J. Black - The Survivors Club

He held up the first page. The Chelsea grin.

“Oh, God, Michael, don’t even joke about that—”

Michael felt the dark tide rising in his chest. It all but obliterated the terror he’d felt as the truck bore down on him. But the dread remained.

I KNOW WHAT YOU DID .

That fueled his anger. His anger was always silent, but effective. He said, “You don’t like the Chelsea grin? I admit, it would ruin you for acting jobs. Or modeling. Look at the picture.”

Obediently, Martin craned his neck to look again. He’d seen it before. The Chelsea grin was what happened when someone took a knife to the corners of a man’s mouth and cut to make the grin wider.

“Michael, you wouldn’t—”

“Martin, you don’t know what I’m capable of.”

Martin stared at him.

“You have a choice. Like last time.” Michael reached out and touched a black curl of Martin’s hair, hooked it behind his lover’s ear. “You know you’ll be all right. A little bit of pain, and then pleasure beyond your wildest dreams. You just have to choose. The Chelsea grin or—”

“Please! Please! ”

“Shhhhhhhh.” Michael put his finger to his lover’s lips. Martin was shaking uncontrollably. It reminded him of his wife’s worthless Chihuahua, always trembling. “You don’t want that, it’s okay,” Michael crooned. “There’s always another option.”

“What? What? ”

“The bastinado. Some pain, but on the good side, no marks. No marks , Martin. Nothing to mar your beauty. Easy peasy. Just something for you to get through, to prove how much you love me.”

“Michael, I love you. Let’s make love and—”

“Shhhhhhh. A couple of whacks, that’s all. No more than two to each foot.”

“No! Please, Michael! Let’s make love! Please, I want you so much—”

“The Chelsea grin or the bastinado? You have to choose.”

Martin was crying now. Sobbing. His fear kited up out of his soul and Michael felt that if he opened his mouth right now he could swallow it whole. “You have to say it, Martin.”

Martin whimpered, “The bas—the bastinado.”

“Legs in the air. Soles of the feet facing me.”

Martin raised them slowly.

“Keep them up. No fair cheating. I want my two whacks. I won’t be cheated.”

Martin’s legs were trembling. His beautiful, muscular, tanned legs. He would keep them up. He was completely in submission mode.

Michael took a couple of practice swings. The dowel whipped back and forth, making a satisfying whooshing sound as it cleaved the air.

“You know something, Martin?” Michael said as he stood at the foot of the bed and assumed the stance of a Samurai.

Thwack!

“I’m feeling better already.”

CHAPTER 44

By the time Tess reached Phoenix, it was getting late. She’d called ahead and the cold case detective, a tall rawboned woman named Jenny Searles, came out to greet her. She led the way down the hallway to the office she shared with two other detectives, both immersed in their own cases at their desks.

Searles had a file on her desk, marked Karen Poole.

Karen Poole’s murder book.

Searles said, “Couple of things, so you won’t get pissed off at me. This is a cold case, and as often happens, it looks like a few things are either missing or incomplete. There was a big reorganization of the file room seven or eight years ago, and a lot of stuff ended up being misplaced.”

Tess nodded. She’d worked in a cold case unit years ago in Albuquerque, and sometimes a cold case was like a piece of paper torn to bits. You had to paste together the story as best you could. “Thanks for the warning.”

“No problem.”

The first page carried the details of the shooting. Karen Poole, along with the clerk, was killed. Karen had been standing by the counter of the Pit Stop convenience store, talking to the young man behind the counter. It was just before shift change at twelve midnight. She was shot at point-blank range. The young man, a kid with dishwater-blond hair and a stud through his eyebrow, had fallen behind the counter, shot through the eye. The killer had managed to get him to open the cash register and took what little money was there.

Tess watched and rewatched the surveillance tape. The man who entered the store wore a black ski mask and a hoodie. The sweatshirt he wore either made him look bulky or he was heavyset. Under the ski mask his head looked substantial, and from the way he moved, Tess thought he was older—pushing forty. Definitely not a kid.

Tess asked Searles, “Have you made any progress on this case?”

“Unfortunately, no. The only witnesses are dead. And the guy must have run off to a car parked nearby.”

“Anything unusual?”

“No. Except usually the robberies are committed by younger males.”

She saw no nervousness. No panic. No hesitation.

He was good with a weapon. Just from the trajectory, just from the way he killed.

“How much money was there in the drawer?”

“Twenty dollars.”

Tess went back and forth through the report. It looked an awful lot like Karen Poole had been in the wrong place at the wrong time. There was just too much evidence that this was a convenience store holdup.

But she didn’t believe that.

Tess had already formed an opinion, already thought the shooter was Wade Poole. Everything she’d learned about him pointed to that. But the evidence just wasn’t there. There didn’t seem to be a way to orchestrate it. No way to make it happen. Too many variables.

Tess said, “So what do you think?”

“The guy’s a good shot.”

The image was grainy and dark. The man had walked out the door to the right, money stuffed into the pocket of his hoodie. To the right along the walkway and out of view. Gone.

“Can we look at it again?”

“Sure.”

Tess watched it three times.

“Can we go back?”

“Sure.”

“There.”

Detective Searles stopped the tape. There was a lot of static, everything frozen, gray and black, blurry image, the greenish light of a car going by, headlights hitting the wall.

“What does that look like to you?”

“His hand?”

“Yes.”

“He’s wearing gloves.”

“Yes, he is. But there. You can see the outline of a ring. On his right hand.”

“Looks like some kind of man’s ring. Biggest ring I’ve ever seen.”

The ring was bulky and square, stretching the leather glove.

Tess had seen a clunky ring like that before. She’d seen it on the third finger of the right hand of the cheerful rancher type she’d met at Jaimie Wolfe’s place.

How he’d grinned and looked around at the stable yard, at the riding ring, and the barn. “Name’s Barnes,” he’d told her.

She saw him reach down to lift a potted plant off its saucer, exposing the key to the house. Saw the clunky ring sparkle in the sunlight as he twisted the key in the doorknob, all the while making small talk. She remembered asking him for his contact information so she could talk to him later, and how he’d put her off by asking her to give him her card.

“I’ll copy you on the file and the tape,” Jenny Searles was saying. “The detective on the original case is Sol Green. I think his number’s still good.”

“Thanks.”

“I’ll walk you out.”

“Great,” Tess said. But she hardly registered the walk back out to the front doors of the station.

She was still back at Jaimie’s ranch, watching Wade Poole let the dogs inside the house as he gave her the biggest snow job ever.