Soultaker (6 page)

In retrospect, she should have stayed home.

Robbed of her patience by exhaustion, she’d snapped at several customers and a few of her more annoying coworkers. This culminated in a bitter exchange with a snide old bitch. A dispute over late fees ended with Jordan screaming at the woman, calling her a “miserable, skeleton-faced cunt hag from hell.”

Thus had Jordan’s less-than-illustrious career at Mondo Video come to an end. Not that she cared. She didn’t give a shit about her job or anything else connected to this rotten town. Showing up for work today was just the kind of thing Jordan did, fulfilling her obligations. She felt nothing but contempt for slackers. But how could she reconcile that with her behavior today?

She poured herself a glass of juice and shut the refrigerator. “Christ, give yourself a break, girl.”

Okay, this talking to herself shit was a bad sign. But the sentiment was dead-on. This was just a setback, and a minor one at that. The loss of the Mondo Video job was your basic
blessing in disguise. It meant there was one less thing tying her to Rockville. Even last night’s public embarrassment was a blessing. She didn’t need duplicitous people in her life. She was better off without those backstabbing bitches.

She sipped her juice and contemplated her immediate future. As recently as yesterday evening, she’d planned to be in Rockville for another year, long enough to get her associate’s degree from RCC. But fuck that. She was spinning her wheels here. Her first-year grades at RCC were impeccable. It was time to start sending out applications to real universities, maybe get enrolled at a good school by the fall semester, somewhere far away from Rockville.

“Sounds like a plan,” she muttered.

And thought, Stop that!

Bailing out of Rockville was clearly the way to go, but there was some shame in it, too. She felt a bit like a whipped dog running away with its tail tucked between its legs. It was the sort of thing she would normally rebel against. But not this time. Enough was enough. This time running away was absolutely the right thing to do.

It was too much to think about right now. She was tired. She yawned and stretched. What she needed right now was rest. The future could wait a few more hours. She dumped out the rest of her juice, dropped the empty glass in the sink, and shuffled out of the kitchen.

She heard the dim noise of a television as she moved down the short hallway toward her bedroom. Alarm surged through her until she realized she’d probably forgotten to turn it off before leaving this morning. She’d been in a mental fog, so it was a reasonable explanation—but when she entered the bedroom, she saw that she was wrong.

Bridget Flanagan was on her side in Jordan’s bed, her head propped in the upturned palm of her right hand. Her other hand aimed the remote control at Jordan’s television. A white comforter was pulled up over her breasts. Her bare shoulders made it clear she was nude beneath the comforter. Jordan gaped at her a moment before her gaze went to the small pile
of clothing at the foot of the bed—Bridget’s skirt, blouse, and panties.

Jordan cursed herself for being so stupid. The door to her apartment had been unlocked when she came home. She’d been too tired to notice. Probably she’d left it unlocked this morning, too.

Bridget dropped the remote and sat up in the bed, holding the comforter up over her breasts. “There you are! I was hoping you weren’t at work today.”

Jordan felt numb as she said, “I was. I got fired. What are you doing in my bed, Bridget? What are you doing in my apartment at all?”

Bridget pouted. “I’m here to see you, silly.” Her eyes crinkled at the corners as she tried to fake emotion. “I feel real bad about last night. I don’t know what got into me.”

“Bullshit. Put your clothes on and get out of here.”

Bridget pouted some more. “I was just afraid. Please don’t be mad at me, Jordan. You made me think about a part of myself, my sexuality, that I just wasn’t ready to deal with.”

Jordan smirked. “And now you are?”

Bridget nodded. “Yes. I…I want you, Jordan.”

Jordan couldn’t believe it. There was just no end to this chick’s head games. She hated that she’d been so blind to Brid-get’s true nature for so long. She was a user. A manipulator. An emotional sadist. “You make me sick, Bridget. Get out of here before I throw you out.”

Bridget smiled. “You don’t want to do that…” She let the comforter fall away, exposing her breasts. “Do you?”

Jordan knew she should say something. Keep focused. But she stared at Bridget’s full, firm breasts and imagined touching them. Her mouth hung open. Her eyes fluttered. Christ, she was too tired to think straight. She imagined how she must look to Bridget and felt a fresh surge of anger, directed both at herself and the evil bitch in her bed. “Get out!”

Bridget laughed. She threw the comforter back and stretched out on Jordan’s bed, her long, lean body aglow in the morning sunlight slanting in through the window blinds. She
lifted her legs off the bed, stretched her feet to their fullest extent, and wiggled her toes. She lightly trailed the fingertips of one hand over her smooth, concave belly, the glint of pink nail polish a sensual contrast to tanned flesh. She met Jordan’s gaze and winked.

“I don’t feel like leaving just now, Jordan.” She pinched one of her nipples. “Why don’t you come over here and put your mouth on this?”

Jordan wavered for just a moment. She saw herself caving in, submitting to this degradation. Although it would be the fulfillment of a fantasy, it would absolutely be a degradation. And knowing this strengthened her resolve.

She went to the bed and Bridget sat up, puckering her lips, anticipating a kiss. She yelped when Jordan grabbed her by the wrist and yanked her out of the bed. Bridget shrieked and struggled until Jordan drove a fist hard into her stomach, and then she was gasping for air. Still holding her by the wrist, Jordan scooped up Bridget’s clothes and pulled her former friend out of the bedroom.

“What are you doing, you bitch!?”

Jordan dragged the struggling girl down the hallway. “Throwing out the trash.”

Bridget tried to twist out of Jordan’s grip, but to no avail. They arrived at the front door moments later. Jordan pulled it open and shoved Bridget through it. Then she threw the skimpy, silky clothes—which felt so nice to the touch—out after her. She threw the door shut, turned the lock, and leaned against it. Bridget screamed and pounded her fists against the door.

“You’ll pay for this, you fucking whore!” came the muffled voice from outside. “I’ll kill you! You’re gonna die, Jordan! Die!”

Jordan closed her eyes and tuned out the rest of it.

So she didn’t realize that Bridget’s screams had turned to cruel laughter.

Jake stopped at a convenience store on the way back to Washington Heights. He picked up a copy of the
Rockville Times
and got in line behind a woman who reminded him a little too much of his mother. Bottle-blonde hair. A skimpy white tank top. Tattoo depicting a coiled snake visible on her left shoulder blade. Denim cutoffs that clung like a second skin to her shapely ass. She caught him looking at her and winked.

Jake’s stomach clenched.

It was as if his mom had caught him leering at her. He was mortified. The woman’s face had that haggard quality common to middle-aged women from the Zone. Too many years of hard drinking and hard living. She could’ve been anywhere from thirty-five to fifty.

She smiled at him. “I know you, sweetie?”

His face flushed. “Ah…no. You look like somebody I know.”

Her red-rimmed eyes almost twinkled. “Well, want to get to know
me
better?”

Jake forced a laugh. “Yeah, I’m flattered, but I’m…married.”

He tried to conceal his lack of a ring by shifting his grip on the newspaper, but the lady had an eagle eye and didn’t miss the lame attempt at subterfuge.

Her smile vanished. “Oh, fuck off.”

She turned away from him and set her twelve-pack of Old
Milwaukee on the counter. Embarrassed, Jake wandered to the rear of the store, where he grabbed a six-pack of Heineken from the beer cooler. The flirtatious woman hurled a final curse his way as she banged the door open on her way out. Jake paid the clerk and left the store. Back in the car, he pried the top off a Heineken, wedged the bottle between his legs, and wheeled out of the parking lot.

The Heineken was empty by the time he pulled into Stu’s driveway. His hand moved to toss the empty into the Camry’s backseat, but he stopped and frowned at the bottle.

He sighed. “You’re on a slippery slope here, man.”

But fuck it, it was done.

He chucked the empty into the back and got out of the car. He went around the side of the house and let himself in through the back door, then stepped into the kitchen and hit the light switch. The overhead fluorescent lights flickered for a bit before coming all the way on. He put the rest of the Heineken in the fridge and poured Coca-Cola into an ice-filled glass from a two-liter bottle. Then he grabbed his paper and headed to the living room.

He was in an old leather recliner and looking at the newspaper before he noticed the girl. She was curled up asleep on the blue sofa on the other side of the coffee table. She was small, with a pale face and straight, lustrous black hair tucked behind her ears. She wore a dark gray hoodie, ratty blue jeans, and striped orange-and-black socks with holes in the toes.

Jake had no idea who she was.

Stu hadn’t mentioned anything about a girlfriend or a roommate. It bothered him. She didn’t look like a criminal. But that didn’t mean much. She could be an intruder, what did he know? He thought about calling Stu. Maybe even the cops. But he just couldn’t bring himself to do it. What kind of criminal breaks into a place just to sack out on the sofa?

But hell, he knew the answer to that.

The mentally unbalanced kind.

Then Jake saw the small handbag and the key ring on the coffee table. An idea occurred to him. It was an invasion of
privacy, but the idea’s allure was strong. Oh, the hell with it. He folded the paper and set it aside, then got up and moved cautiously to the other side of the coffee table. The hardwood floor creaked beneath his hiking boots. He searched the girl’s face for any indication of imminent wakefulness. She kept on snoring. Jake reached into the handbag, rooted through a jumble of lipsticks, pill bottles, and other ephemera, and finally extracted a lime green wallet. He undid the snap and looked at the girl’s plastic-encased driver’s license.

His eyes widened. “I’ll be damned.”

Kristen Walker woke with a yawn, startling Jake. The wallet jumped out of his hand and landed with a thump on the coffee table. She smiled and said, “Hello, Jake.” She glanced at her wallet and smirked. “You know, if you’re hard up for cash, you’re robbing the wrong girl.”

Jake covered his embarrassment with a laugh. “Sorry, I’m not robbing you. I just had no idea who you were, and my curiosity overwhelmed my good sense.”

She regarded him with a cool gaze, an expression conveying both reproach and amusement. “I assume you’ve figured out who I am, then?”

“I have the vaguest memory of Stu having an older sister, a fact that I forgot until now. Do you live here with Stu? I thought he was alone here.”

Kristen sat up and perched herself on the edge of the sofa. “He is. But he lets me stay here when I need to. Like now.”

Something in her tone put Jake on edge. Her words revealed little about her real situation, but there was an undertone of distress. Maybe she was in an abusive relationship and stayed at Stu’s place after especially bad domestic episodes. A surreptitious glance at her left hand failed to reveal a wedding band. But that didn’t mean she wasn’t involved with some creep who liked to settle domestic disputes with his fists.

He kept his tone neutral as he said, “So what brings you here this time?”

Her expression turned sour. “My boyfriend kicked me out.”

Jake frowned. “Oh. Well. Um…”

He had no idea what to say.

Kristen seemed to sense this and the corners of her eyes crinkled. “He was justified in kicking me out, Jake. I made some promises I couldn’t keep. He found out I was a lying bitch, so he gave me my walking papers.”

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to pry.”

She laughed. “You’re not. I volunteered my sad tale. But I’m done talking about it for now.”

Jake shrugged. He felt awkward standing there, so he sat down at the far side of the sofa. He felt a little tremor of excitement as Kristen turned to face him. “Hey, wait. How did you know who I am? Stu’s been gone all day.”

Kristen stared at him a moment. “There’s this new gizmo that’s been catching on lately. Cell phones. Maybe you’ve heard of them. Anyway, I called my brother’s cell this morning to tell him I’d need to stay here a while. He told me you might be here. But I would’ve recognized you anyway.”

Jake cocked an eyebrow at her. “Um…how?”

“There was a story in the
Rockville Times
when
Blood Circus
came out. Then another when
House of the Damned
was released.”

Jake frowned. “Huh.”

“Something wrong?”

“No.” He shook his head slowly. “I guess not. It’s just the last time I knew of my name being in that rag was in the weekly crime report years ago.”

“You mean nobody sent you clippings?”

Jake shook his head. “Who the fuck would do that? Me and Rockville, we’ve kept our distance.”

“So why are you back?”

He told her about Trey’s situation. She listened to him attentively through the whole tale, never breaking eye contact. She was so earnest it was unsettling. Her rapt gaze gave the impression that nothing else existed for her while he was talking.

When he was done telling her about Trey, she bit her lower
lip and cast her gaze downward. He figured she was thinking the situation over and would soon volunteer some insights.

But what she actually said was, “Whenever I meet someone new, I have a test. It’s not an especially complicated test, as far as tests go. It’s more subjective than most, and there’s just one question. I ask you to tell me one true thing about life and existence, one thing close to your heart, one thing you believe says everything there is to say about you as a person.”