by J K Ellem
The boat bobbed up and down in the gentle swell, the water black as oil. Apart from the winking light of an ocean buoy that she had passed a mile back, there were no other boats, the ocean calm and empty.
Olga looked back, a sparse line of lights outlining the coastline.
It would be deep enough here, and this is where the larger predators swam.
She carefully undid the rope, cut the cable ties then hoisted the body to the side of the boat, making sure the plastic sheet was still underneath. The rope she used again to tie the weight around the ankles. Most amateurs would just dump the body over the side, thinking that was enough, hoping the mouths to feed would find it quickly.
But Olga always made sure.
Taking her knife she scored the skin, drawing blood, before rolling the body over the side. It vanished out of sight. Within a day or two, there would be nothing left, just a length of rope attached to a lead weight on the bottom.
She tossed the plastic sheet overboard as well, doing her bit for the environment. The blood and any traces would be washed away in a matter of seconds. No one would pay any attention to another piece of garbage floating in the ocean.
She pulled out her cell phone, placed a call, saying only two words when it was answered. “It’s done.” Then she hung up.
It was a nice burial at sea Olga thought as she started the motor and headed back to the mainland.
Her job here was indeed done.
47
The problem with having too many choices is that it can take you an eternity to decide and pick one.
There was a retired software engineer who had made his money designing a new search engine algorithm that was touted to be the next Google. But he was too young. Not that she was too old. Some men these days preferred older women. A real woman, not some churlish girl who couldn’t hold a decent conversation without their face constantly glued to their cell phone.
A woman of experience, poise and class who knew how to please a man properly. She was all this and could be a lot more. Whatever was required.
The news articles said that he’d had a spate of young girlfriends who chased him like the little whore gold diggers that they were. All without success.
Perhaps he is looking to settle down now, find a real woman not some silicon bimbo airhead? Perhaps.
She clicked the mouse and opened up the shortlist folder on her laptop and scanned the contents again. A carousel of faces and places, bios and news articles, gossip and facts.
The mouse pointer finally settled on man whose bio she read numerous times. She kept being drawn back to him.
Yes, he sounded more promising and he liked golf as well. He owned several golf resorts in Hawaii and in Florida.
Wife recently died. Tick.
Worth more than a two hundred million dollars. Tick.
Still kept in good shape by the look of the recent photos of him in the business magazines. Tick.
No kids. Tick, tick, tick!
Him!
Margaret Brenner had made up her mind from the fifty candidates she had whittled down during the last six months. The golf resort millionaire would do nicely.
She closed the laptop, placed it in her travel bag next to the three packed suitcases that sat next to the bed. She had told the staff she was taking a short vacation abroad. To get away for a while.
Mexico would be her first destination. She had a wonderful plastic surgeon whom she paid cash to keep her looking young and beautiful. After several trips to his clinic and then a few days spent recovering by the swimming pool, she would be ready to tackle her next intended target.
And if nothing came of it? Who cares? There were plenty of fish in the ocean. There was no shortage of rich eligible men in the world.
Margaret had a figure in mind that she wanted to hit. Like mileage points on a loyalty program of greed, Edward Brenner could only get her so far. She needed others to make her goal. This time though she wouldn’t pick someone who had children. Abigail Brenner had been hard work and Margaret was nearly rid of her.
Abby wouldn’t be missed. Margaret just wished she had come up with the idea sooner. The ruse of playing the alcoholic, drug dazed, depressed mother had gone on for too long. Long bouts of hiding in her room, not leaving the estate, wearing disguises when she did. The time was well spent planning and implementing and convincing herself that, in the end, it would all be worth it.
It was a good thing Abby was a wild child. Dylan was going to give her a heroin overdose, make it look self-inflicted. Margaret smiled.
Like mother like daughter.
She checked her cell phone again. Dylan hadn’t texted her yet. Why was he taking so long? She hoped he wasn’t drawing it out like he’d done with his past acquaintances. She had told him specifically just to grab Abby and give her the overdose. The police would get suspicious if her body was battered and bruised as well.
Margaret was counting down the days. As soon as the three years were up in a few weeks’ time, she’d be long gone and so would all the money in the family bank accounts. Unbeknown to that doddering old fool Kerber, she’d hired another law firm in Boston. They were experts in estate law. They would expedite the court documents and the transfer of all the family money immediately into her offshore account once he was declared legally dead.
Margret never wanted to kill him. That was not part of the plan. Killing his wife, Alice had been hard enough for Margaret. She wasn’t a natural born killer. It was the son she spawned, Dylan, who was.
Edward Brenner would be left penniless and broke and emotionally ruined. His first wife, now his daughter? He wouldn’t have the courage, the mental state nor the finances to pursue her.
As soon as the money was transferred she would disown Dylan as well. He wasn’t privy to her final plans of where she was going. Dylan had outlived his usefulness. He was unstable, too. Prone to fits of aggression, his insatiable appetite for abusing women steadily growing worse.
No. This time she would find other means to dispose of her future husbands. There were also more than enough willing and capable young men in the world who she could manipulate into doing her bidding. Dylan was too much of a risk. He was a quick fix but that was all.
Margaret checked her cell phone again as she impatiently paced back and forth.
Still nothing.
She needed to catch her flight.
48
He reminded Shaw of the horrible pictures of people in the Nazi concentration camps.
Edward Brenner was in no condition to be moved. He needed the urgent medical care of a proper hospital, with doctors and nursing staff. He was on the brink of starvation. Whether that was self-inflicted or through the neglect of whoever was holding him prisoner, it didn’t matter. All that Shaw knew was that he needed to get help fast or the man would die.
Shaw pulled back the blanket and let out a gasp. It was an image of skin and bones and of severe malnutrition. He quickly covered him and checked his pulse. It was there, just barely, the breathing shallow.
Shaw bent down and touched the man’s forehead. “I’m going to get help for you,” Shaw said. “I’ll be back. I promise.”
There was a glimmer of hope in the man’s eyes as he looked at Shaw. A hand, fingers boney like a claw came out from under the blanket and took hold of Shaw’s wrist, willing him to stay, not to leave.
There was still strength in Edward Brenner’s grip. That was a good sign, Shaw thought. “I will be back Edward,” he said, “I promise. I will get you out of here.” Shaw slowly pried off the fingers and stood. And with that promise, Shaw left the cell.
Stopping at the storeroom outside, Shaw grabbed a spare flashlight and ran back to the circular landing platform. Metal gantries branched off into the darkness. Climbing the ladder back through the hatch to the surface wasn’t an option with the drone patrolling above. He had to find another way out. The tunnels had to link up at some juncture. He just needed to find out where that was.
Shaw picke
d one of the darkened tunnels and sped along it, the beam of the flashlight bobbing and weaving, his feet clanging on the steel mesh flooring.
The space narrowed before opening up into a channel of concrete rooms. Shaw paused. Anti-radiation suits, dusty and faded with age hung from racks with gasmask hoods. Shaw touched one. The material was thick and clumsy with heavy seams, metal cuffs, military issue, olive drab in color. The suit looked like something from the Cold War era, for nuclear, biological and chemical threats.
Most of the electrical wiring in the room had been ripped out, leaving only the switch panels and old gauges on the walls with big boxy housings, reminiscent of the old Bakelite material they used to make radio cases from.
Shaw kept going, past other rooms that he didn't bother looking into. The gantry spanned out across a small void before entering another passageway.
Twenty feet in Shaw pulled up, killed the flashlight. Up ahead he could see a corona of light, just a blurred ring, nothing harsh but emanating from the side of the wall.
Shaw eased forward towards the light, his fingers feeling along the wall, gentle deliberate steps, his rubber soles now silent on the diamond mesh. Something rode the air, the scent of antiseptic, cleaning bleach and something else Shaw recognized. His gut tightened.
His fingers curled around the side of the wall, the entrance of a room from which the dim light seeped. Shaw kept back in the shadows, assessing. He could hear movement inside, through the open doorway. Not voices, but quiet activity, and…humming? Someone was humming a tune to themselves, like they were enjoying the pleasantries of some mundane task.
Shaw took a breath, steadied himself then pivoted inside.
49
It was a scene reminiscent of Dante’s Divine Comedy. Everywhere Shaw’s eyes went he saw the collective efforts, the bitter concentration of one person’s failed attempt at humanity. The years, the pain, the hatred, the victims, the inhumanity, all of it reduced into one moment of mental footage that Shaw would never forget. It would be the plague of his nightmares for many years to come. What was seen couldn’t be unseen. He knew it. From this moment in his life until the day he died, Shaw was damaged.
Emotions bled out from him as he stood there. Confusion, disbelief, disgust, fear, anger, rage.
Dylan Cobb, crouched behind the camera aperture, turned his head slightly towards Shaw.
Shaw stood in the door of the chamber of horrors, his face aghast. He tried to speak but words failed him. Words would have failed any normal, sane human being.
Cobb spoke first, a deranged smile on his face. “Welcome.”
There was no journey to paradise here. Shaw’s eyes saw hell and purgatory with Dylan Cobb ruling over it.
Cobb stood up and turned fully to face Shaw. He was completely naked, head to toe. Pale skin, smooth as chiseled granite. A mosaic of defined muscle, intricate detail, painstakingly fashioned and laid down through years of disciplined exertion and vanity.
Shaw’s brain flickered between the images: Abby clothed but unconscious, stretched floor to ceiling. Cobb, the man he’d seen up at the Ballard mansion, posing god-like behind a video camera and tripod. A metal cage, open but with no animal inside. Other similar metal cages, same purpose, same function. An array of hideous tools and instruments perfectly aligned along a wall. Their shape left no doubt as to their intended purpose; not to heal, save and build. But to inflict damage, and destroy.
Shaw didn’t make a sound. No words. No questions. No need. He sprang forward, straight at Cobb.
Cobb moved, fingers gripped the tripod. Lifting it he swung it at the charging Shaw. Shaw ducked, the heavy apparatus passing within inches of his head. Cobb swung it back then hurled it at Shaw.
The tripod and camera hit Shaw in the side, knocking him back.
It gave Cobb enough time to retreat, back towards the work bench and his tools. Not content with just one weapon, Cobb grabbed two off the wall: a handcrafted Australian rawhide bullwhip and a German-made brain sectioning knife, 12 inches of molybdenum stainless steel with a non-slip handle.
He turned and came at Shaw.
The whip sang. The heavy plaited hide snaked out towards Shaw, unfurling in one fluid motion before flicking back with its distinct crack that sounded like thunder in the confined space. The whip was capable of stripping human flesh with one stroke, or breaking bones with several. Cobb could attest to both.
They circled each other, Shaw judging the reach of the whip, Cobb hunched down like a gladiator, the huge knife pointed forward, whip slithering at his feet like a living creature ready to strike again.
Shaw angled away from where Abby was strung up, drawing Cobb towards him and away from her.
Cobb obliged, pushing closer, crowding Shaw as he shuffled back. A morbid dance where only one could live.
Shaw slowed his breathing, controlled his initial rage, settling his mind to the task at hand. It was only then, when the rage eased and the room came fully into focus that he noticed Cobb’s arousal: a lance of bone hardness that swung side to side as he moved towards him. The man was truly demented.
The whip came again, a hissing arc, just missing Shaw’s head as it reached its zenith. The tip instead lashing a wooden post to Shaw’s right, leaving a mark in the timber. Another crack of thunder in its wake.
Cobb lunged, slashing the huge knife, trying to open up Shaw’s abdomen. Shaw retreated out of the knife’s range.
The whip came this time, it could reach further.
Shaw was ready, saw the movement before it happened, slid sideways, using the post for cover, then burst forward around it, blinding speed, away from the knife hand.
Cobb spun into Shaw as they came together, Shaw clamping his hands on each of Cobb’s wrists before he could bring either weapon around to bear.
They shuddered as one, forces straining, faces inches apart, hand to wrist, all locked up. Cobb tried to pull away. It was no good, Shaw’s grip vice-like. Two sets of eyes glared at each other, each man wanting to desperately kill the other.
Cobb was stronger, linear brute force. Shaw cleverer, using leverage and torque as he twisted and augmented Cobb’s limbs, blunting the man’s efforts to overpower him.
Enraged, Cobb shook his arms violently. Shaw twisted some more, bending Cobb’s ligaments and joints in ways they weren’t meant to be bent. Cobb snarled in pain, eyes wild, his face rippled with hatred, clenched teeth and spittle.
Bringing his knee up, Shaw aimed for the groin.
It was a feint. Cobb flinched suddenly trying to protect himself. It was enough. The grip on the knife loosened, Cobb’s fingers sweaty from the exertion. Shaw twisted, breaking Cobb’s wrist in the process before thrusting his hand up, freeing the knife. It spun upwards, and Shaw plucked it out of the air as the handle oriented towards him.
The blade arced low, this time in Shaw’s hand. It blurred across the front of Cobb, above the knees but below the pelvis, the reaping movement of a sickle harvesting crops. It sliced effortlessly through blood vessels, nerves and connective tissue.
Cobb screamed, releasing the whip. Something elongated and spongy also fell to the floor. Blood dripped then gushed from the wound.
Cobb was defenseless, both of his hands clutching at his groin, at nothingness, a void where something had once been. Cobb looked down in horror. Something limp and ugly lay at his feet. A part of him.
Still not content, Shaw dropped the blade and buried his fist into Cobb’s face, releasing all his anger in a single, brutal punch.
Cobb dropped like a carcass and didn’t move.
Abby was still unconscious, thankfully oblivious to what her fate could have been. After removing the restraints, Shaw laid her gently down, checked her all over then returned to where Cobb lay, broken and defeated.
As Shaw stood over him, Cobb stirred and let out a whimper. “Please don’t hurt me,” he sniveled, his face a bloody mess. Gone was the look of utter contempt, the arrogance of a man who for most of his adult life had preyed
on women. Drugging them, confining them, torturing, raping and eventually killing them. Dylan Cobb, in all his evil endeavors hadn’t encountered a half-decent male adversary, until now.
Cobb went to sit up but Shaw stood on his broken wrist and the man screamed hysterically. He had never felt true pain and suffering before.
Turning away in disgust, Shaw collected up the whip and the knife and placed them out of reach.
His eyes fell on the dog cage that Abby had been placed in.
50
“We found your son, Mrs. Brenner. He was in some sort of dungeon in the rocks under the Ballard Estate. Do you care to explain how this came about?”
Margaret Brenner sat in stony silence, her hands cuffed, a large police officer standing right behind her, another outside the door.
“He was bound and gagged, in a cage. A dog cage.”
Silence.
“We’ve taken him into custody but he, like you, is refusing to talk.”
More silence.
Dylan Cobb was under police guard in a hospital, after three hours spent in surgery. The surgeons couldn’t reattach his severed penis. It was too far gone. So they threw it in the bin.
“It’s a good thing we found so much incriminating evidence. Hundreds of hours of video footage he had personally taken. Himself in the frame most of the time, too. We are interviewing other women now as we speak. And then there is the contents of your laptop. Do you care to explain what we found on it?”
The woman conducting the interview opened a file box, withdrew a neatly stapled ream of paper, and slid it across the table.
Margaret Brenner averted her gaze, preferring to stare at the two-way glass on the opposite wall. Her eyes burned as though her hatred and contempt could melt through the glass and set on fire the people who stood on the other side watching.
The woman conducting the interview persisted. “That’s a list of more than thirty men, millionaires, industrialists, philanthropists, business owners and the like. There’s more on your laptop we found. Correspondence to a law firm in Boston, for example.”
