The Real Mrs. Price (18 page)

But regret was sitting next to him, shaking its ugly little head, pursing its thick and slimy lips.
Tsk. Tsk. Tsk.

Plato had been married so long ago and at such a young age that most of the time he felt as if some other dude had said “I do” to his ex-wife. They'd lived together, made a kid together, probably made some promises to each other, but it was all ancient history and fleeting—well, except for the kid part. Home was whatever hotel he was staying in at the time. It was his car, airplanes, hostels. He had more money than he could spend in his lifetime, and yet he was homeless.

Women like Marlowe were the physical interpretation of the word
home
to Plato. A lovely, comfortable, inviting woman that welcomed a man with open arms and good food and good love. The misogynist in him gloated. It almost shamed him to admit, even to his slimy little friend next to him, that he could want her if it wasn't for the kind of life he led. He honestly couldn't remember the last time he'd felt that way about a woman. Of course, in all fairness, he had seen her beautiful self all shiny and naked the night before, spread out before him like treasure. So maybe that's where all this melancholy was coming from. He was horny. Plato sighed, relieved. If that's all it was, and he convinced himself that it was, then regret had wasted a trip visiting him, and it needed to get its dirty little ass out of his car.

*   *   *

The first thing he did when he got back to his room was fire up his laptop and plug in that thumb drive he'd found in Marlowe's bedroom on the floor by the nightstand. He'd paid that kid two g's to unlock this thing. Highway robbery, to be sure. Criminals charged too damn much. There was one file on this thing. Nothing more than a simple spreadsheet with three labels at the top of three columns: Code and Name and Date.

There were a total of fifty rows of data filled in on this thing. Underneath the Code column was a list of four- to six-digit combinations of numbers, letters, and keyboard symbols. The Name column appeared to contain what looked like stock market symbols of corporate or business names. The Date field data went back as far as two years and ended as recently as two months ago, a month before Price went missing from Marlowe's. By itself, all he had was a bunch of extraneous information that didn't appear to mean a damn thing. Appearances, though, were usually deceiving. It meant something. He just didn't know what yet.

*   *   *

It was nearly midnight by the time he'd showered and climbed into bed. Last night he'd slept next to her. Another man would have ravished that passed-out, beautiful, compliant, and pliable woman and not given it much thought. For some odd reason, however, with Marlowe, he was consumed with the idea of making a good impression, which was probably a waste of time considering the fact that she believed he was Satan. The thought made him chuckle, but not passionately. The more he thought about it, the more he concluded that she might very well be right on some level. The term
devil
was relative. One person's devil was another person's … well, the bottom line was there wasn't a person on earth that was all good or all bad. Everyone had varying degrees of both traits in them. Maybe she'd gotten her signals crossed and Ed Price was that devil her possum bones warned her about. Shit, six of one and a half dozen of the other—Plato or Ed. Marlowe had drawn a fucked-up hand, no matter which part of the deck she pulled from.

Nelson, Texas, was on the other side of those trees where that body had been found. It was a two-, maybe three-mile walk from the crime scene, a trek that could've easily been made after setting a body on fire. Nelson sat on the other side of the highway, and right on the edge of town was a budget motel. Burn a body, hike through a forest to a highway, check into a room, shower, order a pizza, go to sleep. The concept wasn't all that far-fetched to Plato. If he thought long and hard enough, he could probably draw from his own personal experiences to rival the theory he was entertaining here.

He recalled the flavor of her. He imagined that Marlowe was as tasty in other places as she was in her mouth. The best version of her was the one who'd peeled out of the burden of being Marlowe Price and allowed Marlowe Brown to show her pretty self. Marlowe Brown talked too much, laughed too loud, danced too long, and was affectionate to a fault. She'd clung to him, sat on him, hugged him, squeezed on him, kissed and teased him until he ached, and he'd loved every minute of it.

He sighed. Now he was starting to frustrate himself.

“Take your ass to sleep, man,” he cussed himself.

He wouldn't pass up the next opportunity he had with her. Another one was coming. He could feel it, so Plato opted against settling with his urges tonight and kept his hand off his dick.

 

Like a Dog

W
AKE UP,
M
ARLOWE
!

*   *   *

It wasn't until that moment when she opened her eyes that she realized desperation had an odor. All of him was on top of her before she could even scream. His hand covered her mouth, her arms and legs were pinned so that she couldn't move, and fear stole her breath.

“Shhhhhh,” he said, his lips pursing from the unruly brown-and-gray beard covering his face.

Waves of tousled brown hair covered his head, and she absolutely did not recognize him until he said her name.

“It's me, Marlowe,” he said gruffly. “It's all right, honey. It's me.”

Eddie!

He trusted that her knowing who he was would be enough, and so he removed his hand from her mouth, reached over to the lamp on the nightstand next to the bed, and turned on the light. The soft glow revealed the features of a shell of the man she'd married. His eyes sank deep into dark circles; the blue had faded from them, leaving cold and lifeless orbs void of soul. Is that what killing a man does to you? Is that what running for your life and hiding does to you?

She swallowed her fear and did her best to replace it with something, anything that didn't expose how terrified she really was. “Get off me, Eddie,” she demanded.

He looked confused by her tone but not convinced by it. Eddie lowered his lips to hers, and when she turned her face from his, he gripped her jaws with his hand and steadied her while he pushed his dirty kiss onto her.

“I'm your husband, gotdammit!” he growled. “Kiss me like I am!”

He forced his lips on her again and then dug his fingers into her cheeks until she had no choice but to open her mouth. Eddie slipped his tongue into it so greedily that she gagged, and Marlowe bit down as hard as she could, drawing blood.

He snatched away from her. “The fuck!” Eddie looked like he wanted to hit her.

“Get the hell off me,” she demanded again, struggling to free some part of herself. But the more she fought, the more aroused he became, pressing his growing erection against her thigh.

The only thing between the two of them was the bedsheet covering her.

“Dear God! I have missed you, Marlowe,” he said, driving his knee between her thighs to separate them.

“Let me go, Eddie!” she said, not realizing that she'd started to cry.

Tears made her look weak. Marlowe couldn't afford to let him see her weak. He couldn't know that she was scared to death of him.

“Who is he, Marlowe?” he asked with a pained expression on his face. “Who's that big, black mother fucker you've allowed into my house?”

He'd been watching her. Marlowe's heart banged in her chest.

“Are you fucking him?” He stared helplessly at her. “Hmmm? You're fucking him in my house? In my gotdamn bed?”

“It's not your house, Eddie,” she argued. “It's not your bed.”

She should've just said no. That's what he wanted to hear.

Without warning, Eddie punched his fist hard into the wooden headboard above her head. “You're my wife. My fucking wife. How dare you. How dare you let that bastard put his hands on you.”

His face flushed red. The veins in his neck and forehead swelled.

“One of your wives, you bastard!” she snapped. “How many more you got?”

A wicked smirk curled the corners of his lips. “Only one that matters, sweetheart. And I'm home.”

“Where've you been, Eddie?” she shouted, changing the subject. “Where the hell have you been?”

Again, confusion washed over his expression.

“Do you know what they think?” she continued, fighting back tears. Fighting off fear. “They think I killed you. Have you seen the news? Do you know what's happening?”

He nodded erratically. “Yes.” Eddie swallowed. “I know. I know. I know, baby.”

“We need to go to the police, Eddie,” she said, trying to sound rational. “We need to go now and let them see that you're not dead. They need to see that you're alive, Eddie. We need to go now. Right now.”

Marlowe was pleading for her life. She was begging him to stand up and do the right thing.

“If you love me, Eddie, then you'll come with me to the police,” she begged. “Please. They want to send me to prison. Eddie. Do you hear me? They want to send me to prison because they think I killed you. They think that that body they found in that car was you.”

She'd said the wrong thing. All of a sudden his expression darkened, and he stared back at her with those hard, cold eyes.

“Where is it?” he asked unemotionally.

“Eddie. Let's just go to the police. Please. Please, let's just get up and go now.”

“Where is it, Marlowe?”

She shook her head. “What? Where's what? I don't know what you're—”

“The fucking drive, Marlowe.”

“What drive?” she shouted back. “I don't know what you're talking about,” she lied.

Eddie's frustration was starting to become even more dangerous. “It's black. It's small.” He waited for her to say something. “It's small, Marlowe.”

She shook her head.

He seemed to have a revelation all of a sudden. “Did you give it to the police?”

“I don't even know what you're talking about,” she said, starting to cry again. If she told him that Plato had that drive, there was no telling what he'd do to her. “I don't know about any drive, Eddie.”

“They were here, Marlowe. In the yard. I saw them. Did you give them my drive? Tell me, baby. Please, tell me.”

His eyes widened. His breathing deepened.

“No,” she swallowed. “No. I didn't give them anything.”

Eddie looked sad all of a sudden. Regretful. Remorseful?

“Aw, baby,” he whispered sorrowfully.

Dread filled her stomach and her chest.

“Baby. Baby. Baby,” he muttered, burrowing his face in the pillow underneath her head.

Warning shot through her like an arrow. “Eddie?” she started to sob. “What? Eddie?”

He slid one arm across the mattress to the other pillow and slid his hand underneath it. Eddie had hidden something under that pillow.

Marlowe writhed underneath him until one of her arms was free, and she balled her hand into a fist and slammed two quick punches into his jaw, causing more pain to herself than to him, but it was enough.

“Ah!” he cried out, covering the place where she'd hit him.

Eddie raised himself up onto his knees, and Marlowe jammed her knee hard into his groin. He cried out again but reached for her neck, wrapped his hands around it, and started to squeeze with one hand while still hunting for whatever he'd hidden underneath that pillow. Marlowe reached over to her nightstand, grabbed the lamp by the metal base, and started slamming it against his head until he finally loosened his grip enough for her to roll out from underneath him and onto the floor.

“Bitch! Marlowe!”

She crawled away from that bed as fast as she could toward the door. Eddie rolled off the opposite side, closest to the door, and grabbed her by her hair, forced her to her knees, and then pushed her down onto her back and pinned her to the floor.

“Where the fuck is my drive?” he demanded to know again.

She saw the gun in his hand. “Oh, God! Oh, God!” she cried.

“I will hurt you, Marlowe,” he told her. “I don't have to kill you to do that,” he said, pursing his lips. Tears rolled down his cheeks. “Don't make me.”

No. No. No. You don't die like this, Che'.

Words resonated inside her in voices that didn't belong to her. They were ancient, though, a chorus of them. Ancestors.

Eddie poised the tip of that gun on her thigh. “Where is it, Marlowe? I won't ask again.”

“My purse.” Her voice faded. She squeezed her eyes shut and swallowed. “My purse.”

He looked like he didn't believe her at first.

“My purse, Eddie,” she sobbed.

“Where's your purse?” he asked suspiciously.

She mouthed, “Downstairs.”

He pulled her up by her hair, but he didn't let it go. He held on to it as he walked down the stairs, dragging her behind him until they were in the living room. Marlowe's purse was on the coffee table. He took her to it. She picked it up and rummaged through it until she found what she was looking for. He didn't know what had happened at first.

“What was that?” Eddie let her go and stumbled back. “Ah! What the … what … shit!”

The pepper spray stung her eyes, too, but not enough to stop her from racing to the front door and out to her car. The pepper spray canister was part of her key chain, so she didn't have to search for her car keys.

“Marlowe!” he yelled, stumbling through the doorway and down the stairs. “Marlowe!”

Eddie made it to her car, but not before she was inside. She locked the doors, put the key into the ignition, started the car, and pulled out of the driveway, crying and shaking so hard that she thought she'd never stop.

 

By Moonlight