The Nine Lives of Felicia Miller (8 page)

In the girls’ room, Ruta slapped ten with Felicia, who stood grinning like the cat that ate the canary. “The ball’s in your court now,” Ruta said. “Go get ‘em, tiger.”

***

“What the hell did she mean?” Sparrow asked nervously. “Prepare for what?”

“How the fuck do I know?” Wally said gruffly.

“You think Felicia’s gonna squeal about what we done? Oogie said he saw the two of them talking the other day.”

“She won’t squeal if she values her miserable life. Just be at my house tonight after dinner. And tell all the other guys to be there. No exceptions. We have to get our stories straight. Just in case.”

“In case o’ what?”

Wally scowled and swatted his pencil-necked pal on the side of his head. “Stop asking stupid questions. Just spread the word them I want them there. That’s all they need to know.”

81

Sheriff Owen Sutter steered his massive SUV around the final curve of the forest road that led to his rustic homestead. As was his nightly habit he flipped on the side-mounted spotlights to sweep the dense walls of pine that lined either side of the road. The brilliant white glare washed out the autumn hues of the foliage, giving the woods a pale ghostly appearance.

Scanning the woods was a habit Owen picked up five years earlier, following a major prison break a few counties north of Greenville. One of the escaped cons had been a worthless piece of trash named Tracy Lee Johnson, the first man Sutter had ever sent away on a life sentence.

A bi-polar maniac, Johnson’s paranoid delusions and ultra-violent tendencies were controlled in prison with a daily dose of anti-psychotics. But during his trial he’d vowed out loud to wreak vengeance on the lawman he claimed had built a bogus case against him. And now he was out. Out and about. Without his medication.

The escaped con never did return to Greenville to exact his revenge. But he was never captured either. He was still out there somewhere, and Owen lived with the possibility of him popping up when it was least expected. Revenge served cold, as the saying goes.

Owen slowed his vehicle as his spotlights caught something flitting through the woods.

It vanished for a moment… then he saw it again. A fleeting glimpse of something small and furry running just inside the edge of the woods.

Nothing to get worked up about.
Probably a fox.
             

For a moment he considered pulling over to shoot it with the rifle he kept in his vehicle. It would be easy to speed past it and pull over to set up a shot. Take it by surprise from the comfort of his SUV. But the 220 grain bullets in his 300 Winchester would obliterate such a small animal’s pelt. A senseless waste of time and ammunition.

He thought of his son and how the boy wouldn’t hesitate to slaughter such a small animal if he got the chance. He’d already been caught pelting cats and dogs with bee-bees and paintballs.
God only knows what else he might have done to them. Face it, Owen. The boy’s a budding psycho.

Gravel crunched under his tires as he swerved onto his driveway, which cut the last twenty feet through the woods before entering the cleared acre surrounding his house.

He headed straight for the open garage but halfway inside he slammed on his brakes and jolted to a stop.

Wally’s mud-splattered dirt bike was laying right where it shouldn’t be. On the floor of the garage, waiting for the careless youth to take it out and thrash it to death on some rocky hillside. Unless it was run over first.
Goddamn cretin. How many times do I have to tell him?

As the Sheriff opened the back door to enter the mudroom, a gray streak darted past his legs and disappeared under the utility sink, moving so stealthily that Owen never noticed it.

As he opened the door leading into the kitchen, the slinky critter once again slipped past him unseen.

“Wally, I’m home.”

No response.

“Wally?”

The house was quiet and dark, lit only by a timer-controlled table lamp in the living room.
The asshole must be out running around with his pack of junior assholes. Getting into more trouble. Hopefully not getting caught this time.

He headed straight for the liquor cabinet. Happy to put another tedious day behind him. He enjoyed writing traffic tickets and lording his power over ordinary citizens, but this had been one of those rare unsatisfying days when nobody seemed to be in a hurry. He wished his own son was as easy to handle as the townies he had trained like Pavlovian dogs to tow his party line or keep the hell out of his way.

He poured himself a shot of bourbon… then topped it off with an extra splash.

I just hope the little fucker doesn’t bring home anything too big for me to handle.

Old lady Pemberton had approached him after the last town meeting and warned him that the complaints about his boy were getting out of hand. Had anyone else in town offered him such a genteel threat, he’d have laughed it off, or worse. But Mrs. Pemberton was the doyenne of Greenville’s founding family, and her heirs would be running the county for years to come, in what everyone knew was an ironclad dynasty.

Eldest son Sanders was already serving his third term as Mayor, having succeeded his father at the helm. And there were plenty of kids and grandkids ready to step up to the plate.

The Pembertons had founded the town and locked up control of the county long before Owen’s grandfather settled there. Owen understood full well that just like his forefathers before him, he served under the Pembertons’ aegis.

Owen was the third generation of Sheriff Sutters, an honor and privilege he didn’t take lightly. The Pembertons appreciated his heavy hand, which made it clear that the town was not a playground for miscreants, a reputation first established by granddaddy Sutter and his Colt Army Special.

But by now it was clear that Owen’s only son would not be fit to carry on the family tradition. Nobody in the county wanted to see Wally wearing a badge and a gun. The family tradition would retire with Owen.

He threw down a second shot of bourbon, his nightly attempt to drown out the lingering certainty that the day was fast approaching when he would have to inflict true justice on his boy. On that day, he would lose a son and take down a bona fide criminal.

But he knew when that day came, he wouldn’t flinch from the task.
The Sutter legacy will not be spoiled by one rotten apple that has rolled too far from the tree.

As he tilted his head to shoot back another fiery jigger, the furry gray creature scurried past him and scooted silently up the stairs.

***

Felicia paused in the second floor hallway, still adjusting to the strange new perspective of her cat vision.

Her sense of smell was overwhelming. She never would have imagined that a cat’s sense of smell was so strong. Many times stronger than it had been in her human form. Right now she was reeling from an olfactory gangbang.

But one smell in particular drew her attention… the scent of teenage hormones festering in piles of unwashed clothing.

Her nose twitched. Her mouth opened to suck in a broader taste of the hallway air. A sophisticated array of sensors analyzed the scents and locked on the one she was after.

Focusing on the telltale odor she tracked it to a closed door at the end of the hall.

Her eyes moved up and down the door, quickly  studying the seemingly impassable barrier. The doorknob hung loose on its spindle, and the thick layers of old chipped paint on the door and the doorjamb told her all she needed to know.

Rising on her hind legs she swatted at the doorknob with a front paw while rolling her slinky torso against the lower edge of the door. Just as she anticipated, the door popped open a few inches. She punched her head through the gap and slipped through the narrow opening.

Wally’s room was the messy teenaged wasteland she’d expected. Death metal posters and sleazy magazine spreads covered the walls, which were crudely painted with cheap black paint over layers of ancient wallpaper. Piles of dirty shirts, socks and jeans with skid-marked jockey shorts still tangled in their legs covered the floor.

Felicia recoiled from the odor.
The unmistakable odor of Wally.

A lively smattering of voices sounded downstairs. Her ears flared open and shifted direction to catch the aural vibrations and identify the speakers. Like her sense of smell, her hearing was greatly improved. With even more range than a dog’s.

From the sounds downstairs she knew that Wally and his crew had arrived, and were getting a measured earful from Mr. Sutter.

Dismissing his father’s reprimand with a flippant remark, Wally led his gang up the stairs. Felicia heard the pounding of their approaching footsteps and quickly scanned the bedroom for a hiding place. She scooted under the bed just as the door banged open.

“And keep the fuck out of my room, ya snoopy fuck!” Wally shouted testily, aimed in the general direction of his father downstairs.

“Chill, man,” one of his comrades gently urged.

“Screw that sneaky fuck,” Wally replied. “Dumb fuck left my bedroom door wide open. He’s too frickin’ stupid to cover his tracks.”

“He’s still the frickin’ sheriff, dude. No sense pissing him off. How many times has he had your back when you got into trouble?”

Felicia recognized Sparrow’s warbly voice.
No surprise there.

“Fuck him. He knows the day he crosses me will be a day he’ll soon regret. Sheriff’s badge or not. I don’t play games. Not even with my own sperm donor.”

“All’s I’m saying is don’t push him when you don’t have to.”

“The Birdman’s right,” chimed Marky Muller.

Marky Muller.
Felicia recognized his voice immediately, with the sibilant slur he’d acquired after falling headfirst down a rocky slope while making an ill-advised audition video for the MTV show “JackAss.” Marky wasn’t the sharpest pin in the cushion and the boys tolerated his company just to see how far they could push him. Wally was always duping him into attempting suicidal stunts, and took pleasure in teasing him that he was expendable.

“Fuck you all,” Wally sneered. “I grew up with the stupid dickwad. I can handle him just fine.”

Felicia flattened her furry belly on the dusty carpet beneath the bed as the boys flopped onto the mattress. The box spring sagged precariously under their weight. The ancient slats made cracking sounds and the musty linen cover dipped onto her back.

She crawled to the side of the bed, ready to bolt if the bed frame collapsed.
Sparrow… Marky… Wally… come on… speak up boys. Who else was with you that night?

She counted four boys total in the room. Four of the five who’d assaulted her. Listening to their voices as their feet dangled from the bed or paced the floorboards in front of her, Felicia quickly established which heavy boots or dirty sneakers belonged to whom.

“Where the fuck is Oogie?” snarled Wally. “I said this meeting was mandatory.”

Oogie.
The thought of that disgusting creep laying hands on her, and worse, was enough to make Felicia sick.
But of course he would have been there. He was the one who set it all up. The one Crystal saw in the hallway, carrying what she thought was Mrs. Cuddles.

“I told him to be here,” said Sparrow.

“The fuck better not be bailin’ on us.”

Oogie… Marky… Sparrow… Wally… and…?

She realized the fifth boy was lying on the bed just a few feet above her. But he hadn’t yet spoken a word.

Wally stomped across the room to his supermarket boombox and popped a CD in. Felicia eyed his steel-toed Doc Martin’s and realized how vulnerable she would be if he caught her and decided to kick her guts out.

I need to see who that last boy is, and figure out how to get out of here. Fast.

Her furry ears folded shut as a deafening hip-hop beat thumped across the floor. The bass was obnoxiously thick and dull and it rattled the cheap voice coils of the speakers.
Only someone with damaged eardrums could possibly think that sounds good.

But a moment later the music crackled and skipped and gave way to a loud electronic hum. “Fuck!” Wally hopped off the bed and ran back to the stereo and started pounding on it angrily. “Cheap Chinese junk!”

“Stop hitting it, dude. That ain’t gonna help.”

Wally finally gave up and switched it off, silencing the offensive hum. “Every time I crank up the fuckin’ bass, the piece of shit craps out on me.”

A moment of silence followed. The boys were too afraid to suggest to Wally that he really needed to get a grip. To control his crazy temper.

“Must be something loose inside,” said the mysterious fifth boy quietly. Felicia tried but couldn’t quite place his voice. The loud bass music had done a number on her delicate eardrums. They were still ringing. “Probably just needs a hit of solder.”

“Fuck it,” Wally replied. “It’s easier to boost a new one at Wallfart. I’ll use this piece of shit for target practice.”