The Trees Beyond the Grass (A Cole Mouzon Thriller)

by Reeves, Robert

  CHAPTER 2

  BY THE EMPTY booths and bar, Thursday nights were clearly not the night to be at Wild Salsa. Poinsett walked into the bar and quickly located Tony at the counter, two empty shot glasses before him and a beer in his hand. His red polo shirt, blue jeans, and thick brown leather belt screamed boring to Poinsett. A black cap covered his close-shaven head. She quickly noticed him flipping a white linen paper card between his fingers like a quarter. My card. She had mailed it to him from New York several days earlier after finishing off Whitney Havex. He looked down at the card and Poinsett could tell he was re-reading it.

  Dear Tony,

  You cower in life as you will at death. I am here to reclaim what has been taken.

  I am beside you…

  P

  She watched as he laughed to himself and then moved to step away from the bar. Time to introduce myself. Before Tony’s foot could reach the floor, Poinsett pulled up beside him, sitting on the wooden swivel stool and pressing her chest against the counter to gather the attention of the bartender…and Tony.

  “I’ll take a skinny margarita.” Her accent, perhaps from Alabama or Georgia, was noticeable. Feeling his gaze on her breasts, now firmly pressed against the counter’s edge until they looked like there were about to pop free of her dress, she glanced over to him. By his look, he was loving this. It was clear it had been some time since he’d gotten laid, and it certainly wasn’t with any woman who looked like her.

  “Where you from?” Tony smiled his toothy smile.

  “Oh, Birmingham originally. But I work in Tulsa now,” she lied.

  Tony was intrigued and wanted to know more. “What brings you down this way? Business or pleasure?”

  She smiled as she answered, “Business, but I’m not adverse to pleasure.” Her eyes rolled up and down his body before returning to his gaze.

  Tony’s face flashed clear moments of hot sex before she could even finish saying ‘pleasure.’ His light mahogany eyes glanced across her half-exposed breasts and the deep, layered V formed by her pink and green floral-print sundress. His gaze then ran down her body to her white leather sandals and returned to her breasts before he looked back at her eyes.

  “Well, you’re in luck, ma’am. I happen to be a very pleasurable guy.” His cliché line was met by a slight come-hither look in Poinsett’s blue eyes, one brow slightly askew. With her left hand, she swept her long, blonde hair off her face and over her shoulder. A wig, purchased before the killing in New York.

  “Oh? Do tell, cowboy?” Two can play at this game, thought Poinsett. By this point she was two-thirds through her drink.

  He leaned in toward Poinsett and placing his empty glass on the bar. “How about a shot?” Tony was trying to speed up the process. Time was wasting and he was clearly ravenous to play. He pushed for requests. “What would you like? A lemon drop, chocolate cake, what’s your poison?” He placed his right hand on the back of her wooden stool and rubbed her exposed shoulder with his thumb in small circular movements, the grin still firmly on his face.

  Poinsett looked at his hand and cringed internally. She wanted to kill him right there in the middle of the bar. She would break her now-empty glass against the edge of the bar and slash his throat with the shards if she thought she could get away with it. The thought played out for a few moments in her head before she spoke. “Tequila!” she announced, matching his grin with a slight smile. She wanted him dead, and now.

  A deep, hollow-chest “Ha,” came out as Tony pulled back in excitement. “My kind of girl… I mean, lady.” He tipped his faded black cap in apology. She smiled back as to say, ‘no offense taken.’ Looking around her, he waved the bartender over and ordered two shots of Jose Cuervo Silver. The bartender grabbed two shot glasses and the bottle, pouring the shots in front of them. Poinsett caught the slight look of what the fuck cross the bartender’s deeply tanned face. He clearly didn’t understand the attraction playing out at the otherwise empty bar. Running his hand over his black fauxhawk haircut, he returned to the opposite end of the bar to apparently discuss with the ample-breasted waitress with the daisy-duke shorts and tight white tank top what they were observing.

  Poinsett turned back to Tony after seeing a giggle from the waitress. Tony promptly raised his glass at her gaze, which she followed with her own. “To business and pleasure,” he said.

  They both downed the stinging shot without involving a lime or salt. By the look on his face, he approved.

  Poinsett wondered if he had any clue what was about to happen. With Whitney in New York, there had been no interaction until the first blow. Before Whitney got home to her Astoria Park condo, Poinsett had arrived and convinced the front desk security guard to give her access to the building.

  The story was simple. Her new boyfriend lived in the building, and it was his birthday. She intended to surprise him with a bit of a peep-show: “He loves strippers, after all.” The deal was closed with a slight flash of her red bra, which sent Jeff the doorman over the top. His face went flush as he nodded in understanding. He walked her to the elevator bank behind his circular stand and let the door open. At the twelfth floor she stepped off and looked around for the stairs. As a precaution, she selected a floor other than that of Whitney’s so as to not immediately raise suspicions when her body was ultimately found. Fire wells couldn’t be locked under the local fire code, giving her free access to each floor. She opened its door and walked another three stories up to get off near Whitney’s sixteenth-floor condo.

  It was an old building; any renovations done focused on the aesthetics of the hall, not on the mechanics of the doors. They clearly relied too much on Jeff the doorman. A quick slip of a credit card and a small screwdriver and she was inside Whitney’s apartment, where the fun began when she arrived twenty minutes later.

  CHAPTER 3

  “ANOTHER?” SHE SAID with a sweet Southern smile still beaming at him. Poinsett snapped back to the present, determined to get the hunt moving along. This time she placed her soft hand on Tony’s thigh, close to his groin, to emphasize her implications. He stared at her hand for a moment and then raised his head. “Of course!” He waved over the bartender, who tore himself away from the waitress and walked over to pour the second shots, and as quickly as the first, they were gone. He was halfway back to his post when he obviously heard Poinsett say, “Let’s get out of here.”

  The look on his face was pure shock when he turned to walk to the register beside Poinsett. He shook his head slightly in disbelief as the bill printed out and he delivered it, folded down its spine and placed in a shot glass.

  Using the opportunity for closer interaction, Tony leaned in to grab the glass and softly said, “Sounds like a great idea. Where’s your hotel?”

  The slight grin returned to Poinsett’s face. “Awh, can we go to your place? I’m here with co-workers and I’d rather not be seen bringing a boy home. Sorry…a man.” She intentionally mimicked Tony’s prior remark and then pulled her left hand from her lap, tapping her ring finger to flash a diamond.

  Tony’s face flashed shock, then pleasurable trouble. “Sure.” He was attempting to muster an ‘I understand and am a mature man’ voice, but what came out was ‘gleeful kid who’s just received a new toy.’ Poinsett smiled. She had him hooked.

  After Tony paid the tab with cash, they walked out to leave their admiring audience to discuss. Poinsett could feel Tony’s gaze on her cross-fit firm backside as she walked to the Accord with him behind in obvious ecstasy. It was after nine and the parking lot’s streetlights dotted the street parking with small circles of creamy light. She looked up from her five-eight frame to Tony. “So, I’ll follow you to your place?”

  “Yeah, I’m in that white pickup over there. It’s maybe a fifteen minute drive. Just stay close. Wouldn’t want to lose you.” Poinsett smiled. Oh, you won’t lose me.

  Following behind Tony, Poinsett’s mind again flashed back to New York. Whitney was taken down with nightshade. Much like its rumored effect
s on Romeo, Whitney was helpless on her bathroom floor—aware of everything, but unable to move. Poinsett had worked slowly with a steady hand until Whitney lay slowly dying from the cuts. Peeling off a pair of polyester gym pants and a top that had been coated with blood, Poinsett looked down at the body, satisfied with her work. Her heart pumped heavy with the thrill. She wanted, needed, that thrill again. Tony was her next chance.

  Minutes later, Tony pulled up to his A-frame home off Angelina Drive with Poinsett in tow. It was nine-thirty p.m., and the street was quiet but for a few kids several blocks down on skateboards under a street lamp.

  Tony was visibly giddy with anticipation as he walked up to her car door. “Come on in.” She stepped out in a grand sweeping movement like she was about to walk the red carpet, and extended her hand for him to assist her up. She then closed the car’s door and proceeded to the nondescript white-painted home. Entering through the door, she glanced at Tony and said softly in her genteel accent, “Let the fun begin.”

  CHAPTER 4

  TONY FELT A slight prick in his neck as he swung closed the red-painted wooden front door. “What the…hell?” He turned to see Poinsett with an empty needle in her hand. “You fucking bitch! I’ll kill you.”

  Poinsett had acted too soon. He swung around with his right arm and backhanded her with his broad right hand. She fell to the brown shag carpet floor and tried to crawl away. Leaning down, he grabbed her left leg and pulled her from beneath an aged yellow table.

  Poinsett panicked at the idea that she could become the victim. Standing over her, he whipped off his cap, throwing it to the floor and revealing his shaven head. “So you like it rough, huh?”

  He unbuckled his belt and yanked it free of his jean’s loops when she kicked and spat back. “Go to hell.”

  As he bent down to grab her legs again, he stumbled, falling hard to his knees. Poinsett pulled out a scalpel she had hidden in the strap of her bra during the car ride earlier and sliced the air, landing her last swipe across his left cheek. Tony screamed in pain and rolled to retreat. She jumped up and was on him, stabbing him below the ribs and in his stomach. He grabbed her right wrist, bending it back and forcing the blade to fall. He chased and within a second he had a hold of it, jabbing it like an ice pick into her. Then his body failed him.

  Tony was helpless within a minute of being stabbed by Poinsett’s needle. He felt his body go lifeless and tumble down like a large tree that had been chopped low at its base. His head caught the corner of his glass-topped coffee table as he fell, causing a throbbing gash that consumed his head.

  Standing before him, Poinsett stared down, grinning. He wasn’t dead. It was worse than death; he was alive and trapped in his body like in a dream. He could see and hear everything Poinsett was saying. He could feel everything, he just couldn’t respond. “Sorry Tony, you won’t be getting laid tonight. Guess you kind of figured that out by now.” She shrugged her shoulders, pinching them at her neck. “I know you can hear me. You’ve been given a very strong tranquilizer, a muscle relaxant used by hunters to take down their prey.” She held the grin tight and narrowed her eyes. That’s what Tony is, prey.

  “I told you that you weren’t worthy of life, of the stolen years you lived, Tony. And now it’s time for it to end. I’m here to take back what is mine.” Tony watched in horror as Poinsett cleaned the scalpel with the bottom of her now-disheveled sundress and dropped to her knees to straddle his body at his hips, pinning him between her thighs. Slipping her smirk to one side, she told him, “Tony, I’m not going to lie. This is going to hurt.” Tony’s eyes welled up with fear, tears cresting their inner frames. Pure hatred could be read in them as Poinsett used the blade to slice vertically up his red polo shirt in rough repetitive movements until it was completely cut, lying in two limp pieces on either side of his frame. His eyes revealed his racing thoughts. What the fuck is she doing? God, please help me, please!

  POINSETT’S LEFT HAND ran up his solid stomach, her eyes admiring his six-pack with its slight tuft of hair at the navel. “You know, it’s a shame I didn’t get to enjoy you. I’m sure that you would have at least been good at that.” Pulling back and sitting erect, she added, “But…perhaps not. Looks can be deceiving, can’t they?” Grinning, she cut a swath of his shirt off and wrapped her arm, creating a red bow.

  She waved her finger at him. “Tsk, tsk, Tony. You shouldn’t have done that.” Poinsett thought to herself that he was sexy in a ‘dirty mechanic on some lonely road’ type of way. His face was covered in salt-and-pepper scruff and chiseled, slight smile marks created brackets on either side of his broad lips. But she had no interest in his attributes. She was on the hunt and it invigorated her. It was far better than any sex she’d had. Her heart pounded as she drew the scalpel across Tony’s upper groin; she was enjoying this power over him.

  Tony looked on in horror, then pain, as she drove the blade deep into his left ribs, close to his sternum. She was carving. Unlike Whitney, Tony was conscious and Poinsett enjoyed the panic playing out in his eyes. The fast pulsing of her heart was a high; the feeling euphoric and addictive. Tony likely wanted to scream out in pain, but his mouth wouldn’t move. She smiled as more tears filled his eyes from the pain and shock of it all. He was dying, and the sight of him coming to this obvious realization excited her.

  After a long top-to-bottom and rounded stroke, she stopped. Blood flowed everywhere. A pulsing artery had been hit and blood splattered across her face. Poinsett leaned back and down to admire her work, wiping her upper lip with the back of her hand and smearing some of the blood. A grin. A very large grin appeared on her face. Tony lay there watching and gasping for air. One of his lungs had been punctured and he was slowly downing in his own blood collecting in his lungs..

  Poinsett pushed herself partially up to roll Tony onto his stomach and the brown shag carpet that covered his floor. Bubbles of blood burst from his mouth as the internal puddle of blood sloshed around and out. On his left lower back she found what she was looking for. Pronounced and clear, the mark had been put there and made small enough to not be seen in day to day life, but obvious to those hunting for it.

  It was a brand, like a cattle brand. A square with a ‘P’ in its middle. Poinsett carved along the edges of the square, then underneath the skin to remove the tag. Tony was obviously still alive, as rasps of panicked air came out as she cut. She had no concern; he would be dead long before the toxin wore off.

  Poinsett sat up from Tony’s flaccid body. Stepping over him, she noticed his breaths were all but nonexistent. After several minutes of watching, she found a large serrated knife in the kitchen and continued her work on his body before snapping a photo with her phone and walking to the front door. “Hunter and prey, you just pulled the wrong stick,” she exclaimed as she closed the door behind her. As with Whitney, a photo of her prize would be placed on Tony’s Facebook page within the hour. It announced to the world her success and the failure of the prey. His friends would be shocked, the police would be called, and some lowly police department would work to capture the killer. But they would never succeed in stopping Poinsett.

  CHAPTER 5

  TULSA

  “AGENT LEAS, LET me repeat the question. Did you or did you not strangle my client immediately before he gave you the taped confession that you now hang your hat on for his guilt in the death of Pam Rubert?”

  Agent David Leas couldn’t recall how he had ended up in Judge P. Jenson Rhode’s Tulsa County witness box on this Friday morning as Hal Grady, David Flint’s hired gun of a defense attorney, worked to have the recorded confession of Mr. Flint excluded as being coerced out of him by fear and force. At forty-three, I’m too old for this shit, blinked in his mind. He lifted his left hand and ran his fingers through the shaggy coal-black hair that accented his Latino features.

  If he was honest with himself, he had been a little rough with Flint. A bloody nose and dislocated jaw was the least he deserved. He had murdered Miss Rubert and her two children after s
lipping into their house dressed as a UPS man. The reason was still unclear, but he had three other murders previously, all done the same way: tied with a phone cord or other wire, gagged, and then their throats sliced from jaw to jaw. He made the mother watch as the two children were killed first… That was his high—their fear.

  Leas had pieced together the pattern, the method of the victims being selected. Flint used laundromats to discover them, then followed them home and returned the next day in uniform. So, Leas had staked out the most logical next locations for Flint’s selection. He had gotten lucky on his second location and noticed Flint, following him as he similarly followed his next selected victim, and then laid a trap. As he waited in the spare room of Rita Drankle’s home the next day, Flint came knocking, claiming he had a package and needed a drink of water, if possible. As soon as he slipped into Mrs. Drankle’s home and attempted to pin her to the ground, Leas was on him.

  “Yes, but…” Leas wanted to add, but the bastard deserved it. He’d killed children…a mother. The anger in Leas had collided with his personal anger and spilled over into his work. It hadn’t been the first time he swung one too many times on a suspect. And he suspected it wouldn’t be his last.

  The attorney pushed again. “So you admit that you physically assaulted my client, and then and only then did you ‘beat’ that statement out of him.”

  “Now wait a damn second. I did not beat him.” Leas’ temper flared.

  Okay, maybe I did just a little. But, Miss Rubert…and Maria deserved to get a few stings in on a cold-hearted killer like Flint.

  “Then you strangled him, deprived him of oxygen and made him fear for his life if he didn’t say exactly what you wanted him to, correct?” The attorney grinned, obviously enjoying the cross-examination.