Bite Me (Devlin Haskell 3) (9 page)

Fortunate
ly, the paint Gary
had tossed on the wall was thick and relatively fresh, it literally peeled off in big sections. I had it all removed within a half hour, including the stuff on Kiki’s woodwork and hardwood floor. I rolled the wall, then rummaged around in the basement and found a can labeled bedroom trim that looked about right and tried it. It matched perfectly. By two-thirty the place looked great and you couldn’t see Gary’s mess or any telltale signs of my spray painting.

I put everything
away in the basement, tossed her paint brush in the trash since I hated cleaning the things and opened a beer from Kiki’s refrigerator. I was sitting at her kitchen counter sipping it when she came in.

“You had better
be finished in that damn bedroom if you’re sitting on your ass out here drinking one of my beers.”

“Go see for yourself.” I said
.

She came ba
ck three or four minutes later a different person.

“Dev, thanks, it looks great. I’m sorry I was so bitchy, but you can see how it would make anyone
wild. I mean, what were you thinking? That Gary person is crazy, absolutely nuts.”

“No argument from me,” I said, thinking
Gary’s not the only one.

“Stay for dinner?”

A little voice inside my head warned me to leave, right now for my own safety, just run.

“Look, let me fi
nish this beer, then run out and replenish your gin supply, grab a shower. What was it Gary drank up?”

“Bombay
Sapphire,” she said.

It figured
, expensive stuff. I finished my beer, raced home to shower, then returned with a fifth of Bombay Sapphire, a fifth of Jameson and a case of beer.

“Wow, how long you planning to stay?” she joked.

“How long can you stand me?”

“Long enough to teach bad puppies new tricks,
” she giggled.

Oh, oh, I thought
and then tossed my Saints cap on a kitchen stool and poured myself a Jameson.

I would like to brag and say we had sex before and after dinner, but we never ate, at least that I c
an recall. Kiki insisted on being ‘hostess with the mostess’ as she referred to herself and kept my drink glass full and the sex nonstop.

I groaned awake sometime
just before noon the following day. I was tied to her bed, unable to move. She was leaning against the door frame, sipping coffee. Her hair was pulled back tightly. She was wearing a black garter belt and sporting a matching black eye.

“Oh God,” I groaned and
then blinked a couple of times as I attempted to focus and think.

“How’
s the head, bad doggie?”

“God, its pounding, feel
s like it’s going to explode. What the hell is this?” I asked pulling against the restraints, they looked like nylons.

“I don’t know, when you want to get kinky I guess you go all out. You made me do it.”

“Made you?”

She brushed her cheek, tenderly.

“What happened? I, I didn’t do that. Did I?”

She nodded, casually sipped more coffee.

“Said it was just the beginning then really worked me over. I’ve never been treated like that before.”

“Look
Kiki, I, I’m not sure what to say, how much did we drink last night?”

“You drank quite a bit, got really rough, you had me frightened
, well and excited.”

“That just doesn’t sound like me, I don’t know what… Look, if it’s not too much trouble, could you untie me?”

“You’re not going to do anything crazy are you?” She said it dead pan, almost like a memorized joke, but I wasn’t laughing. She climbed onto the bed, straddled me for a long moment looking down before she began to untie me, I looked away.

“Oh, so now you’ve had your fill, I get it.”

“Kiki, I hit you? Are you sure? I just have never, ever done anything like that. Are you sure?”

“Oh yeah, it was really scary,” she said as she untied my arm, but she didn’t look scared.
She didn’t even seem concerned, she almost gave the impression of just going through the motions.

She climbed off me, ran her nails down my chest and stomach,
raising welts on my skin. Then she groped me for a long moment, before she ran her nails hard, along the length of my thighs.

“Ouch, hey don’t,” I cried out.

Okay, suit yourself, tough guy,” she said, before reluctantly rolling off the bed.

I sat up,
untied the black hosiery from my ankles.

“God my head is killing me,
it’s really pounding.”

“Look
bad puppy dog, how about a long shower, I’ll get breakfast going for us, take thirty minutes in the shower, you’ll feel a thousand percent better.”

“
Kiki, I’m so sorry. I don’t know what to say. Maybe I should just go and let you get…”

“No,
no, don’t do that. I want to cook you breakfast, serve you, go on, promise me you’ll stay in there for a half hour, you’ll feel lots better.”

“But your eye, I mean, God I just can’t believe I…”

“Not another word or I’ll tie you up again and keep you for the rest of the day. Come on,” she said slapping me across the butt, “get going, I’m making breakfast.” She strutted out into the hall, gave a quick seductive smile over her shoulder then headed for the kitchen.

I’d been in the
shower for some time. Not the half hour Kiki suggested, but at least twenty minutes. The air in the room was steamy, moisture running down the mirror. I felt a little better, but still had a long way to go. I was confused, still a little dizzy and mortified about her black eye. I had never done anything like that in my life. It just didn’t make sense. But, then, neither did the complete black out or making her tie me up. Something just didn’t seem right.

I was trying to remember something, anything from the night before and failing miserably when there was a knock on the bathroom door. God, the poor thing w
as probably bringing me coffee.

“Momen
tito, my precious,” I called, trying to be funny.

I turned off the shower, grabbed a towel and wiped my face, then went to open the door thinking I may have really misjudged her. Amazing how sometimes you can get off on the wrong foot.

“Hey gorgeous, you’ve got…”

The jolt from the offic
er’s Taser gun knocked me to the floor. Writhing around on a wet, ceramic tile floor in electronic shock as thousands of volts jolted through my body did nothing to help matters.

When I stopped sizzling three of them were on me
, one stomped my right hand, I was pretty sure he broke a couple of fingers, but that was the least of my problems. Someone was sitting on my head, not Kiki, while another pulled both arms up behind my back and pinched on a pair of handcuffs. There was a lot of yelling from the hallway and the bedroom. Somewhere a woman was screaming. I was attempting to breathe after being tasered, hyperventilating.

“Bring that bastard out here,” someone yelled.

I was pushed and pulled out the bathroom door. Someone bounced my head off the door frame. A knee narrowly missed its target and slammed into my hip. I found myself handcuffed, standing naked in Kiki’s hallway, surrounded by a mob of blue uniforms, all wearing badges.

“You sick son-of-a-bitch.”

“What, what the hell?” I stammered.

“Too bad you ran out of time, not to worry, you’re gonna have a good long time to think about it. Read him his right’s.”

“What the hell is going on here, where’s Kiki? Kiki, are you okay?” I called.

“Don’t let that animal near me,” a
female voice I didn’t recognize howled from the bedroom.

Kiki
suddenly appeared, at least I thought it was her, she looked completely different. The woman I saw twenty-five minutes before wearing a black garter belt and a hop-on-me smile, now stood wrapped in a terrycloth robe cowering behind two police officers.

Bright red lipstick
was smeared across her lips and chin in a hideous clown-like grin. Tear stained mascara underlined her eyes and ran down her cheeks. Her hair was messed and bedraggled and it looked like the word “slut” was written with some sort of marker across her breasts. And then there was the black eye.

“Don’t let him near me, don’t let him near me, please, please,” she stepped behind a large patrolman.

He looked at me with very cold eyes and moved a hand toward his weapon.

“Read him his rights, get his pants
on and get him out of my sight,” this from a thin bald guy in an ill fitting brown suit.

“What the hell is going on?”

“You have the right to remain silent…”

“All r
ight, this is a crime scene, people. I want everyone out accept the site team. And don’t touch anything! Misses Barkwell, if you would let us take you to the hospital, Officer Christine Jenkins here will be with you at all times.”

Had he just referred
to Kiki as Misses Barkwell? I didn’t have time to ponder that, but was led naked out the back door where my jeans were thrown at me.

“I’m fucking hand cuffed here, how am I supposed to get the things on?”

“Figure it out, you’re lucky you’re not dead, asshole. Tough guy, beating up a woman, raping her. You’re damn lucky there are witnesses around right now.”

“Rape?
”

“I’m accused of rape?
You’re telling me that psychotic bitch is accusing me of rape?” I asked.

“I’m afraid that’s just the tip of the iceberg,” Aaron said, shaking his head.

We were sitting in an interrogation room on the fifth floor of the police station. I knew we were on the fifth floor because I’d been interrogated up here before, although never on a rape charge. Lieutenant Aaron LaZelle headed up the vice unit. He and Detective Norris Manning from homicide were conducting the interrogation. Neither man looked to be enjoying the task at hand.

I sure as hell wasn’t.

The room was either dingy white or light grey, I wasn’t sure which. The place smelled of sweat mixed in with a healthy dose of fear, or maybe that was just me.

Leaning against one of the cinder block walls was D
etective Sergeant Dixon Heller, homicide. I recognized him as the thin, bald guy in the ill fitting brown polyester suit from Kiki’s. I guessed he may have been the officer in charge of the investigation, although he clearly wasn’t conducting my interrogation.

“Rape? Honest to G
od, you guys know me. I didn’t rape her. I’m not some damn rapist, for Christ sake.”

“Look, Dev, I’m going to ask yo
u again, do you want a lawyer present? This is really serious,” Aaron said, looking very uncomfortable.

“Serious? You’re telling me. Look the woman is nuts. She went after
me with a knife the other day, threatened to cut me up into little pieces. Then…”

“Do you have a witness that could…”

“Well, no, but she did. Look guys, she was, no, she is crazy.”

“So you went back there. After she threatened to cut you up? Is that right?” Manning asked.

“Well yeah, but not exactly. See, I brought this guy over to paint her wall, Gary Hobson.”

“When was this?” Manning asked.

“Couple of days ago.”

“To paint her wall?” Aaron asked.

“Yeah, in her bedroom.”

“Just a wall or the entire room,
” Manning fired back.

“Well, just a wall.”

“Just one wall?” Aaron asked.

“Yes.”

“What was wrong with it?”

“Some marks or something on it.”

“You know she’ll tell us if it was more than that,” Manning said, writing a note on a sheet of paper from the open file in front of him.

“There might have
been a little spray paint on the wall.”

“A little
spray paint, define little.”

“Maybe a few letters,” it didn’t sound
good, even to me.

“Did these lett
er say anything?” Manning asked, almost sweetly.

“Come on
, Dev, what was it?” Aaron said, clearly frustrated.

“It said
, KRAZ sucks.”

“Did you spray paint that
?” Manning asked, looking up from his file.

I nodded.

“I’m sorry, could you speak up.”

“Yes, apparently.”

“Apparently?” Manning asked.

“That’s what she told me
, but I really don’t remember doing it. I just woke up and it was there, on the wall.”

“Large letters?”

“Sort of.”

“Care to define sort of?”

“Okay, okay, yeah, about four feet high, all capitals. So that’s why I had Gary Hobson over, to paint the wall and get things perfect for her, you know? Anyway, Gary couldn’t do the job so I ended up painting her bedroom wall. She offered to make me dinner and then talked me into staying. The next thing I know, I wake up tied to her bed. Then you guys break in and tasered me while I was standing in the bathroom.”

Manning tapped his pen on the file in front of him. Aaron stared at the grey Formica table top.

“So, what seems to be increasingly difficult for me to figure out is how you woke up tied to the bed?” Manning said.

“Yeah, right
, exactly.” I nodded in agreement.

“So what happened? S
he unties you, and you tie her up and then rape her? That it?”

“No look, I didn’t rape her. I’ve never raped anyone. I’ve done a lot of things
, but never rape.”

“But you tied her to the bed?”

“No, I didn’t do that.”

“I wonder who did? See, when the officers got to Misses Barkwell’s
home they had to break in, break through the door. You were taking a shower. And she, Misses Barkwell, is tied to the bed. I’m having trouble here, do you think she tied herself to the bed?”

“Yes.”

“So she tied herself to the bed. That must mean she gave herself that black eye? Beat herself up and raped herself using you as an unwitting accomplice. Right?” Manning asked.

“Yeah
, something like that.”

“Som
ething like that?” Manning said.

“
Look. I think I must have blacked out for the night, okay. I have no memory of anything after my first drink there. All I know is, in the morning everything is fine. She untied me, wanted to make me breakfast and sent me to the shower. She even told me to stay in there for thirty minutes, said it would make me feel better.”

“Thirty minutes, she said that?” Aaron asked.

“Yeah.”

“And then she ties herself u
p and calls 911? Gee, all of a sudden it seems so cut and dried,” Manning said, then stared at me.

“I think that’s what happened,” I said.

“You think. Interesting. What about the images we found on your phone. She take those? She looks pretty frightened.”

“Images
? On my phone?”

“Yeah almost a dozen of them, taken over the course of the n
ight, she’s restrained in everyone of them. Looks like a long night for her. What? You wanted some souvenirs of what you did to the poor woman?”

“I don’t know anything about that.
My phone takes pictures?”

“
Apparently. It seems obvious to me after she gave herself the black eye and tied herself up, somehow she managed to take pictures of herself being raped over the course of five or six hours.”

“Look
, I know this looks bad, but I’m telling you, I didn’t do anything.”

“To t
ell you the truth Mister Haskell, it doesn’t look bad, it looks airtight.”

Aaron stared down at the table shaking his head ever so slightly.