Counterfeit Wives
Page 20
Crystal’s hazel eyes shone brightly in front of me.
I said, “Why didn’t you go for him? You knew you had a son.”
“My husband was accepting of my daughter. One child was tolerable.”
“Simon has a sister?”
She smiled and nodded.
I said, “I can only imagine how Simon felt. You kept his sister but not him. You’re a selfish bitch.”
“Who are you to judge me?” she barked.
I raised the .22, sighted it on her. “This makes me judge and jury.”
Dawn said, “It all ends now, in a rundown motel in Camden.” She laughed, and I understood, even though that was an entirely appropriate response to the situation.
Crystal’s eyes widened. “Please. Please don’t kill me.”
I said, “Why not? Let you go off and run your company without any kind of payback for the harm you’ve caused.” I hated her.
Dawn said, “DNA Girl, Inc. That isn’t a real company is it?”
That question surprised me.
Crystal admitted, “No.”
A double surprise.
Dawn said, “A palindrome.”
I said, “DNA Girl, Inc.” Thought about that. “DNA Girl…Darling.”
This bitch was wicked. The lengths she went to. A fictitious company.
I said, “The hurt is a fire I could never extinguish. A pain I felt deep in my bones. But what was more excruciating than the hurt, the pain, was wondering. Why you didn’t love me? Why you didn’t value me? Every day I looked in the mirror and I saw your eyes. I cried tears like a river, because I know you never looked in your mirror and saw mine.”
“Another of your poems?” she sneered.
I said, “No. That’s from Simon’s last letter. To you. You can breathe easy now. He won’t be a nuisance anymore to you, Mama Simon.”
That shook her. The tears came sudden and violently.
I asked, “Was all of this worth it?”
“No,” she sobbed. “I’m ruined.”
“You killed Simon. You killed me, Dawn and Jacqueline. You have so much blood on your hands.”
She sobbed. Her cries were music in an otherwise quiet room.
I moved to her, freed her hands, gave her the .22, with the safety off.
Jacqueline said, “What are you doing, Nikki?”
“We’re taking your car,” I told Crystal.
She nodded absently, held the .22.
“I hope you rot in hell, bitch.”
And we left her like that. Left her in that motel in Camden.
The blast from that .22 came before we made it to Crystal’s car.
I jumped, even though I expected it.
Jacqueline sighed long and hard, her eyes filled with water.
Dawn was unmoved.
And then we were on the Garden State Parkway, headed north. After some time I said, “Least we got a fly whip out of the deal.” I knew we couldn’t keep it. We’d have to wipe it down thoroughly and…do something. But still.
Jacqueline said, “And friendship. We got that.”
Dawn said, “I’m going to start singing again.”
I said, “I’m gonna try and sell some of my poems, for real.”
Jacqueline hadn’t said anything. I couldn’t imagine she was the only one of us unchanged.
I nudged, “Jacqueline?”
She looked at me. My sister counterfeit wife.
She said, “I’m going to learn to speak Spanish.”
COUNTERFEIT WIVES
ISBN: 978-1-4268-2498-2
Copyright © 2008 by Phillip Thomas Duck
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