by Andrew Post
“You have everybody’s bank info,” Brenda said. “Correct?”
“Sure.”
“Then I want you to go find Merritt’s accounts and lock him out, of everything. It’s the only way to slow him down.”
Amber didn’t move. “I get that you’re pissed, but if I do that and Merritt reports back to Felix, he’ll know you’re here and that I’m helping you.”
“You do realize just because it hasn’t happened yet, that doesn’t mean he’s not planning to kill you off too, right? Staying on Felix’s good side should not be your concern anymore.”
“Brenda, I see your point, I do, but at this juncture, making hasty moves probably isn’t probably the smartest idea. Let’s think about this.”
“I didn’t want to take it here,” Brenda said, “but I hope now that all this is out in the open you’ve had your moment of clarity and realize you’re almost as responsible as Felix is.”
“Whoa, hold on. How the fuck could that possibly be the case?”
“Because you – you – were making sure everybody was still getting paid. Minute that’d stop, that’s when somebody would know something was up. I received my advance before getting on a plane to come here. I had no idea I was walking into this shitshow. That’s on you.”
“I see what direction this is heading in, so before you start pointing fingers, Brenda, I’ll ask you to read my lips: I didn’t know shit. Okay? I didn’t know you were getting set up, I didn’t know Mel here was getting set up, I didn’t know anyone was getting set up. It’s not like Felix emailed and said, by the way, Amber, quick FYI, keep on paying everybody but don’t be surprised next week when everybody starts fucking murdering each other, happy holidays.”
Brenda stopped in the middle of the room and clamped her hands on her hips, holding her face between a smile and a sneer, staring down at the carpet like it’d just said something terrible to her.
Mel said, “What did Merritt say? Do we need to keep moving?”
“For starters, he confirmed my suspicion,” Brenda said. “I was supposed to kill you then he was supposed to kill me. He claims he didn’t do Johnny Jade or Kerry Kerosene or any of the others, but he was more than happy to tell me Felix is burning the whole thing down with everybody inside.”
“Either of you got a spare passport I could borrow?” Amber said.
“Make jokes, you fucking wino, but running won’t do any good,” Brenda said. “For all we know, Felix wanted things to go exactly the way they went and bet on us coming here.”
Amber’s wide-eyed stare passed from Brenda to Mel. “Okay, now I definitely think it’s time we go. Mel, you go get the car started, I’ll pour whatever booze is left in the house into a garbage bag, and we’ll do like Thelma and Louise.”
“But they die in the end,” Mel said.
“Then we’ll just do the first half, the fun parts.” Amber shoved a finger in Brenda’s face. “And for the record, I hate wine. Gives me a headache. Come on, Mel, let’s leave this crazy bitch to what’ll be her unquestionably horrific demise.”
Brenda wound her hand around the grip sticking from her under-arm holster and, boring holes into Amber, said, “What was that about not making hasty moves?”
“Running isn’t a hasty move. No matter the situation, running away is always a smart move. Who tells the stories? The cowards do. That’s who. Plus, if shit wasn’t as bad as you originally thought, you can always come back later. And since we have a pretty clear picture of how bad our situation is, I’m sticking with us running away.” Amber raised her right hand. “That’s my vote. Mel? Stay or leave?”
Mel tentatively raised her arm. “Sorry.”
“Put your fucking arms down,” Brenda said. “Nobody’s voting. Nobody’s doing a goddamn thing until I say that’s what’s happening.”
Amber said, “So you make the rules? Why? Because you’re the only one with a gun?”
“That’s pretty much the size of it, yeah.”
“Um, Brenda?” Mel said.
Brenda slowly stopped glaring at Amber and looked at Mel, who motioned to the TV.
The news was broadcasting live from outside the Rest Easy Motel off I-94 just outside Baldwin, Wisconsin. The reporter was in a puffy parka and holding her microphone in a mittened hand, telling the folks at home that a body was discovered early this morning by the motel’s housekeeping staff. Michael Olson, 26, of Milwaukee, was found deceased and strapped to the motel room’s bed, police saying that Olson appeared to have sustained two gunshot wounds and despite his injuries being rudimentarily bandaged, the most shocking thing was that the young man was found completely drained of blood.
Mel thought about how she’d taken the Greyhound through that same exact area last night. She might’ve seen the orange neon of the Rest Easy Motel go past her window, never thinking twice about it. There was also that creep at the truck stop, who was clearly trying to trick her into getting in his car with him. Fuck. Imagine. What if that was the guy who did that? That could’ve been her. Not that her current situation was any more safe and secure. Still.
According to the news, “Police found Olson’s vehicle abandoned on I-94 peppered with bullet holes and covered in blood. Olson was on his way to spend Christmas with his grandmother, Edith Olson, who resides in Stillwater. Tonight at ten, we have an exclusive interview with Edith.” They cut to some muted footage of an old lady in earmuffs openly bawling.
Amber frowned at Brenda. “Did you kill that poor old lady’s grandson? Look at her. She’s so sad. Right before Christmas too? That’s fucked.”
Brenda said, “I didn’t do that. That wasn’t me.”
The reporter went on to say that Olson was not the first but rather the second in what investigators were beginning to think might’ve been the first evidence of a serial killer who appeared to have some ritualistic fixation on human blood or, possibly, it was the horrifying aftermath of cartel narco-satanic activity.
Mel said, “They never miss an opportunity to work in Mexicans may’ve done it.”
Next, another driver’s license photo came on screen. Chaz Knudsen, the report stated, was originally from Red Wing and was found dead yesterday afternoon in his apartment by Knudsen’s landlord, who noticed blood leaking into the unit below Knudsen’s. Knudsen, who had a storied criminal record, a broad history of violence, and links to organized crime, appeared to have been tortured for what medical examiners think might’ve been upward of several days. While nothing definitive had been discovered, police had no reason to not believe that the two gut-wrenching murders were connected.
“So, the second one you did,” Amber said, “but not the first?”
“Only Knudsen,” Brenda said. “Look up Michael Olson. Was he on the payroll?”
Amber clicked and scrolled and typed. “No Michael Olson.”
“He was going to Stillwater. He was moving west, leaving Wisconsin.”
Amber said, “What are you thinking?”
“Merritt went off script.”
“I’ve heard that’s not too unusual with him. Word on the grapevine is one time he went down to do a job in Houston and—”
“I know. I was there.”
“Jesus, that’s true?”
“He doesn’t work clean.”
“I need a drink. I know it’s early, give me the stink eye all you like, but I think given the circumstances….”
Mel watched Brenda processing. Staring into the TV as it went to commercials, eyeing the family of bears talk about their love of toilet paper, but she seemed to be peering through the glass screen, trying to untangle something behind what they’d just been told by the news.
“It wasn’t a proof of purchase,” Brenda said.
Amber came back with a beer and looked at Mel. “That make any sense to you?”
Mel shook her head. “What wasn’t a proof of purchas
e?”
With a small gasp, Brenda blinked, seemingly returned to herself. She looked at Mel on the couch, Amber seated before her laptops draining her beer by half in a single pull. “I think it’s like you said. Felix changed his focus away from fixes to selling to the red market. And he’s using everyone on payroll for the inventory.”
Amber said, “Felix asked you to torture Chaz Knudsen for seven days and on day seven, kill him and drain a quantity of blood from his body?”
“As much as I could wring out of him. That’s what he said.”
Amber nodded toward the TV. “That poor Mike Olson guy was tied to a bed and shot, twice, and then also drained.”
“Yes, Amber, that covers everything we just learned. So?”
“This is going to sound really fucking nutty,” Amber said, leaving the laptops, tiptoeing around the broken glass on the floor, and coming next to Mel again, “but when my friend and I were trying our hand at becoming players in the red market, we got put in contact with this guy who called himself the Rhino. Whose real name, I learned after he was arrested, was Ted Beaumont, and it was his accomplices that cut off my leg. But that’s a story for another day – and one Hollywood might want to pick up, fingers crossed – but anyway, when I still knew Ted as just the Rhino, he taught me what kind of tools to use, how to pack up the body parts the right way, stuff like that. Only over text. That’s the only way we communicated.” She sipped her beer. “One time, I don’t know why, I asked him what’s the craziest thing he’d ever heard while working in the red market. I thought he was just making shit up to scare me, but he said – bear with me here, get your grains of salt ready to take with this – but supposedly there’s some super-weird people out there who allegedly like to torture people, drain their blood, and, so I’m told, drink it because it apparently can get you really super high.” Amber set down her beer to put up empty hands. “I don’t know if there’s so much as a crumb of truth to it, I’m just telling you what he told me.”
“It makes sense,” Mel said. “If someone’s in pain, their body releases endorphins and adrenaline.” She looked down at the cast on her arm. It still hurt.
Brenda said, “If you took somebody’s blood when they were in pain and then consumed it while you weren’t in any pain, that could absolutely get someone high.”
Amber looked like she might get sick. “So, maybe Rhino’s story wasn’t too fucked-up to be real.”
“Fucked-up,” Brenda said, “is a unit of measure completely reliant on perspective.”
“Well, that’s fun. That’s a fun thing you just said.” Amber looked at Mel and gave a wide-eyed holy shit face. “Where’re my manners? You want a beer?”
Before Mel could respond, Brenda pointed at Amber’s laptops. “How much can you move to my account?”
Amber said, “Not a lot without Felix noticing. He gets an email every time I—”
“Then however much you can while staying under the radar.” Then Brenda sent a nod toward Amber’s pile of burner phones. “The rest of those clean?”
“They are.”
“Melanie. Pick one and call your girlfriend. When you’re done, I’ll call my husband.”
Amber choked on her sip. “Husband? Someone married you?”
“Yes, Amber. We’ve been together fifteen years. We have three kids.”
“Did he have a say in any of that?”
Chapter Five
Merritt was aware that he ate his feelings, and also knew that it wasn’t a particularly healthy reaction toward stress and disappointment, but right now all he wanted was a steak so rare it was practically still mooing and the biggest glass of ice-cold chocolate milk they could pour for him.
He didn’t like eating around others. He thought it was disgusting. Especially when those people you’re having a meal with all want to juggle simultaneously sticking things into the same hole they’re attempting to carry on a conversation with, it was just too much for him to endure. We don’t all do together what comes as a natural result from eating, so why do we communally do what comes before it? When he went on break at the grocery store, he’d go out to his car to eat his bologna sandwich, in isolation, the only way it made sense.
Right now, he was in a booth in the back of the steakhouse by himself, sawing into his ribeye, drowning each bloody bite in ketchup, approaching the work of chewing like he was breaking down his problems with his molars, a meditative exercise almost, hoping inspiration would strike as he cleaned the bone and he’d know exactly how he could find Brenda and Melanie.
But his mind, like his plate now, stayed frustratingly empty.
He still hadn’t called Felix. He’d been thinking of how best to word the unfortunate news and mouthing it to himself as he dialed him, hoping he wouldn’t sound like too much of a failure-prone idiot.
No one picked up so Merritt left a message.
“Hi, Felix. It’s Merritt Plains calling. So, I’ll just cut to the chase. The drop didn’t happen. Brenda called me and told me she’s figured us out. Which, you know, probably isn’t the news you wanted to hear but I just wanted to be upfront with you and, yeah, tell you that she figured us out. I’m rambling. Sorry, it’s been kind of a challenging day, let’s say. For you too I imagine, especially after you get this message. Anyway, I’m still in Minnesota. So if you could give me a ring back when you get a chance and tell me how you’d like me to approach this going forward, I’d appreciate it and I look forward to hearing from you. Oh, I almost forgot. Brenda says the car thief is still alive. It sounded like a slip. I don’t know if that information would be valuable to you, just figured I’d pass that along while I have you – or, you know, not have you per se because we’re not actually talking right now, I’m leaving you a message, but anyway, yeah, that’s it. This is Merritt. Don’t know if I said that. Bye.”
He hung up, shook his head at himself, and realizing he hadn’t checked in with his mother in a few hours, wiped his mouth on his shirt cuff, switched to his personal phone, and called her.
“What do you want?” is how she answered.
“I’m just calling to let you know I’m still in the Twin Cities and I may be here for another few days.”
“I already told you I don’t give a shit, Merritt. You come home, you stay there the rest of your rotten life, it makes no difference to me.”
“Mom, why are you like this to me?”
“You really want to discuss this now?”
“I think I do, yes. Did your life not turn out the way you wanted? Is that why you treat me this way? Do you think maybe you weren’t the type of person who should’ve gotten married and had kids and because you did, that’s made you—”
“Your brother was a good boy.”
“I know he was, Mom. I miss him every day.”
She only scoffed. “Listen to you.”
“What did I say?”
“Merritt, things weren’t great with your father, not even from the start. He’d have been the first to admit it.”
Joseph, seated across from Merritt in the booth, nodded what remained of his blasted head in agreement.
“But if he was ever planning on changing,” Merritt’s mother said, “he’ll never get the opportunity.”
“You mean because of what he did to himself that time he took me camping?”
A lengthy silence. Merritt listened to his mother’s wheezing, raspy breaths, each one hard-won.
“You might be able to believe that story after telling it to yourself so many times, Merritt, but I guess I just haven’t heard it as many times as you have.”
“What story do you mean?”
“You wanted to talk about this, Merritt. Let’s talk about it. I can’t tell if you’ve decided you’re not going to take what happened as truth or if you’re just really that unwell, but I know there’s some part of you that’s still got one foot set in reality an
d remembers what you did. Maybe it doesn’t feel bad about it, that isn’t my point, but I know it at least knows, knows the truth.”
After holding it in for so long, it was like pulling teeth that were still healthy, roots long and well-moored, just to get himself to say out loud, “There is a part of me that knows.”
“I said before I don’t care if you come home. I’ve changed my mind. I don’t want you to. Ever again.”
“You said that before but I just figured you were kidding around,” Merritt said. And when she didn’t say anything back, he added, “Are you kidding around this time too?”
“Turn yourself in. Check yourself into some kind of facility where they’re equipped to handle people like you. I don’t care. Just don’t come here.”
“Mom, please, I know you haven’t been feeling too good lately, so I understand that can make you kind of grouchy and persnickety, but why don’t we stop talking about this for right now and when I get home, you and me can sit down and we’ll—”
“Don’t come back here. I tolerated your presence because I didn’t know what you’d do if I threw you out. But with you gone now, and you finally admit what you did, you are certainly not welcome back in this home now. Lucky I don’t call the FBI on you.”
“Mom.”
“I’ll have the locks changed. If I see the motion-light come on over the garage, I’m calling the police. I’ll tell them you’re trying to break in and that you have a gun.”
“But I don’t own any guns. We sold off every one of dad’s rifles to help pay for his headstone, remember?”
“I found that bag in the basement. The one you probably thought you’d hid real well. I also saw that it’s gone now. You need guns with you going to a grocery store employees’ union meeting?”
“You know we can’t afford to be putting me up in nice hotels, so I got to stay in crappy ones in bad neighborhoods. I only brought them for self-defense, to stand my ground.”
“Got an answer for everything, don’t you?” she said. “Merritt, if you hurt someone while you’re out there and the police find out we had this conversation, they’ll put me down as an accomplice. Do you understand that? You saw how prison dealt with your father’s health problems, how he came out with worse lungs than he had when he went in. Do you think they’ll allow me to bring my cpap machine in with me, that I’ll be able to even get the same level of piss-poor care I’m getting now? No. That won’t happen. Me going to prison at my age, as sick as I am, would be the same as you taking one of those goddamn guns of yours and doing to me what – let’s just stop beating around this bush, it’s well past time – what you did to your father and big brother.”
