by C. A. Shives
“Do you know why I’m here?” Herne asked.
McNeil’s voice dropped to almost a whisper, and Herne felt a thread of disgust at the man’s actions. Coward, he thought. But he swallowed the distaste that gathered in the back of his throat. Elizabeth’s face flashed through his mind, and Herne hated the knowledge that he was guilty of his own cowardice.
“Yes,” McNeil said. “But my wife is inside the house. Is there a place we can discuss this privately?”
“My house. Be there in fifteen minutes.”
Herne didn't bother to wait for McNeil to respond. He turned and left.
~ ~ ~ ~
McNeil's hair had thinned to the point that Herne could see the shimmer of perspiration on his scalp, even though the temperature inside the house was cool. Herne preferred the heat of a wood stove to the fake electric heat in his home, and it was not quite wood burning season yet.
“May I have a drink?” McNeil asked as he slumped in one of the wobbly kitchen chairs, the wood creaking beneath his weight.
Herne reached for the bottle of Jack Daniels in his cabinet. A temptation that, most days, he could resist.
McNeil gulped his drink in two swallows, then placed the empty glass on the table. The shake of his hairy fingers stopped as the calming effect of the booze did its job.
“I loved her, you know,” McNeil said. His met Herne's gaze, then his blue eyes drooped like a pathetic, lost dog. “I mean, I still love her. Charlotte. She's special.”
“What was so special about her?” Herne asked.
“I've never known anyone like her. She's probably the smartest person I've ever met, but there's nothing pretentious about her. She's completely grounded. With Charlotte, what you see is what you get. I work with a lot of doctors and medical professionals. I see a myriad of pompous people on an everyday basis. Charlotte was as smart as most doctors—maybe even smarter—but she wasn't a snob.”
“What kind of work do you do?” Herne asked.
“Right now I'm a full-time student, studying to be a Physician Assistant. I'm currently completing my surgical internship. Long hours, rotating shifts. It's not easy.” McNeil paused. “May I have another drink?”
Herne poured the bottle again, and for the first time in a long time he felt the urge to have a drink. Just one taste. Just one sip.
“She used to joke about all the time I spent with beautiful nurses. She had a great sense of humor. She made me laugh like no one else. She never had anything to worry about, though, with the nurses. Charlotte was the most beautiful woman I knew. I never understood what she saw in a slouch like me.”
Herne didn't understand it either. McNeil was muscled, like a man who spent plenty of time at the gym. But Herne could see what lurked beneath the exterior. The man in front of him wasn’t strong. He was weak. Soft. Boring. “Maybe she was interested in the prospects of your future income,” he said.
McNeil glanced at him, his eyes flashing. Then the flash was replaced by a small smile. “You didn't know Charlotte, so I can understand why you might believe that. But Charlotte was the least materialistic person I knew. And the most giving. She was a philanthropist by nature. The kind of person who gives a homeless guy all the cash in her wallet, even if it means she has to skip lunch that day.”
McNeil gulped the rest of his drink. “I can't really believe she's gone,” he said. “Charlotte was a firecracker. She was the type of person who would go down swinging. If she'd been on a plane that was headed for a crash, she'd grab the controls even though she didn't know the first thing about flying. Not me, though. I'm the kind of guy who'd be sitting with his head between his legs, kissing his ass good-bye.” His bittersweet smile seemed tainted by a blanket of nostalgia. “I never knew anyone stronger than Charlotte.”
“You talk as if she's dead,” Herne said.
“She's missing, right?” McNeil said bleakly. “There's no trace of her except her car, according to the news. I know Charlotte. Probably better than her husband knows her. She would never go anywhere without telling me first.”
“How long have you two been having an affair?” Herne asked.
“About a year,” McNeil answered. He buried his head in his hands, his voice muffled. “God, has it been that long? It feels like just yesterday when we first kissed.”
“How did you meet?”
“Well, we first met in high school. But we weren't really friends back then and we didn't stay in touch with each other after school. Then we bumped into each other at a charity event. She was the most beautiful woman in that room. There was a spark between us, and before we knew it, we were in love. We both knew it was wrong, but there was nothing we could do to control it.”
Herne thought about the fire in his own life. The sizzle of electricity that surged when he saw Elizabeth. He understood about sparks.
“Hurricane's a small town. We had to be discreet. Sometimes we managed to slip away for a night in another city somewhere. Mostly, though, we just loved each other from a distance, and tried to manage both our affair and our marriages.”
“Why didn't you just leave?” Herne asked. “Why didn't you divorce your spouses?”
“I have a child with my wife, Mr. Herne. A son named Noah. And a boy needs a father, not a part-time dad. I suppose, too, part of me still loves my wife. She's a good woman who has always treated me with kindness and respect. I don't want to hurt her. I just fell in love with Charlotte, too.”
Herne's upper lip curled into a snarl. He knew, now, what type of man McNeil was. The type of man who wanted to keep his nice little family while enjoying another woman on the side. The type of man who wanted to have his cake and eat it, too. The type of man who would sacrifice nothing for anyone, because he was too selfish to surrender his own comfort.
The type of man Herne despised.
I've sacrificed everything, Herne thought. My job. My wife. My life. But this man keeps everything he has in a globe of protection.
A globe that Herne intended to shatter.
Herne growled, his voice husky with contempt. “Did Charlotte threaten your happiness?” he said. “Did she threaten to tell your wife the truth? To reveal your secret? Is that why you killed her?”
McNeil's eyes widened and he leaned back, his hands in the air in a protective gesture. “No,” he stammered. “I didn't kill Charlotte! I loved her.”
“Did she leave you for another man? Did she find someone else who wasn't a selfish coward? Did you kill her because she finally realized what you really are, and decided she needed a real man instead?”
McNeil pushed back from the kitchen table and stood, towering tall in the room. His muscles shook with tension. “No!” he protested. “I didn't kill Charlotte. How could you accuse me of something like that?”
Herne snarled, enjoying the fear and confusion that passed over McNeil's face. “If you become a suspect in this case,” he said, “I'll invade your life. Your privacy. Your world. You'll discover quickly that the little protective bubble you maintain is nothing more than an illusion.”
McNeil dropped his hands and his shoulders slumped like a man defeated. “You may not believe this, Mr. Herne, but I don't really care. I'd give up everything if you could find Charlotte. I'd do anything to see her again.”
“If you have something to tell me—something I need to know—tell me now. Don't hold anything back, or I'll bury you.”
McNeil shook his head. “There's nothing else. Nothing else I can tell you.”
Herne heard the lie in the man's voice. He knew McNeil was hiding something. And he intended to find the truth.
CHAPTER 6
NOVEMBER 4 – SUNDAY NIGHT
The sunlight had faded to shadows, and now the basement was pitch black. Charlotte could see nothing.
She felt her way to the thin mattress on the floor and sat, her back stiff and straight.
She didn't know what Trout had planned for her, but she could guess. She’d seen the glint in his eye when he spoke to her, amuseme
nt tinged with anger, and she feared the anger would be his driving force. She tried to remember what she had done—what crime she had committed—that had created the deep seated resentment that seemed to sear through his soul.
But she could only remember vague snatches of the past, like scenes from a movie she'd watched once and then forgotten. Trout had not been part of her social circle, and most of Charlotte's high school memories were wrapped up in a package of trying to maintain her popularity amid catty cheerleaders and immature boys.
She'd been alone for hours, her muscles clenched with terror and frustration. Exhaustion overcame her, and she curled on the mattress, feeling its hard springs pressing into her soft flesh. Tears seeped from her eyes—the first tears she'd allowed to fall—as she drifted off to sleep.
~ ~ ~ ~
Her eyes sprang open when he touched her foot, and she jumped to her feet. His white teeth flashed beneath the dim basement light when he smiled. “Are you enjoying the accommodations?” he asked.
“Simply lovely,” she said between clenched teeth. “I'll be recommending this place to all my friends.”
He chuckled and moved away from her. He held a folding chair in his hand, and he opened it before sitting on it. Then he simply stared at her, his eyes never leaving her face. Flustered at the scrutiny, Charlotte said, “I'm afraid I spoiled your pristine bucket, however,” she said, gesturing to the plastic pail in the corner. “I suppose when it gets full I'll have to find a place to empty it. On your head, perhaps?”
Trout chuckled again. “You won't be here long enough to fill that bucket with your piss and shit,” he said.
Terror wormed its way through her heart at his words. But she knew that panic would only paralyze her, so Charlotte tried to ignore the chill that shivered through her body. “Oh no?” she asked. “And I thought this was going to be an extended vacation.”
Trout's eyes grew dark and serious as he leaned forward on the folding chair. “I've been planning this a very long time, Charlotte. A very long time. Now that everything's set in motion, it will all come together quickly. So you and I don't have a lot of time together. But I plan to enjoy every moment of it.”
She couldn't stop herself from speaking. Couldn't prevent the tremor of her voice, even though she hated her fear. “What are you going to do to me?”
“Only the same things you did to me.”
She threw up her hands in an exasperated motion, wondering if she could reason with him. Wondering if there was still a shred of humanity left within his soul. “Trout, I don't remember doing anything to you. I barely remember you.”
Her heart squeezed at the glittering of his eyes, and she realized that she would not be able to reason with him. Because there was no way to reason with the insane.
When he spoke, she could hear the hiss of resentment. “Well, I remember you. You're the one who told everyone that I had fish lips. I carried the nickname Trout throughout all of high school. Your asshole boyfriend, Gabe Vanderbilt, used to torment me just for fun.”
Charlotte shrank from the venom in his voice. “I don't remember calling you fish lips. And Gabe wasn't my boyfriend. He was a jerk back then, and he's a jerk now. I went to prom with him, but I never dated him.”
Trout appeared not to hear her. “I guess you don't remember that day on the soccer field. Do you, bitch? The day I had to kiss Gabe's ass. Remember that?”
She did. The memory suddenly seared itself in her mind, as vivid and bright as the day it happened. The final bell had rung, signaling the end of the school day. She'd wandered to the soccer field with the rest of the cheerleaders, waiting for practice to begin. The soccer team kicked a few balls around the field, telling jokes about girls and laughing about forgotten homework assignments. Trout had been walking by the field—probably on his way home—when one of the boys grabbed him. They wrestled Trout to the ground, shouting insults about his lips, his clothing, his body. He'd been whip thin then. Barely a wisp of a person. And the stronger, bigger boys had easily overpowered him.
“He's got lips made for kissing ass,” Gabe had shouted.
Then one of the boys—maybe Matt Montgomery—had twisted Trout's arm behind his back, forcing the thin boy to his knees. Gabe had dropped his pants and waved his hairy ass in the air, cooing and inviting their victim to kiss it.
Trout had refused, until his arm was twisted even further behind his back. Matt thrust Trout's face toward Gabe's body and continued to apply pressure on his arm until the thin boy relented, planting a puckered kiss on Gabe's posterior.
It was a scene from her past that Charlotte had forgotten.
Trout, however, had not forgotten.
And Charlotte realized that he also had not forgiven.
“I didn't have anything to do with that,” she protested. “I wasn't involved.”
“You were involved, bitch,” he snarled. “You're the one who got me nicknamed Trout. You started it all. Until then, I was flying under the radar. No one noticed me. No one thought about me. The minute you mentioned my lips looked like a fish, I got noticed. You and your asshole friends made me a target after that. The butt of every joke. I hated myself and my life. And I hated you, too.”
“It was kid stuff,” she said. “Maybe I should have been more sensitive. But I was just a kid.”
“Yeah, a little privileged rich bitch,” he said. “My family was dirt poor. You made fun of my clothes. My hair. My shoes. My parents couldn't afford to buy the fancy shit that you and your friends had. Sometimes the only supper we'd eat would be whatever fish I could catch in Paver's Creek. But you were too busy living in your own little world to even imagine what mine might be like. All you saw was a nerd. A geek. A spindly little twerp who made a good target. Well, there's nothing little about me now.”
He was right. His broad shoulders and thick thighs seemed enormous on the cheap folding chair. She could see the strength in his fingers and the muscles that flexed beneath his shirt.
“After high school, you assholes forgot all about me. But I didn't forget about you. I went to the gym. I got my job. And now I'm a different man.”
“You've carried this grudge for all these years?” Charlotte asked. “But you must have seen the kids from our class from time to time. Hurricane is a small town. Why didn't you approach one of us? Why didn't you tell us you were still angry?”
Trout threw back his head and laughed, his voice booming in the empty room. “Why would I warn you? Oh, no. I had no intention of letting any of you know what I had planned. It was better to act as if high school was a lifetime ago, and all was forgotten. I didn't want an apology from you. I didn't want to hear your remorse.”
“What do you want?” she asked.
Her skin went clammy at his response. “Revenge, bitch. Payback.”
He stood up and moved toward her, and she shrank from him, her back against the cold cement wall. “Stay away,” she hissed.
He laughed again. “You're in no position to give orders,” he said. “Take off your clothes.”
“No.”
His eyes narrowed. “Things will be easier on you if you learn to follow orders.”
She shook her head defiantly, wrapping her arms around her body. In an instant he was upon her, pushing her onto the mattress. She struggled, striking out with her hands and scratching with her fingers. Charlotte shrieked, pushing against his weight and kicking with her legs. But she was no match for his size and strength. He flipped her onto her back and straddled her, holding both of her wrists above her head in one of his large hands. The other hand held a knife, thin and sharp and long.
“Are you going to rape me?” she whispered.
“Oh, I have plenty of plans for you,” he said. “But I'm not going to rape you. Not yet.”
He lifted the bottom of her sweater and pressed the tip of the knife against her stomach. She felt the sting of its sharp point on the softness of her flesh, and she gasped again when the knife drew blood. He’s going to cut me open, she thought
. He’s going to slice right through me and spill my guts onto this cheap, dirty mattress. Panic coursed through her veins, coating her mouth with the metallic taste of fear. Charlotte was unable to stop the dry sob that escaped from her mouth.
“Stop being so dramatic,” he complained. “I barely cut you. I just want you to know what I'm capable of. And I want you to have a little taste of what's in store for you. A sneak peek of things to come.”
He slowly slid the knife over her sweater, shredding the yarn with the sharp blade. With a quick tug he pulled the garment off her body, leaving her clothed in just her bra and jeans.
“You have a choice,” he sneered. “You can remove your pants yourself, or I can cut them off of you. And, if I cut them, I can't make any promises that I won't cut you, too. And I'd hate to think I might damage some of your good parts.”
He stood and released her from the weight of his body, backing away slowly.
Charlotte sat upright, hating the feeling of vulnerability that came when she was lying supine in front of him. She gathered her strength, forcing her emotions under control. Panic won’t save you, she thought.
Her eyes narrowed and she pressed her lips into a thin line.
“I always knew you were a pervert, Trout,” she said. “That's probably the reason you never had a date in high school.”
His hand shot out so quickly that she didn't have time to react, its stinging slap against her face sending her head backwards with a jerk. For the first time, Charlotte understood what it meant to see stars.
“Shut up, slut,” he said. “Take off those pants or I'll cut them off for you.”
Charlotte unzipped her jeans and slid them down her legs, leaving her clad in her plain bra and panties. Trout's gaze traveled up and down her body. Disgusted, she saw an erection growing in his pants.
He leered at her, his thick lips curled into a small smile. “You still have a hot body after all these years, bitch,” he said. “You used to flaunt it all the time in that little cheerleader skirt, showing off your legs and ass. But you're done showing it off. By the time I'm finished with you, no one is going to want to look at you.”
