Hot Zone (Major Crimes Unit Book 2) (15 page)

I need a few things. The toilet is the most pressing. He's
not moving. I could...I could...piss on him.

A small, involuntary giggle escapes me, but I know that's a
step too far. He's a killer, probably, not just a drug dealer. And as it
stands, I'm just about safe. I can walk away, be safe.

I sit and let myself go in the toilet, with the door open,
staring at him. Blood's coming from his mashed nose. Looks as though he broke
it in the fall.

I feel good, closing the door behind me and leaving him in
the room. I feel like an adult, and a lucky one. I didn't piss on him. I
probably should have.

I settle for taking off his peg leg and stuffing it right
up his arse instead.

On the way to the elevator, I put his gun in a waste bin
and smile, happy and afraid and alive.

In hindsight, I probably shouldn't have left the note.

VIII.

Dear Peg-Leg druggy,

I was going to put my foot in your arse...but it worked out
better that you did it yourself.

Up yours,

Old Bird.

For the first time in longer than I can remember, I fell
asleep in my own bed with a smile on my face.

IX.

On the fourth day of Christmas, I was cursing myself and
wishing I'd saved peg-leg's peg for my husband instead.

But then, as it turns out, he probably would have enjoyed
that more than I'd like.

The 4th
Day of Christmas

The
Husband and the Mistress

I.

On the fourth day, it turns out I've made a serious enemy of
some kind of peg-legged gangster. Also, my husband's a lying pervert of a
cock-sandwich.

So, make that three enemies...because it seems I'm my
worst-own.

II
.

I wake up, roll over, and see the light on my mobile phone.
It's still dark out, and I sleep with all the lights off. It's bright, there in
the dark. I wonder why my phone's lit up, why I'm awake before the sun (I won't
get light until around eight, because it's winter and winter is gracious to
those who love to sleep).

The phone woke me. It's not ringing, so it's a text. It's
on vibrate, so it shimmies across the night table if it rings. A text just
makes it shimmy a little. I reach out, the screen saver flicks on.

It's the 28th, but more importantly only seven o'clock.
That's an ungodly hour, but it might be my husband...

I think about ignoring it anyway, sigh, and slide the
screen across to see a pair of balls, squashed into a carpet, with a high-heeled
foot grinding them down.

'I know you've been naughty. Time for your punishment,
little baby boy.'

At first, I think it's a mistake, a joke, a
scam...something.

Until, after a second glance (that's the kind of thing you
look at, even if you don't really want to...because you don't see that every
day, do you?) I think I actually recognise those balls.

'Damn,' I say. My voice startles me, and I feel like my
parents just caught me home early from school with my boyfriend's hands on my
tits.

Damn, because I do...I know those balls.

The most recent pair I've seen up close belong to peg-leg.
But these aren't his. These are the missing balls. The ones that belong to my
husband. It's been a while, but balls are like faces, I find. Some people have
a good memory for faces. Some, for balls. Twenty years, I've known those balls.

I'm thinking an awful lot about balls. I'm also wondering
if I've got a pair of high-heels sharp enough to squish them good and proper,
squish them so badly they become non-balls.

'You bastard of a cock knob,' I say. This time I don't jump
at the sound of my voice, but I've got to move. Yesterday's small triumph and
experiment in pegging are gone from my mind. I'm angry as hell...again. But
it's good. It's been a long time coming.

Like he will be if I get my hands on a good pair of heels.

III.

Anger's a funny thing. It can keep you going when you're out
of options. But sometimes it just drains you. It can make you so tired that
instead of hunting for a pair of sharp heels, you sit and cry into your hands,
snot pooling in your palms because you don't want that on the kitchen counter.
Anger can make you sob so hard it feels like your tears are coming from your
nose and your snot from your eyes. Your ears roar and your head hurts and your
chest heaves in a way that makes you wonder if you're not having a heart
attack.

It got me like that, this time. Of course it did.

Because he's a twat, but also because I am. How can anyone
be so stupid?

But then, I guess people ask themselves that question
plenty of times over the course of a lifetime. Then, like me, wish it wasn't
them. Wish they were comforting someone else, saying things like, 'you weren't
to know...don't blame yourself...'

Saying things that can't help, well-intended or not.

IV.

And the thing is, I still want someone to say those things
to me. The words don't help...but hearing them, hearing a human voice...that
helps. So does tea.

I could hit the wine, or the whiskey...but for a change I
decide to stick to tea that morning. I'm not sobering up, drying out...none of
that. I'm just drinking tea.

I call Mandy, rather than Nicola. I love them both, but for
things like this, I call Mandy first, Nicola second. It's just the way it is.
Like I'd call a mechanic for the car, a plumber to fix the sink.

Apparently I'm still crying a little when Mandy picks up.

'Honey? What's wrong? What is it?'

'He's...he's...he's seeing someone...or...he likes having
his balls squashed...'

'Honey...you're not making any sense.'

'Mandy...he likes HAVING HIS BALLS SQUASHED!'

'I'll come over, shall I?'

I nod, but that's fine. She knows I'm nodding.

'Give me thirty minutes. I'm on my way. Love you, okay?'

I nod again, then hang up.

V.

Five minutes pass, and I turn with a cup of tea, planning to
sit at the breakfast counter and wait with my drink, think, or not
think...either way.

But dad's there at the counter. Fuck if he doesn't make me
jump.

He never talks. I don't know if he can and doesn't want to,
or if ghosts can't talk, or if they can and I just can't hear them. But he
smiles, a sort of sympathetic thing that makes me smile even though I feel like
shit, and a stupid one at that. He isn't judging. He's just there, letting me
know he's there. Nothing more. Even if he could talk, I realise, it wouldn't
make a difference. Him being there, right now, is more than enough.

'I miss you, dad,' I say.

He nods back. He isn't ethereal, like people think ghosts
always are. He looks solid...maybe a hint of white light floating around him,
almost an outline, or like a light shines on him from behind.

I can see the wrinkles around his eyes, and just beneath
the sides of his nose. He looks like he did older, but not like he did when he
died. Cancer got him, and he lost weight and I had to put his teeth in when mum
couldn't. He knows all that. He's not embarrassed about it, I think.

'I'm a tit, aren't I?'

He kind of wobbles his head from side-to-side, raises his
shoulders.

Yes, he's saying. But also, 'What are you going to do?'

I am what I am...he knows that. He'll love me whatever.
That's a good thing to hold onto. The kind of love that sees a girl through,
even when her husband's a filthy lying knob-head.

'Thanks dad,' I say. The doorbell rings, a loud peal that
fills the lower floor of the house, bouncing from all the cold, expensive stone
floors.

'See you, dad,' I say. He blows me a kiss and I go to
answer the door. When I bring Mandy out of the cold and into the kitchen for
tea and condolences, he's gone.

VI.

'Tell me everything,' says Mandy.

So I do, and then I show her the text.

'No mistake?'

'They're my husband's balls, and the only way I'd be happy
with that picture was if they weren't still attached to the useless bastard.'

'Fair enough,' she says. She doesn't say the usual crap,
for which I'm grateful. But something else, instead.

'That's it, then. Divorce, and a pre-divorce party. Our
house, New Year's Eve. Best revenge all round? A good drunk-fuck.'

'You offering?'

She laughs, I laugh.

Damn, we're all so fucking cheerful, aren't we?

VII.

I don't need a man, I tell myself. I can sort this out.

Mandy's right, though. Not about the drunk-fuck, I think.
Possibly about that, too, though.

But divorce is the only answer. The only man I need, maybe,
is one with letters after their name who charges by the hour for their
services, and I don't mean a rent-boy called 'Jr.' Divorce, then...there's a
line. This is it.

I'm gullible...I'm not a complete idiot.

VIII.

Next day, I am entirely sure that last statement isn't true.
I'm gullible, stupid. Gloating, leaving a note at the peg-leg crime scene was
the stupidest...no...being in his room was more stupid...actually, I think
possibly everything I've done since I was twenty-five, beginning with my marriage,
has been seeped in vin de imbecile.

The 5th
Day of Christmas

The
Sullied Ring

I.

On the fifth day, Mandy and Nicola and I are eating scones,
jam, clotted cream and drinking tea in a bistro kind of restaurant in Windsor.
There's a picture of the Queen Mother in the centre of a Welsh Dresser with
Wedgewood blue-and-white plates and jugs and cups and saucers. I think I'm
supposed to like it. Mandy drove, Nicola and I sat in the back. She drives an
X6 like she thinks it's a mini. I shit myself around six times on the M4.

I don't like the cafe, bistro, whatever it is. The scones
are dry and the tea's weak and the Queen Mother's just as dead at the waitress
who serves us. She's hollow and sallow both, looks yellow all the way through
from cigarette smoke. Her fingers are yellow when she puts the plates before
us, her thumb on top of the plate.

I'm nothing like a holy terror when it comes to
cleanliness...but that doesn't seem even a little bit hygienic.

We talk about a few little things. Mandy's brood, their
husbands, Nicola's new yoga kick. She's limping, because it's new and frankly
Nicola's not cut out for yoga. I'd never tell her that, but she's got hips like
a rugby ball sitting sideways and tits like a scrum. Whenever she moves, I
wonder if the hooker's just thrown a ball in there, and they're jostling to get
the bugger.

I love both, unreservedly, and yes, these are mean
thoughts. But it should've been the other way. Mandy's rake-thin, big pouting
lips and pert tits that cost around ten grand. She's so well put together, most
people don't even notice she's a finger short from that most insidious of
rich-people perils...a horse bit her finger clean off about ten years ago.
She's got three kids and looks like she must have bought them.

Nicola has none, although if ever there was a woman who
looked like a good breeder...Nicola would be her, top-to-bottom.

I'm sitting there, quietly thinking snide thoughts, but in
an absent way that's mostly harmless...I'm thinking about how my friends are
doing alright, too. They're happy in their lives, with their husbands. I think
I'm hot shit and my husband doesn't come home for weeks at a time and likes
having his balls stood on.

Who's the mug?

Me. That's who.

I've got this big pair of sunglasses on my head, a leopard
print scarf keeping my neck warm. An old woman is in the window seat, her back
turned, with a headscarf on. I see her hands, as she lifts her tea. Arthritis.

If I get arthritis, will my expensive sunglasses perched on
my head keep my hands warm? I'm not wearing gloves, the sky's such a dark grey
it might even snow. The old lady's got gloves, I've got sunglasses.

'How you going to get back at him?'

I'm soul-searching, but Nicola wants to talk about my
twat-husband.

I sigh. Of course...everyone wants to talk about the twat.

'Take him to the cleaners, honey.'

Mandy's got a point. I could. But I don't know if the
cleaners can get out that kind of shit-stain. That's a good line, I think. I
think about saying it, looking at the old woman's hands. But I don't get a
chance, because the girls aren't really listening. They're talking out their
righteous anger, like it's their husband fucking some weird, black-shoe wearing
dominatrix.

'Every penny he's got. You can get the house. It's your
home. You earned it, right?'

I don't need to speak, not really. I half-listen, though.

'Got to leave him. Talk to a lawyer, though. Don't walk
out...'

I look at the old woman's hands while they talk about my
life. I look for a long time. She looks like a woman who's alone, but not upset
or lonely. She's not hunting around for someone's ear to chew.

She's wearing a wedding ring. I know her husband's dead,
and she's a widow. Little things I notice. She isn't covered in assorted cat
hairs, she doesn't wear eau de widow or anything like that. She bears herself
like a widow...but not one who was ever embarrassed by her man. She exudes some
kind of steely pride, sitting there with no stick and her crooked hands, her
ring proud on her finger.

Am I proud? Proud of feeling like the biggest idiot in the
world?