Tango Key (28 page)

"Nothin' more than what he always done, miss. He ran away from home. Hope he don't come back this time, so that grandma of his can have some peace."

Four months later, a hobo found Bo's remains in the old railroad shack. But no one cared.

She slides the soap over her face, trying desperately to leap onto some other track of time. There are good memories in there somewhere, aren't there?

"Lean forward and I'll get your back," he says.

Her eyes flutter open. "I can wath mythelf."

"Babe, let's not go through this again."

She glares at him. She wishes him dead. Her mouth throbs.

Her head aches. "Why're you doing thith?" she whispers, her eyes filling with tears.

He touches her hair, strokes it, but he doesn't answer.

Doesn't matter. She knows why. She knows, but she won't think about it now. She will think instead of God. Yes. God is making him do this to her, God is using him as an instrument to teach her a lesson. God is getting even. This is easier to deal with than the truth.

"I can tie your arms again, you know. I can tie your arms if you won't lean forward. I can even tie your arms and hold your head under water."

"And then you'd have to fuck a corpth."

He frowns. It creases the skin between his eyes deeply, creating a furrow. Birds could plant seeds in that furrow. "I told you that ladies don't say words like that."

"Fuckfuckfuckfuck."

He draws his hand back to smack her, and she screams; "Go ahead, go on, knock out all my teeth, go on, do it!"

His hand halts. It is like a bird that has been stripped of its wings and doesn't know it yet. Then it moves to her shoulder, the fingers digging into the soft flesh on the inside of her collarbone, digging painfully, pushing her forward, holding her there, forehead against her knees. Pain flares in her gums. He slides the washcloth over her spine, under her hair, around to her sides. She presses her arms close to her ribs.

"Sit back," he says.

She does. She watches his face as he moves the washcloth over her breasts. Now it's the soap, making lazy circles around her nipples. They stand erect—obedient little soldiers.

He slides the washcloth down her stomach, then lower.

"Open your legs, babe."

She ignores him.

He flicks open an oversized switchblade, the blade as narrow as a finger. The light from the lantern strokes the metal. "We have to go through this again?" He smiles and holds the blade up high, where she can see it, where her eyes can follow it as it moves to her shoulder, pausing there, the tip sliding lightly down her arm to the crook of her elbow, then down the inside of her arm to her wrist. Now he slips the tip of the knife between her fingers, applying pressure. For a second, she is sure he is going to drive the tip through the thin, loose flesh between her index and second fingers and impale her hand against the edge of the tub. Instead, he says, "Stand up, babe."

She presses her hands against the edges of the tub, rising slowly, her eyes always on the knife, soap still glistening on patches of her skin.

"Step out. Onto the mat."

She does.

He holds the knife level with her nose. "Kneel on the mat, babe."

She does this, too, so now her eyes are level with the zipper on his jeans, which he is drawing down. "If that'th what you want," she says, "you don't need the knife to get it."

"Wrong, babe. The knife is part of it. Lie down on your back now like a good girl"

He's gonna cut me open he's gonna slice me he's gonna

"On your back I won't tell you again." He touches the knife to a point just under her left eye. She imagines it slipping, sliding into her eyeball, cutting through it like a, a blade through a melon.

"Okay." The word slides into the air.

He takes the knife away, and slowly she stretches out on the bathmat. He is naked now from the waist down and already hard, standing to her side, swinging the knife over her belly in smooth, tight circles, a hawk circling a prey. Fear coats her tongue in the thick, sour taste of bile. Always in the past, sexually, she has been in control. She has been the one to say,
Hurt me, get the belt, do this, do that.
This man's unpredictability terrifies her. A knife is different from a belt; it is quite specific. And a little pain from a belt is not at all like the pain of a knife.

He kneels beside her on the floor now, the knife sliding across her collarbone, dipping under it, slipping between her breasts, circling the right breast, the left. She watches his face—the smile widening, eyes glazing over, the bright beads of sweat pimpling his forehead. "I bet your blood is bright red, babe," he says. "Should we see if it is? Hmm? Should we?"

"Pleathe . . ." she whispers.

"What? I can't hear you."

The blade pauses between her breasts, and then the tip nicks at the skin there, a sharp stinging, a bee sting. She gasps—not because it hurts so much, but because she didn't expect him to really do it. Not deep down. No. Deep down, she believed he was using the knife just to keep her in line. To remind her who is in control. Who is boss. Who's running the show. But the knife is part of it.

She gazes down at her breastbone. The spots of blood bloom against her white skin. He touches his finger to the blood and smears it around one breast, the other, then draws his fingertip straight down to her tan line. He dampens his fingers in the blood
again, and now he
slides his finger along her tan line, draws it precisely, so a thin ribbon of blood cuts her in half at the pubic bone.

"Oops, the blood is drying up already, babe. Hmm. Where should we test next? Got any ideas?" His eyes glide from the nick between her breasts to her shoulders, her belly, between her legs. "Ah. I know. We'll just dip inside and see what's what. How about that, babe?"

The skin across her belly tightens as he draws the knife lightly down the center of her, as if preparing to fillet her like a fish. The blade hesitates at the edge of her pubic bone. She holds her breath. She knows he is going to do it, he is going to plunge the knife into her, up inside her, twisting the blade into her womb, carving it up while she is still alive, still breathing, and she won't die for a long, long time, she won't die until her blood has poured out of her. She will just lie here in excruciating pain, the room growing dimmer, her head lighter than a balloon, the blood around her thickening. . .

Now his hand is against the inside of her knee. It coaxes her legs open. She is weeping. She can feel the knife moving lower. She begs him, her voice a hiss, a soft slide of words, "Pleathe, no, pleathe. . ." Their eyes lock. His slow smile widens until it is a hideous grin. She sees his teeth, the end of his tongue—pink and wet and slipping along his lower lip. The knife is in the crease of her leg. The tip nicks the skin; she gasps. Isn't there an artery along the inner thigh?
Yes. Oh God.
An artery. What artery? Is that what he's going to do? Slide the knife into the artery? Then her death will be quick. The blood will pump out like oil, the blood . . .

"Where do you want it, babe?"

Panic. Where does she want what? The knife? She doesn't want the knife. But if she says that, he'll get mad.

"C 'mon, babe. Tell me what you want. Say, 'I want you to fuck me.' Say it"

"Iwantyoutofuckme."

"No, not like that. Like you mean it. Say it, babe. Say it again, c'mon."

He is moving the knife back and forth in the crease of her thigh. He is sawing her leg off. He is sawing her leg off with a switchblade. But there's no pain. How can there be no pain? No. Wait. It isn't the knife. It's his finger. Jesus, his finger, sliding back and forth in the crease, mimicking the knife. Then where is the knife?

"Babe, once more. What do you want me to do? And say it like you mean it."

"I. . . want. . . you. . . to. . . fuck. . . me."

"Much better, babe, much better. Bend your knee. That's my girl. Now the other knee. " Then he thrusts the knife inside her and a white agony erupts in her womb and she opens her mouth and screams and screams as he twists the blade, thrusts it in again, thrusts harder, the blade is huge, the blade is . . .

His open palm slams into the side of her face, silencing her. "Shut up."

She stares at him. She's still alive. It isn't the knife inside her, but him.
No knife no knife no knife.
Hysteria bubbles like soda water inside her throat. A huge laugh explodes from her. He doesn't seem to hear her. He is pumping inside her. Grunting. His eyes are closed. He grips her knees. Where is the knife? He dropped it. But where? He is groaning now, sliding his hands under her, lifting her hips. She feels
nothing. She's been
injected
with Novocain.
He is almost finished with her. Then he will scoop up the knife and drive it through her like a stake. Unless she does something.

He bellows, he collapses against her, his breath heating up the side of her damp face as he says her name over and over again. Her arms remain stiff at her sides, her head turned slightly left. She says nothing. Does nothing. She waits.

As he is climbing off her, she lifts up on her elbows, draws her legs toward her. He is rocking back on his heels, looking around, probably for the knife. As he begins to stand, at the exact instant when he is rising up, her legs shoot out. Her heels sink into his groin. For a second, a look of utter astonishment seizes his face. Then he cries out and doubles over, clutching himself, and suddenly she is on her feet, racing out of the bathroom, slamming the door behind her. Her bare feet pound the old floors. Her breath erupts from her chest in great, heaving gasps. He shouts. The bathroom door slams into the wall as he throws it open. She is in the kitchen, she is going to make it, she is going to get away this time, she will, she . . .

The screen door is ajar, but he has dead-bolted the heavy door behind it. Her hands are so damp they slip and slide across the lock. He shouts at her. She grabs hold of the upright plank next to the door, a long, heavy piece of wood she somehow knows he intends to fix across the door like a safety bar. She grips the plank like a sword and whirls, swinging it through the air, threatening him with it.

He feints. She swings. The plank whistles through the hot air, missing him, and now he comes at her from the side, his shoulders slightly hunched over. When he moves, he looks like a gorilla. Blind with panic, adrenaline rushing through her like a hot and powerful wind, she swings again. The plank slams into his upper thigh. He yelps, grabs hold of the end of the wood, and yanks it toward him—and her with it.

He catches her from behind. Eve kicks. She shrieks. She kicks again. But he's stronger, faster, and clamps a hand over her mouth, pressing down so hard against her broken teeth that she nearly faints from the agony. Then he pinches her nostrils shut, robbing her of air.

The light turns browner than the Mississippi. Her brain pleads for air. Images flicker across the insides of her eyes. Then there is nothing but a sweet, warm blackness, deep and soundless.

F
or the next ten days, Aline did virtually nothing but keep Eve under surveillance.

She followed Eve's yellow VW bug on drives to the beach near the old Pleskin place and watched as she dug for clams or spent hours on a towel in the shade, reading. She followed her to the grocery store, the gourmet shop, the bank, the attorney's office. She followed her to the expensive shops in Pirate's Cove where Eve never left empty-handed.

After one such excursion, Aline backtracked to each of the shops—six in all—identified herself to the clerks, and asked how Mrs. Cooper had paid for her purchases. Credit cards. The combined credit bills for that day's spree totaled more than $8,000. For a woman who was getting only $15,000 cash from her husband's estate, the Mercedes, and the sloop, she was spending like there was no tomorrow. The purchases were odd, too. There were clothes, of course, but also things like a sleeping bag, lanterns, navigational maps, freeze-dried food, canned goods, a Sterno stove, camping utensils, rain slickers.

And because Aline kept her under surveillance for sometimes as long as fourteen and fifteen hours, she had a pretty good idea how much time Eve and Murphy spent together. A lot.

They spent most nights together at either his house or hers. Some mornings, Eve left her place at eight and putted down to the south end of the island in her trusty VW and met Murphy in the boatyard, where he was still working. They sanded down hulls together, varnished old wooden masts, rebuilt engines, whatever needed to be done. They would break for lunch around noon or one, hop into Murphy's Scarab, and tear away from the dock as if they couldn't escape Tango Key fast enough. They acted, she thought, like newlyweds who were biding their time until they left for their honeymoon.