Black and Blue (Chubby Chasers, Inc. Series Book 3)

by Angie M. Brashears

  I take in the scenery behind him—an office, with a view of the skyline, no buildings in the way to block out the vista. That kind of view is expensive. Carl must be some kind of big cheese. The rest of the office is meagerly furnished. Each piece in the cold environment worth more than my car. The whole aura screams, Big deals are made in this place!

  My eyes fall to Carl, the man who’s paying the tab. Fiftyish, balding, a pot belly hiding his flaccid penis from view. “Is this a good use of company funds, Carl?” He shakes his head before dropping his piercing eyes from my sprinkled tits to his own belly button. That won’t do. Visual stimulation is most of the fun for a male. I point at him and command. “Look at me, worker bee.”

  He does, starting at my glossy black painted toenails. A direct contrast to the spiky pink heels covered in rainbow sprinkles I’m wearing. Can’t say I planned that, I was more interested in my toes matching my lingerie, for Riley. But it works. His eyes caress my legs wrapped in powder-pink fishnets, but stop at my confectionary cunt. Covered in fake frosting and sprinkles.

  I reach down, sweep a hooked finger over the plastic, and suck it into my mouth. My eyes roll in my head at the absolute taste of nothing. I moan for him, like it’s the best thing ever.

  He squirms in the Italian leather chair. I watch as his peenee, soft and pink, becomes hard and red, pressing against his spare tire.

  “Hmmm, slacking and packing on company hours, no less. Oh, Carl, you bad, dirty, filthy boy,” I purr as I smack my hand with the hot pink rolling pin he’s provided. Emphasizing every word. “This is gonna be fun.”

  I’m in full-speed-ahead mode. Yelling shit about paperclips and Xerox copies, nonsensical shit that only a sub would understand. One bikini cup pulled to the side to reveal a tease of nipple, and he blows a load all over his varicosed thighs.

  “Encore,” he whispers.

  From somewhere remote—it sure isn’t Carl; he’s bound to a chair—a button is clicked. Two thousand more dollars blink in my virtual piggy bank, and we go again.

  “You’re a real piece of shit boss, Carl.” That one’s for the assistant, just off-screen, who’s forced to sit and watch this debacle. Carl bellows, low and long, like an injured bull.

  I flash my eyes to the screen, worried I might be striking too close to the vein of truth. Yet I’m unable to stop myself from exploring this line of thinking further.

  I hope his secretary’s on standby with a defibrillator. This much excitement might be a tad too much for his fat marbled heart. His face is getting mighty red, except for the pale splotches dead center on each cheek, with all this office gossip talk. I lay into him.

  “The ladies in the office think you’ve planted a camera in their bathroom.” At that, he looks up, shaking his head vehemently. “No, I swear…” Hmmm, yep, definitely onto something here. Hope his monitor/secretary is taking notes.

  I smack my palm with the rolling pin. “Enough!” I yell. “Don’t snivel to me. You can argue your case to the board! Or whatever powers-that-be that hold their boot to your turkey neck.”

  I prance around in a circle, chanting, “Your breath smells like Limburger cheese and rotten eggs. Oh, yes, Carl. Every time you talk to me I get the taste of rotten quiche in my mouth.” I swing my arms in side snow angels with huge wings. “Personal bubble, Carl, look it up! How is it that you have never heard of the term personal space?”

  I turn back to the bowed form. “You’re also an eavesdropper, listening in on everyone’s conversations. Snatching secrets that don’t belong to you. Just to whisper cheap office gossip, half-truths embellished with your own filthy lies. You spread gossip around like you medaled in the sport!” I smack the rolling pin on my hand, listening to his labored breathing.

  “Maybe you’re the chain letter king at your office, the guy who’s never seen a chain email he doesn’t like. Be it prayers to Santa Maria or death threats, if you don’t forward this to 52 of your closest friends, you are doomed! Promises of instant wealth, invigorating health, or overnight happiness, all if you just pass these adorable kitten pictures on!”

  I hold the rolling pin like a torch over my head before lowering my voice to a conversational tone. “No one in the steno pool wants to see your workout pics, the last fish you caught, or your overpriced vacation snaps, Carl. If anyone cared about that crap, they would be in the pics! At your side, taking part in the memories, not being penned into their cubicle, backed into a flimsy corner, looking at picture after picture of your sunburned jowls.”

  Another scenario occurs. My eyes beam with Eureka!

  “Are you the loud talker in the office? The noisy one? Do you chew ice? Rustle cellophane needlessly, clear your throat endlessly, Carl? Is that you?”

  I lean over seductively, pushing my sugary tits together for his viewing pleasure. “Nah, that’s not you. You don’t have stones big enough to even strike up a conversation with any ladies, let alone be noisy, do you?”

  Now I’m reduced to flashing as I try to think of another office offender. Man, I should’ve prepared better. Then it comes to me. I cover my breasts and say. “But I bet you reek. Stink to high heaven.”

  I’m rewarded by a muffled cough off-camera. Pay dirt. “Filing motions, stamping everything with your approval, making deals worth millions, in a thousand-dollar suit smelling like a two-dollar hooker’s sticky, used-up asshole?

  “A sweaty orangutan’s cheesy ball sac?

  “Like the smell of the goo that coats the inside of a fat man’s ass cheeks. You know the dark and dirty part, where his T-rex arms can never reach to clean. Is that you? Are you the Pigpen of the office? The one that walks around in a gassy cloud of noxious Carl fumes.

  “Are you him? Do you have smell-o-vision? Afraid the deodorant stick is gonna bite you?” I wrinkle my nose, feigning a bad odor coming from the screen, waving away imaginary Carl stink before yelling at the monitor.

  “Which is it, worker bee?” I’m distracted by the sound of an approaching engine.

  “Come on, Carl. You can tell me. I’ll only blab it around to all my chunky cousins in the house.”

  At that last threat, I walk over and pick up the house phone, dialing the universal distress signal—911. The first sister to see it on their screen will respond, but it will pop on all the screens in the house.

  “They’ll love this one. After the distress call goes out, I talk into the dead phone. ‘Hey Ladies! Get in here! Carl’s got something he wants to share!”

  He squirms in his restraints, but I see the wicked glint in his eye. His dial is turned wayyyy up at the thought of his dirty bird secrets being blasted to all the other girls in the house. While his pulse ratchets up, I pause to listen again, unsure if it’s a passing car or one that’s coming to our door. Unwelcome and uninvited.

  I slam the phone down and turn to my loyal subject. “I am your Confection Commandant, and I will not listen to any sniveling, groveling, or excuses. Do you understand, mister?” My eyes want to wander to the window, but it faces the pool, so that’s a flat-out no help.

  I wait for his answer, one ear tuned in to the approaching motor.

  He nods once, and I continue in full throttle Sasha-ism, ready to berate the shit out of Carl and his misallocation of company funds. “Sex talk on company time; I won’t hear of it!” I scream at his HD little mushroom of a penis.

  Esmie materializes to my left, a momentary grimace marring her perfect face, the only hint that I’ve inconvenienced her. I nod in her direction. Just because she’s being a bitch doesn’t mean I have to be one, too. I flash her a toothy grin, before sneering back in Carl’s direction.

  “This is goth girl, Mistress Esmie, the darkest ray in the deepest hole, but you can refer to her as Sargent Snacks. The Cleopatra of corporal punishment. If you think I was hard on you, just wait till she sinks her poisonous fangs into you.” She nods, taking the baton I pass to her. The pink rolling pin of snark.

  She doesn’t need a dry run, just jumps right in. “Think abou
t all the office sins you need to atone for. Leaving the office bathroom dripping with the stench of your Mexican-food-for-lunch shits. Rifling through other people’s lunchboxes and stealing all the good snacks. Taking one bite out of people’s sandwiches and putting them back. Eating other people’s lunches out of the community fridge.

  “I know you, Carl. You’re putting your mouth on the water spigot again, aren’t you? Aren’t you!” she screeches at the pile of dough on the screen. “Drinking the last of the coffee and not making more! Not washing your hands after coughing, peeing, or diddling little Carl under the desk! And then touching every single keypad…”

  I give her a nod of respect. She’s got it, the queen of mean. I can go out and investigate. Is the motor still running? What the…?

  Javi’s out of town. Who’s here? No one, should be the correct answer to that question. Before I hit the little red panic button, alerting the house that uninvited company is on their way, I decide I need to see for myself.

  Risking the wrath of Esmie, Carl notices I’m distracted and tries his hardest to draw my cupcake-covered ass back into the scene. Trying to make this a twofer.

  I don’t miss the cajoling tone he uses as he begs. “Sasha, I’ve been a bad, bad…”

  But I’m not having it. “Yeah, pipe down, Peewee. Mistress Muffin needs some time to think of a really good punishment.” I’m out of the room before he can grovel and beg, snatching my trench coat by the door on the way out, so I don’t miss Esmie’s outrage. “You will give me your full attention! I am your world now, or I won’t let you…”

  The door snicks closed behind me. Out in the hall, the unmistakable sound of an engine idling turns my bowels to liquid.

  I’m afraid the driver might hear my clodhoppers over the motor, hence the theatrical tiptoeing down the hall.

  This is a private drive, protected by an electronic gate. How in the hell is someone idling in front of the house?

  I scurry past the big screens in the living room and catch Esmie take a bite of a Slim Jim before whipping her thigh with the rest. Carl crying and jabbering, clamoring for her attention.

  I snatch peeks out windows as I go, but the vantage point from this side of the house sucks.

  A car door opens, and I duck, almost tumbling to the tile before catching myself and moving forward again with Sumo steps. Not sure why. Unless he’s Superman, this midday intruder won’t be able to see me. By the time I make it to the front door, I’m practically crawling.

  We don’t take deliveries here. There should be no one coming to the house—on a Tuesday—for drop-offs. My stomach churns. All this stress is wreaking havoc on my bowels. Last night’s dinner wants out.

  Our brazen visitor didn’t try to scale the walls and army-man crawl across the grass, so why the fuck am I? I think and straighten to my full height. Parking at the front door, the nerve! Who in the blue fuck has this much nerve?

  A quick glance, through the peephole on the front door, and I see him getting out of the truck!

  I’m sooo relieved, you don’t even know! I’m out the door and down the steps, squealing out Javi and Blues at top volume before he even looks up. No second glances, no smiles, nothing.

  Just one leg out of the open door, gathering keys and wallet, and he can barely spare me a glance.

  The fuck? I think, scanning the passenger seat for my missed girl. It’s been a few days, but it feels like months…

  She’s not in the front.

  Fine. If he doesn’t want to start, I will. He…but where is she? I dart a pointed glance around the back seat now, still no sign of her.

  “Where is she?” It comes out more forceful than I’d like, especially when dealing with this moody maniac, but since last night I’ve had an unshakable edgy feeling every time I’ve thought of Blue. Well, since early this morning, at least. Last night my thoughts were consumed with whip marks on a certain broad back. We watched a few videos.

  Two nights ago! my mind interrupts. And the guilt I’ll be carrying for this whole debacle, for the rest of my life, stands and makes itself known. Ready to bring the hammer down on me-, I’d given her a shout-out text, ADIOS VIRGINITY!!! And when I got in my car this morning, I’d been surprised, then nervous that I hadn’t even gotten a thumbs up back.

  Sooo not like her. Relatively new to texting, she loves the whole back and forth of it. In fact, most days, I send her a text instead of calling or even walking down the hall to her room, knowing that the little meow! that cues my incoming texts really tickles her. She loved receiving them. Took great pains to respond with the snarkiest cat meme.

  Javi couldn’t be that much of a stud that he still had her flat on her back without even the slightest emoji for her best friend, Sash. Not like her. She’d have found some time over the last two days to respond. Even if it was under the guise of peeing. Her deafening silence had draped my heart—but Gretchen said she fine! Having a good time! —but I didn’t feel the suffocation until right now.

  This moment. Seeing him minus her. My heart is absolutely tangled in it. Please let it just be that she’s sooo sexually satisfied from their honeymoon that she’s lying low. I duck my head under the rearview and search for her smiling face. But the backseats empty, sterile, unused. It steals my breath. Her obvious absence confirms I had a whole lot of something to be worried about.

  My heart beats hard in my chest, and I feel dampness in my pits.

  The relief I felt at seeing his truck is thwarted by the obvious absence of Blue. “Where is your new wife, crazy?” Keep it light, Sash, get him talking. Gretchen’s advice rolls through my mind.

  He doesn’t even acknowledge me, just sneers, “Don’t you have clients, Sasha?” as he takes in my barely there outfit before disappearing into the house. Like it’s perfectly normal to come home wifeless after the honeymoon. So not kosher.

  He sticks his head back through the door. “I’m starving. I need to go eat something.” He taunts me with a vicious smile. “Unless you wanna have a bite with me?”

  Revolted, I give a noticeable shiver.

  “Didn’t think you had the heart for it.” He exits, leaving me befuddled.

  What the ever-loving fuck? Was Javi just hitting on me?

  It feels like I woke up in a really scary episode of The Twilight Zone. Like I’m lost under a bed with no one to reach out and grab me from my alternate reality. Shit’s turned sideways.

  I’m stunned. Not sure what I expected was gonna happen, bringing her to this funhouse like a lost, starving little puppy. And she was starving. The loneliness wafted off of her like day-old stale beer.

  I mean, really, Sash? You know what kind of fucked up he is. What did you think would happen? Why did you think she could handle him, leash him, when you never could?

  Watch and protect her?

  And was that so hard? To keep a good eye on Blue, until she could handle him herself? Why didn’t we let her dip a toe in the crazy before throwing her head first into those murky waters? Before she even realized she was swimming with the cookiecutter shark?

  Why didn’t you lie across the path of the truck, or better yet, jump your big ass into the back seat of the Tahoe. Anything not to let him out of your sight.

  Every single bad thing that I worried could happen is occurring right now, in front of me, and I can’t get the sight of Blue’s dancing eyes out of my head. I should have followed, hot on their tail, and crashed the wedding, shotguns blazing.

  A felonious thought decides to rear its bloated head. It was the date.

  Riley’s best night ever. With two days of Riley-time blazing my trail, I didn’t give it a second thought. Wouldn’t let myself believe that history was repeating itself, with Blue.

  But I saw him with Blue. He was happy, laughing.

  Didn’t care much for my sisterly pre-wedding advice, but hey, overall he was Javi.

  Selfish to the end, my thoughts turn to Riley as I stare at the empty car in our driveway.

  It’s then that I realiz
e this suburban, while black and shiny new, isn’t his. No CC sticker on the back. Our Chubby Chaser logo. This must be a rental. I feel like yelling, “It’s not his car!”

  All kinds of grisly thoughts flash through my head. I even look down to make sure there isn’t a bloody frayed rope dangling from the back bumper.

  Maybe he needed a new car because the old one’s interior was soaked in her blood.

  He couldn’t drive the other one. The alignment was off after running over my big girl Blue.

  He roofied her unconscious…again…and left her blacked out body, in the other truck, idling in some nightmarish garage.

  He drove the old one into a lake with her belted in, knocked unconscious, forever ensconced in a Tahoe at the bottom of a watery grave.

  To cover his tracks. Why in the hell else would he have a rental?

  Did she manage to kick out a window before he killed her? Maybe kick out taillights from the trunk? Oh, but wait, no real trunk to stow her in, but there is a roomy hatchback.

  So maybe she scrawled Help! in blood on the back window. I look closer at the back hatch, but I see no messages, nothing but road dirt. All the taillights are accounted for. I peer through the back windows expecting to see my friend hogtied, her flowery headband all askew.

  The ticking of the engine as it shuts down ruffles my feathers. For a second there, just one creepy moment, I almost see her.

  Disheveled and weak, one battered arm reaching up, her broken and dirt-crusted fingernails tick-tick-ticking on the smoked rear window. It’s so real, I have to look again, my heart beating in my throat. I shade my eyes and really scrutinize, my eyes slanted to squints.

  But no, she isn’t there anymore. “Was never there, Sash,” I say out loud, trying to reassure my frazzled nerves.

  It felt like a goose honked over my grave there.

  Was it her ghost? Begging me to find her discarded body?