Destroyed and Detained

by Danelle Helget

  “Well, what would make her come all the way here and make her feel she needed to peek into windows and take pictures?” Derek asked in an accusing tone.

  I put my hand up and opened my mouth and I was just about to rip him a new one, when Aunt Val caught my eye and interrupted. “Well, jealousy, that’s what! If a woman has her heart broken she’ll do anything to get a man back.” Aunt Val was a smart woman.

  “I don’t know. But I’m getting real tired of it. And I’ll leave it at that,” I said in snappy fragments.

  “Well, I’m going to hit the hay. You ladies can hang out and discuss the day’s events. Sara, I’ll meet you in the room later?”

  “Yup, good night.”

  He went to the entryway and grabbed his bag, then proceeded down the hall. When the door was shut, I took a deep breath and shot my angry eyes over to Miss Kitty.

  I put my hand out. “I’m going to need another happy pill!”

  24

  Miss Kitty looked at me like she was scared. Then she looked at Tannya and Val. I looked at them too. Harder. They were like deer in the headlights, afraid to answer anything.

  “COME ON!” I jerked my hand at her again.

  “Ummm, I’m not sure you should have any more,” Miss Kitty said cautiously.

  “ELEANORE, I have been through hell and back to day. All of it was because of you three! Tannya, you and your LARP group, which you just HAD to sign up for. Aunt Val and your crazy pirate boyfriend. And YOU, you put a cannon on my pontoon, decorated it in glitter, called it a ship, AND named it ELLA VASHOW! Then … THEN there’s Jodi! I got knocked out, bound and gagged and dropped in a raft with her. I was chased through the woods and stuffed in a trailer by a man in a pirate costume, who will only answer to Flying Dutchman. I’ve re-ripped my head open, lost a quart of blood, and then had the joy of getting it re-stitched. I’m pretty sure that qualifies me for a HAPPY PILL!” I shouted and extended my hand again.

  Miss Kitty quickly rummaged through her purse and handed me one. I put it in my mouth and picked up the glass of water that Tannya brought me. I looked at Tannya, raised the glass in salute and tossed it back.

  “There, now would anyone like more pie?” I asked calmly.

  “Please, let me help,” Val said. “I’ll find something to fill our stomachs.” I glanced at the clock, and it showed ten o’clock.

  “Has there been any action on the ship?”

  “No,” Miss Kitty said. But we should get out the listening devices and see if anything is going on at the house.

  We all moved to the dining room. Val brought over chips, dips, veggies, some pie, and a pitcher of water. We munched while we set up.

  Pepper looked up at us. He got up, sauntered over to the table and sniffed in the pitcher. He could reach with all four paws on the floor. Then he walked back to the fireplace and lay down.

  “Guess he’s a margarita dog,” Miss Kitty said.

  “What if Derek comes out?” Tannya said.

  “Screw him. It’s not his jurisdiction,” I told her.

  We set up the video screen for the mini camera pen and the listening device for the bug. We could hear voices, but no one was on the screen. I had the video screen, I turned up the audio as far as it went, and Tannya did the same on the bug listening device. The screen was small, only three inches, and quite grainy. The camera was in the living room and there was no one in there. We quietly munched on snacks and kept watch over the video screen.

  Finally on the screen we saw Wayde and Scooter come into the living room and sit down on the couch. They had a bunch of paper out in front of them on the coffee table.

  We all leaned forward to hear. “All right, Scooter, sit,” Wayde said.

  “He sounds funny,” Val said seriously. “He’s talking in a normal tone. No more pirate.” She looked kind of saddened by that.

  “Honest, I didn’t do it and I don’t know who did. The last time I was in the house, the window was fine,” Scooter whined.

  “Fine, I’m past that. Let’s move on.”

  “Sir, you’re not using your pirate voice. Are we in game off mode?” Scooter asked him.

  “Yes, game off. Geez, you can’t be that dumb. Have you not noticed that this has moved past a LARP? There are few things you need to know. You’re already involved, you know that, right? You’re an accessory already, so you can leave if you want, but you’re involved. You’re going to get in trouble if we stay here and wait to get caught. Your other choice is to help me, make a cut on the money, and get the hell out of Dodge ASAP. So what do you say? Are you in?”

  “I … ahh …” Scooter stumbled.

  “He’ll do it,” Tannya said.

  “Ah … ahhh …” Wayde mocked. “WHAT? This isn’t difficult. Make a choice. In or out, and if you’re out, get the fuck out. I got shit to do.”

  “Well, shit, I’d like to know what the hell I’m involved in first.”

  “Burglary! Okay?” Wayde spat.

  “Burglary? Like the treasure Val stole?”

  We all looked at Val and she shook her head. “Bastard.”

  “No.” Wayde paused and took a deep breath then continued. “Look, we don’t have a lot of time. The stupid cop just left here and he had a lot of questions. Having the broken window helped make us look like victims, and it bought us some time, but he’ll be back with more questions. They’re getting too close, and if those jackasses open their mouths during questioning later, we’re going down fast. So the way I see it we got a matter of hours, maybe less.”

  “So if this isn’t a LARP, what the hell is it?” Scooter asked.

  “It’s a gang I was in four years ago when I lived in Chicago.”

  “A gang?” Scooter asked, confused. “But you’re white.”

  Tannya covered her mouth and gave a huff of laughter.

  “Shut up, fool! Anyone can be in a gang.” Wayde shook his head and continued. “We were a group of friends sitting around one night, a few of us down on our luck and all of us under the influence of a variety of drugs. We came up with a plan to steal stuff for a living and came up with a name. Pirates steal for a living so we went with that theme. We came up with Low-life American Rebel Pirates. Which it turns out is also the acronym for Live Action Role-Playing.”

  “We started out small, teaming up together. Each of us had our own roles: stalkers, look-outs, route planners and drivers and robbers. We would do our parts, sit down and hatch a plan then break into houses, and garages and small sheds.”

  “Then we got better and more confident and moved on to storage sheds. We started with four of us but brought on a fifth, a brother to one of the guys. He was to keep track of the money and split it up evenly amongst the five of us. He would sell the stuff on the internet and to other buyers and then divvy up the money. Things were going really good. We carried guns but never ran into anyone while on the jobs and never got caught. We were professionals.

  “One of the guys thought we should move to bigger and better things like jewelry stores, banks, and casinos. I was on board with that but the other three weren’t. So our group split up. Me and Mike decided to keep going without them and ended up moving to the Twin Cities. Clint, Brad and Rick, from what we knew, went back to their old lives. They were happy and had some money in the bank, so they gave it up. They didn’t want to take any bigger risks.

  “So one night a few months after the split, Mike and I took a jewelry store. It was a Jared store just opening in the Maple Grove area. We did our research and found out their grand opening date. We knew it would be a busy day with a bunch of new, under-trained employees. We emptied the place out just before they opened. The shelves were well stocked for the event and we made off good.

  “Mike and I went back to the apartment we shared and split it. We were up late celebrating and when I went to my room to go to bed, Mike stayed up. He was really high and was on the phone with someone. I heard my name mentioned so I crept in the next room and listened. He told the person on the ph
one that he was going to steal my share, all except a few items, and then rat me out to the police while he made a getaway. I was fucking pissed. Instead I put a gun to his head and took his share.”

  “Dude,” Scooter said slowly.

  “Yeah. I’m not proud of myself. It’s something I live with every day, but he was planning on stealing my life too. I cleaned the apartment of anything that might link me and left. I moved back in with my mother after that. I’ve been here for three years. I can’t stop thinking about the Low-life American Rebel Pirates. It’s stuck in my head. I guess I was born to be a pirate, born to steal … and born to protect my treasure in any way I had to.

  “I never told my mother what I’d done but she knew something was wrong. I used to put ships in bottles to pass the time. She said it was a waste of time, that I should do something bigger with my life.”

  “So why didn’t you?”

  “Well, dipshit, for one thing I’d need to pass a background check for most jobs and give an address on the application and show a license. I’m not sure how much the police know, but I don’t want my name rolling around. My mother was remarried three times, so her last name has changed a bunch, and the last time not legally. Her ex paid cash for this place so her name isn’t linked to this house or to me. So they’d have a hard time tracking me down.”

  “Where’s her ex?”

  “Don’t know, he ran off with some young broad from the bar one night. They left the state, and she never heard from him again. So since I can’t really go and get a job, instead I built a big ship. I sold a few pieces of the jewelry and bought a ‘ship kit’ off the internet.

  “When Mom died that’s all I did, just built the ship all day long. Then about six months ago I was trying to decide on a name for my ship and I came across a LARP website. It was the same letters as our gang and I sort of got sucked into it.”

  “I’d say! So you thought that dressing like a pirate and talking like one would heal your loss and your hurt?” Scooter said, sounding like a therapist. We all glanced at Tannya who also looked surprised at his question and loving tone.

  “What the shit?” Tannya said with a wrinkled face.

  “I guess. It was pretty therapeutic though. When I was in ‘game on’ mode I didn’t have to think about the real world and my real world problems. It was a fun game that I could keep playing. Real people and the real world didn’t know anything about Captain Wayde. It was nice to escape.”

  “So do you think the police are still looking for you?”

  “I know they are. When Ocean’s Lie came aboard, and I told you to go below deck and check on the leak, that’s when I knew it was happening. Clint, Rick and Brad had figured out what I did and, well, they weren’t happy. They’ve been trying to find me since that night. I spoke to Rick, a.k.a., Captain Morgan, a few months back when I registered my ship and LARP crew. I was out there.”

  “Out where?”

  “Out on the internet. Rick said he found the name Wayde on the internet, listed under a LARP group. He looked at it, figured out it was about pirates and knew I’d loved pirates since I was a kid, and took a long shot that it might be me. Flying Dutchman is his brother, the one that came on later as our book keeper. His real name is Butch. Long John, whose real name is John something, was just another jerk that came along. They needed him for his computer knowledge and he’ll do anything for his next hit.”

  “So Rick wants the real treasure?”

  “Yes.”

  “Well, he didn’t kill you when he came aboard, so what’s his deal?”

  “He didn’t kill me because he needed the treasure. I don’t know where it is. But I agreed to help him find it. I told him if he didn’t kill me I’d give him and his men a seventy/thirty split. I informed him the value of the entire treasure is over four million dollars. I’d give them seventy percent of it to walk away and move on with their lives, or he could kill me and leave with nothing. We decided to go to the house where Ella Vashow is parked and find out what those women did with it.

  “Rick and I are in agreement that those women are in on it together. Val was over here stalking me and learning my plans months ago. She played me to a ‘T.’ I don’t know how she found me, but she’s good,” he paused and looked down at the coffee table. “She was very good.”

  We all looked at Val. She had hurt in her eyes.

  “Are you in love with her?” Scooter asked him.

  “What? No … no, I’m not.”

  “He’s lying,” Miss Kitty announced.

  Val looked at her somberly and tightened her lips.

  “And now she’s teamed up with her niece and your ex? They’re out to get us. We have to watch our backs, Scooter. I don’t know what their backgrounds are and what their motive is, but those women can’t be trusted.”

  Scooter shrugged. “I don’t think it was a plan. I think it just happened.”

  “No, think about it. Val worked her way in long ago, played along with everything, and it was just last year that they moved into that house. There’s no way she wasn’t in on this for a long while. They’ve had a plan from the get-go. They got a cannon on the pontoon, and decals, and they even had matching uniforms. You don’t just pull that shit together overnight!”

  “Yes, I did!” Miss Kitty said proudly. We all fist bumped her.

  “They’re afraid of us! This is great!” Tannya said. “Yeah, we had a plan. We always have a plan!”

  We turned our attention back to the screen.

  “Maybe, but what does Tannya and the blonde, skinny bitch have to do with it? No way Tannya figured any of this out on her own.”

  “Heeey!” they both said.

  “Well, I don’t know. But what I do know is that they were supposed to go to the pontoon and get the treasure and meet here at the house. But now it seems the cops have detained Long John and Rick. And apparently Flying Dutchman is on the loose with a kidnapped woman named Jodi. And I’ve got a broken window!”

  “Who is this Jodi anyway?” Wayde continued. “She said she wasn’t with Ocean’s Lie or Ella Vashow. And I believe her because neither of them seemed to care about her safety. They keep leaving her behind, yet they tie her up like she’s a threat. I don’t get it.”

  “I don’t know. Maybe she’s a hostage, a bargaining chip,” Scooter said. “Maybe we could exchange some gold for her.”

  Wayde reached out and slapped him upside the head.

  “She isn’t worth her weight in gold,” I said. Tannya and Miss Kitty fist bumped me.

  “Well, what’s my cut in all this? Seventy/thirty doesn’t leave a whole lot for me,” Scooter said.

  Tannya chuckled.

  “You’re sharing my part.”

  “So we each are only getting fifteen percent? That’s a bunch of bullshit! No, if I’m going to risk jail time then I want more than that! Fuck this!”

  “Well, then what do you propose? I already made an agreement with them.”

  “They’re in jail or hiding from the law. There is no them. Let’s go get the girls and find the treasure right now. We don’t need to wait for them. We’ll get the gold and get out of Dodge before they rat us out in jail.”

  My heartrate increased. “Come on! Let’s go now! Throw what you need in the truck and let’s head over there. Then we’ll leave town. By the time it’s reported we’ll be miles away.”

  Wayde stood. “Okay, but what about the ship?”

  “Just leave it. The police’ll probably take it anyway,” Scooter said.

  “But that ship is my life,” Wayde said sadly.

  “It was his life,” Val agreed.

  “Change out of your pirate get-up and let’s go!” Scooter ordered.

  “All right! All right! But you’d better remember who’s in charge here.”

  “Yeah, yeah, I’ll meet you in the truck.”

  I turned around and grabbed the binoculars. “I see Scooter! He’s getting in the truck!” I said anxiously.

  “Oh, shit! Wh
at do we do?” Miss Kitty said.

  “They won’t never find it!” Tannya said.

  “Still, I don’t want them in here! And remember, Wayde killed a man once already over this!”

  “He’s about to lose it all! He’s threatened and he has nothing to lose. That makes him extra dangerous!” Val said.

  “We need a plan!” Tannya said. She was about to pump her fist in the air. I put my hand out, shoved her fist down, and gave her a warning look.

  “I think we should call Rex!” Miss Kitty said.

  “Rex is busy trying to find Jodi,” Val said. “He’s probably miles away.”

  Suddenly the door to my bedroom opened up. It startled us and we all jumped. “What is all the excitement about? You guys are loud,” Derek said. He walked towards us to the dining room. He was sleepy eyed, and in a t-shirt and lounge pants.

  “Honey, you’re awake,” I said and walked up to him.

  “Thank God he’s here,” Val said to me.

  Derek looked at me with confusion. “What’s going on now? Haven’t we all had enough excitement for one day? What is that on the table?” he asked with a finger point.

  BAM! The front door flew open. We all jumped, and Miss Kitty let out a high-pitched scream that lasted until she ran out of breath.

  Standing in the doorway were Scooter and Wayde, both with pistols pointed at us.

  25

  Scooter Potter, what the hell?” Tannya scolded. She got up out of her chair. “Don’t you knock? You think you can just invite yourself in without someone’s permission?” she yelled. We all stood there in shock as Tannya marched towards him. “You son of a bitch!” she said with a finger point. “How dare you! I know what you’ve been up to. I know about your secrets. I’ve seen the bat cave you live in, in my shed!” She was right up in his face pointing her finger in his chest.

  He looked scared. Wayde looked scared too. Pepper got up and sauntered towards them. I feared they’d shoot him so I acted like I fully controlled him. “Pepper! Down! No attack. NO ATTACK! Sit!” Thankfully he stopped dead in his tracks and sat.