The Venue

by T J Payne

  He now saw that there were three limos, all crammed together on the narrow road. He tried to keep looking at the ground, but he couldn’t help but see that all the shouting adults wore suits and dresses that were splattered with blood. They waved axes and machetes at him as they screamed.

  The woman who had him by the shirt collar tugged him toward the last limo. Toward the open door.

  Johann didn’t want to go. He didn’t want to look in that door. He didn’t want to be shoved inside and hacked to pieces by this insane, angry, probably cannibalistic group of well-dressed adults. He dug his heels in, but the woman was strong and determined.

  She dragged him to the limo and wrenched his head to look inside.

  It took a moment for his eyes to adjust to the darkness. But when they did, Johann saw blood. Tons of blood. Men and women had crowded into the back seats. Some were unconscious but many writhed about. They moaned in the red pools that had formed on the upholstery.

  The woman twisted his head to look at one person in particular. Another woman. In a greenish dress. She was unconscious, but from the paleness of her face, Johann wondered if she might actually be dead.

  Johann was yanked back out of the limo and the woman slammed him up against the side of the vehicle.

  She reached into his pocket and pulled out his phone. She held it in front of his face as she said again, “Doktor!”

  Johann knew there was a special number to call in situations like this. And it wasn’t the number for the doctor. There had been times during his childhood when a person or two made their way down the mountain and screamed for help. There was a reward for calling the special number in those situations, although Johann had never had the opportunity to do it himself. He never dreamed that he would encounter three cars full of such people.

  As he looked in the eyes of the woman who held him, Johann’s nerves vanished. He had never seen such intensity before. If he didn’t get these people to a doctor — a trustworthy doctor — he believed that this woman wouldn’t just kill him, she would burn the entire town to ash.

  Johann was friends with a boy from two towns away. The boy’s dad was a doctor. The people of that town knew nothing of what went on at the mountain.

  Johann called that boy.

  CHAPTER 34

  Amy stared out the window.

  The view looked out over the treetops. She could see spires of the city dotting the distance. The world looked green and healthy on this summer’s afternoon.

  It had been almost two days since they had escaped The Venue.

  She heard the rustling of the hospital bed beside her, followed immediately by a heavy breathing and the creaking of Mariko yanking on the restraints that bound her to the bed. Mariko was working her way into a frenzy.

  Amy quickly stood and bent over the bed, putting a reassuring hand on Mariko’s shoulder.

  “It’s okay, it’s okay,” Amy repeated in a calm voice. “You’re safe.”

  Mariko’s head, which had been jerking from side-to-side, stabilized. Her eyes took a moment to focus in on Amy’s face. What had been a look of panic became one of confusion.

  “Hiya, sleepy-head,” Amy said with a smile.

  Mariko gulped. She opened her mouth.

  “Wait, wait, wait,” Amy said. “Have some water first.”

  Amy reached to an extendable table that was attached to the bed. She rotated it over and lifted a sippy cup that she held to Mariko’s mouth. Mariko eyed the cup suspiciously. Amy placed it to her own lips and took a sip, making a show of swallowing the water down. Finally convinced it wasn’t poisoned, Mariko put the straw in her mouth.

  “We’re in a hospital in Bern. It’s the fifth biggest city in Switzerland. Cool, huh?” Amy said as Mariko drank. “They had to give you a shit ton of blood, but they say you’ll be okay.”

  Mariko took another gulp and then let the straw fall loosely from her lips. Amy set the cup back down.

  “How much do you remember?” Amy asked.

  Mariko looked down at her left arm which had been bandaged over at the elbow. Her look said it all — she remembered everything.

  Amy nodded. “You’ve been thrashing around a lot. The nurses said to buzz them when you finally woke up, and they’d take the restraints off. But fuck ‘em. I don’t have to play by their rules.” She reached over and undid the strap that held Mariko down herself.

  Mariko stretched her now-free arm. When she opened her mouth, her voice was hoarse. “Wh-what happened? After…”

  “Well, the party died down pretty quick after I found you,” Amy said. “It was like everyone hit the wall at the same time. Their blood-sugar levels just tanked, or something. Lotta sobbing.”

  As she spoke, she found that her voice didn’t contain any trace of emotion. She wasn’t feeling the fear or the sadness or the confusion from her story.

  “Go on,” Mariko said weakly. “What then?”

  “Someone found a garage that had three limos in it,” she continued, her words flowing out on autopilot. “It took an hour for us all to find the keys, but Jesse… Did you meet him? He was on Caleb’s college debate team. Nice guy. Kinda awkward. But whatever. Anyway, Jesse finally cracked open the box they were kept in. So, we all piled into three limos, bleeding all over the place, and we zoomed down the mountain.

  “No one knew where we were going. I didn’t really help much. I stayed in the back of the third limo, just trying to keep you warm. Eventually, we came to a town. No one spoke the language and none of us trusted local police. I sort of assumed that we’d be surrounded and shot and then buried off in a field, or something. I think everyone assumed that.

  “But we had cracked open the boxes that had our cell phones. And so, everyone just started filming everything. Every interaction. Every person who approached the limos. We uploaded it all. All their faces. Streamed the whole thing. The locals stayed clear of us. A doctor arrived from out of town. He stabilized the critically wounded. Like you.”

  Amy took a breath.

  “Pretty soon, some emergency helicopters came,” Amy continued. “They flew us to Bern. And here we are.”

  “Are we going home?”

  “The Embassy is working on that. They interviewed me. They’ll come back, I’m sure, and interview you. But, yes, we’ll go home soon.”

  “So… that’s it?”

  Amy shrugged. “The police took statements from me. The media too. You’ll probably want to change your phone number and address as there’s a shitstorm of cameras out there. Because of your, um…” Amy motioned toward Mariko’s missing arm. “They really want a photo of you. I haven’t let them. They’ll probably pay.”

  Mariko looked down at her arm. After a moment, she tilted her head and stared off. Amy’s words still seemed to be bouncing around her mind.

  “I’ve been talking to the other survivors. We all agree that the more media attention there is, the safer we feel.”

  “So, we’re… safe?”

  Amy nodded. She believed they were safe. Or, at least, she hoped they were.

  She had refused to leave Mariko’s side, even when the police came to interview her. And they came often. They’d have her describe The Venue. The faces of the staff. The invitation that Caleb had emailed her.

  They brought maps for her to try to trace back its location (she couldn’t). They brought books of headshots so she could identify a waiter or a bellhop (she couldn’t). They forced her to log into her email and find the invitation (she couldn’t). After each conversation, the detectives would step into the hall, make a phone call, and speak in a hushed tone.

  The doctors did the same. As did the staffers from the American Embassy who stopped by. Everyone seemed to be reporting things back to someone else.

  Or maybe Amy was just being paranoid.

  She decided that she would wait for Mariko to be a little stronger before she burdened her with that paranoia. No one had threatened her or even appeared to be doubting her. The story of the wedding from he
ll had spread and no matter how much the police dragged their feet on finding the hidden location, the secret was out.

  “But that place… there was a lot of money there,” Mariko said, seemingly giving voice to Amy’s own fears without Amy having to say anything. “Caleb couldn’t have been the first to rent them. They must be well connected. And powerful. What if they come for us?”

  Amy took a moment to actually think about that question — a question she’d been avoiding.

  Would they ever truly be safe? What kind of life would they have?

  She honestly didn’t know.

  But as she looked down at Mariko, she did know at least one thing.

  “We’ll just have to learn to live with the unknown,” Amy said.

  As the two looked in each other’s eyes, Amy reached into her pocket. She had prepared a speech. A speech of love. Of the future. Of making each other stronger and better.

  Working on the speech had been the only thing that kept her mind occupied during the long hours of guarding Mariko’s bedside. She had memorized it and even practiced it out loud once. But at this moment, the moment she needed them, the words had been filed away in some cabinet of her mind and she had lost the key.

  And so, Amy pulled the ring from her pocket and pressed it into Mariko’s hand.

  “I can’t really explain why I didn’t want to marry you before,” Amy managed to say. “I know I said things and made up all these excuses, but the real truth is… the truth is, I was just in my own head. I was figuring my own shit out. Telling myself stories. Never actually talking about it. Never talking with you. And… and I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

  “This is how you’re proposing?” Mariko smiled.

  Amy felt her face blush as she, too, smiled. “You don’t have to say anything now,” Amy said. “We’ll talk through what you want. What I want. We’ll be honest. I just… I’m stronger with you. I never want to leave you again.”

  Mariko looked at the ring. A simple gold band with a small stone. The diamond may have even been fake. In fact, it probably was.

  “When did you buy this?” she asked.

  But as Mariko held the ring up to the sunlight, Amy could see the recognition flash across her face.

  Amy pulled out the ring’s companion. A simple, wide silver band. She had made sure to gather them before she left The Venue. She had kept them in her pocket ever since, clutching them tightly whenever feelings of sadness or anger rose in her. The rings calmed her. They made her feel loved and safe.

  On the inside of the wedding band was an engraving. “Together Forever” — 1979 — R & C.

  R & C.

  Roger & Candice.

  Together forever.

  Mariko read the inscription and instantly understood. A tear formed in her eye. She sat up in bed, held out her good arm, and wrapped Amy in a hug.

  “I love you,” Mariko said.

  “I love you too,” Amy said between heaving breaths.

  They held each other. Amy didn’t want to let go.

  She vowed she would never let go of a good thing again.

  EPILOGUE

  The Event Planner was a tall man and reasonably attractive. But not too tall and not too attractive. The owners felt that staff who were too tall or too attractive made the male clientele feel insecure. An insecure client only caused problems.

  And today, the Event Planner had enough problems on his hands.

  He stood in the ballroom, overseeing the cleanup. This wasn’t an ordinary scrub-and-repair job, like he was scheduled to perform today. This was a cleanup of a different nature.

  The first priority had been to remove all the files and computers from the Control Room and offices. They destroyed them on-site so that they couldn’t be intercepted on the road down from the mountain.

  And now, sensing that he had a little bit of extra time, his crew performed the next level of cleansing. Cleaners rotated through the ballroom, throwing bodies on wheelbarrows and carting them away. The incinerators in the back parking lot had been roaring for hours now. Time permitting, he wanted to have the pools of blood absorbed by sawdust and sent to the incinerators as well. DNA evidence could be so troublesome.

  He ordinarily trusted the cleaners to perform their jobs unsupervised, but time was of the essence today and he felt that his presence in the ballroom added an extra push to their step.

  Still, it left him with little to do but stand and watch.

  He found himself glancing down at the body by his feet. A woman, or what was left of her. His former colleague. She had been in competition with him for promotion, but despite that, they had stayed on friendly, professional terms. She, like all the other event planners, understood the stress of the job.

  “Sir?”

  The Event Planner turned. His assistant held out a phone.

  “I have Mr. Van Rutherford on the line.”

  The Event Planner nodded. “I’ll take it outside. Less noise.”

  “Very good. And the Swiss police? What should I tell them?”

  “Tell them to delay another two hours. Then they can come investigate. Relay those same instructions to all our contacts in Interpol, the F.B.I., and any embassies and state departments who are involved.”

  “And the survivors? There are so many of them…”

  “Let them go home.”

  “Sir?”

  “Let them talk to the media. Let them tell their stories. Let them live their lives in peace, without our interference. There are to be no threats or bribes. No contact with the survivors of any kind. The coverup is always more dangerous than the crime. Once this building is retired, they will have nothing that connects back to us. If they try to pull on some threads, they will soon discover they all lead nowhere. In the meantime, we have a business to operate.”

  “Very good, sir.”

  His assistant walked off to make the calls. The Event Planner took a deep breath. Talking to Mr. Van Rutherford wasn’t high on the list of things he wanted to do, but a job is a job.

  He unmuted the phone as he walked out of the ballroom.

  “Mr. Van Rutherford, I am so sorry for the delay. As I am sure my associate told you, things are a bit chaotic here. It is my unfortunate duty to tell you that there has been a scheduling error at The Venue. Sadly, the Alpine lodge location is unavailable for your family reunion. I am dreadfully sorry. We will provide you with an alternative of your choice. We have a private jungle treehouse venue in Singapore. Or perhaps our castle venue in Luxembourg, which is my personal favorite. If you desire a more urban setting, we operate a skyrise venue in Dubai. If you wish to stay local, there is a rustic farm venue in the Americas.”

  He paused as the man on the other end cut him off. Fortunately, the man didn’t scream insults or threats. The rich could behave brutishly to other service-oriented businesses, but they tended to be on their best behavior for The Venue.

  The Event Planner calmly listened to the man’s concerns and desires for his family reunion (the rich also tended to be rather long-winded). He stepped out of the building and into the fresh air, having to move to the side to allow a team of cleaners carrying gasoline cans to enter.

  He walked off across the parking lot to avoid the noise.

  “Might I suggest something?” the Event Planner began when it was his turn to speak again. “We operate a yacht venue that sails from the Cayman Islands. It can accommodate all sixty of your guests. For the inconvenience, we will discount the rate by twenty percent. Does that suit you? Excellent. We will see you on the twenty-third. Thank you for your understanding.”

  He hung up. Not a bad result. The clean-up on the boat events was always the easiest. Unfortunately, he would need to expense some sea-sickness medication, but it was a small price to pay.

  He stood in the parking lot and watched as his friend, the female Event Planner, was carted out the front door and hauled to the incinerator. What a mess.

  The Event Planner’s eye caught the bronze sign by the front d
oor. Someone had vandalized it in blood so that it now read, “We hope you enjoyed your SLAY.”

  He shook his head. What kind of guests did the bride and groom invite? he wondered. How can people be so cruel?

  He didn’t have long to ponder the question, though. There was a building to be burned to the ground and a yacht party to arrange.

  The hospitality industry stops for no one.

  Luxury takes no vacations.

  It would be another busy day.

  THE END

  Thank you for reading!

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  Free Excerpt

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  IN MY FATHER’S BASEMENT

  a serial killer novel by T.J. Payne

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  PROLOGUE

  It was 4:32 a.m.

  Officer Cornett was the first responder.

  When he exited his vehicle he initially thought it was a prank call. He didn't hear any gunshots. He didn't see any signs of mass panic. The campus was silent, and the dorm—from the outside, at least—looked as though most of the residents were still sleeping. It did not appear that an attack was in progress.

  Then he heard a rustling.

  Several first-floor residents opened their windows and dropped down into the bushes. They silently crept away from the building until they got some distance, then they broke into panicked sprints across the parking lot. They were barefoot and still in their sleep-clothes.

  For the first time in his career, Officer Cornett drew his weapon.

  He approached the building. He was still confused as to why he couldn't hear gunshots. Maybe the attacker had finished his spree and already committed suicide.