Quake (39 page)

    At first, he thought she would hit the water flat, a real belly-whomper. At the last instant, however, her body twisted and curled. Her side hit the surface. A geyser of white, sparkling spray shot up and she was submerged in a roil of froth.

    The spray sprinkled down. The froth vanished. After her impact with the water, Sheila must've rolled, She was face down, bound hands hanging toward the legs spread apart. Submerged in water her body seemed to waver and shimmer. As Stanley watched, she glided slowly upward. The surface of the water slid away to make room for back. Her back became a slick, clean island that gleamed sunlight. But it was the only island. The rest of Sheila stayed down, a layer of water over her buttocks, the hair on the back of her head rising and swaying. She's faking it, Stanley told himself. Wants me to think she's drowning so I'll let my guard down. She'll come up for air any second. But the only movements of her body seemed to be those made by the gentle shifting of the pool water buoying her up. What if she's out cold? What if she drowns? 'Sheila!' Nothing. She can't drown! That'd ruin everything. But even as Stanley leaped from the edge, he wondered if this was exactly what she wanted him to do. He was on his way down when he realized that his hands were empty. He'd set down the scissors and razor…

    'Shit.' he yelled.

    His feet slapped the water. A moment later, they struck the bottom of the pool and he felt as if his legs were being rammed up through his hips. His knees folded. He tumbled forward through the rising spray of his splash and slammed onto Sheila's back. He drove her down. He felt a slight jolt when she hit the bottom of the pool. No struggle came from under him. No good, he thought. No good at all. What if she drowns? He knew he should act quickly to save her, but he wanted to savor the moment- the silence, the mild and heavy coolness of the water, the slick feel of Sheila's skin against his chest and belly, the way he was pressed against her rump with his penis snug between her buttocks. Why they call 'em buns, he thought. Could do her right now. Go just a little lower, and shove it in… And she'll drown for sure, he warned himself. Don't want that. She's gotta be alive and kicking, or it won't be any good at all.

    So he clutched her just below the armpits and slid himself backward. On his knees, he leaned away from her and pulled. She glided up with him. As her body rose, her arms descended and slid over the backs of his hands, pressing them against her sides. Their heads lifted out of the water. Stanley gasped for air. Sheila didn't. She hung limp in his arms, her head drooping. Stanley shook her. 'Hey!' Nothing. He stopped shaking her. She didn't seem to be breathing. Doesn't mean anything, Stanley told himself. She's just holding her breath. From his position at her back, hands clamped to her, he couldn't tell whether she had a heartbeat. So he shoved hands forward, forcing them through the tight spaces between her arms. When they came out the other side, they touched her breasts. Which ended his quest for her heartbeat. He filled his hands. The breasts were wet and heavy. He squeezed them. They were soft, firm, he swirled his hands around them. The nipples were stiff, rubbery nubs. Breathless, he grew so hard that he ached.

    'Can you feel it?' he whispered, pushing against her. She didn't respond. 'Answer me.' She didn't.

    'This is a test,' he whispered. He clamped both nipples between his thumbs and forefingers.

    'Tell me when it hurts'

    He squeezed. Not gently. She didn't flinch rigid and scream with pain, as Stanley thought she might. But she did moan. She did squirm slightly. As if disturbed in her sleep. Then she started to cough. A wet, rattling cough. Stanley cupped her breasts loosely so he could feel them lurch and bounce, slapping against his hands as she was wracked with spasms of coughing. Don't wait till she stops. Get her now while she's screwed up! Clutching her breasts, he pulled her backward until she was tight against him, then put his feet on the bottom and stood up, lifting her. The water was almost waist-high. He glanced over his shoulder and spotted the chrome ladder fixed on the side of the pool, near the corner. It didn't extend down very far - it was intended for use when the pool was full. He wondered if he would be able to reach the lowest rang. Hoped so.

    Wading backward, he dragged Sheila toward the ladder. She twisted and writhed, and couldn't stop coughing. At the corner of the pool, he swung her around and shoved her at the wall. She didn't bring up her arms in time to stop the collision. Her body made a wet, smacking sound when it hit the tiles. Her forehead thumped. Stanley's hands felt pleasantly trapped between the wall and her breasts. He kept them there while Sheila coughed a few more times. Then he slipped them free. He stepped away from her back, grabbed her upper arms, and spun her around to face him. She tried to push him away. The effort was feeble. So much for our Amazon, Stanley thought. Bash her around enough, she ain't so tough. He thrust her bound arms high.

    Her wrists reached almost to the ladder's lowest rung. Pinning them to the wall with his left hand, he caught the dangling strand of barbed wire with his right. Though he jabbed himself a few times, he drew the wire up and wound it around the side rail and bottom rung of the ladder. With a few twists, it was secure. He stepped back. 'Fabulous,' he muttered. In his wildest fantasies, perhaps Sheila had almost looked like this. But perhaps not quite so beautiful, so vulnerable, so ready for him. Most of the filth and blood had been washed away. Except for a few bright red trickles sliding down her forearms from fresh wounds on her wrists, her skin looked clean and glossy. It ran with streamers of silver water. It dripped diamonds. Arms raised high, she stood straight and tall, her head back. Each time she coughed, her body shook. Between coughs, she panted for air. The shaking and panting did wonderful things to her breasts. The ruffled surface of the water encircled Sheila's waist like a fluid, transparent skirt, vaguely pink. Just below it, the fine curls of her pubic hair sparkled like gold. Stanley could see through them as if they weren't there. Her legs seemed to blush in the sunlit, blood-tinted water. Stanley knew they weren't moving, but they appeared to undulate.

    My Sheila, Stanley thought. Just the way always dreamed, only better. While he was gazing at her, she lowered her head. She grimaced at him, eyes squeezed almost shut, teeth bared. She coughed a couple more times, then sniffed.

    'Are you all right?' Stanley asked. She didn't answer. 'You look spectacular.'

    He moved closer. He dipped his hands into the water by her hips, then slid them up her sides to the smooth hollows of her armpits. Then he explored the sleek muscles of her upraised arms before sliding his hands down to her breasts. He watched her breasts as he fondled them, hefted them, pressed them together, squeezed them. Sometimes, Sheila moaned. She likes it, Stanley thought. She squirmed and made quiet wincing sounds when he pinched her nipples. When he pulled and twisted them, her back seemed to stiffen and she hissed through her teeth. He caught one of her nipples between his lips. He flicked and wiggled it with his tongue, then opened wide and sucked in her breast until his mouth was full of the slippery, cool flesh. He tested its springiness with the edges of his teeth. What if I bite it? Bite it off and eat it? She wouldn't look so great afterwards, but imagine the screaming. And the taste. And she'd turn into part of me, flesh of my flesh… Sheila attacked him with her knee. Stanley felt it thrust in and slide up between his thighs. A groin shot - sapped of its power by the weight of the water. If we hadn't been in the pool… But we are. Yes yes. As the knee rushed upward, Stanley shut his legs to trap it. But the water slowed him. By the time he clamped his thighs against the sides of Sheila's knee, it was already touching his scrotum. Instead of crashing into his testicles, her knee simply stopped, barely touching him, and hoisted Stanley upward. His feet lifted from the bottom of the pool. His mouth lost hold of her breast, which popped out with a squelchy, sucking noise. Rising out of the water, he saw the fierce look on her face. The agony. And despair, because she had failed. Stanley was riding her knee like a pony, pointing at her with his stout penis. He didn't even fall off. He simply rode her knee up, and rode it down.

    'Wanta try again?' he asked. She glared at him.

    'You could've hurt me, you know. You could've ruined everything.'

    'That was the point,' she said.

    'I know.'

    Stanley punched her in the stomach. There was no water in the way to slow down his fist, so it landed good just above her navel. It sounded like smacking wet meat. Her breasts jumped nicely. Her legs jerked upward to double over but couldn't. Her breath blasted out and was smashed backward against the side of the pool. Stanley punched her once more in the same place. Not only did her breasts bounce like before, but this time her eyes bulged wildly and her knees broke the surface of the water so that she hung there by the barbed wire around her wrists. Hung there and squeaked as she tried to haul air into her lungs. Fabulous! Stanley shoved his hands into the creases behind her knees. Clutching her there, he pulled the knees wider apart and drew them toward him and stepped between them. As he lifted them above his hips, her dripping cleft came up out of the water and tilted toward him. He plunged into her. He thrust up hard, rising on his tiptoes to reach high and deep, staggered by her tight, gripping slickness. It had never been like this for him. Not even close. This was better than he'd thought possible. I'm in her! In Sheila. I'm fucking her. Yes. Sliding his hands up the backs of her thighs, he clutched the solid globes of her buttocks. He clung to them and tried not to move. Don't move a muscle, he told himself. Don't, or you'll lose it. Hang on. You're in her. In her as in as it gets. Hang on. Make it last. Try to think of something else. That'd be a neat trick. Suddenly, the hug of Sheila around his shaft was too much. Or maybe the knowledge that he was inside her, inside Sheila, finally, was more than he could stand. He felt himself swelling tight with a massive urgency. Even if he didn't move, he was past being able to stop. Even if he tried to think of something else. No use holding back. Go for it. Gripping her ass, he quickly slid almost all the way out. When only his tip was still embedded, he rammed hard into her again. He felt as if he were being clutched and sucked up. Torn from his throat was a noise he'd never made before. 'RA -AHHH.' And he was pounding inside her, throbbing, pumping, grabbing her by the hips and trying to shove himself higher and deeper, jolting her so hard that he had trouble hanging on. Slam it to her, slam it to her, slam it to her. Yes yes yes! 'Stop it! Leave her alone!'

    He heard the shout - a woman's voice from close behind him. But the voice couldn't stop him. He kept thrusting, squirting.

    'Get away from her right now!' Someone I know, he thought. But who? Judy! Sounds just like her. How the hell did Judy get loose? 'Get away from her or I'll shoot!' Shoot?

    He quit thrusting. He was done with Sheila, anyway -at least for now.

    'I'll stop!' he gasped. 'Don't shoot!'

    'Put your hands up!'

    He let go of Sheila's hips and raised his arms. Though longer supported by his hands, she stayed against him, impaled.

    'Judy?' Stanley asked, not looking back.

    'You better believe it.'

    'Don't shoot.' He took a few quick breaths. 'I give up.'

    'Get away from the woman.'

    He nodded. Then he tried a couple more thrusts. Look Ma, no hands! Great. I could do her all over again.

    'You fucking bastard!' Judy cried out.

    And a new voice said, 'Here, give itto me. I'll shoot him.' He pulled out fast and turned around.

    When he'd last seen Judy, she had been naked at the house in her bathtub, feet bound to the faucets, a chair on her chest, her arms wired together with a hanger.

    Now, she stood directly across from him, looking down on him from the edge, only the width of the pool away. She was dressed.

    It looked like the clothes she'd been wearing that morning. Her arms were straight out in front of her. She was using them to hold the revolver that was aimed at his chest. The revolver was big and shiny. It looked like something Harry might use.

    Standing by Judy's side, tugging the sleeve of her shirt, 'was Weed. 'Give it to me,' Weed said. 'I'll blow his fucking head off.'

    Judy shook her head. 'Don't do that.'

    Weed. She looked exactly the same as Stanley remembered her: skinny and mean, her scalp hairless except for black stubble like a two-day growth of whiskers, her eyebrows pointed, her eyes tiny, her chin sharp. She still wore the gray tank top that was cut off just below her ribcage. The golden ring in her navel glinted in the sunlight. Her jeans looked ready to drop from her lean hips. She held a butcher knife in her left hand. Stanley'd had big plans for her. If only he could've found her before. Seeing Weed with Judy, a lot of things suddenly made sense. He hadn't searched for her in Judy's house. But that was obviously where she'd gone to hide from him. And while there, she must've found Judy in the bathtub and set her free. Two of his victims, joining forces. And coming for him. Shouldn't have cut through Judy's back yard. Shouldn't have made Sheila scream so much. Tipped 'em off, and now they're here like a couple fucking harpies. It's like somekind of a nightmare, Stanley thought. Maybe it is a nightmare. Maybe none of this is real, and I'm asleep. Or in a coma. Maybe I never even got out of the house this morning, and I'm trapped there under…Bullshit, he thought. Forget the 'Owlcreek Bridge' bullshit, this is real. It better be real, or was I only dreaming I fucked Sheila. It's real, he told himself. So deal with it.

    'I surrender,' he called. 'Don't shoot. You don't wanta hurt Sheila. I mean, that's a big gun. It'd shoot right through me and right through her, too. You don't wanta kill her, do you?'

    'Of course not,' Judy said. 'Just you.'

    'I give up. See?' He raised his hands even higher. 'I won't try anything. I promise. Just tell me what you want me to do.', With the barrel of the revolver, Judy gestured to her right. 'Move that way.'