Hair of the Bitch - A Twisted Suspense Thriller (24 page)

“Did you?”

“Yes.”

“Can I have it?”

“Right now?”

“I’d like to feed it to my garbage disposal.”

She went to her duffel bag and retrieved a black DVD case. The devilish little smile now full-grown, she waved the DVD case in front of her in true tantalizing fashion. “Wanna watch it again?” she asked.

“You’re kidding, right?”

She continued waving the DVD, continued smiling. “Aren’t you just a tiny bit curious? I mean now that it’s all over?”

“I’ve seen it, thank you.”

Still waving the DVD: “Going once…”

“Angela.”

“Going twice…”

“What the hell is wrong with you?”

She burst out laughing.

I shook my head, laughing a little myself. “You’re sick.”

She set the DVD on the TV and then cozied up to me again. “Isn’t that what you like about me?”

“It does have a certain desirability.”

She went in to kiss me then paused. “You’re not going to give me your cheek again are you?”

I kissed her. She pulled away and headed towards my bedroom, undressing on the way. She stopped at the doorway, naked, her back to me. Then a glance over her shoulder with carnal fuck-me eyes before disappearing into my bedroom.

I didn’t run, but I certainly didn’t stroll after her either.

Aftermath.

My analogy had stirred a deeper, more troublesome realization. Its impact jerked me, and Angela stirred.

“You okay?” she asked.

“Aftermath,” I said.

She rolled off my chest and propped herself onto one side. “What do you mean?”

“The aftermath. We discussed it prior, but we haven’t discussed it since.”

“What’s to discuss?”

“Leaving a trail? My blood, my
ear
at the scene? Christ, why am I only realizing this
now
?”

She raised an eyebrow. “Uh, maybe because you’ve experienced more trauma in the past twenty-four hours than most would in twenty-four lifetimes? I’m impressed you remember your name.”

“No, no—this is bad…”

“Calvin, stop it. The police think it was a robbery gone wrong. They even think it may be drug-related.”

I spun on my side and faced her. “
What?
How do you know that?”

“It was on the news.”

“When? I never saw anything.”

“You were in the hospital.”

“Yeah but there was a TV in the room. The news was on. I didn’t see anything about a robbery gone bad.”

She shrugged. “You were probably stoned on painkillers and missed it.” She yawned and curled back into me. “You’re in the clear.”

“I don’t believe it.”

She shrugged again and closed her eyes. “You can read about it tomorrow. I’m sure it’s somewhere on the internet.”

“It can’t be that easy, can it?”

Her eyes were still closed, she looked close to drifting. “I told you, they said it was—”

“I know, I just—you see all those crime shows like
CSI
where they talk about DNA and fibers and every other little goddamn thing you’d never consider…”

“That’s TV.”

Her words and blasé manner helped some, but I just couldn’t get my head around the fact that my fucking
ear
could be at a crime scene and somehow not come back to haunt me. Christ, why hadn’t I picked the damn thing up and taken it with me? Fine, with Paul dying and all I didn’t have time to get down and scrub away my blood and vomit, but at least pick up the goddamn ear!

“I don’t see how it can’t come back to me,” I said.

Angela sighed and opened her eyes. “Give me one—
one
—reason why the police would ever consider you a suspect?”

“
My ear!
”

“Is your DNA on file?”

“How should I know?”

“Have you ever committed a felony?”

“No.”

“Then it’s not on file. Even if for some inexplicable reason it is, the government is so backlogged, there’s a good chance it’s not even in the system. You’re in the clear, Calvin. Go to sleep.”

My mind was racing now. “Okay, forget the police—what if one of Mr. John’s people puts the pieces together?”

She groaned. “You know, after what you’ve accomplished you wouldn’t think you were such a pussy.” She rolled out of bed, went to my dresser, and snatched the bottle of Oxycontin the doctor had prescribed me for my pain. She then left the room, and I soon heard the water running in the kitchen. She returned with a glass of water and a palm offering two pills.

“Here. It’ll help you relax.”

I was to only take one pill every four to six hours. “That’s gonna knock me the fuck out.”

“That’s the idea.”

Was it any different than drowning my anxieties with booze, which I could
really
go for right now by the way? I took the pills from her and chased them down with the glass of water.

She smiled and got back into bed, curling into me once more and then stroking my chest. “Relax, baby—everything’s okay now.”

I fell into a deep sleep soon after.

“Angela?”

No reply. No sounds of the shower going, no sounds in the kitchen, no TV.

I sat up. “Angela?” Still nothing.

I made my way out of bed, wincing and groaning every inch of the way. My body felt as if I’d survived a stoning. I threw on an undershirt and a pair of boxers and wandered into my living room.

“Hello?”

The bathroom door was closed. Maybe she was, you know, what we guys call:
in the office
? I waited a couple of minutes, using the time to check my face in the living room mirror. I certainly hadn’t gotten any prettier while I slept. My eyes seemed blacker, and when I peeled off the dressing, my nose bigger, even
more
crooked.

I peeled off the dressing over my ear. At least that didn’t look any worse. There was still a fucked-up-looking hole where my left ear used to be of course, but at least it hadn’t shed its vanity overnight like my nose seemed to be doing.

I tossed the dressings into the trash and went to the bathroom door again. I’d heard no flush or anything. Maybe she was reading on the John? I know I did. Jesus, I’d never scrutinized a woman’s toilet habits so much in my life.

Ah, fuck it; we were past modesty here, weren’t we? After all we’ve been through? I knocked on the bathroom door. “You in there?”

Nothing. I tried the doorknob. It was unlocked. I opened the door and entered my bathroom. No one. I touched my shower floor. It was dry. The sink was dry. My towels were dry. The toilet seat was up. She’d never been, at least not since last night.

I headed into the den. Her duffel bag wasn’t on the sofa. Why?

“She just went home,” I said aloud. “Wanted to get more of her things.” It
needed
to be said aloud. Thoughts race and squirm like a tank of eels. Words are slow and plodding; once spoken they carry a stamp. This needed stamping. “Went home to get more of her things.” I nodded in affirmation to my own words. Stamp, stamp, fucking stamp.

I sat on the sofa, took the remote, and pointed it at my TV…and the canvas money belt seated atop my TV.

I leapt from the sofa. There it was, the money belt, coiled on top of my TV like the snake I’d always likened it to. Next to it was the infamous black DVD case. Next to that, an envelope with my name written on the front. I tore open the envelope. A handwritten letter was inside:

Calvin,

 

I don’t know why you felt the need to lie to me about the money. I truly want to believe that you intended on telling me about it eventually, but right now, after all we’ve been through, my heart is breaking that you would deceive me like this. Perhaps I was right; your trust will never be for sale.

 

I left you the DVD as part of our agreement. Destroy it and you’ll be free.

 

I doubt you’ll hear from me again.

 

Angela.

Oh God yes please do that please it would be so nice please yes please. Or better yet none of it is real I’m crazy it’s all been in my head I’m crazy and I’ve got both my ears and Angela doesn’t hate me and I’m just fucking crazy and Angela doesn’t hate me and I’m somewhere locked away safe and Angela doesn’t hate me…

(
No. Sorry. Nope. No
.)

“
FUCK!
”

I don’t remember dressing. I might have left my house naked. I only know I drove to Angela’s house, rang her doorbell, banged on the door, and then waited in her driveway until nearly two in the morning. She never answered. No car ever pulled into her driveway either.

In a fit of desperation, I’d smashed one of her windows and climbed in. No alarm (curiously), but no Angela either. I checked every fucking nook of every fucking room, almost crying as I called her name.

She was gone.

The bartender pulls a face. “Are you kidding? You
did
pull it off!”

I laugh and sip my scotch. “Got my friend stabbed. Lost my dream girl. Got my—”

“
Dream girl?
”

I frown at him. “Yeah…?”

“You saying you still trust her?”

“Why wouldn’t I?
I’m
the one who fucked up.”

He pulls another face. “You sure, man? Maybe you did exactly what she wanted—and now she’s done with you.”

“What? You mean freeing her from Mr. John?”

“Exactly.”

“And the money?”

He shrugs. “Didn’t you tell me she was already loaded? Hell, she even left you the money belt. I assume that’s where those hundreds you keeping handing me are coming from.”

I think on this for a minute.

He interrupts with: “When you think about it, maybe your hiding the money gave her the perfect little out she was looking for.”

It’s all too much at once. His reasoning is sharp, mine pickled. Try and focus. Money. Go back to that. “Okay then…how did she find the money? Tell me that.”

“You hid it in your hamper, man.”

“So?”

“You live in a one-bedroom apartment. She drugged the hell out of you—coincidence by the way?—and therefore had ample time to turn over the three, maybe four whopping stones your tiny place has?”

Fuck, he was making sense. Wait, no. “But how would she know I was lying? What if there really
was
no money? What would prompt her to go looking around my place? Assume I was lying?”

The bartender shrugs. “I don’t know, man. Maybe she read something in you—knew you were lying about the money from the moment you told her.”

I shake my head adamantly. “But she didn’t
care
about the money. You just said it yourself.”

A sympathetic face. “But she
did
care about the lie. The potential behind it, I mean.”

“Why not just leave? Why all the drama with the letter and leaving the money belt on the TV and all? Why not just up and leave as soon as I was asleep?”

More sympathetic face. “Because you would have hated her for it. This way you get to hate yourself.”

I drain my scotch. “Good Christ, could she really be that cruel? Knowing me the way she does?”

He fills my glass. The Macallan is half-dead. “So where does that leave you then?”

I sip and say: “What do you mean?”

“I mean what happens now? With you?”

“I guess I don’t have to worry about killing anybody anymore.”

I laugh.

He frowns.

I frown back at him. “Well what the fuck do you want me to say, man? You want a moral or something?”

He senses my frustration and loosens his frown, takes a step back. “Sure, okay. What’s the moral?”

“There
is
no moral. People always want to think everything happens for a reason. Shit just fucking happens. The world doesn’t owe you a reason.” I drain my scotch. “Morality is for picture books. In life, it’s nothing but learned naiveté…keeps us from blowing our brains out if we ever saw people for who they truly are.” I hang my head. “The moral is there is no moral…I lost the girl.”

“And gained your life.”

I look away and start nodding.

“You don’t care, do you?” he asks. “About your life…”

I turn back. “I guess I do. I
do
know that I couldn’t take another. No way…no way in hell.”

“Well that’s definitely something.”

I give a soft chuckle. “How many people utter such a thing? It’s like I’m swearing off the bottle.”

He accommodates me with a little chuckle of his own.

I drop my head for a moment. Everything’s fuzzy except Angela’s face. “I just…I kinda wish I got the girl.”

He looks apologetic now. “Hey, man, I could be all wrong you know—my theory about her motives. I mean I wasn’t there; I don’t know. Maybe it
is
pretty damn straightforward. She stumbled upon the money and felt betrayed. Maybe she just needs some time to cool off.”