During the entire drive from Seattle to Mount Shasta, the events of last week replayed in my mind over and over.
The memory of Roman slapping Mac across the face with picture after picture of the evidence of his appalling, malignant endeavors. All the while he roared, demanding irrelevant and nonsensical answers.
Even from where I stood in the shadows I could see her cracking, her sanity withering to ruins. And all I could do was pray the medicine mother gave her for her ‘mastitis’ would kick in and deliver my Mac into unconsciousness. Every tendon under my skin almost snapped in half while Roman took out his anger and mistakes on Heather’s lifeless form.
As I pull off the exit ramp and merge into the city’s traffic, anxiety begins to hum through my veins and excitement settles in my stomach. By the time I pull through the gates of mother’s ranch I’m on the brink of losing my sanity. The tires of my Buick slide, fishtailing before grabbing traction and speeding up the gravel drive. When the nose of my car is inches from the stone facing of the house, I slam the breaks, throw it into park and leap from the car. Taking the stairs two and three at a time, it only takes three giant hurdles before my hand is turning the front door knob and I’m shoving my way passed the front door and into the main foyer.
As soon as my feet meet the hardwood floor of the anteroom the barrel of a gun meets the base of my skull and less than a second later I hear the unmistakable sound of it being cocked. “Ya said it wouldn’t be till tomorrow child. Whatcha tryin’ to do, getcha self killed?”
“Lizbeth, I’ve missed you, sister dearest. I see you’ve easily settled mother back in our home with no problems and in little time. Now, if you’d be so kind as to lower your gun, I’d like to discuss our current situation as well as our future plans.” The sound of the guns’ safety clicking into place reduces the palpable tension in the air and I release a pent up breath from my lungs before stalking into the main sitting room.
Without turning to address her I comment over my shoulder, “How is she? It’s been nearly five days, has she regained consciousness?” After pulling the pillbox of Trazadone from inside my suit jacket, I fill the crystal tumbler to the brim with bourbon before tossing the pills in my mouth and washing them down with the warm amber liquid. Once I sink into the plush couch my eyes find and lock on my sisters’. “Has mother heard from him?”
Mother walks in portraying royalty and my glare follows her as she moves around into the sitting room before perching at the end of chair. “Oh, son, you know she’s fine. I’ve already told ya that. And no, I haven’t spoken to him…I doubt I will. As for her consciousness, I really can’t be sure. There are moments as I watched her interact with Lizbeth that I was able to clearly see the lucidity in her eyes—then it’s as if a light switch is flipped and she transforms to the frightened lamb who looks down right terrified. However, other times…” She shakes her head before bringing her fingertips to her temples and rubbing the sides of her head.
Sitting forward, I lean towards her and rest my elbows on my knees before demanding, “Other times…she what? Mother, continue.”
When her eyes shift from her fidgeting hands to mine and I see the tears welled in them, any anxiety or excitement flowing through me moments before is squelched and spoiled to dread. “Other times the evil rolling off her, the sinister grin and gleam in her eyes mirrors Rome’s. Son, this woman isn’t what you thought she was, I’m afraid she isn’t what either of us believed she was. I know what a man whose soul has been darkened by evil looks like, hell, I raised him.” Mother’s head nods towards Lizbeth first, then the direction of guest bedrooms. “Our Heather harbors the same demon who possesses and spoils Roman William Payne. Child, this is not a war you will win. Against mere men? Possibly. Against the shade where the demons rule, run, and play,” She casts her eyes down before quietly finishing, “You will find defeat if you continue the path you’re currently on. Let the child go, let her mother that bastard child of hers, and for the love of all that is holy, walk away from this right now, son, before it’s too late.”
I slowly nod my head taking in what I’ve heard before leaning back and pinning my eyes with Mother’s, “It’s been too late since the first time I laid eyes on her gazing out of the main windows as you dusted the floorboards six feet away and you know it. There is no walking away, Mother, and there for damn sure ain’t no lettin’ go.”
After standing to my full height I head towards the wing of bedroom suites, and before I cross the threshold I inform her over my shoulder, “That bastard child is mine. Not by blood but something much stronger. You may have seen no other choice but to hide your bastard child from the man who held your fate and lied to me every day of my childhood, but I assure you there are better ways and I’ll be damned if I hide my daughter.”
After I’ve changed into more comfortable clothes, I quietly open the door conjoining mine and Mac’s rooms. I carefully make my way to where she lies peacefully sleeping and ease onto the mattress, letting my eyes gobble up the sight of her beautiful face. It’s in this space of time I realize how hard these last few days have been without her. I also concede what I already knew, there’s no way I’ll ever be able to let Mac go, no way in hell.
I rake my fingers through my hair before resting my head in my hands. The apologies and excuses are on the tip of my tongue when I look back at Mac. The woman smirking at me with menacing defiance in her eyes sends chills up my spine and ice shooting through my veins.
My confidence wavers slightly at first and I try to conjure up Roman and how he would react to this change in his beloved mouse. I’m left speechless with my mouth hanging open, coming up short on more ways than one. Roman’s Heather didn’t own a smile this wicked, Roman’s mouse never looked at him, or anyone for that matter, as if they were nothing but mere prey.
After several attempts to swallow the lump lodged in my throat, I finally clear my throat by coughing and speak, “Mac, how are ya, darlin’? Thirsty?” My hand brings the glass of ice water from the bedside table to her face and as we both note it clearly trembling, her eyes flash up to mine with a sinister gleam in them. She makes no move to sip from the glass in my hand and after a few awkward moments, I set it back on the bedside table and watch the beaded condensation roll down the glass surface. Without moving my eyes to hers I ask, “Is there anything I can do for you, Mac, anything at all?”
When she doesn’t answer I nod looking straight in front of me before standing to leave and as I’m closing the door between our rooms I hear a voice that is not her’s speak, “It’s Mace, darlin’. Your Mac checked out.” The door has already clicked shut behind me as her words register.
As I stand here, unmoved, her words circle my fractured thoughts as my mind scrambles to piece them back together.
“It’s Mace, darlin’. Your Mac checked out.”
I don’t give a shit what she calls herself, just as long in the end she calls herself mine.
Chapter 3
A knock jars me awake and the instant I push myself up from lying face first on the mattress, a migraine slams into my groggy, still inebriated mind, causing me to wince. I sink back into the bed and pull a pillow over my head to block out the sun filtering in through the windows. When I reach my hand out in a blind search to locate my down comforter, my fingers tangle in last night’s Heather’s matted up hair in a rats nest resting on my hip. It pisses me off and I immediately blame her for there being no blanket on the bed.
Using my hand I shove her head away from me in an attempt to wake her up. She needs to wake up so I can inform her it’s time to get her things and get the hell out from under my roof. When my hand shoves the head at my hip it rolls away, much too easily to be attached to a body. And as I hear the soft thud hit the floor, I know I went too far again last night.
The knock sounds again at the door and I shove myself up from the bed. Only then do I notice the bed is soaked in so much blood, standing puddles, some only half an inch, but most two to three inches deep wh
ere you can still make out my impression on the mattress.
My eyes scan the unfamiliar room and for a split second I release a sigh of exhaustion…until the knocking starts again. I eye the lock on the door from where I stand, but it’s so far away I can’t determine if it’s locked or not. Not that it would matter because it’s barely hanging from the door. “Just a minute. We’re not dressed for visitors, it’s hardly dawn.”
My eyes land on the blond mass of hair on the floor beside the bed. As I use a woman’s boot I found on the floor to shove this Heather’s head under the bed, the irony of what I’ve just said to the unknown gnat on the other side of the door inspires a somewhat grim, yet hysterical, dry humored thought: Well, she’s not dressed for visitor’s, and I’m fairly certain she never will be.
“Rome, it’s Drew.”
Thank God.
“Come in! Pretty sure it’s open.” I button last nights’ dress slacks still damp with blood and pull on the once white button up shirt that is also the color of the sheets I woke up on.
As soon as Andrew walks into the room I hear him gagging before I see him in my peripheral vision. He is inching back towards the door in an attempt to escape.
“No. You let me get out of hand last night and now you’re going to have to help clean up the mess. Go grab the black industrial plastic bags from the trunk of my car, the jug of gasoline, and find a big enough box. Now! And make it quick so we can get the hell out of here.”
Andrew despises cleaning up messes such as the one he currently stands in. But this time it will be him, not me, who will shoulder the burden of removing the evidence of his albatross.
Once he’s wrapped the body parts I’ve sectioned off in plastic and shoved them into the gasoline soaked box, I have him strip the bed of its sheets and we toss those into the box as well before wrapping it in cellophane. I lift the box and head towards the apartment exit when Drew’s voice interrupts, “Roman, you can’t leave like that. Your clothes are soaked in blood and you’re carrying a woman’s chopped up body in a box. Are you trying to get caught?”
I slow my steps near the door and tilt my head. After silently counting to twenty I answer his question to the best of my current ability, “Andrew, I’ve been doing everything in my power to be caught since the day my wife died. And if the authorities fail to accept my generosity, there will be more Heathers meeting her same fate, until there are no more Heathers left alive. Use what’s left of the gasoline and burn this entire floor and the ones surrounding it.”
As I head through the hall towards the stairwell of the apartment, I hear Andrew cursing and muttering and all I can manage is an irritated sigh. I toss the box without any special care into the trunk and slam it shut before walking to the driver’s side door, opening it and sliding into the front seat. After I hit the OnStar button and speak, “I need my current location as well as directions to 181 Banyan, Boulder, Colorado.” An automated voice responds:
Current Location: 8889 1st Street, Albuquerque, New Mexico.
Your requested route to 181 Banyan, Boulder, Colorado has an estimated driving time of Seven hours and twenty-three minutes. Head North and turn left in approximately 100 feet…
What. The. Hell am I doing in Albuquerque? Shit. Weren’t we in the slums of Las Vegas yesterday? Or was it the day before? After flipping through my memories of the last week, the only thing I remember is stumbling in a drunken hurry from Caesar’s Palace after the Spanish housekeeper walked in to find me buried inside Heather number three who happened to be perched upside down over a dead Heather number one with her head between her legs eagerly licking my cum from her pussy. Then of course there was the very clearly dead Heather number two hanging by her neck from the ceiling fan. Ribbons of flesh hung in tatters from her body as rivers of blood trickled, raining down and dripping from her feet to the floor. With all the different circus tricks and freak sideshows commencing, I couldn’t discern which of the three ring main attractions induced such a passionate, verbal, and deeply emotional reaction from the housekeeper. Was it me, balls deep inside one blond woman while my paring knives mirrored each other side by side slicing down the exaggerated arch of Heather number three’s back? Or maybe it was the sight of that same Heather purring while slurping my cum from the rapidly cooling Heather number two’s cunt.
I like to believe however, this seemingly simple woman who stood before me, held the only modicum of art and culture knowledge in her entire family, ten generations over and it was the very poetically erotic arch in Heather two’s body hanging from her neck that she appreciated so immensely it caused her to cry out to her God moments before fainting.
I allow OnStar to direct me home, and as soon as I pull my Audi R8 into the five-car garage and hit the garage door button, my cellphone rings. When I hear my father’s voice on the other end I tense and immediately regret not letting the call roll over to voicemail.
“Son, explain to me why your mother and I were the last to hear of our daughter-in-laws death and subsequent funeral. Then you explain to me why you, YOU, her husband and the father of her child didn’t attend and pay his respects.”
Walking into the kitchen through the mud room from the garage, I supply him with the only answer I have, “Because, Father, I’m who put her there. I’m the sick, demon riddled man who allowed an argument to escalate until accidently allowing my actions to take over rational thought before bludgeoning my wife to death with a fire poker. Now, is this inquisition over, or do you have more words of wisdom to prevent me from following in your own pathetic footsteps?”
When my fathers’ only response is nothing but white noise barely discernable over the phone I attempt to piece together my common knowledge as my brain formulates and recognizes the dilemma before me, as the proverbial nail in my coffin, “Goodbye, Father…don’t worry yourself with my affairs.”
An incoming call beeps in my ear interrupting the verbal chess match between father and son. After the phone finally ceases its insistent notification, a good twenty seconds of silence settles between us. “Father, my goal for Heather never involved her bearing the punishment of my own tribulations, much less my beloved daughter, Ivy. Please, leave me be. Allow me the privacy I need to heal and regain my strength.”
“Son, I am fairly certain the authorities already have men skirting your property’s perimeters. For me to fight alongside you would be futile, especially considering the circumstances surrounding your current predisposition.”
“Yes. I understand that notion. It’s the reason I haven’t once even considered asking for your help, Father. Not since the first incident, and I have no plans of requesting your assistance in the future. Is there anything else you wish to discuss or review with this phone conversation, or are we done?”
I pour whisky to the brim of a crystal glass and toss it back while my father responds, “I do have just one more concern-with little Ivy now motherless, thanks to her fathers’ proclivity of losing control over his rage, will it be you raising my granddaughter or just any shmuck who’s willing to take her in?”
Rage, thick and potent sears through me so abruptly it blinds me momentarily. By the time I seize control of my anger, my father is no longer on the line.
I know my father’s question was a valid one, but it’s also one I am not ready to examine too closely. If I acknowledge the issue of who will raise my daughter, the man who woke up this morning with a woman’s head resting against his hip will look like Peter Pan instead of the villain from ‘Saw’.
However, I know I have to do something now before my rights as her father are threatened, so in an effort to put a band aid on a bullet wound, I dial Andrew.
“Sir?”
“Andrew, I need you to contact Dolores. Let her know I need her to temporarily watch over Ivy.”
“Yes, sir. After Heather’s funeral I think she moved back home to northern California. I’ll find her phone number and make arrangements to bring her here within the hour.”
“Very well.
That’ll be all for the weekend, Andrew.”
“Sir?” His voice rose towards the end.
“I said that’ll be all for the weekend. Did I stutter?”
Say it. I dare you to say it, motherfucker.
“Oh. Okay. I-I just wanted to make sure. I didn’t realize you’d decided to stay home this weekend. If you need a-anything, or any, if you need me, I’m just a phone call away.”
“Yes, Andrew. That is what I pay you for. I am aware.” I slide my thumb ending the call before I say something he’ll regret in the morning.
After I settle in the high back oxford leather chair behind my large mahogany office desk I pour glass after glass of whatever liquor I’m able to find in the liquor bureau.
I don’t think you’re wrapping your fucking mind around what I have done. I don’t think you’re understanding the ramifications of my actions when I slammed picture after picture of my sins, literally against my wife’s face. Taunting her, demanding to know why. Why she stayed all that time when I knew damn well I left every window, every door unlocked, silently begging her to run. But she didn’t…she stayed. I wanted her to finally tell me the one thing I’ve always truly wanted to know, WHY did she allow herself to be a lamb in a known wolf’s presence. Why? God-fucking-dammit, WHY did she love me?
I’m not worthy of her. I was never worthy of her. And now…now I’ll never be a man worthy of a woman as my Heather was. I stain my hands nightly with as many Heathers’ blood as I can, because when their blood coats my skin, it makes hers go away…
Roman's Redemption: Roman: Book II (Roman's Trilogy) Page 2
