by Gareth Spark
I’d snatched her within a week of leaving Bar-L. Then I’d driven her to a deserted house on the banks of Loch Ard in the Trossachs. The hire car was parked out of sight and I had all I needed to exact my revenge.
Taking the hunting knife from its sheath at my waist I sliced through the cotton strip I’d gagged her with.
There was fear in her eyes as she looked at me wondering if she dare scream for help. I answered her unspoken question by letting out a scream of my own.
‘Scream all you want. There’s no one coming to help you.’ I sat on the other chair I’d brought and watched her as she tried screaming and yelling for help.
Five minutes later when she’d stopped shouting and started to sob instead, I spoke again. ‘Awful isn’t it when you are screaming for help and none comes.’
‘What are you gonna do with me, James?’ It was the first time she had spoken to me directly.
‘Well Diane.’ My voice was laced with anger as I too used a Christian name in deference to our one time familiarity. ‘What I’m gonna do is commit the crime I was wrongly imprisoned for.’
‘No! James, please no. I beg you.’
‘You beg me? You fucking beg me? Who do you think I begged when I was being sent down? Who do you think I begged when they came for me in the night? In the showers?’
‘I’m sorry. I was just angry about you flirting with that girl. I never thought you’d get jailed.’
‘How many times have you got to be told? She was my bloody neighbour and I wasn’t flirting.’ I was getting close to losing my temper so I started pacing round her, using the movement to cool my boiling blood.
‘Please let me go James.’ The desperation in her voice calmed me more than anything else, and I knew there and then that I would be able to carry out my plan without losing the plot and killing her.
‘When you’ve suffered the way I’ve suffered, I’ll let you go.’
Diane wept as she struggled against her bindings in another doomed attempt at breaking free. ‘My family are rich now. They can pay for you to have a new life in another country. If you let me go, I promise I’ll get them to set you up abroad.’
‘I’ve heard your promises before. You lied your pretty little head off in that courtroom. Your lies ruined my life. Besides, what’s the point in getting a new life when the old one has already been sentenced to death?’
‘I swear, James. Anything you want you can have.’
‘Can I have back the five years I spent in prison for a crime I didn’t commit? Can I have back my anal virginity? Can I have back the respect I lost as your lies poisoned the world against me?’ When she didn’t answer me I lifted her chin and stared into her eyes. ‘Do you honestly think I’ll ever believe a word you say to me?’
‘What are you going to do to me then?’ There was resignation in her tone.
Diane was a tough girl and it took a lot to shake her for any length of time. Now she had accepted the inevitability of her predicament, she was drawing on her internal strength to face whatever I threw at her. She was an intelligent woman and knew that there was a fairly decent chance that she could survive being raped by me without actually catching the dreaded disease.
As I watched her I could see her confidence grow as she compartmentalised her impending trauma.
‘I don’t believe you’ll do it, James.’ Her tone was a direct challenge. ‘You are not the kind of bloke who’d rape a helpless woman. I know you. You won’t be able to get it up when push comes to shove. Remember the time I let you tie me to the bed? It didn’t work then and it won’t work now.’
‘Yeah. That’s what I reckoned as well. But I’ve had a long time to plan this.’ I reached into my pocket and pulled out a blister pack containing two rows of little blue pills and a tube of lubricant. ‘D’you know what these are?’ Diane nodded once as her new found composure fell away.
I worked my mouth to generate some spit and then popped two tablets in my mouth and swallowed. ‘They take half an hour to really kick in so I’ve got time to get you ready.
‘Ready?’
‘Yes ready. I can’t possibly rape you when you are sat on your arse on a chair can I? You said I raped you vaginally which was a lie. I’m gonna show you the truth of how I was raped.’
‘Please don’t do this. Don’t be the man people say you are.’
‘I’m just gonna be the man you said I am. You’re the one who called me rapist. Nobody else. You. There was three months between you crying rape and me being sentenced. In that time my mother was spat at, shunned by lifelong friends and her home was covered with the vilest graffiti. The shame caused by your lies put my mother in an early grave.’
‘I’m sorry James. I never heard about her death.’ Diane was falling to pieces in front of my eyes and I could see that she was now terrified for her life. I could have spared her this worry but if I’m honest. I wanted her to worry. I wanted her to suffer the stress of terror as she awaited an unknown fate.
‘You caused it Diane. That viperous tongue of yours wrapped its way around her throat and tightened the lies until she could no longer breathe.’
I left her sobbing to get a table from the other side of the room. I pushed it across the floor until I had it butting against the far wall. It was a standard rectangular kitchen table. Five feet long by three feet wide with a leg at each corner. The only unusual thing about it was the large metal hoop I’d screwed to the table earlier.
I used my knife to slit her bonds and then held it at her throat with one hand while using the other to cable tie her hands to the hoop.
She tried kicking at me as I secured her legs to the table leg but I’d had a lot of time to work out lately and I could easily restrain her.
Diane was now bent forward over the table with her backside sticking up just as I planned it. It only took me a moment to remove her clothes with the help of my knife.
‘No. James, please stop. Don’t do this to me.’
I walked round the table to where she could see me and stripped off my own clothes so she could see my drug induced erection.
Pleas fell from her mouth unheard by my ears as I stood behind her. There was no contact between us but I could feel the heat coming from her bare skin.
‘DIANE! Are you ready for me?’
‘Pleeeeeaassse no. Don’t rape me. Pleeeeeaassse.’
‘Get ready, ‘cause I’m gonna start any second now. Or would you rather I killed you instead?’
Her voice when it came was a whisper. ‘Kill me. I’d rather die than be raped that way.’
‘What did you say?’
‘Please kill me, instead of raping me.’
‘Louder!’
‘PLEASE DON’T RAPE ME. KILL ME INSTEAD.’
I picked up my knife and carefully aligned it in front of her eyes. I wanted her to watch what I did next. Her eyes blinked uncontrollably as tears and stress poured forth. I was watching her eyes intently as they widened when I cut through the cable ties holding her arms and then legs.
‘Feel like that for five years and you’ll know what hell prison is for an innocent man.’
I had waited a long time for this day and when I’d seen her eyes admit defeat, I knew that the wait was over. I had finally shown her my perception of purgatory.
Once I was dressed I looked over to where she lay sobbing and left her with a final threat, ‘If you tell anyone what happened today, there’ll be a different ending next time.’
Graham Smith is married with a young son. A time served joiner he has built bridges, houses, dug drains and slated roofs to make ends meet. For the last eleven years he has been manager of a busy hotel and wedding venue near Gretna Green, Scotland.
An avid fan of crime fiction since being given one of Enid Blyton’s Famous Five books at the age of eight, he has also been a regular reviewer and interviewer for the well respected review site Crimesquad.com for over three years.
He has three collections of short stories available as Kindle downloads
and has featured in anthologies such as True Brit Grit and Action: Pulse Pounding Tales as well as appearing on several popular ezines. His first collection Eleven the Hardest way has been longlisted for a Spinetingler award.
Twitter - @GrahamSmith1972
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Graham’s own books
Gutshots: Ten Blows to the Abdomen
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Harry Charters Chronicles
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Eleven The Hardest Way
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Anthology Entries
Off the Record 2: At the Movies
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True Brit Grit
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Action: Pulse Pounding Tales
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Flashy Shorts
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By Walter Conley
Jose said, “I don’t want to drive you to Wyoming.”
“I need you to,” Alton said.
“I don’t want to.”
“I get that, Joe, but I don’t have a choice.” Jose hated the older man’s American nickname for him. “I can’t load that goddamn truck by myself. I can barely see to drive. I’m having a hard time just sitting up, talking to you like this.”
“So?”
“So, I’m in no shape to do much of anything.”
Alton shifted on his stool, creasing his suit between the rumples. He glanced around the bar. His hair, knotty and colorless, was plastered to his mottled skull, making his head look like something you might find knocking against a pier.
“Stay here, then,” Jose said.
“I can’t.”
“Rent a U-Haul.”
“I can’t.”
“Why not?”
“Long story. The only thing that matters is I have to be in Casper, Wyoming in two days.” Alton looked into his son-in-law’s dead brown eyes. It was slow, quiet and dark; the handful of other patrons were all loners, there to do nothing more than get fucked up and watch TV. “Come on, man. Please. I’m begging you, for crissake.”
“Don’t beg,” Jose said. “Pay.”
“I plan to. Believe me. I’ll make it worth your while.”
“And don’t swear at me like that anymore.”
“I won’t.”
Jose sipped his drink. He only drank Bloody Marys. He wore a sweatshirt over a button up pinstripe shirt with the collar folded outside. The sweatshirt was tucked into his pants, which were too big and fastened with a shiny belt. He had new boots on. Jose wore cloth gloves all the time in public, the white kind ladies wear to garden parties. He’d taken them off to drink. They were folded on the bar.
“What are we talking about?” Jose asked.
Alton wrote a number on the wet bar top with his finger. His hand trembled. He wiped his fingertip on the bar’s chipped edge as he withdrew it.
“Half up front,” Jose said, looking away.
“I can’t do that, either,” Alton said, “But the minute we get there, I’ll give you the whole thing. Cross my heart. We can stop at a bank first before we do anything else.”
Jose thought for a moment and said, “You’re not going to shoot me when we get to Wyoming, are you?”
“Shoot you?” Alton said, grinning. “No way, man.”
###
Jose shot Alton in a department store parking lot, fifteen miles into Wyoming. He told Alton that his head was killing him, which was true, from all the driving he’d done. He said he needed some aspirin.
“Please hurry,” Alton had said, giving him a five dollar bill.
“I will,” Jose said. Then he looked out the window past Alton’s head and whispered, “Holy shit…”
When Alton looked too, Jose pulled a throwaway revolver from his sock, held it behind Alton’s left ear and pulled the trigger. Alton slumped against the passenger’s door. A noxious odor filled the cab.
On the seat between them were an overcoat, Jose’s white cloth gloves, the knit cap and scarf Alton had brought to wear whenever they left the truck. Jose pulled everything on, thinking that he probably should have donned the gloves earlier. He rolled Alton to the floorboard. Where Alton had been sitting, there was an oversized atlas and all kinds of road trip garbage they hadn’t tossed out yet. He swept it off the seat onto Alton’s back. To passersby, Alton would appear to be a pile of dirty clothes and trash, which wasn’t too far from the truth.
Jose grabbed the canvas sack Alton had been using as a pillow, jammed between the passenger’s seat and door. He unzipped it. Inside, he found a paper sandwich bag full of cash, a hell of a lot more than Alton had promised him, which he slid into the inside pocket of his coat.
He sat there for a moment, listening to himself breathe. Victoria wouldn’t ask what had happened. He wouldn’t have told her anyhow. She knew that he was driving Alton to Wyoming and that was it. Neither of them could stand her father. If necessary, after Alton’s body was found, she would give him a solid alibi.
Jose left the truck, locking his door. He walked across the intersection, scarf around his face, gloved hands in the overcoat pockets to a busy gas station. He stood by the payphone, stamping his feet.
Thirty seconds later, a man pulled up in a Buick Skylark. He left the engine running, cranking the heater before he got out, then jogged into the store.
Jose slipped in and drove away.
###
He drove straight through to West Virginia. Every two or three hours, he stopped for coffee and over-the-counter speed. He was sweating so much that he only had to go to the bathroom once. He’d wanted to drive all the way home, but was so exhausted that he was seeing double.
Jose found a cheap hotel in the mountains. He paid with some of Alton’s cash. After a quick meal of convenience store donuts and a piping hot shower, he crawled into bed and passed out.
###
He awoke to the sound of a cleaning cart being rolled along the sidewalk. The clock on the night stand read 10:46. He’d been unconscious since yesterday afternoon. How many hours was that? Jose was too thick with sleep to figure it out. He did, however, realize the hotel would expect him to leave soon.
In no condition to drive yet, Jose threw his dirty clothes back on and stumbled to the office. A teenage boy with long hair and pouchy eyes stood at the desk.
“Can I get my room for another night?” Jose asked.
“That depends,” the clerk said, backing away.
“On what?”
“On whether or not you can pay for it.”
“What do I look like?” Jose said, laughing.
“I’d rather not say,” the kid told him.
###
That night, around eleven O’clock, Jose woke up again. The local news was on TV. Jose tucked an extra pillow behind his head. He was parched. In a few minutes, he thought, when his head cleared a little, he’d grab a soda from the machine.
He sat through the weather, sports and photos of viewers’ pets. At the end of the broadcast, a graphic showing crime scene tape and chalk outlines went up behind the anchorwoman.
She said, “More twists in today’s shocking Virginia homicide. Police in Louisa County are reporting that they now have substantial leads in the grisly fatal shooting of Victoria Sanchez.”
Jose’s jaw dropped as a photo of his wife appeared onscreen.
“It has now been confirmed that the body of Alton Vine, Sanchez’s father, was also discovered, earlier tonight, in the parking lot of a Wal-Mart in Greendale, Wyoming.”
Jose tried to swallow, but had no spit.
“One of Mrs. Sanchez’s alleged shooters was a
pprehended shortly after four O’clock this afternoon as he tried to cross the border into West Virginia,” the anchorwoman said. “According to the suspect, who police say is cooperating fully with them, the late Mrs. Sanchez was the target of a professional hit. The suspect and one other man, who police have identified as William Perry, of Casper, Wyoming, were reportedly hired to murder Sanchez if the woman’s father, the late Mr. Alton Vine, did not pay a substantial amount of money owed to an as-yet unnamed party in Wyoming by noon yesterday.”
Jose looked at the bag of money on the night stand, the cost of Victoria’s life, sitting there within reach.
Photos of Alton and another man, half his age, went up behind the anchor: the names below the faces read ALTON VINE and WILLIAM PERRY.
“Police are asking that anyone with information on the crime, or who may have seen either of these men, please contact them at one of the anonymous tip-lines at the bottom of the screen.”
The two photos were replaced by another. A full-screen shot of Jose, taken from the wall of his home. His dry lips moved as he read his own name.
“Police are also interested in speaking with the victim’s husband, Jose Sanchez, of Louisa, Virginia, whose whereabouts are currently unknown.”
Walter Conley got his start writing comic books and now writes for a variety of media. His short stories and poetry appear in anthologies, small press magazines and literary websites like Danse Macabre and Mad Swirl. Walter also does illustration and records original music under the name Katharine Hepcat. His latest print publication was the poem "black friday" in A Poet's View of Being. Forthcoming in 2013 are Crime and Horror E-books. You can find him at http://facebook.com/wconley2 and reach him at [email protected].
