Scottsdale Heat: a romantic light-hearted murder mystery (Laura Black Mysteries Book 1) (17 page)

Against the far wall was a large iron bed frame with a torn and filthy mattress sitting on top of it. Next to the bed were two battered wooden chairs. On the floor around the bed were several empty beer bottles and half a dozen used syringes. Smith waved the gun, indicating he wanted me on the bed.

“No!” I said, stopping in my tracks.

Now, I should have kept my mouth shut, but these guys were starting to piss me off.

“Look, you jerks,” I said turning to the men. “I’ve gone along with your bullshit games, but I’ve had enough. If you want to talk to me, fine. If you want to make up stupid names for yourselves, that’s fine too. But put the guns away and cut the crap.”

All right, so I don’t normally talk like that. But jeez, enough was enough.

“My brother,” Smith said. “Perhaps you are correct. This whore has no manners. Please teach her some.”

Jones came toward me but as he did, I snapped into my defensive position. From my recent training, I spun around with a high, hard, roundhouse kick. Gina would have been so proud of me. The kick was well timed and I caught him with the sole of my shoe square in his face, just below his right eye. The blow made a loud wet
slapping
sound.

I was about to follow up with a snap kick to his knee, when I felt a hand grab the back of my hair and pull me upwards. I was off balance and swung my arms wildly. Without warning, I felt a rough
thump
as Smith’s fist hit the side of my head.

Hot pain radiated outward while white spots flashed and danced in front of me. Stunned, I staggered sideways on my feet. My eyes cleared enough to see Jones come at me, his cheek already reddening and starting to swell. A trickle of blood flowed out his nose. Looking at his smashed face made me feel proud. Jones raised his fist and walked toward me. I stiffened myself to take another blow when Smith barked out: “No! Wait! I need her undamaged. Later!”

Jones hesitated, took another step towards me, and then stopped. He stared at me with a look of pure hatred. He then lowered his fist and smiled. Blood was now running down his face and covered his teeth in a red grimace. The smile sent a shiver of fear through me.

Through blurry eyes, I saw Smith pull a pair of handcuffs from his jacket pocket. He took my arm, dragged me to the bed, and forced me to sit on it. He fastened one cuff onto my left wrist, the other cuff to the bed frame, at the top where the pillow would go. This left me enough slack to sit on the side of the bed.

Smith arranged one of the wooden chairs so it faced me. It was so close that when he sat our knees touched. Lights were still dancing in front of my eyes, but Jones had moved his chair to the foot of the bed and was still staring at me. He had found a dirty rag and was holding it to his bleeding nose.

Cool, maybe I broke it.

I then saw the hatred in his eyes had been replaced with something worse. He was still grinning but now his eyes had a sickening look of lust and anticipation.

“Now then,” Smith said. “You will tell me where my property is.”

“What property?” I asked.

“Do not play games with me, you diseased whore! My brother wants you to give untruthful answers so he may use you for pleasure, but I do not. I know it is true the filthy pig Alexander Sternwood has my property. I want to know where they are. Where did he hide them?”

OK, so Alex had something belonging to a couple of pissed-off guys. With that information, a few things fell into place, but still not enough for me to figure out what was going on. My problem was I had no idea what they were talking about. Alex had been selling things but I didn’t know what they could be. My only chance was to tell them what I knew.

“He sold them,” I said. My head was still throbbing. It made it hard to think clearly. “He’s been selling them all week. He sold some at a place called Meyer’s Jewelry and then he sold some at the Tropical Paradise. That was three days ago.”

“That is false!” Smith shouted. “Without help, he could not sell all of them. Without Reinhardt that would be impossible.”

“I saw him,” I said. “He made a sale at Meyer’s Jewelry and then he went to the Tropical Paradise. He met Reinhardt there. They went into the back room of the art gallery there and didn’t come out for ten or fifteen minutes. After he left, two big guys in a black Lincoln began following him. They’ve been following him ever since.”

“You lie!” Smith screamed. “You cannot have heard of the name of Albert Reinhardt until I mentioned it just now. You have no idea who I’m talking about, do you?”

“It’s true,” I protested. “I did see Alex make a sale to Reinhardt.”

“Lying whore!” Smith’s face turned red as his anger mounted. He stood up and threw his chair against the wall where it shattered with a loud crash. His chest heaved as he began to pace back and forth. He walked toward me and brought his arm up to backhand me, but for some reason didn’t. He then resumed pacing in front of the bed.

After thirty seconds he stopped. He seemed to have made up his mind about something. He walked over to a metal cabinet next to the broken printing press, opened the door, and slowly pulled out a knife. It was almost a foot long and had a thin pointed tip. There were ink spots of various colors all along the blade and handle.

Smith stared at the knife for a moment, then turned, and looked at me. His eyes were open wide with excitement. His lips were parted in a cruel smile.

He walked over to where I was shackled to the bed. Bending down, he took the knife and lightly held it against my nose. He held his face less than three inches from mine. As he spoke, I felt his hot, foul breath against my face.

“Listen carefully, bitch,” he said. “Your life depends on your next answer. If you do not speak truly, my brother will harshly use you for his enjoyment, and I will cut you. I have not yet decided in which order these things will occur. Although it is most likely Reinhardt would have called me if he had possession of my property, I must know for sure. If you have truly seen Alexander Sternwood with Albert Reinhardt, then you will be able to describe to me what Albert Reinhardt looks like, no?”

For a moment I panicked. My head throbbed and my mind was blank. I couldn’t remember what Reinhardt looked like.

Come on, Laura. You saw him just three days ago. What did he look like?

“
Answer me!
” Smith screamed. As I watched, he took the knife and slashed it across the top of the mattress. A deep cut opened in the mattress, less than three inches from where I sat. Little black spots danced in front of my eyes as I stared down at the mattress, horrified with the knowledge the knife could just as easily slice open my leg. Smith took the knife and pressed it against my stomach. I shuddered and took a deep breath.

“He’s a little shorter than you and thin. He’s about sixty years old and has an athletic body, like he runs a lot. He has short blonde hair and a gray beard and moustache. And he had bloodshot watery eyes, like he had allergies or was on drugs or something.”

Smith’s eyes opened wide. He started yelling in to Jones in some language I didn’t understand. Jones stood up, waved his arms, and yelled back. This went on for a full three minutes. They looked like a married couple having a spat.

It stopped as quickly as it had started. Jones turned and walked out of the room. Smith looked at me for a moment then spoke. “We will now visit the Iceman, Albert Reinhart. If what you say is true and he has my merchandise, then Reinhardt will answer to me and you will live. We may even release you, after you amuse us and my brother pays you back for what you did to him. If what you have said is false, then I will come back and deeply slit your belly. I will then watch with joy as you bleed to death in front of me.”

Smith then stalked out of the room. I heard the front door of the office open and close. After a minute, the engine of the Chrysler turned over and then grew faint as the car pulled out of the lot.

Jeez, I hate it when this happens.

I sat on the edge of the bed and my whole body began to shake. At times like this, I think I should work in a beauty salon or maybe at the library. I’d be good at that stuff. Nobody at the library threatens to gut you like a fish if you tell them they owe a three-dollar fine for an overdue book.

~~~~

It took me almost five minutes before I could think again. When my heart had slowed to a fast trot, I looked down at the handcuff locked to my wrist. Out of desperation, I yanked hard to see if I could pull my hand out. I was rewarded with a bolt of pain as the cuff bit into my wrist.

It reminded me of a Stephen King novel I had once read. It was about a woman who was also handcuffed to a bed. As I recalled, before she could slip the cuff off, she had to slice off part of her thumb with a piece of broken glass. I hoped I could get myself free without having to resort to that.

By lifting the mattress, I could see the other end of the cuff was securely attached to the bed frame. I swung my legs around and stood up. I wrestled off the mattress and took a good look at the frame. Disappointment hit me, as I saw the frame was a solid piece of welded iron. It didn’t have an opening, a gap, or any way to simply unbolt it. The bed frame itself was too big and heavy to just drag it out of the building.

OK, let’s go to plan B
.

My problem was I didn’t have a plan B. I didn’t know how long they would be gone. If they decided I knew too much, they might come back and finish me off before finding Reinhardt. Thinking about that made my heart kick back into high gear again.

I looked around the room. If I could find a metal bar, maybe I could pry the cuff off the bed. The bar would have to be thin enough to get between the cuff and the frame, but strong enough not to bend when I put my weight behind it.

I pulled the bed across the concrete floor toward the old printing press. As soon as the heavy bed started moving, it made a deafening screeching sound. Ignoring the noise, I scanned the broken machinery, hoping to find some sort of metal rod. I spotted one piece that might work, but it was securely bolted to the body of the press.

I then tugged the bed to the metal cabinet Smith had gotten the knife from. I opened the cabinet door and looked in. There were old cans of ink and some wooden sticks, but nothing useful. In frustration I turned and screamed:

“Damn it! Give me a freaking break!”

As I yelled, my eyes glanced to a stack of shelves on the far wall. Sitting on the uppermost shelve, next several old cans of ink, was my purse.

I stopped breathing. My mind was racing. Jones had taken my purse and tossed to Smith. Had Smith gone through it? I couldn’t remember. Why had he put it there? Was there still anything in it I could use?

Well, only one way to find out.

Once again, I pulled the screeching bed across the concrete. Sweat was running into my eyes and I was close to exhaustion by the time I had crossed the twenty yards to the shelf. I reached up to get the purse, but was two feet short. I grabbed the bed with my cuffed hand and lifted it, but still couldn’t get it high enough to grab the strap of the purse.

I looked around for anything that could help. On the floor, twenty feet to my left, I spotted a wooden paint stirring stick. I tugged the bed over to the stick, picked it up, and then drug the bed back to the shelf.

Holding the paint stick, I stretched my arm to its limit. By using only the handcuff chained to my wrist, I pulled the bed several inches off the floor. The cuff dug into my wrist and the pain was intense. I took a deep breath and held it.

With one last jab, I hooked the strap of my purse with the stick. I gave the strap a yank and it tumbled off the shelf. I caught my purse, one-handed, before it hit the floor.

Panting and drenched with sweat I sat down hard on the edge of the bed frame, clutching my purse to my chest. With my whole body shaking, I opened my purse and peered in.

When I saw what was inside, I began to giggle. The giggles rose until they became full blown laughter. I laughed so hard I couldn’t breathe and tears rolled down my face. So OK, maybe I was a little hysterical.

Gradually I calmed down, tears still streaming down my face. Inside the purse were my Baby Glock and my cell phone.

I pulled out the gun and felt the weight of it in my hand. I held the gun with my shackled left hand while I chambered a round with my right. I switched the gun to my right hand and carefully aimed at the chain stretched tight between the cuffs. I angled the gun so I wouldn’t shoot either my hand or the bed. After all of this, I didn’t want the bullet ricocheting back and hitting me. With a deafening
Booom!
I yanked my arm up. I was free.

With a handcuff still attached to my wrist, I got up and crossed the room to the door leading out to the offices. I opened the door a crack and then eased it open, the Glock following my every movement. Nobody was in sight. I peered out of one of the grimy windows to see if anyone was waiting for me in the dirt parking lot. Of course, if there were anybody there, the gunshot would have alerted them to my escape. Well, I thought, it’s tough luck to anybody who gets in my way right now. I’m in a real bitchzilla kind of mood.

~~~~

I walked outside, first to the parking lot, and then out to the street. I half walked, half ran a block to the west, then a block to the south. I crossed the street and went over the embankment. This put me on the north bank of the Salt River. I walked west a half a mile, following the river along a city maintenance path, until I came to the Scottsdale Road Bridge. I was about to climb the embankment up to the road, when I noticed I was still holding the Glock. I ejected the round from the chamber and reloaded it back in the magazine. I then slipped the gun back in my purse.