employees. There was little about the office that was not nondescript. If he had been asked to picture the office of a restaurant’s manager, he likely would have imagined something very like this--staid and boring.
By far the most compelling thing about it was the ugly little man sitting on the other side of the desk. This was the Diabolical Conspiracy member who always reminded him vaguely of Hitler. He had the same beady, creepy eyes as the deceased genocidal maniac. The mustache and short, greasy brown hair also contributed to the impression. But Hitler, not exactly a pretty man himself, had been positively dashing compared to this dude. In fairness, it was the fault of biology rather than any failure of grooming or hygiene. It had a lot to do with the shape of his face. Nothing seemed properly symmetrical. One eye looked like it was higher up on his face than the other, which had the effect of throwing his other features out of perspective. His nose looked too small, while his perpetually protruding lower lip made his mouth look too big. Simply put, he just was not an attractive man. At all.
And his name definitely was not Jasper.
“Um…I was told to ask for--”
Edward Olson nodded. “Yes. Jasper. I know. It was code. Have a seat, Mike.”
Mike glanced at the metal-framed chair sitting opposite the desk, shrugged, and dropped into it. “So what’s this about? The note I got said something about a package.”
Olson steepled his fingers as he leaned back in chair. “We’ll get to that in a minute. You seemed distracted when you walked in here. Is something wrong?”
He had been distracted, all right, but it wasn’t the memory of the hostess’s sensational little body that was making him so twitchy. No, that was all thanks to the mysterious summons from the conspiracy. He could confess to the true nature of his unsettled demeanor. Surely Olson would understand. Still, Mike was of the opinion he should keep feelings like that close to the vest where other conspiracy members were concerned. He didn’t want any of them suspicious of his motives or potential future behavior, after all. Playing it off as purely a byproduct of his intense attraction to Angelique was the way to go. They were both guys. Olson would get it. He could even crack a sexist joke or two and they could have a moment of phony male bonding.
“Angelique. Jesus, man, that ass of hers is pure perfection. What I wouldn’t give to take a bite out of it.”
“Oh?”
Mike grinned as he started to get into it. After all, he wasn’t faking anything here. His lust for the hostess was sincere. “Definitely. Too bad I’m shacked up with Marnie these days. If I could get with Angelique, I wouldn’t let her out of bed for days. If ever. It would just be nonstop, Olympic competition-level sport fucking.”
Olson’s expression didn’t change as he said, “She’s my daughter.”
“Say what now?”
“She’s my daughter.”
That’s what I thought you said, but it doesn’t fucking compute.
Mike felt his face grow hot. He shifted in the chair and felt twitchier than ever as he said, “About what I said--”
Olson waved it off. “Relax. Of course you feel that way. Who wouldn’t want her? You can have her if you want. I’ll arrange it.”
Mike stared at him in open-mouthed shock for a longish moment. He pictured himself actually fucking Angelique and for a space of many seconds he was incapable of thinking coherently of anything else. But then the sleazy, sick reality of what Olson was suggesting finally registered and the lust consuming him withered and died.
Good lord, he thought. Is this guy really talking about pimping out his own daughter?
The notion disgusted him on numerous levels and elicited a shame for his own lustful thoughts. The attraction he felt for Angelique was normal and understandable, but it was now tainted by this loathsome proposition.
Olson surprised him by laughing. “The sneer on your face tells me you think my suggestion reprehensible, which I find amusing.” He leaned forward and rested his arms on the edge of the desk. “We’re Satanists, Mike. Perverting the natural order and offending God is what we’re all about.” He smiled. “At least in part.”
Mike tried to think of an appropriate response to that and failed.
Olson smirked. “Would it help at all if I told you she’s not my biological daughter, that she’s adopted?”
It doesn’t help a goddamn thing, but it explains a lot, including the mystery of how a toad like you produced a goddess like that. Should have known that shit wasn’t possible.
Mike regained some of his composure and sat up straighter in the chair. “Maybe. We could talk about it some other time, though. I’d really like to know what the deal is with this package. I was late getting off work and now I’ll be even later getting home. I’d really sort of like to just get whatever this is over with.”
Olson nodded. “Understandable.” He scooted his chair back from the desk and stood up “Let’s go for a walk.”
Mike followed him out of the office and down the short passage until they arrived at the flapping double doors. Olson pushed through the doors and Mike hurried in after him. As he suspected, this was the kitchen. There was a lot of noise, the clank of dishes and the rapid-fire talk of the staff. The kitchen workers remained focused on their work and barely acknowledged the intrusion as Olson led Mike to another set of flapping double doors at the other end of the kitchen. Beyond those doors was a storage room and doors to freezers.
Mike was more confused than ever. He couldn’t imagine why a package of interest to the Diabolical Conspiracy would be stashed in the bowels of a restaurant. If it was anything especially sensitive, wouldn’t it make more sense to keep it somewhere less public? Well, yeah, of course that would make more sense. The Diabolical Conspiracy did many things that made little or no sense on the surface.
Olson led him to a far corner of the storage room, where he stopped and looked at Mike. “Here’s your package.”
He slapped the sealed top of a blue metal barrel. There were three small holes drilled through the barrel’s lid. Seeing them retriggered the gnawing sense of unease that had gripped Mike during the drive here, though at first he wasn’t sure why.
He frowned. “What…is this?”
There was a crowbar lying across the barrel’s lid. Olson grabbed it and used it to pry the lid open. After setting the lid aside, he beckoned Mike to take a look inside, which he did with extreme reluctance. He susp
ected he was about to see something that was either unspeakably abominable or otherwise disturbing.
He was right about the disturbing part.
A little girl of about six or seven stared up at him with dazed eyes. She was wearing a torn polka-dotted dress. One cheek was smudged with dirt from leaning against a side of the barrel’s interior. She was bound and gagged.
Mike stepped back and choked back bile. He hadn’t felt this sick since the night of his first conspiracy meeting…since the moment he buried the heavy blade of that axe in Donnie Wilkerson’s neck. “Oh my God.”
Olson replaced the lid and looked at him with a quizzical expression. “You all right, Mike?”
Mike couldn’t say anything at first. All he could think about was the fact that there was a tied-up little girl in that barrel--and that Olson had just closed her up inside it again. Just knowing she was in there was worse than anything else that had happened since he had become mixed up with these conspiracy assholes. Worse by far than the murder of Donnie Wilkerson. This little girl was a pure innocent. This thing being done to her--whatever its ultimate aim was--was an offense against everything right and decent in the world. No question on that count. And Mike was again seized by the idea that it was within his power to end this right now. He could grab that crowbar and beat this despicable, grotesque excuse for a man to fucking death. And then get that girl out of that goddamn barrel and head straight for the police station.
Olson nodded. “Forget it, Mike. You think we’re alone here?” He pointed to a security camera in a corner of the room. “You’re being watched. Acting against me would be futile. You might overpower me, but you’d never make it out of the restaurant alive.”
Mike glanced at the camera then looked at Olson again. “Who’s watching us?”
Olson shook his head. “Doesn’t matter. What matters is that you leave here with the package tucked away in the trunk of your car and that you then proceed directly to Nadia’s house. I’ll call Nadia as soon as you’re on your way. If you don’t arrive at her house within twenty minutes of that call, she’ll make some calls of her own.”