Michael Prescott - Shiver

She felt a hand close over her arm with a tender, affectionate squeeze. The Gryphon guided her forward, into the middle of the room, navigating around obstacles she couldn’t see. She heard him unshoulder the drawstring bag and deposit it heavily on something soft and yielding, perhaps a bed.

Metal clicked. A jet of flame sprang from the cigarette lighter in his hand. She watched, motionless, still holding the two shopping bags from the trunk of the car, as he lit the candles scattered throughout the trailer’s interior.

The narrow tunnellike space was a single room, forty feet long, eight feet wide, nine feet high. It was no more than a shell of steel, like a storage shed, with no bathroom or kitchen, no built-in amenities of any kind. Gray short-nap carpet covered the floor. Sheets of corkboard lined the walls and ceiling. Cork, Wendy knew, was often used for soundproofing. What went on within these walls that the Gryphon didn’t want passersby to hear? Too many possibilities occurred to her, none good.

A futon was stretched along one wall. Near it stood a bookcase, the kind made of pressed wood with simulated grain, put together from a do-it-yourself kit. The shelves were stocked, not with books, but with boxes of Ritz crackers, bags of Doritos and Lay’s potato chips, and bottles of soda pop and mineral water. Beyond the bookcase was a table piled high with picnic plates, Styrofoam cups, paper napkins, and plastic utensils, as well as more food: jars of Skippy peanut butter, bags of Oreo cookies, a loaf of Wonder Bread, and a litter of candy bars.

On another table, against the opposite wall, three boombox-style cassette players were displayed. The speakers had been detached; the speaker wires ran along the floor, crawled up the side of the large storage cabinet next to the table, and disappeared under the lumpy white sheet that draped the cabinet as if it were a body in a morgue.

Not far from where she stood, four metal folding chairs were arranged around a card table dressed in a red-and-white-checkered vinyl tablecloth. Two candles in silver holders flanked a plastic floral centerpiece. The Gryphon lit those candles last.

She looked around at the trailer that had become her prison. The candles’ flickering glow rippled over the walls and ceiling like rain shadows.

“So what do you think?” the Gryphon asked.

“It’s very nice. Very… homey.”

“I know you’re going to be happy here, Wendy.”

Her name sounded obscene sliding out of his mouth, filthy and slimy, a pale mucid earthworm emerging from its hole.

She forced a smile. “I’m sure I will.”

The twenty-five-minute drive from the gas station to the trailer, most of which had passed in silence, had given her time to think. She’d decided her best hope of survival was to agree with everything he said. If she could mollify him, humor him, go along with whatever he wanted, then maybe he wouldn’t kill her. Maybe.

She was pretty sure he’d been serious when he claimed to feel something like love for her. Of course it wasn’t love in any terms a normal person would understand. He seemed to regard her not as a human being but as a toy, a plaything, like… like one of those life-size inflatable dolls sold as masturbatory aids.

“Penny for your thoughts, Wendy.”

She realized he was watching her face. “Oh, nothing,” she answered lightly.

“No, no. When I say, ‘Penny for your thoughts,’ you have to tell me what you’re thinking. It’s a rule, see? A rule for lovers.”

“I see. Well, I was just thinking that…” Make it good. “That, as nice as this hideaway of yours is, it sure could use a woman’s touch.”

“Which is precisely why you’re here. To make my special place even more special.” He grinned. “You can put those bags down now. Gently, please.”

She’d forgotten she was holding them. She placed both shopping bags carefully on the floor near the card table.

When she looked up, she saw the Gryphon slip his sunglasses into his pocket, then put on an ordinary pair of glasses, which he hadn’t worn before. Thick-lensed glasses with heavy black frames. They struck a chord of memory in her.

Gazing at him in the alley, she’d had the feeling his face was familiar; now she was certain of it. She’d seen this man before. And when she had, he’d been wearing those black-framed glasses-yes-glasses that had caught the amber glow of a computer terminal’s display screen.

The clerk at Crane’s. That was who he was.

“You,” she whispered.

He smiled at her. “Recognition at last.”

“You sold me the necklace.”

“It wasn’t much of a sales job. You wanted it quite badly. And it looked lovely on you too. I saw you wearing it when you came home last night.” He made a tsk-tsk sound. “Shame you don’t have it with you.” His face brightened. “Hey, I’ll tell you what. I’ll buy you a new necklace, just like the old one. And a beautiful new dress too; we can’t have you wearing that plain gray skirt in here. Not that there’s anything wrong with your outfit, but I want you to look your very best for me. What’s your size?”

“Four.”

“I’ll remember that. Tomorrow, when I’m in the department store, I’ll buy you a gorgeous evening gown, and then when I come here after work, you can dress up for me. Won’t that be fun?”

“I’m sure it will. I love getting new clothes.”

“Women always do. They need to feel pretty and feminine. It’s in their nature, the same way a man needs to feel strong.”

Smiling happily, he shrugged off the brown coat and tossed it on the futon, next to the drawstring bag. Despite the uniform, he looked nothing like a policeman to her now. She wondered how she could ever have been fooled.

“In a moment I’ll fix you something to eat. I’ll bet you’re hungry.”

She had no appetite whatsoever. “Starved.”

“First, however, I have a little chore to take care of. It won’t take long.”

He lifted one of the shopping bags off the floor and set it down on the card table. Holstering the Beretta, he turned his back to her and leaned over the bag.

She tensed.

He’d just made a mistake.

The pistol’s checkered plastic grip shone in the candlelight. Almost within her reach.

“Unfortunately,” he was saying, “lunch won’t be anything fancy. You see, I’ve got no electricity here, no refrigerator or stove, so I’m limited in what I can prepare. I’ve been meaning to buy one of those portable generators, but I never seem to get around to it.”

“I’m sure”-her voice was steady-“whatever you make for me will be fine.”

She took a step toward him.

“Well, it won’t be as tasty as what you’re used to, I’ll bet.” He reached into the bag with both hands. “You must be a wonderful cook.”

“Not really.”

Another step.

The holstered automatic was inches away.

“Oh,” he said pleasantly, “you’re just being modest. I’m sure you can cook the pants off me.

Hey, that’s a funny way of putting it, don’t you think? Cook the pants off-”

She lunged for the gun. Her fingers closed over the handle. He spun to face her, and his hands flew free of the shopping bag and scrabbled at the holster-too late.

Wendy aimed the pistol at him from a foot away.

I did it, a voice in her mind exulted from a great distance. I did it, did it, did it.

“All right,” she said tensely, “put your hands up.” The words a legacy of every TV crime drama she’d ever watched.

He stared at her, his eyes almost comically wide, his mouth hanging open. Then he took a shambling step backward and thumped into the card table. The shopping bag fell over with a thud and whatever was inside rolled toward the edge.