“Maybe, maybe not. How bad do you want to know?”
“Tell me.”
“Don’t tell her,” Quen said.
Through her tears, she gave him a fierce look. “Shut up,” she said.
“I’ll shut you up.”
Toby aimed the pistol at him.
“Sorry,” he said. “I’m just thinking, hold back the information till she does what you want. Make her work for it.”
“I already figured that out.”
“Oh. Okay. Sorry.”
“Just stay out of this.” He looked down at Fran. She was still on her back, but she no longer gasped for breath. Her face was smeared with blood from the gash on her cheek. The rest of her body was pale and shiny, running with sweat. Her gaze was fixed on the ceiling. She seemed uninterested in it, though. She looked as if she might be daydreaming about something vaguely pleasant.
“Just watch Fran,” Toby said. “Make sure she doesn’t try nothing.”
Quen chuckled. “She won’t try anything. She’s just lying there hoping I’ll fuck her again.”
“Watch her. And keep your mouth shut.”
“Aye-aye, sir.” Quen snapped to attention and saluted Toby.
Toby had to smile. Turning to Brenda, he said, “So you wanta know if your sister’s alive?” he asked.
Her head moved slightly up and down.
“Gotta do something for me first. Do what I say, and I’ll tell.”
“Okay.” With the back of one hand, she wiped the tears from her eyes. Her face still glistened with shiny wet streamers. Not all tears, Toby realized. Had to be sweat there, too, because she sure didn’t have tears running down her neck and chest and belly.
We’re all dripping like crazy, he thought, and me and Quen haven’t been crying at all.
Correction, he thought. Baxter ain’t dripping.
Oh yes he is.
Toby laughed.
Brenda stared up at him.
“Ready?” he asked.
“Sure,” she muttered.
“Take off your top.”
A corner of her mouth twitched. “Why am I not surprised?”
Toby laughed.
Brenda sat forward, grimacing—maybe because of the bullet hole in her leg?—then reached behind her back with both hands. Watching her, Toby felt himself grow heavier in the groin—stiffening and rising under the front of his loose, hanging shirt.
Its back strings untied, the bikini went slack. Its pouches no longer held her breasts, but draped them like a pair of tiny rags. She brought her arms forward, slipped her left arm underneath the limp garment to cover her breasts, then plucked at the neck strings with her left hand. The bikini top fell away and came to rest on her lap.
“It’s off,” she said. Toby heard a tremor in her voice. “Happy?” she asked.
“Put your arms down.”
She lowered both arms.
Her breasts were small, smooth mounds, pale as moonlight, tipped with nipples the color of a baby’s lips.
The front edges of Toby’s shirt brushed against the sides of his rising shaft.
Brenda looked at him sticking out, then quickly raised her eyes to his face. “Tell me about Sherry,” she said.
“I killed her,” Toby said.
And watched her face, already wet and red, contort with agony. Slumping back against the door, she covered her face with both hands and wept.
“Just kidding,” Toby said.
Quen brayed out a harsh laugh.
“She isn’t dead,” Toby went on. “Not yet, anyway.”
Brenda kept on crying.
“But I’ve got her,” Toby explained. “She’s my prisoner. So if you don’t want me to finish her off, you’re gonna do everything I tell you. She was supposed to follow orders but she blew it. That’s how come all this is happening to you and your pals—because big sister tried to screw me over. Now it’s up to you. I’ve got her. I can nail her any time I want. And that’s what I’m gonna do if you give me any shit. All you’ve gotta do is listen to me and do everything I say. Be real friendly and nice and no funny stuff, and it’ll stop here. How’s that grab you?”
Brenda wiped her face and jerked her head up and down. “Yeah,” she blurted. “I’ll…I’ll do it. Anything.”
“That’s what Sherry said, but then she fucked with me.”
“I won’t. I’ll be good. I promise.”
“We’ll see about that.”
He looked over at Quen. The guy was gaping at Brenda, his mouth hanging open, his hands pressed flat against his thighs, his rigid penis aimed at the ceiling.
“There’s a knife in my shorts,” Toby told him. “Take it out. I wanta see you slice those jeans off her. And whatever she’s got on underneath.”
Quen cast him a feverish glance. “You got it, boss.” He sank to a crouch over Toby’s shorts. Searching the pockets, he found a pair of pliers. He held them up. “Want ’em?”
“Maybe later. Just get the knife.”
“Yes sir.” He resumed the search.
“I can take my pants off,” Brenda said. She sniffed and wiped her eyes. “Nobody has to cut them.”
“Quen does.”
“Why?”
“ ’Cause I told him to.”
“Screwdriver?” Quen asked.
“Just get the knife.”
“Here we go.” Quen removed a folding Buck knife from a pocket of the shorts. He pried open its blade, stood up and stepped over to Brenda.
“Scoot down and lie on the floor,” Toby told her.
She eased herself down, gritting her teeth, a couple of times flinching with pain.
Toby watched drops of sweat dribble down her body. He watched how her small breasts jiggled ever so slightly as she moved. When she was flat on her back, she almost seemed to have no breasts—might’ve been a boy except for the very subtle slopes and the size of her nipples.
Quen spread her legs, stepped between them and squatted down.
Fran, still on the floor, pushed herself up to her elbows and raised her head to watch.
Quen slipped the knife blade underneath the frayed denim high on Brenda’s left thigh. Then he looked over his shoulder at Toby. “Can I cut her?”
“You want to?”
“Maybe a little.”
“No skin off my nose.”
Brenda pushed herself off the floor and braced herself up with her elbows, like Fran only slim and beautiful. Looking Quen in the eyes, she hissed, “You just dare cut me, you shitty pervert, and I’ll shove that knife up your ass.”
Laughing, he started to work the knife back and forth, sawing his way up her thigh.
Toby watched the denim split open, a V widening its way up the top of her leg.
Fran watched, too. She had a strange look on her face. It looked almost like a smile.
Brenda also watched the knife’s progress. She didn’t flinch or cry out, so apparently Quen was avoiding her skin.
She scared him off.
She wasn’t wearing a belt. When Quen sliced through her waistband, the side of her cut-offs slid from her hip and fell to the floor. With a quick flick of the blade, Quen severed the side of her bikini pants.
Then he began to cut a slit up the right side of her shorts.
He sawed through the waistband. The right side fell away.
When he slashed the side of her bikini pants, she jumped and yelped. Blood started to spill from a gash near her hip. “Woops,” he said. “Sorry about that.”
With his left hand, he grabbed the front of her waistband and pulled downward. The shorts, loose at both sides, lifted away from her like a large denim flap hinged by the narrow strip of fabric at her crotch. He jerked hard. The strip broke and he flung the panel away. Then he tugged off her severed bikini pants. She grunted as the seat was jerked out from under her rump.
On his knees between her legs, Quen gazed down at her wispy golden curls and cleft.
Toby stared, too. And moaned softly with the ache of
wanting her.
Quen turned his head and smiled at him. “What do you want me to do now, boss?”
“What do you want to do?”
“You kidding?”
“Wanta stick it to her?”
“You kidding? But…it’s not my turn. You’d better go first. You wanta go first, don’t you? I mean, if you don’t, it’s fine with me, but…”
“No, you can go ahead.”
“Really?”
“Sure. But first you have to give her the knife.”
“What?”
“You cut her. See that blood?”
“Yeah, but…”
“She told you what she’d do if you cut her.”
“But she’s our prisoner!” He let out an odd laugh. “Doesn’t matter what she says.”
“Does to me. Brenda and me, we’re working out a deal. We’re cooperating. So give her the knife.” Toby aimed the pistol at his face.
“You serious?”
“I feel serious.”
“She said she’d stick it up my ass!”
“Well.” Toby grinned. “Should’ve thought of that before you cut her.”
“Shit.”
“It’s the knife from her or the bullet from me. Take your pick.”
He looked at Brenda. She was still braced up on her elbows. “You won’t really do that to me, will you?”
She just stared at him.
“I mean…we’re friends. I had to do this stuff, you know?”
“I know,” Brenda said.
“You gonna stick it up my ass?”
She shook her head. “No.”
“Promise?”
“I promise. None of this is your fault. Jack made you do it.”
“Right,” Quen said. “I was forced.” Though he looked worried, he handed the knife to her.
She sat up fast—very fast—grabbed Quen’s erection like a handle to stop him as he tried to lurch away, and slashed the blade across his throat.
Chapter Fifty-nine
Quen squealed.
Blood erupted from his ripped throat, spraying Brenda.
Fran screamed.
Toby, delighted, called out, “Thata way to go, Brenda baby!”
Releasing her hold on Quen, Brenda slumped back down on the floor. Blood still flew at her, falling like thick red rain on her face and chest and belly.
Quen clapped a hand against his slit throat and lurched to his feet. His other arm reaching out, he staggered toward Toby. “Help,” he gasped. “Ambulance.”
Toby grinned and nodded. “Good idea. I’ll get right on it.”
“Please!”
As Quen lurched closer, Toby pranced backward.
“For God’s sake help him!” Fran yelled.
She was on her feet.
Toby aimed the pistol at her face.
She cried out, “Yeee!”
“Get down!”
“Don’t! Don’t! Please!”
Quen grabbed the front of Toby’s shirt and looked at him with pleading eyes.
Toby kicked a leg out from under him. Quen went down, still clutching Toby’s shirt, ripping some buttons loose, then letting go but leaving behind a bright red handprint. He landed hard on the marble floor.
Toby checked Fran. She was on her knees, sobbing, her bulgy red eyes jumping from Quen to Toby to Brenda to Quen to Toby.
He checked Brenda. Spattered with blood and dripping with sweat, she was stretched out on her back, her eyes toward the ceiling, her chest rising and falling as she took quick breaths, her arms down by her sides, her legs slightly apart.
“Guess you took care of him,” Toby said.
She ignored the comment.
Quen was twitching a little.
Leaking a lot, Toby thought, and chuckled.
“Why’d you do that?” Fran shouted at Brenda, her voice shrill. “You didn’t have to do that! My God, that was Quentin! You killed him!”
Brenda kept staring upward.
“You goddamn bitch! You always were a goddamn bitch! He was a good guy and you killed him!”
“I know what I did,” Brenda muttered, her gaze still fixed on the ceiling. “Just let it go.”
“Let it go?”
“Let it go,” Brenda said, sounding very calm. “He was worthless.”
“Worthless! How can you say that! He was a human being!”
“Worthless garbage. The world’s now a better place.”
“No!”
Brenda turned her head and calmly met Toby’s eyes. “Just like it’ll be a better place when you’re dead.”
A grin spread across Toby’s face. “You’re fabulous! You’re a gem! You and Sherry…Wow! You two are so much alike. Course, she has bigger tits. I’m not saying they’re better tits, just bigger.”
“Whatever you’re gonna do, why don’t you just shut up and do it.”
“Good idea.”
With his free hand, he undid the lower buttons of his shirt. Then he slipped the shirt off each of his shoulders. It fell down his back, slid down his arms and floated to the floor.
He took a step toward Brenda.
“What about me?” Fran asked.
“Oh yeah. You.” He aimed the pistol at her face.
“No! Wait!” She put out a hand as if she thought it might stop the bullets. “The knife!” she blurted. “Brenda’s still got the knife!”
His guts went cold.
He whirled toward Brenda.
She still lay stretched on her back just like before. No sign of the Buck knife she’d used on Quen.
“Okay,” he said. “Where is it?”
Her blood-flecked eyebrows lifted. “Where’s what?”
“You know damn well what. The knife.”
“Thanks for opening your yap, Fran.”
“Fuck you, Brenda.”
“He’d forgotten about it till you opened your mouth.”
“So what?”
Brenda frowned up at Toby. “Friends like this, who needs enemies?”
Toby chuckled. “You’ve got me.”
“Guess I’ll be getting you whether I want you or not. Which I don’t, by the way.”
“Now let’s have the knife.”
“I haven’t got it.”
“I thought you were gonna cooperate.”
“I am cooperating. I don’t know where it is. It flew out of my hand after I cut Quentin.”
Toby looked over at Fran. “Did it?”
She shook her head. “No. I was watching. She still has it. I think it’s under her.”
“Thanks,” Brenda muttered.
“Wanta do me a favor, Fran? Go over and get it for me.”
“Yeah, Fran. Come and get it.”
She shook her head. “Huh-uh. No way. You’ll nail me like you nailed Quentin.”
“Why would I do that?” Brenda asked.
“ ’Cause you’re a bitch.”
Brenda stared at her, then said, “God, Fran, I thought we were friends.”
“Yeah, well.”
“I thought we were good friends.”
“Yeah, well. So maybe you were wrong. You’re not always right. I know you think you’re always right, but you’re not. You think you’re so perfect and everybody else is some sort of worthless loser.”
“Most people are,” Brenda said. “But I didn’t think you were.”
“Oh girls, girls, girls,” said Toby, grinning and shaking his head.
“Baxter wasn’t a loser,” Brenda muttered. Then she said very softly, “Good old Baxter.” And Toby saw her start to weep.
He turned to Fran and pointed the pistol at her forehead. “Go over and get the knife.”
“But…”
“Or do you want me to put a slug through your ugly face?”
She pushed out her lower lip as her chin began to tremble.
“Who knows?” said Toby. “Maybe Brenda won’t slash your throat.”
As Fran struggled to her feet, she said, “You won’t let her, will you??
??
“Why not?”
“Because. Because I warned you. I told you she had it. If I’d kept my mouth shut, she might’ve killed you. I saved your life.”
“Yeah, maybe so. Thanks.”
“So you like owe me. Right?”
“Sure. I tell you what, Fran. You go over and take the knife away, and I’ll let you leave.”
“Really?”
“Sure he will,” said Brenda.
“You shut up,” she snapped. “You don’t know everything.”
“I promise to let you go,” Toby told her.
“Reality check,” said Brenda. “You’re an eyewitness, Fran. You aren’t going anywhere. Not alive, anyway. Not if he has any say in it.”
Toby walked up to Fran and pushed the muzzle of the pistol against the tip of her nose. “Go get the knife.”
“Okay.”
He lowered the weapon and moved aside. Fran wiped her eyes, then stepped past him. He watched the fat, dimpled cheeks of her buttocks wobble and shake as she walked toward Brenda.
“Now that’s a lard-ass,” he said.
She glanced back at him, a pouty look on her face. Then she stopped in front of Brenda’s feet. She held out her hand. “Just give it to me.”
“I don’t have it.”
“Yes, you do. I know you do.”
“Where’d you say it is?” Toby asked.
“Under her back.”
“Well, reach under and grab it.”
She started to squat.
“You’re blocking my view.”
“Sorry.” She straightened up and stepped around to Brenda’s other side. “Here?” she asked Toby.
“Perfect.”
She knelt down close to Brenda’s hip. Resting her hands on her own thighs, she frowned and said, “Roll over.”
Brenda latched her eyes on Fran. A corner of her mouth twitched slightly, but she didn’t roll over. “Don’t think so,” she said.
“Please.”
“I would’ve had him, Fran. I would’ve had him. But you had to open your big mouth.”
“He was gonna shoot me.”
“You didn’t have to tell him about the knife. It was our only chance.”
“Not much of a chance,” Toby said. “Knife versus gun? I don’t think so.”
Brenda looked at him. “You feel that way, just let me keep it.”
“Take it, Fran.”
“Roll over,” Fran said.
“Make me.”
Fran jutted out her trembling chin. “You better not try something.”