The Store

by Bentley Little

  "I can't."

  "Do what you have to do."

  She backed against the closed door, shook her head. "It's . . . it's murder."

  "It's business. And if you don't do it, someone else will. Why should they get the job you deserve?"

  "I . . . can't kill anyone."

  "I'll call the police!" the manager cried.

  "Shut up!" Mr. Lamb roared at him.

  "I . . ."

  "You can," Mr. Lamb said. "You must."

  "It's wrong," she said. "It's murder."

  He took her hand, put the dagger in it. "You can," he said.

  4

  There was a Kmart in Flagstaff, and a Wal-Mart, but the city did not have The Store, and for that Bill was grateful. Newman King had taken Sam Walton's approach and pushed it to its limit, opening stores in small towns in which there were only locally owned businesses, but The Store would not build in a town that was host to another chain.

  King hated competition.

  Bill needed to remember that. It might be something he'd be able to use.

  They stopped at Target, bought toilet paper and cleanser and detergent and other household items, then stocked up on groceries at Fry's. It felt strange shopping at regular stores after all this time. There was no pressure, no tension, no threatening employees, no bizarre products, only a relaxed, pleasant atmosphere and an extensive selection of goods. This was what shopping was supposed to be like, he thought. Fun. Not the horrible ordeal it had become in Juniper.

  He had not really realized until now just how deeply The Store had affected their lives. He'd known intellectually, of course, but he hadn't really understood, emotionally, the depth of it, had not fully grasped all of the peripherals. It took this exposure to normalcy to enable him to recognize how strange and skewed everything had become.

  Shannon came with them, and though they didn't talk about it, he knew that she, too, noticed the difference.

  They returned to Juniper after dark, and the phone started ringing the second they stepped through the door. All three of them were loaded down with grocery sacks, so he quickly flipped on the lights, put his sacks down on the kitchen counter, and grabbed the phone. "Hello?"

  It was Sam.

  She wanted to tell them the good news.

  She'd been appointed manager of The Store.

  THIRTY-ONE

  1

  They received a gold StoreCard in the mail the next day, along with a photocopied form letter, signed by their daughter, that explained the benefits of belonging to the Store Club.

  Bill called Samantha for the first time since she'd moved out, thanking her for the card. He was not at all sure that he ever wanted to shop at The Store again -- the drive to Flagstaff seemed infinitely preferable -- but with Sam in charge now, there was an opening, an opportunity, and he made a concerted effort to take a more conciliatory stance.

  Their conversation yesterday had been brief. He hadn't known how to take her announcement, and while she was obviously proud of her news and wanted to share it with the family, he could not be proud of her or happy for her, and after awkwardly insincere congratulations, he had handed the phone to Ginny.

  He was better today. He'd had time to get used to the news, and he even managed to sound supportive.

  At the very least, the breach between them had been healed.

  But when he asked her to release Shannon from her contract and allow her to quit, Sam grew rigid, formal, toed the party line, said it was not her decision to make, that even though she was manager, she was still required to follow corporate policy.

  He didn't fight with her, didn't try to force her to let her sister go, but he didn't tell her that he understood, either. He didn't make her feel that her decision was all right with him. He was not going to put any pressure on her, but he would make it clear that he didn't approve, and he'd let that work on her for a while.

  Maybe she'd come around.

  Then he'd ask her about Ben and the others.

  The important stuff.

  They talked for a little while longer, but she was on break and he had to get back to work as well, and she promised to come over for dinner later in the week. He walked back into his office, checked his fax tray and E-mail to see if there was any news from the company or on the off chance that Street had finally decided to send him another message, but as usual there was nothing. He quickly fired off his daily complaint letters to various business regulatory agencies and to The Store's corporate headquarters, then got busy with his documentation.

  He'd gotten another assignment last week, this time a human resources package for a midsize Southern California city, and the deadline was just around the corner. Someone somewhere had screwed up, and he'd gotten involved in the project at a very late date, had not been involved in the development or testing phases at all, and now he was expected to crank out a set of instructions, with almost no lead time, on a system he didn't really understand.

  He was going to earn his pay on this one.

  He wrote until midafternoon, then Ginny finally persuaded him to take a break and have something to eat, and he walked out to the kitchen and wolfed down a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and a glass of milk.

  The fax was waiting in the tray when he returned to the office.

  He read it.

  Read it again.

  Read it again.

  Ginny poked her head in the door. "Hey --" she began, but she stopped as soon as she saw the look on his face. "What is it?" she asked, walking up to him. He held up the fax. "Looks like I finally got a response," he said dryly.

  Ginny looked at him, already a little frightened.

  "It's from The Store's corporate headquarters. From Newman King himself.

  He's invited me to Dallas. He wants to talk to me."

  They'd debated whether or not to tell the girls and had decided to do so but to downplay it. Now, in bed, they were alone, and the false nonchalance they'd been feigning was gone. The spin they'd put on the situation had not fooled Shannon, but she'd pretended it had, and for that Bill was grateful.

  Honesty was nice and communication was important, but sometimes events were too big to be digested at once, and he was glad that she hadn't forced him to talk in detail about this, that she'd allowed him to sidestep the issue. She was a good girl, more sensitive than he gave her credit for, and he was thankful that she'd understood the situation without him having to explain it to her.

  He'd pay her back somehow, make it up to her.

  If he ever got the chance.

  He looked over at Ginny. She'd finished putting on her moisturizer and was fluffing up her pillow before turning off the light.

  She sighed, looked over at him. "Why does he want to talk to you? That's what I don't get. He probably gets a thousand complaint letters a day. Why does he want to see you?"

  "Because I'm a persistent pain in the ass?"

  She kicked his leg under the covers.

  "I don't know," he answered seriously.

  "It frightens me."

  They were both silent for a moment.

  "Sam thinks its an honor. I think she has renewed respect for you now."

  "Didn't realize what a bigwig her daddy really is, huh?"

  Ginny laughed, but it was a forced laugh and it died too soon. "Do you think that's all he wants to do?" she asked. "Talk?"

  "I don't know."

  "Maybe you shouldn't go."

  "Maybe that's what he wants. Maybe he's just trying to frighten me and cow me into submission."

  Ginny's voice was quiet. "Maybe he wants to do more than frighten you."

  "That's a chance I have to take."

  "I don't want you to go."

  "I don't want to go, either. But I have to."

  "Why?"

  "Because if I don't, that means he's won. Ben's gone, Street's gone, everyone else has either died, disappeared, or been intimidated into silence."

  "Not me."

  "You weren't invited."
/>
  She kicked him again.

  "It sounds paranoid and egotistical and everything else, but it's true."

  "I know," she said quietly.

  "That's why I have to go."

  They made love after that, the first time in several weeks, and though it should have been great, for some reason it wasn't. It was good, though, and they both came, and afterward fell instantly asleep.

  In his dream, he flew to Dallas, was picked up by a limo at the airport and driven to The Store's corporate offices, where he was led past desks of secretaries and assistants before finally entering the CEO's office.

  There was no one there.

  "What -- ?" he started to say. Then he realized the truth. Newman King was a fictional figurehead, a made-up character. There was no CEO. There was no president. There was no leader. There was only the company. It ran itself, and the bureaucracy maintained it, and there was no way on earth to stop it.

  Ginny dropped him off at Sky Harbor in Phoenix the next day. Arrangements had been made online, through King's secretary, and he'd been assured that everything was taken care of, but he still wasn't sure what to expect. He assumed there'd be tickets -- coach, probably -- waiting for him at the counter where he was supposed to check in, but instead a tall, straight-backed blond man in a black leather Store uniform met him at the desk and escorted him through a series of doors and hallways until they were outside the terminal and on the tarmac, where a black Lear jet was waiting. Ginny was not allowed to go any farther than the terminal exit, and she pulled him aside, hugged him. "Be careful," she said.

  "Always."

  "I still don't think you should do this."

  "We've been through all that."

  She hugged him again. "I'm scared."

  He hugged her back, held her. He was scared, too, but it would do no good to tell her that, would only make her worry more, and he said nothing.

  The blond man cleared his throat. "We have to go, Mr. Davis. Our flight has been cleared."

  He kissed Ginny. "I love you."

  She was already crying. "I love you, too."

  It felt too much like permanent parting, a final goodbye, and he was creeped out by it. He wanted to postpone it, wanted to linger, wanted to somehow shake off this feeling of dread that had crept up on him, but instead he waved to her, blew her another kiss, then hurried across the tarmac to the loading ramp of the jet.

  The flight itself was uneventful. He was the only passenger, and he had the entire center section of the jet to himself. There were couches, a bar and small refrigerator, a television and VCR. The pilot assured him over the loudspeaker that he was free to use any of the luxuries and partake of any food or beverage provided. He was not hungry, but he was thirsty, and he opened a can of Coke. He was nervous, antsy, and was not in the mood to watch TV, despite the impressive selection of videos offered. He was tempted to use the cellular phone to call Ginny, but he knew the conversation would be bugged, and what he wanted to tell his wife was not something he intended to share with officials of The Store. Besides, she'd still be driving back to Juniper.

  So he sat on one of the couches for most of the two-hour flight, staring out the small porthole window at the passing desert below.

  They were over Dallas when the pilot finally spoke again. "The power's off to your right," he announced over the loudspeaker, and Bill looked out the window to see a black skyscraper situated several blocks from the other downtown high-rises. It probably didn't look that strange from the ground, but from this perspective it appeared that the Black Tower was being ostracized by the other buildings, and the visual symbolism was not lost on him.

  He fastened his safety belt, the jet touched down smoothly, and a moment later the hatch was being opened, the same Aryan employee offering to help him down the steps.

  Bill declined, disembarking on his own, and he glanced around as his feet touched the tarmac. He was sweating already, the heat unbearable, and he looked up, thinking idiotically of how similar the blue Texas sky was to that of Arizona.

  "Over here, sir."

  He turned toward the voice, and the hairs prickled on the back of his neck as he saw The Store employee standing next to a long black limousine.

  The limo from his dream.

  He made no effort to move.

  "Sir?" the employee said. "Your ride is here."

  Bill nodded dumbly.

  A pause. "Mr. King is waiting."

  "I'm coming," he said. "I'm coming."

  He moved forward, put one foot in front of the other, and it was a cold sweat that dripped down his face as he walked across the tarmac and forced himself to get in the car.

  2

  He was dropped off directly in front of the Black Tower.

  It was like nothing he had ever seen.

  The Stores themselves bespoke average American sophistication -- up-to date, but in a way the ordinary swap meet shopper could relate to. They were impressive not so much for what they were but for the context in which they appeared.

  The Black Tower was just plain impressive.

  Under any circumstances.

  He got out of the limo, looked up. The building was not catering to rubes or yokels or the average joe. There was no attempt here to feign modesty or mediocrity. This was the true Store, the real Store, the home of Newman King, and though it possessed superficially the attributes of the average downtown Dallas skyscraper, within those confines it asserted its independence and its supremacy. The Black Tower stood alone, the artistry of its design and the quality of its construction marking it as the property of an extremely powerful, important, and influential man.

  Newman King.

  The smoked-glass front door of the tower opened, and the same blond employee who'd met him at the airport in Phoenix and the airport here in Dallas strode down the marble walkway toward him.

  Bill frowned. This wasn't possible.

  The employee drew closer, and now that he looked more carefully, he realized that it was not the same employee after all. The one in Phoenix probably hadn't been the one at the Dallas airport, either. They just looked the same.

  He found that disturbing.

  "Mr. King's waiting for you," the blond man said with a smile. "I'll take you to him."

  Bill nodded. He didn't know what he was going to do, what he was going to say, how he was going to act when he met the CEO. He thought of Ben, and part of him wished he'd brought a gun or a bomb or some type of weapon, but he knew that even if they didn't search him, he'd probably have to go through some type of metal detector.

  The two of them walked through the front door into an enormous lobby with a two-story-high ceiling. The floors were marble, the walls were marble, there were palms and cacti, modern sculptural fountains with running water. Behind a gigantic desk, under The Store logo, sat a single receptionist, a pretty blond woman wearing black leather.

  He was led past the receptionist, ushered into a glass elevator, and he and his escort rode to the top of the Tower.

  The metal doors slid open. Before them was a huge boardroom with windowed walls that overlooked the skyline of the city.

  The CEO's office from his dream.

  A chill passed through him as he glanced around and saw familiar furniture in familiar places, a scene through the windows he had seen before.

  In front of him, fifteen or twenty business-suited men were seated around a gigantic black marble table.

  But the only one who mattered was the one at the table's head.

  Newman King.

  There was something inherently frightening about the CEO, something unnatural and disturbing in his too-pale face, his too-dark eyes, his too-red lips. Taken individually, his features were not that unusual, but they had come together in a way that seemed grotesque, both aberrant and abhorrent. It was not something that translated, not something that could be seen in photographs or on television. There was intelligence evident in his face and an all-American sort of ruthless business acumen, along with an a
w-shucks, one-of-the-guys demeanor that could be highlighted or shut off at will, emphasized or de-emphasized according to need. Those things translated.

  But that inner wildness, that horrible, undefinable inhumanity -- that could only be experienced in person. Even this far away, across the boardroom, with all of those other people present, it was a powerful thing to behold.

  Bill's instinctual reaction was to run, to get as far away from King as he could, as quickly as possible. He felt shaky, his bowels and bladder ready to give at any second, but he stepped out of the elevator and into the boardroom, facing the CEO.

  King smiled, and though his teeth were all white and even and straight, there was a sharklike malevolence to the gesture, a vampiric quality about it.

  "Mr. Davis, I presume?"

  His voice was smooth, strong, carefully modulated, with none of the twangy folksiness he used in public, but again, there was something about it that seemed unnatural.

  Bill nodded.

  "Welcome. Have a seat." He motioned toward a series of black chairs to the left of the conference table.

  "No, thank you."

  King's smile widened. "Brave man." He held up a hand and was suddenly holding a sheaf of papers, though Bill could have sworn that both of his hands had been empty a moment before. "Do you know what these are?" He did not wait for an answer. "Your faxes, your E-mail."

  Turning on the charm, the CEO began walking around the table toward Bill.

  The other board members remained seated, unmoving, staring across the huge table at each other. "If I didn't know better," King said, "I would say you were not a supporter of our organization. If I didn't know better and I was a cruder sort of person than I am, I would say that you're an anti-American agitator. But of course, that can't be the case. You're a Store Club member, your youngest daughter works as a Store sales clerk and your oldest daughter has been appointed temporary manager of the Juniper, Arizona, Store."

  "Temporary manager?" Bill said.

  "She cannot become a full-fledged manager unless she completes our two week training course."

  "I thought she had."

  "No."

  Newman King was next to him now, and this close he seemed even stranger, ever! more monstrous. Not only was his skin pale, it seemed to be fake, made out of rubber or some sort of malleable plastic. His too-perfect teeth also looked artificial. The only parts of him that seemed real were his dark, deep-set eyes, and they burned with a cruel animal ferocity.