Lustmord 2

by Kirk Alex

  “Yo. You crazy? Why you trippin’? You know you ain’t nothin’ but a crack ho.”

  The stare he projected defined: If looks could kill. She stared back. Muck was at the door again. Had it open enough to be able to peer through.

  “It’s over for you.” Pearleen spoke from where she sat. “It’s over. . . . Not to mention the blood you’ve already lost.”

  “Yeah? How you be so smart all of a sudden?”

  “That gun won’t help you any.”

  He turned. Looking at her. “Know why come you still alive, ho? Omar say he was gonna ice yo fine ass.”

  She didn’t feel like responding. Refused to.

  Marvin Muck took a step in her direction. Grunted as he did. Couldn’t get over the bitch having had the nerve to slap the last of his glo out of his hand like that. Only way he had of dealing with his pain, only way he had of helping him forget how much he was suffering, was the pipe. Now all Hope be gone.

  She was right about one thing; ho was right, too. He was losing too much blood. A peculiar numbness was beginning to take over his wounded leg, his entire body.

  “Man, why I got to be the one wiff bad luck all the time?”

  Blood dribbled down his chin. Marvin did not bother wiping. “I know what you be doin’, ho; I know what you be doin’. I don’t be as dumb as everybody thank. Faked him out, didn’t you? Didn’t you? Put the fake on the man. You knowed if you show fear you wuz dead, so you play it the other way. Got smart, and play it cool. Only that game don’t work wiff me, see, bitch?” Finally the mixture of blood and spittle got to the point it bothered him enough to wipe it with his shirt collar. “‘Cause I know different. I know you scared. Scared shitless, too. Ain’t you, sista?”

  Pearleen remained silent.

  “‘Cause nobody be wantin’ to die. Am I right, ho? You don’t want to die. I know I don’t, me. I bet even my girl Patience over there don’t want to die. Am I right, Patience? Huh, baby? You don’t say jack, but I know you don’t want to die.”

  Hunched over, Marvin was coughing up blood.

  “It’s all over for you. You are finished.”

  He looked up. “Say what, ho?”

  “You heard. This is where it stops.”

  “Not for Daddy Muck. Know why come? I be taking you wiff me. You be my ticket out of here. ’Sides, never did get none of that tang. Omar was tight about that. Never lemme have none. Took care of him real good, me. Got him lookin’ real nice. All busted up an’ shit.”

  “Why don’t you do everyone a big favor and keep your filthy mouth shut?”

  Marvin looked at the gun in his hand. Held it up. Limped toward her. “I could still ice yo ass. Pop a cap in yo snapper. How would you like that, ho?”

  “You don’t scare me, Marvin. You’re a dead man no matter what you do.”

  “Shut up, ho. You supposed to be on my side—”

  “What?”

  “You black, ain’t you? You supposed to be on my side. Jus’ ’cause you got the bootay and looks that don’t mean you better. I got the pretty skin, ho. I got the hair. You ain’t better ’an me. You ain’t no better. I see black trash just like me, only you thought you wuz better. Fuckin’ dopefiend. Just a crack ho.”

  “Like I said, you don’t scare me—gun or no gun. You’re done.”

  “Yeah?” Marvin grabbed her by the arm. Lifted her. He jammed the gun in her ear and then slid the barrel inside her mouth. “Can you suck on that, Oreo ho? You think you so good. Suck on that.”

  Pearleen jerked her head away. Glared at him. “You are nothing. . . .”

  Marvin moved, wanting to strike her, but his own wounds were so intense that tears were forming in his eyes. Pearleen reaffirmed her stance. She truly did not care at this point.

  “You can’t hurt me. Somebody like you could never hurt someone like me, no matter what you do to me.” He was more unpredictable and screwier than Cecil in some ways, no doubt about it; she knew that as well as she knew anything—but she had needed to get these words out just the same. It made her feel good to say them. Either fate was acceptable. She’d been through too much and felt too numb all over for it to make a difference.

  With a shaky arm, Marvin stuck the gun against her crotch. Held it this way. Only to watch her smirk at him.

  “Shut up, bitch. Don’t you care if you got yo snatch blowed apart? If your hole got blowed up like the fuckin’ Grand Canyon? Huh, bitch?”

  “You’re wasting your time trying to intimidate me when you have a far more serious problem on your hands—like how to save your own miserable ass, for instance.”

  “Never could figure or even stand a smart nigga ho like you, that be for goddamn mothafuckin’ sure.” He moved the gun up against her back. “You my ticket out of here, ho.”

  CHAPTER 586

  He shoved her toward the door. Being every bit cautious and careful, Muck reached for the door knob, drew the door toward him to open it—and came face-to-face with Greta Otto’s screeching, buzzing Black & Decker chainsaw that sliced his gun hand right off, and Marvin toppled to the ground.

  The bullets she had sustained earlier in shoulder and wrist had weakened her considerably, to be sure, yet she was determined to will this final, crucial bit of business through and proceeded to do some more cutting on that same arm. The razor sharp teeth of the saw blade cut through muscle and bone with demonic fury and had the limb severed from the shoulder in less than two seconds.

  Pearleen had got her hands on Marvin’s gun in the interim. Ordered Greta to step back. Greta wanted to. Before she could yield, Marvin had summoned what little he had left, albeit enough, and with a last heave kicked at one of the big woman’s knees hard enough so that it brought her down. As she landed on her back so did the chainsaw blade against her lower region, cutting into her crotch and belly, slicing deep into her internal organs, the blade spinning this way, scraping against concrete and bone, viscera and blood—and petered out of its own accord due to lack of fuel.

  Greta was finished. She had been bisected halfway up her torso. Black sweater and negligee soaked with the red stuff. Jackboots had filled up.

  “Blood don’t bother me . . .” Marvin groaned through clenched teeth from his prone position on the floor, as crimson gushed from his shoulder, “. . . long as it don’t be mine.”

  Pearleen kicked him in the groin for good measure. She stood over him and fired a shot into his chest and she continued firing bullets into his upper body and face until the gun was empty—and did not stop pulling the trigger even then until she was certain that the weapon in her grasp was completely out of ammo.

  “Asshole.”

  No sooner did the expletive leave her lips, Miss Betty Lou Rutterschmidt and her daughter Mildred Elizabeth rushed in with straight razors.

  “What do you think you’re doing, fornicator?” As was her custom, Miss Betty was the one shrieking and waving her straight razor in one hand and the Bible in the other, as the daughter pushed the wheelchair inside the Furnace Room as far as the bodies on the floor permitted. Miss Betty screamed orders at her daughter, to no avail. The wheels were stuck under Greta’s neck and an arm that once was part of Marvin Ritalin Muck.

  “MOVE IT, DAUGHTER! WE’RE TOO FAR FROM THE HEATHEN FORNICATOR! I CAN’T REACH THAT FILTHY HEATHEN BITCH FROM HERE, I TELL YOU! GET ME CLOSER, DAUGHTER! CLOSER, DAMN YOU, DAUGHTER!”

  Mildred Elizabeth screamed back at her mother and she was on the verge of tears, helpless and confused. There was too much happening here, too much bedlam for her feeble mind to comprehend or cope with. Miss Betty insisted on shrieking orders, a rage stoked by her need to get at the nude dancer, by her maniacal desire to see the strumpet’s blood spilled once and for all.

  CHAPTER 587

  Pearleen stepped in. Raked the gun against the older woman’s head and watched her fall back against Mildred Elizabeth. The blow dazed Miss Betty momentarily and blood appeared above her upper lip.

  Pearleen reached down for the presently sile
nt Black & Decker. Tried to start it. Couldn’t. She stuck the chainsaw guide bar in the furnace long enough for it to turn hot and take on a red glow.

  She pulled the chainsaw out of the fire and held it against Mildred Elizabeth’s face, singeing hair and then literally frying the front of her face. She watched a good chunk of it come off, stuck and sizzling, to the guide bar and chain—that resulted in the daughter folding over and dropping to the floor in pure agony.

  By the time Betty Rutterschmidt was able to rise up out of her chair, unsteady on her feet, she was, and attempted to lash at Pearleen with her straight razor, swinging up and down and across, the Belle of the Ball dealt with her in the same manner she had dealt with the daughter: hammered away at the old woman’s head with the sharp chainsaw blade—and finally pressed it down and held it against her screaming, screeching blood-soaked jaw and neck. When she drew the saw back she took a considerable section of the face with it.

  Pearl Bell was not done, not by a long shot, and proceeded to do the same to the other side of the flailing crone’s face, only was much fiercer at it this time: separated more flesh and scalp from that portion of her skull, dislodging rotting dentures and exposing raw bone and causing more blood to spray. She then followed it up with such a vicious and powerful whack that the old crow was sent back into the wheelchair, caused it to topple over on its side with the twisted witch half in/half out of it, landing like a wedge in that immediate and utterly gruesome portion of the floor between the door and the other dismembered and mutilated bodies.

  There was not a peep out of the wretched Bible-thumper or the other hag. Not a finger budged, not an eye batted. Mother and “daughter” stayed down—and were silent this time for good.

  CHAPTER 588

  Pearleen Bell slumped back in her corner. She lowered the chainsaw in her hands, and wept silently. Patience McDaniel felt a need to console the other woman—and did so by resting her head on her shoulder. This was what Pearl had needed: sign of support by someone she felt was on her side, by someone who understood. Patience McDaniel’s own eyes were filling up by now.

  Pearleen wondered if the nightmare were truly over. At last? Or was there more hell to endure? Doubted she even had it in her to fight anymore. Would she—if she had to?

  It was then both women were given a real start by the ensuing creaking noise caused by someone attempting to budge their way in and had the exhausted Pearleen Bell reach for the chainsaw.

  Not again, she thought. Please, God. I can’t take this.

  Focused on the door, all she could make out was a pair of male hands along the edge by the knob and lock, then part of a face. It was Monroe Perez—and he was having a difficult time pushing the door in due to the wheelchair and sprawled bodies on the floor.

  He stayed with it. Managed, at last, to get it open wide enough so that he was able to step in sideways and enter the Furnace Room. He looked down as he did, trying to figure why the door wouldn’t budge any further—and got his far-from-pleasant answer—and determined not to allow this present, stomach-churning sight to affect him any further than the heretofore witnessed bloodshed and general mayhem already had.

  He took a breath, as foul smelling as the dungeon was, and held it, intent on keeping his eyes from tearing; at least, he hoped, keep his emotions under some kind of control, for the moment, time being—and wondered if he were able.

  CHAPTER 589

  A relieved Pearleen Bell took her hands off the chainsaw. Wiped her eyes. Monroe Perez, shaky enough himself, helped the women up. A couple of the guys assisted Pearleen to the door. Trouble was the wheelchair was stuck in such a way, and braced against the door (with the mangled body of Betty Lou Rutterschmidt, her mutilated face and head lodged down there against the bottom) that the chair and the door itself had to be pried back each and every time someone exited—and the wheelchair would slide back into its previous position, causing the door to close.

  One task after another, thought Perez. But this was such a seemingly minor nuisance that the people with him coped with it without making a fuss. Alas, to clear a genuine path to the door was simply out of the question; there were too damn many bodies in way too horrendous condition for anyone to want to go near them any closer then they had to. And so the door was shoved back periodically and the individual leaving would turn sideways and squeeze his or her way out of the room, and the wheelchair, or a body—or body part—would force the door to close again.

  Couple of the other members of the rescue party gave Rudy Perez a hand with Patience McDaniel. She rose to her feet and they walked her to the Furnace Room exit. They helped her turn sideways, like everyone else, and pushed her through—and followed suit themselves.

  As Monroe looked about one final time, seeing the horror and finding it still impossible to accept, his belly churning, he happened to glance down at the lifeless and sprawled figure of Marvin R. Muck at his feet. Noticed Marvin’s severed arm and the crudely etched prison tat across the blood-stained palm:

  FUCK

  U

  Roe found himself fighting a sudden, powerful urge to upchuck, and failed, releasing a torrent of bile over Muck’s tattoo and rest of his body. Thoroughly disgusted with himself and everything in general, he ran his forearm back and forth against his mouth and chin. Needed to get out.

  He did what he could, as others had, to move the wheelchair out of the way, but the damn thing refused to stay put. He shoved it back again, with hardly satisfactory results. Finally gave the door a hard tug and slipped through the opening, before it swung back into place, shutting of its own accord.

  CHAPTER 590

  It was determined that Big Tony would be carried out of the basement. It took a few strong “poll bearers” to latch on to his legs and shoulders and heft the lifeless giant of a man off the blood-drenched floor and move toward the staircase with him. Some of the men wept openly.

  Monroe wouldn’t allow himself. Losing Big Tony had been a major loss, as there had been other losses that had hit as hard, if not harder. You couldn’t shed a tear, not now. Tears got in the way. There was a job to do.

  Monroe walked with the men briefly; he needed desperately to request a special favor of one of them, a fellow auto mechanic named Pablo Chinchilla.

  “I am not able to myself. . . . Can you take what’s left of Rudy and his girlfriend Olivia out of the refrigerator up there in the kitchen . . . and bring them outside? Please. . . .”

  The man nodded. “I will do this for you, amigo. . . . No problem. . . .”

  “Thank you.”

  It was a real struggle, but the men managed to make it up the tricky staircase with their dead boss. There were other bodies throughout the basement: some in that room with the mattresses who needed to be collected and carried outside, still others who were wounded and waited to be escorted up the stairs and taken out of this dungeon of death and depravity.

  It was also evident to Monroe and other people that a tally of some sort, an adding up of the goons who were part of Biggs’s band of insane killers, if at all possible, needed to be taken. What was the total number of nutjobs Cecil Biggs had on hand? How many of them bit the dust?—and how many others were hurt to the point they no longer posed a threat?

  In addition, and far more pressing: Biggs himself remained missing. Was painfully unaccounted for.

  CHAPTER 591

  The group with Pearleen guided and supported her toward the staircase, while a second group, those with her friend Patience McDaniel, lagged behind and did what they could to offer help.

  Pearleen looked around as she negotiated the stairs and did her dire best to warn Perez and anyone who would listen, that Norbert Fimple was still alive. Fimple and Sassy Sassounian; that they were possibly holed up in the attic.

  Mostly her mind was on Biggs. She wanted Cecil caught and dealt with and dealt with harshly. She had to be reminded to use the handrail as she ascended the staircase and to avoid the steps covered in oil and glass shards and nails. A chicken su
ddenly appeared at the top, and just as suddenly leapt into the air and flew past them, to land somewhere on the basement floor. Wilburn Flinger ran in through the open basement door, pausing at the landing, looking about.

  He was warned not to take another step, that it was dangerous. “Stairs are covered with nails and glass and some kind of slippery substance, maybe motor oil.”

  Wilburn stood there cursing, wanting to pursue the chicken.

  “I ain’t gonna hurt it.”

  He was clearly bothered—not only by what he was being told by all the people going up and trying to get past him—but by the fact he wouldn’t be able to do anything about it. Before turning and giving up, he pointed at what he saw: a black woman, whose name he did not know, breaking away from those who were wanting to help her down there, and making the effort to get to the hen herself.

  Something had snapped inside of Patience, pulled her out of her perpetual daze, in spite of the fever and the debilitating condition it caused: she had a desire and a need to help this living thing out, save it somehow from all the bad stuff going on.

  CHAPTER 592

  Up at the top of the stairs, Wilburn cursed, and returned to the hallway.

  “He shaved his head.” Pearleen felt a deep need to convey certain information to anyone who would listen, unaware that her friend Patience had remained behind to pursue her task. “His head is shaved. He did it to confuse you. Could still have that evil Trusty Lusty clown makeup on. Same clown makeup Marvin had on him. Else he could be wearing the pig mask. Parfrey the Mad Pig is the one I’m talking about. Pig mask. Calls him Parfrey. Got him all them aliases/alter egos; blaming the world for his troubles. Got as many disguises as he has excuses for what he’s been doing to people, when you know what it comes down to: the dude is just plain fucked-up.” No one responded in any clear-cut way; their main goal was to escape the stench of the place before those who hadn’t vomited yet joined those who had.