by B Anders
Colby thought she heard a small gasp of recognition when Jessie saw the car from the main entrance of the hospital, but it could have been nothing but an involuntary response to the feel of cold ground against bare feet. Colby turned on the radio to drown out the quiet. It was an old rock and roll station and the sounds of “Tutti Frutti” ate up the silence between the two of them.
“Could you turn that off?”
Colby smirked, “That’s a classic. What’s the matter with you? Don’t you like real music? Thought they taught you culture in that rich bitch Dana Hall School of yours.”
“Dr. Leshkari used loud music as a punishment. Please, could you just do this one thing for me?”
“What shit did you get up to at the booby hatch that needed punishing? Did they catch you drinking out of the toilet bowl again? Or did you go kill someone else?”
Jessie looked out the car window and muttered back, “Forget it. It’s nothing I can't handle. I’ll deal with it.”
“Oh, poor little old you. Let me tell you something, you no good piece of shit, a little music is nothin' compared to the hours you stood by and watched Marty suffer. Tell me, how long did it take him to die? Did you enjoy listening to his cries for help while he was being curved up like some goddamned Thanksgiving turkey?”
Colby’s voice became low and dangerous as she steeled herself for the wave of impudent anger and tears that she was sure would accompany Jessie’s reply.
“Did that turn you on, Bitch? Watching him slowly bleed to death on the floor of his own fuckin’ house?”
“Shut up, Colby.”
“Did I hit a nerve?” Colby asked with a deep laugh.
She expected a scream of frustration from Jessie or at the very least a string of obscenities. She even thought perhaps, if she played her cards right an anguished confession might follow. Her own pen jammed hard into her thigh by Jessie’s suddenly free left hand came as a complete shock.
“You fuckin’ psycho bitch!”
Colby screamed as she struggled to fend off the enraged woman while trying to keep the car on the road. In the end, she finished the fight by letting go of the steering wheel long enough to pop Jessie hard on the jaw.
Jessie’s head snapped back and hit the passenger side window with a sickening thud just as the Charger jumped the curb at the entrance to Shopper’s World. It came to a sudden stop with its mangled hood wedged tight under the greeting sign. Colby could feel her confidence deflate as rapidly as the tire on the driver’s side.
“Why in hell did you go and do that for, you stupid bitch? You could have gotten both of us killed.”
Colby groaned as she clutched her thigh. She knew it wasn’t a good idea to pull the pen out but she was going to do it anyway.
“I asked you nice to turn off the radio and you made fun of me. I don’t like it when people make fun of me.”
Jessie answered softly as she wiped the trickle of blood from the side of her mouth and resumed staring out the window as if nothing had happened.
Colby stared at her in disbelief.
“Maybe she really is fuckin’ crazy." Colby wondered to herself.
Either way Colby knew she was going to find out soon enough.
*****
Chapter 5
Pat Pickman snuck a quick glance at the two disheveled looking women huddled near the curb from the side mirror of his tow truck. He was glad they looked so miserable. It was a sin what they did to such a beautiful car.
"No respect, no respect at all," he muttered with a shake of his head as he grabbed the tools he need to winch the car free of the crumpled sign.
They weren’t local that’s for sure and an odd couple, they were at that. One was tall and lean in a beat up leather jacket and shades. She looked mean enough to eat shoe leather and spit out the nails. The smaller, skinnier woman was some drugged out hippie type with long dirty hair, stinking of dried sweat and disinfectant. From the way she was dressed and restrained, he figured her to be a Framingham girl. Pity was she went all to hell in the looks department. She could have been a real heart breaker with a bit of soap and water and a lot of scrubbing. Make up wouldn't hurt none either. She wasn’t his type, though. He liked his woman well-padded and friendly. This one looked cold enough to freeze the balls off King Kong. There was something about the eyes. They were empty, nearly dead.
The tall, mean looking one caught him staring at the other woman out of the corner of her eye and flashed a gold shield at him. It was enough to get his fat ass moving and more than enough to keep his yap shut before any questions dribbled out of his sunken cheeks.
Pickman slowly nodded and focused his eyes on the task at hand. He hated the goddamned pigs. No need asking questions when the cops were involved. It never did any earthly good to talk when it was police business. Piss off the wrong one and before you knew it a swarm of regulatory agencies would be descending on his auto shop like hungry locusts all wanting a piece of the pie.
He learned his lesson the last time he asked a Statie if he was drunk after the man tried to bend his cruiser around a tree. It took three years and ten grand of clean up money he didn’t have to get the Environment Police out of his life. Nope, it was definitely not worth sticking his neck out as far as he was concerned. The she cop could rip the ice queen’s head right off in front of him and she wouldn't hear a peep out of him. As long as she paid him, he didn’t give a damn what she did.
After Pickman finished securing the chain to the rear of that sweet ride, he stopped a while to blow on his hands trying to warm them up. It was rotten weather to be out on a job, but the bills didn’t pay themselves not in this economy. The weatherman on the news said it was spring, but it didn’t feel like spring to him. Old Man Winter was not ready to give up his grip on New England and, in spite of brilliant sunshine, it was windy and cold.
He got to the winch and prepared to hoist the Charger ass end up and out from under the sign. He checked over his shoulder at the last minute to make sure the cop and the other woman were back far enough from the disabled vehicle. It was bad business policy killing the customer before you collected.
Pickman noticed this time around that the smaller woman was shivering in her thin orange scrubs; her bare feet ghastly white against the cold concrete. She looked young but badly kept. Looked a little like his daughter, Sue Anne, first thing in the morning after a really wild Saturday night, except for those dead fish eyes of hers. There was something wrong with those eyes. They belonged in an old woman’s face not one as young and pretty as hers. But then Pickman figured he wasn’t the best judge in the world when it came to these matters. Truth was his baby, Sue Anne, was no spring chicken herself. She was pushing thirty five with nothing to show for it, but a dead end waitress job at a highway rest stop and a string of no good boyfriends. But he decided that except for the leather restraints, the ice queen looked harmless enough. Her cop friend however, was another story altogether.
Against his better judgment, Pickman abandoned the winch and approached the cop. Her eyes narrowed into slits and her lips were a colorless straight line. He imagined it had something to do with her bleeding thigh. He didn’t know how she managed to cut herself there, but he didn’t like the look of the dark colored stained. She was bleeding out like a stuck pig. Her shoulders noticeably stiffened when he was within five to eight feet of them. The pain was making her cagey and he knew to be careful, only thing worse than a cop was a cop nursing a wound. He respectfully bobbed his head in her direction before he spoke, no point in making things more awkward than they already were.
“Lady, you want to wait in the truck?” Pickman cleared his throat and added, “You look kind of cold.”
“Just take care of the car,” Colby snapped. She didn’t want to admit it, but the pain, the cold, and the waiting was getting to her. She needed a drink and some place warm to lie down for a bit.
Pickman raised his hands in surrender. If this was how the bitch wanted to play it, it was fine with him. He was
just being a Good Samaritan.
“Just tryin’ to be helpful Lady, is all. Car’s gonna need a day or so to fix up. Thought you’d need a ride somewhere, is all.”
Pickman quickly turned to walk back to the winch when Colby asked, in a somewhat strained voice, “A day?”
Pickman nodded and hurried back to the truck to put some distance between them. He didn’t want to be anywhere near that bitch in case she took out her gun and started pointing it at him. The goddamned pigs were all crazy as far as he was concerned.
“Why a day? It's a fuckin’ flat! Why do you need a whole day to fix a flat?” Colby bellowed, the veins in her neck standing out in bright relief against her white skin.
Pickman engaged the loud winch system before shouting his reply.
“Charger here needs special tires. They gotta match or you’ll flip. You got an extra in the trunk? A spare ready to go?”
Colby shook her head. The spare was the flattest of her five. She meant to get it fixed, but somehow never got around to it. Now she was stuck out in the middle of nowhere, bleeding from a puncture wound to her thigh, and arguing with a tow truck driver who was giving her the evil eye. She wanted to punch something hard.
Pickman nodded with a grin, “Figured that. Most people don’t keep good spares, cost too much.”
He stopped speaking for a minute to gently edge the Charger out from under the sign. It was a thing of beauty, it was. Just slipped out like a well-greased hog from Old MacDonald’s hands. The damage rendered to the sign and the hood wasn't too extensive. Neither would win a beauty contest, but neither were gonna keel over which was all right by him. Pickman secured the settings for the winch before turning back to the cop.
At the jangle of the chain, the cop mumbled, "F."
"Huh," Pickman asked but the cop waved him off.
He turned his attention to the ruined front tire and winced. He was going to have to make sure she understood the repairs needed to get the car back on the road. The car was a classic and he was going to do his best by her. He couldn’t give a fuck about the she cop and her creepy lady friend.
“Might need to get you a replacement rim by the sight of it. Done a helluva job, you did, but it could have been worse. A Charger can take a fair share of knocks. They sure don’t build them like they use to.” He sighed and rubbed his head gathering his thoughts before giving her the bad news.
“Lady, I gotta get you a matching tread. Better to get two but start with one, at least. If I go to a dealer, it’ll cost all outdoors and still take a couple of days. These tires are special order. Since you’re in a hurry, my boy can head over to the junk yard and find something suitable. We’ll get you good to go, but it’ll take a day or so to get the right fit so you don’t do cartwheels out on the road.”
It was Colby’s turn to wince. When she drove out to “The Castle” in the afternoon she had not intended on it being more than a routine visit, much less get herself and a first class psycho stranded in the boonies. She knew she should get on the cell and call the local cops or the Staties or even Faust for a ride back to the city. But right now, she didn’t really want anybody poking around in her business especially with her thigh giving her crap. She was feeling really motivated to have a deep and meaningful conversation with Jessie Walsh—alone.
“Any place around here we can hold up until you finish?” Colby asked, immediately adding in a lower tone, “Any place private, really quiet?”
Pickman flashed a big wide smile for the first time since he set eyes on the women and their broken down ride. She cop was planning some unscheduled personal one-on-one with her lady friend. He heard that sort of thing was real common in prisons. Although the higher-ups didn’t like it much, which meant it would be easier for him to negotiate his way out of trouble later.
“My wife used to work the weekend desk at ‘El-Crapo-Helltell’ before they closed for renovations last week. They got shut down by the health inspectors. Said it was bugs or mice or something, but as far as anyone could tell there was nothing wrong with the place. Maybe it was a little old and rundown, but it was clean and reasonable. It’s right at the end of the mall.”
Colby frowned unsure as to the direction the conversation was taking. The confusion in her face brought another broad smile to Pickman’s cheeks.
“My cousin Bernie’s the night manager and for $30 I can get you a key for a suite and shut off the alarm. The water and the lights are still running and my wife’s the one to get called if any thing’s up so you got no worries. I’ll give you and your friend a lift over on my way to the yard.”
Colby nodded in agreement. A motel off the highway, all to herself and Jessie Walsh, the offer sounded too good to be true but she wasn’t about to look a gift horse in the mouth.
“I got an overnight bag in the trunk I'll need.”
Pickman took a deep breath and counted to ten. No matter how many times he asked people if they got all their gear before the lift, some idiot always needed to get into the trunk after a perfectly good hoist. He went to the winch to ease the Charger back to the ground.
“No wonder she ended up under the fuckin’ sign, she a moron,” he thought to himself as the winch groaned into action. It was going to be a long drive.
***
‘El-Crapo-Helltell’ was a low slung one story building housing a single row of ‘family’ rooms along a common corridor. These were slightly more upscale than the hourly rooms directly facing the parking lot that normally saw a lot of traffic.
The property was old and water stained but it had its own bar and outdoor pool with a barbeque pit. Despite Colby’s initial misgivings about the man, the tow truck operator was good to his word. The room was clean and spacious. He secured them the “honeymoon suite” with a tub and a large double bed before driving off with her money safely tucked away in his front shirt pocket. They were now left alone in an empty motel with hot running water for the tub, electricity for the TV, and all the privacy Colby could stand.
Once alone in the room, Colby marched Jessie straight toward the bed. The fact that the bound woman was still somehow able to snag the television remote from the dresser top as she walked past was not lost on her. While Colby began to secure Jessie’s waist restraint with a set of handcuffs to the wooden bed frame, Jessie ignored her and continued playing with the remote. Jessie remained oblivious to Colby’s presence, her eyes never leaving the flashing screen, even as Colby struggled to lock her down.
Heaving a sign of relief after finally managing to secure the cuffs, Colby grabbed her bag and made a break for the bathroom leaving Jessie alone in front of the blaring TV like some dirty, neglected five year old. Sitting on the edge of the tub, Colby struggled out of her blood stained jeans careful not to jar her throbbing leg. The wound was messy and mean looking with blood continuing to ooze out from the opening. Colby knew she ought to have it stitched but she was in no mood to play twenty questions with some pimple faced resident. She carefully cleaned the laceration while counting off a hundred different ways she would like to strangle Jessie Walsh. Her fertile imagination assured each one was more innovative than the last. The distraction, at least, made the pain bearable.
There weren’t any bandages in the bag so Colby grabbed a roll of duct tape left over from her last quickie on the go repair job. It was better than nothing. Using a small face towel to stanch the bleeding she secured it over the wound with the tape. It worked like a charm. She read about using duct tape to seal a wound once in a book but never thought it would work.
“Thanks for the suggestion, Stieg!” Colby muttered as she tugged her jeans back on.
She quickly gathered her things together before limping back into the bedroom. Jessie was still channel surfing. Pictures flashed by in a nauseous blur. Colby suddenly felt light headed and looked away.
“Okay, you’re next. Get up.”
“What?” Jessie asked dully not bothering to stop or look up.
Colby took the remote out of Jessie’s ha
nd, clicked off the power and tossed the remote onto the other side of the bed.
“Hey!”
“What?” Colby answered sarcastically as she bent down and unlocked the cuffs.
“Colby, I was watching that.”
“And, now you’re not. Come on. Get on your feet. You need to get cleaned up. You stink worse than me.”
Ignoring the killer looks Jessie was shooting her way, Colby began unfastening the main harness of the restraints. As she methodically removed the leather wrist and ankle cuffs a slow smile spread across her face.
“Oh, aren’t you a clever girl?” Colby smirked as she looked at the left wrist cuff. “You’re just about stretched the hell out of this.”
Jessie smiled sweetly at her. “It’s an occupational hazard. They wrapped me up almost twelve hours before you and fat boy showed. A girl gets bored strapped to a chair all day long with nothing to do but stare at the wall.”
