Ann Marie's Asylum (Master and Apprentice Book 1) (19 page)

“I didn’t threaten you. I don’t know where you got that idea.”

“I’m gonna tell him you threatened me and he is going to throw you in the ocean like those other people.”

“Listen,” the man went on, “I apologize for what I said about you and your mother but I was upset. Maybe there is some way we could settle this.”

“What do you mean?”

“How about five thousand dollars? I can write you a check right now. Let me just get my pen. I would feel a lot better about things and that way, we can put this whole evening behind us.”

“Your measly five thousand is nothing to us,” said Ann Marie. “Now take your poor ass and get the fuck out of here!”

“Then we’ll consider the matter closed, Dr. Bandini?”

“I said get the fuck out of here.”

The man got into his Maserati and fled.

Ann Marie drove home with her mom not waking or even stirring. Even with her hands shaking on the wheel, she managed to handle the freeways without screaming out loud or crying. At one point during the trip, an eighteen wheeler zoomed by at eighty miles and hour and she thought her heart had stopped. When she reached their driveway, she finally started crying, softly at first, then with a fury that could have easily been heard outside the car.

After a few minutes, she got herself together and tried to wake her mom up. It took a light slap to the shoulder before Lori Bandini finally stirred.

“What happened, baby?” Her mom asked, sounding peaceful and drowsy. “I was just talking to the nicest guy.”

...

Well after midnight that night, Ann Marie couldn’t sleep. Her mom was snoring and fight-or-flight chemicals from her earlier encounter were still slithering around in her veins. Each toss and turn in bed seemed to only make her more frustrated. She even slapped her pillow.

Leaving her mom snoring, she took the car keys and left. At first she thought she would only take a drive down the Pacific Coast Highway, but all she could think about was The Asylum and Dade Harkenrider. He hadn’t mentioned any plans about going into the tank or needing her help but he also didn’t say that she couldn’t visit him.

She found him reading in the lounging chair he kept in his lab. It had to be the only piece of furniture he had fit for a human being. Before she got very close, he had already dropped the botanical journal he was reading. “What’s wrong?” He asked her as he rose from the chair like a king cobra.

Taking a moment, she considered lying to him. However, with the way his eyes studied every muscle, she came to the decision that the effort was destined for failure. “How did you know?” She asked.

“Facial expression, redness around the eyes and...”

“And what?”

“The smell. Fear.”

“Yuck,” she said. “Are you telling me I smell bad?”

“No. Stop being silly. It’s a chemical. I detected it.” He asked more forcefully this time, “What’s wrong?”

“Some asshole grabbed me,” she blurted to her immediate relief. She didn’t understand why but it felt like the greatest comfort of her life to tell him.

“I see,” he said sounding almost mechanical. He looked her over. “Are you injured in any physical way?”

“I just got my hair pulled. I’ve had worse happen to me back in Philly. The worst part was that he called us
trash
and said that my mom was desperate and
lonely
.”

“You said asshole. Does that mean man?”

“Yes,” she said nodding. “A real flashy guy.”

“I see. Do you have any other information? Perhaps you have a skin scraping or some of his hair? We could get some DNA and do PCR. Everyone’s in the database now. Well, everyone except me.”

She just stood there looking at him because she didn’t know what it would mean to tell him.

“What is it?” He asked her.

“He works for the corporation.”

“I see.”

“There are thousands of employees,” she started to argue. “I don’t think you could ever find him. I just wanted to talk to you about it.”

“We’ve discussed it. Now it’s time for action,” he told her. With just a few questions, Dade managed to home in on the man’s age, hair color and most importantly it turned out, the color and make of his car. Dade went to his computer, hammered on the keys like a mechanical marvel, and within moments had a photo up on the screen. “This the asshole?” he asked her.

Again, she paused in the middle of the decision to admit it to him. “Yes!” came out like the flood from a collapsing dam. “Yes that’s the fucking prick!”

“Stay here,” he ordered her. “His address is close, right on the hill. It won’t take me long.”

“No,” she started to argue. “It wasn’t that bad. You’re just going to say something to him. Right?”

“He’s going to say something to you. He’s going to apologize. Meet me in the front of the lab in fifteen minutes.” He got up and disappeared out the door.

Ten minutes later, Bright blue-white light from Asylum One’s headlamps came up the cliff road and poured into the parking lot. Dade had only been gone a short time. Ann Marie wondered if that meant he couldn’t find the man. All her questions were put to rest the moment when the blonde-haired executive came tumbling out of the back of the truck and landed on his hands and knees. He was crying harder than he had made Ann Marie. The sight made her gasp.

“Told you it wouldn’t take long,” Dade said in quite a matter-of-fact way.

“Please God. Please God,” the executive said. “I just made a mistake. It wasn’t that bad. I don’t deserve whatever you’re going to do to me.”

Harkenrider grabbed him by the hair and suspended him in the air. His scalp started to ooze blood into the blonde hair. He carried him over to Ann Marie and dropped him down like a cat with a gift kill. “How do you know,” Dade asked him, “what I’m going to do with you?” He shot a chilling smile at the businessman. “Maybe you’ll apologize to my colleague and the matter will be closed. How do you know I’m going to do something horrible to you?”

The man sobbed so hard that it made his words difficult to understand. “B...B...Because,” he said. “I know who you are. You’re Dade Harkenrider.”

“Apologize,” Dade ordered the man.

“I’m so sorry,” he appealed to Ann Marie while on his hands and knees. He sounded perfectly genuine. “I was awful to you and there is no excuse for what I did. I’m so sorry. Can you forgive me?”

Before she could answer, Dade lifted him over his head like a powerlifter with a truck tire. He started walking toward the cliff.

“What are you doing?” Ann Marie asked.

“There isn’t any sense in keeping something like this around. It’s dangerous.”

“I’m a god damned human being!” the executive shouted. “I just made a...” he said before it faded into sobbing. “Mistake!” he finally shouted. “I don’t want to be like the others. Please. Don’t make me like the others!”

“What are you going to do?” Ann Marie asked as though the whole walk-to-the-cliff was part of some act. She thought maybe this was part of some negative reinforcement and he would let the man go any second. She asked again, “What are you going to do? Throw him off the cliff like a stone?”

“Of course,” Dade told her as he hurried his pace toward the cliff. “It’s great for the ecosystem. The fish and crabs are gonna love this guy.”

“You can’t do this!” she told him. “There are laws! It’s wrong!”

Dade stopped, still holding the man high in the air like he weighed nothing. “What laws are you referring to?” He asked. “Laws of physics? Laws of nature? Or do you mean the laws of a primitive society that don’t apply to me?”

“I have a family,” the man pleaded. “A wife and a daughter. Please don’t make me like the others.”

“I’ll make sure your wife and child receive full financial support from the corporation,” Dade told him in a way that was meant to be reassuring. “They probably won’t miss you and they’ll probably be better off.” He started carrying the man to the cliff with Ann Marie following.

“So you’re not gonna inject me with something?” The man asked as his sobbing took on a different character, a relieved one. “You’re not going to make me like the others.”

“You’re thinking of someone else,” Dade said as he got close to the cliff.

“Wait! Please!” The businessman cried out. “I can help you. I know some things. Just please listen to me!”

“What interesting thing can
you
possibly tell me?”

“I’ve heard things,” the businessman said. “I’ve heard something is going down at the highest levels of the company. I know that Bernard Mengel is involved...And...And...some woman. They’re planning something.”

“Thanks for the tip.”

Dade threw the man so high into the air that it reminded Ann Marie of the circus. After a second or two of shrill screeching, the man and his screams disappeared into the surf below.

Ann Marie, who had spent the past few moments totally stunned, finally blurted out, “No!”

“That’s a little late,” said Dade as he started to walk back to the lab.

She wound up and punched him in the shoulder. Dade didn’t react but it hurt Ann Marie’s hand. “How could you do that!” She shouted, backing away like he was a dangerous reptile. “You’re a murderer! They’re going to put you away!”

“I know that seemed cruel,” Dade stopped and told her. He paused for what seemed to her like a long time, so long that she noticed the smell of the tropical breeze and heard some small animal climbing around in the bushes. “Maybe it was cruel but I point out that it was likely a very quick and painless death. It’s a hundred and ten foot drop from that cliff.”

The man’s last scream as he saw the ocean racing toward him echoed in her ears. She turned away from him. “I can’t believe you did that,” she said. “He didn’t deserve that.”

Dade spoke plainly while she kept her back turned to him. “A full grown man with the full power of money and the law grabs a young girl, half his size, by the hair. What sort of use is a man like that to anyone? Do you think the revolting things he said to you were chosen by accident? No. He chose them to injure you psychologically in addition to assaulting you physically. That thing wasn’t human. It was a predator. Predators like him are often pathetic but that doesn’t mean they aren’t dangerous.”

Ann Marie slowly turned around and met his eyes.

Dade continued, saying, “Humans have too hard a time with these predators if you ask me.”

“Again. You say that like you’re not one of us.”

“It’s hard to explain,” he said.

“Before you threw him over,” she began to inquire, “he said he didn’t want to be like the others. What does that mean?”

“He had me confused for someone else. I’ve never done anything worse than killing someone.”

“So you’re admitting to other murders too?”

“I don’t know what to say, Ann Marie.”

“I want you to let me take a trip in the tank,” she said.

“Where did that come from?”

“I’m tired of you keeping everything from me. I don’t want to be a helper. I want in.”

“You’re not going into that tank,” he told her. “Don’t waste your time trying to convince me.”

“Bernard said you were holding out on me.”

“Oh he did,” said Dade, smirking. “Well, if the honorable Bernard Mengel says it, then it has to be true.”

“I just saw you commit murder,” she said as she crossed her arms across her chest. She looked like she was holding the trump card to win the argument. She told him, “I would be careful.”

“Why? Are you going to tell on me?” He didn’t wait for her to respond before he went on. “You’re amazing, kid. It takes some nerve to threaten your boss, especially after you just witnessed that boss throw an important man off a cliff. You must feel pretty safe around me. It’s odd because I find most people seem to be afraid of me. I rather like it that way.”

“I know you won’t hurt me.”

“How can you be so sure?”

She struggled to come up with an answer. “I don’t know,” she finally said. “I just know. Call it intuition.”

“Teenagers,” said Dade. He rolled his eyes and started to walk back to the lab.

“Wait,” she said, catching up to him. “Shouldn’t we call the police?”

“Why?”

“Shouldn’t we come up with some sort of story?” She asked, looking in the direction of the cliff and surf below. “You could say he fell.”

He stopped and faced her. “But you’re a witness. What do I do about you?”

“I won’t say anything. I’m on your side,” she said. “I promise.”

Dade studied her face in the moonlight. He seemed almost touched by the gesture and didn’t know what to say at first. He finally said, “I kicked down the door of the man’s home and dragged him out, kicking and screaming, right in front of his wife and little girl. Both of them and several neighbors saw me throw him into a rather distinctive six-wheeled vehicle and drive off. I don’t think I was stealthy enough to avoid attention.”

“Then the police are probably coming for you already.”

He started laughing in a quite pleasurable way. “You’re the greatest, kid!” he said like he had heard the best punchline. “That really would be something. I honestly hope they do stop by. It’s been a while.”

...

Later that night, when she made it home, she found her mother sleeping on the couch with an infomercial playing on the television. The volume was at a jarring level and probably audible to the neighbors. Ann Marie shut it off and her mom sprung immediately to red-eyed life.

“Where you been?” Lori asked as she started to yawn. “Why did you go back out?”

“It’s nothing. I’m fine.”

Lori opened her eyes wide and rolled them around in the sockets to wake up. She sat up and rubbed the sleep from the corners of her mouth. “If it was nothing,” she asked, “why are you back so late?”

“I was working. I was busy.”

“I remember the nice guy at the bar. I remember you driving us home several hours ago. Then I remember you going back out very late. Why? What happened?”

“I’m not answering all this!” Ann Marie started to shout. She surprised herself with intensity of the outburst and tried to get under control. “Listen, Mom,” she said. “I don’t want to talk about what happened tonight. Not now. Not ever. I think that I do enough for our family to earn a little bit of privacy. Don’t you think?”