Treacherous: Grifters, Ruffians and Killers

Gary Phillips

TREACHEROUS

Grifters, Ruffians and Killers

First published by Level Short 2024

Copyright © 2024 by Gary Phillips

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning, or otherwise without written permission from the publisher. It is illegal to copy this book, post it to a website, or distribute it by any other means without permission.

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

Gary Phillips asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

Author Photo Credit: Gilda Haas

Second edition

ISBN: 978-1-68512-719-0

Cover art by Level Best Designs

This book was professionally typeset on Reedsy

Find out more at reedsy.com

To Arnold Hano, the storyteller

Contents

Acknowledgments

Praise for Treacherous

I. GRIFTERS

The Performer

The Kim Novak Effect

Swift Boats for Jesus

Roger Crumbler Considered His Shave

The Man for the Job

II. BAD JUJU

The Investor

The Snow Birds

Sportin’ Men

Beginner’s Luck

Branded

Black Caesar’s Gold

III. BOTH OF SHADOWS AND SUBSTANCE

Can’t Be Satisfied

Incident on Hill 19

Disco Zombies

Rio Blanco

IV. HELL BENT

House of Tears

Chatter

Masai’s Back in Town

The Counterfeit Comrade

The Measure

The Calling

About the Author

Also by Gary Phillips

Acknowledgments

The Performer originally in Orange County Noir, Akashic, 2010

The Kim Novak Effect originally in Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, November 2008

Swift Boats for Jesus originally in Politics Noir: Dark Tales from the Corridors of Power, Verso, 2008

Roger Crumbler Considered His Shave originally in Los Angeles Noir, Akashic, 2007

The Man for the Job originally in Dublin Noir: The Celtic Tiger vs. The Ugly American, Akashic, 2006

Ther Investor originally in Damn Near Dead 2: Live Noir or Die Trying, Busted Flush Press, 2010

The Snowbirds originally in Once Upon a Crime: An Anthology of Murder, Mayhem and Suspense, Nodin Press, 2009

Sportin’ Men originally in Full House, Putnam Juvenile, 2007

Beginner’s Luck, originally in Shades of Black: Crime and Mystery Stories by African-American Writers, Berkley Prime Crime, 2004

Branded originally in Flesh & Blood: Erotic Tales of Crime and Passion, Mysterious Press, 2001

Black Caesar’s Gold originally in The Heroin Chronicles, Akashic, 2013

Can’t Be Satisfied originally in Too Much Boogie: Erotic Remixes of the Dirty Blues, LL Publications, 2011

Incident on Hill 19, originally in Retro Pulp Tales, Subterranean Press, 2006

Disco Zombies, originally in The Cocaine Chronicles, Akashic, 2005

Rio Blanco originally in Guns of the West, Berkley Books, 2002

House of Tears, originally in Black Noir, Mystery, Crime and Suspense Stories by African-American Writers, Pegasus, 2009

Chatter, originally in Plots With Guns: A Noir Anthology, Dennis McMillan Publications, 2005

Masai’s Back in Town, originally in Send My Love and a Molotov Cocktail: Stories of Crime, Love and Rebellion, PM Press, 2011

The Counterfeit Comrade, originally in Measures of Poison Dennis McMillan Publications, 2002

The Measure, originally in The Blue and the Gray Undercover: All New Civil War Spy Adventures, Forge 2002

The Calling, Akashic’s Monday’s Are Murder (online), 2013

Praise for Treacherous

"Treacherous: Grifters, Ruffians and Killers by Gary Phillips isn’t a book you’d want to give to your best friend who loves cozies, as the subtitle indicates. In fact Maureen Corrigan said on NPR that some of these stories ‘would make Nancy Drew faint facedown into her cucumber tea sandwiches.’ I didn’t know that Ms. Drew was into cucumber tea. Or maybe I’m reading the sentence wrong. At any rate, this is a collection full of the real hardboiled thing."—Bill Crider, Mystery Scene Magazine

Phillips obviously loves his anti-heroes, as the stories’ major characters are all, as the subtitle promises, grifters, ruffians and killers. You may not be on their side, but you can’t help but be fascinated by their escapades… Phillips unfaltering ear for contemporary urban dialogue and patois, relentless pacing that grabs you from the opening sentence—oh, and plenty of sex and violence, too.—Alan Cranis, bookgasm.com

Those looking for a fun romp amid crime and killers will be satisfied.—Publishers Weekly

I

GRIFTERS

The Performer

Avery Randolph finished the stretched-out riff of Billy Joel’s Just the Way You Are, hoping his playing covered the unintentional flattening he gave the last lyrics. He meant to take his voice up a notch, not down. The throat was the second thing to go. There was polite applause from the Seaside Lounge crowd, and Randolph nodded slowly while noodling the keys jauntily.

An aging couple, both in bright attire, their matching sterling gray hair arranged just so, walked by the piano, hand in hand. The woman, peach-colored lipstick gothically enticing in the bar’s subdued lighting, dropped a five into the large brandy snifter for tips. She smiled. Randolph smiled. The man gave a quick wave to a short-haired woman at a table near the window, and the two departed. The man let his hand glide down and, briefly and tenderly, flutter against the woman’s backside.

This is for Emily, Randolph announced and began a leisure intro into Straighten Up and Fly Right, channeling Nat King Cole, letting it build while several patrons bopped their heads and tapped their feet to the rhythm.

Cool down, Papa, don’t you blow…your…toppppp, he finished in the key he meant to, and this time the applause was more heartfelt. He stood and bowed and blew a kiss to Emily, the one the man had waved to, sitting at her usual spot next to the window overlooking the medical center down below. For sixty-three, Randolph reflected, she looked good, handsome in her dark blue dress and diamond broach, an ever-present martini glass near her steady blood nailed hand.

She lifted her drink and toasted him with a sip and a toothy grin.

Randolph finished his set with an instrumental rendition of Fats Waller’s Ain’t Misbehavin’ adding, Don’t forget the sand dab special, folks, Rene swears they are to die for. That got a few chuckles, and he did a wave on his way to the bar. Among those sitting there was a National Guard trooper in his camouflage, his combat service badge dully gleaming over his flapped breast pocket. He was drinking a beer from a pint glass and was having an animated conversation over his cell phone. He turned his body away and hunched over some as Randolph perched on the opposite end.

Carlson, the head bartender, came over with his Jack and Coke. You tinkled them good tonight, he commented, setting the squat glass on a napkin with the Lounge’s name on it.

Thanks, man. Momentarily, Randolph watched the logo become distorted by the wet bottom of the glass, then took it to his lips.

I guess you have to go easy on that stuff, don’t you? Or does it help your playing?

Randolph looked over at the woman who’d sat beside him. She was young, that is, younger than him. In her late twenties, he figured, jeans and some kind of loose faux suede top. Not too much make-up, Rite Aid earrings. Pretty, but not overwhelmingly so. He sized her up as the wife or girlfriend of some soldier or marine over in Iraq or Afghanistan. Lonely. Bored. There was a lot of that in Los Alamitos.

Everything in moderation, he said. He didn’t offer to buy her a drink, making sure he kept his eyes on her face and not down on that alert swell beneath the top’s material. The bare arms, though, impressively toned.

I used to play guitar in high school, she continued, even had us an all-girl band for a while. But you know how it goes, she elevated a shoulder.

Not the next Bangles, huh? She frowned.

Before your time, Carlson piped in. A not so subtle reminder that Randolph was probably a decade and half older than her. Randolph resisted a remark. Goddamn Carlson was older than he was but worked out on the weights and had bragged about getting pectoral implants. So I can pick up more pussy easily, he’d cracked to Randolph and Rene Suarez, the chef.

Can I have a gin tonic? the woman asked, looking from Carlson back to Randolph.

Yours to command, the bartender said and went to prepare her order.

What do you do now? What the hell, Randolph concluded, no sense making it easy for Carlson. Besides, he was just making with the chit-chat, no more, no less.

She jerked her head and said, Work at the PX on the base. Original around here, right?

Carlson returned with her drink. Me lady.

Shit fire, the soldier engrossed on the phone swore as he threw the thing across the bar top. It slid into another customer’s glass, the drink’s owner glaring at the Guardsman. Aw, hell, here we go. Another old lady done told her hero boy bye-bye. Carlson, himself a vet, double-timed to cool out the serviceman.

Your husband on his second or third tour? Randolph asked the woman. They both watched Carlson putting an arm around the soldier’s shoulders, his head down as he mumbled words of self-pity.

He was killed about half a year ago. Roadside bomb hit their convoy coming into Pakitka Province. She drank some. Jeff was Army, then after he rotated out, he wanted to do something about what he’d seen over there. Something different. She shook her head. Jeff’s a…sweetheart. He worked for CARE International delivering food and relief.

She put the gin down quietly. Damn. Sure sorry to hear that.

Lori. My name’s Lori. She offered her hand, and he shook it, smiling crookedly at her.

He told her his name, and for several minutes, they sat side-by-side in their shared silence. Carlson returned after escorting the soldier outside.

Sorry, folks, I’m back, he announced and got behind the bar to fulfill his enabling duties.

Hey, look, Randolph began, let me get your second G and T, okay? I’m not, you know, trying anything funny.

Thanks, but no thanks, Avery. She’d turned her body toward him slightly and touched his arm. I better get going. Inventory tomorrow, so I’ve got to be in early. She got off the stool, and the young widow strolled out of the landlocked Seaside Lounge.

You get her number? Carlson asked when he came over to Randolph.

Kind of, the piano player answered, looking off, then readying the order of songs in his head for his next set.

A week later, he was finishing off a loud and lyrically incoherent sing-a-long version of Volare when Lori returned to the bar. She was wearing a modest skirt, shirt, and sweater top combo, and earrings that sparkled in the low artificial light. Randolph banged the keys with his heel a la Little Richard for the climax, everyone clapping and laughing. He stood, breathing heavy, pumping both fists in the air to more acclaim. A patron shouted, Right on, baby, above the din.

Glad you came back, he said to her. She lingered on the side of the piano, her purse atop the instrument. Normally, he’d say something about that but didn’t want to break the mood—his, at least. People came by and gave him pats on the back and shoulders. The brandy snifter was brimming with bills tonight.

Want to go somewhere, have a sandwich or something? I’m hungry.

She leaned in closer to him. Hungry for what? Her smoke-colored eyes remained steady on him.

There’s a little hole-in-the-wall place over on Cerritos, he answered neutrally, but not breaking his gaze from hers. "They have great vegetarian burritos with fire-roasted peppers. Magnifico."

I like meat alright.

They grinned at each other like over-heated teenagers as Randolph collected his tip money. Over in the corner at her customary table, Emily Bravera sipped her martini carefully as if testing the stuff for poison, watching the couple over the rim of her glass.

Randolph and the woman descended the outside stairs from where the Seaside Lounge was on the second floor of an aging ’80s-era strip mall. Down on the parking lot asphalt, he became aware of a familiar odor and looked up to see Carlson, the bartender, taking one of his Camel breaks. He leaned on the railing, the unfiltered cigarette smoldering in his blunt fingers. Lazily, he looked at them. The two men then nodded briefly at each other, and Randolph walked the woman to her eight-year-old bronze Camry with a dark blue driver’s door. He gave her the directions to where they were going, standing near her and pointing off in to the near distance.

See you there. She gave him a peck on his cheek, her fingers holding onto his upper arms. Her hair was freshly washed and smelled of blueberries and mint.

At Agamotto’s Late Nite Eatery and Coffee Emporium, they ate and talked. Lori McLaughlin was originally from Buffalo. She’d met her late husband Jeff, a local boy from Long Beach, when she’d come out to Southern California four years ago, winding up working at a dog food manufacturer.

That’s a trip, Randolph remarked. Like big vats where the meat and whatnot is all mixed together?

This place, Emerald Valley, is like the Escalade of dog food makers, she said, biting into her barbecue meatloaf sandwich and chewing. She then pointed at the sandwich. Good cuts of meat like this, natural ingredients, grains, they make a high-end product selling to trendy pet stores in West LA and further down in the OC like Newport Beach and Lake Forrest.

But not for us peasants here in Los Al. They both chuckled.

Randolph asked her, You have family back in Buffalo?

She had some of her beer and dabbed a napkin to her mouth. Let’s just say there’s a reason I came out here to put as much distance between me and that so-called family. Still holding the napkin, she squeezed his hand. Okay?

Okay.

The lanky youngster in the stained apron behind the counter gave them a grunt as the couple left. He returned his attention to a news item on the small TV he watched, an image of Long Beach police personnel leaving a burglarized condo in Belmont Shores from earlier that day.

Out in his car, after she had him pull behind a closed liquor store, they made out. There was a bare bulb streaked with an oily substance over the metal back door of the establishment, and slivered fractions of that light filtered into the car’s interior and over their grasping forms. Randolph had his hand over her sweater, cupping one of her breasts as they kissed. He moved his thumb across her hardening nipple. She placed one of her hands on his zipper and rubbed.

That feels good, he murmured.

This’ll feel even better. She tongued his ear and unzipped him. Involuntarily, he sucked in his stomach. I didn’t catch any hairs, did I, Avery? she asked in a concerned voice.

No. Light-headed is all.

Mmmm. She worked his shaft and then bent down.

Randolph leaned back, eyes fluttering, noting he needed to clean his headliner. Try as he might to fixate on prosaic matters to prolong the sensation, he soon wheezed, Hey, careful, I’m…I’m about to come.

She gave him a lingering lick along his penis, returning to the tip. Uh-huh. And she let him climax in her mouth.

Sweet mother of mercy, Randolph exclaimed, grinning like a goon.

From her purse, Lori McLaughlin produced a half pint of Jack Daniels and, breaking the seal, had a swig and handed it across.

Remember your motto, she said as he had a taste, everything in moderation.

Most assuredly, he retorted.

She took something else from her purse and, palm up, presented it to him. Because you’re not through, piano man. You have encores tonight.

He took the offered orange oblong tablet of Cialis. I’m not that old, you know.

I know, darling. McLaughlin had pulled up her skirt and, using her middle finger, pleasured herself. He stared and said nothing. She continued this for several moments, then took off her light blue panties and pressed them into his face. He breathed in deep, then popped the Cialis in his mouth, not bothering to wash it down with the booze.

Early that morning, at her three-and-a-half-room apartment not far from the Joint Forces base, Randolph pulled on his cigar-smoking Woody Woodpecker head boxers and went into the kitchenette in search of juice or cold water. On the counter, he spotted a past-due notice from SoCal Edison.

On a book ledge crowded with perfunctory knick-knacks was a picture of a square-jawed, handsome Lance Corporal he took to be the late husband. He picked it up to see it better by the moonlight. The confident look of the soldier reminded him of the photo of his father, a decorated combat captain who died in Vietnam. A man he never met and only knew from Polaroids and letters his mother kept. He sighed inwardly, put the picture back, and traipsed to the refrigerator. Inside, he found an open can of Diet Pepsi and straightened up, holding it. One hand on the open door, the light from inside the refrigerator casting its glow about the compact space, Randolph looked at a print of a leafy country lane hung on the wall. It wasn’t anything special, like the kind of mass-produced reproduction demonstrating the virtues of the frame you came to buy.

Guzzling the soda, looking sideways at the lane, cold air blowing against his lower legs, he suddenly had a massive, pulsing erection.

"Magnifico, he said, proudly stalking back into the bedroom, moving his hips to let his member swing from side to side. He hummed Rocket Man" and sent up a prayer of thanks to the horny bastard who cooked up the orange wonder.

In the morning, Randolph stretched, scratched his side, and rubbed his whiskered face. In the other room, he could hear Lori McLaughlin talking on the phone.

…no. You listen to me, Karen, that’s not going to happen, you understand? I won’t stand still while you try that kind of shit with me.

He got up and used the bathroom. When he stepped out, McLaughlin was sitting on the edge of the bed in her cloth robe, hunched forward, arms across her upper thighs like a player waiting to get called back in the game. He sat close, putting an arm around her shoulder.

Can I help with anything?

She made a sound in her throat. I could lie to you and tell you it’s nothing, she began, but you might as well know now as later. She regarded him for a moment and said, I was talking to my wonderful ex-mother-in-law. A woman who would make Big Bird slap the shit out of her. She chuckled evilly at the mental image.

This involve a child? he asked, having also noticed last night an assortment of toys in a cardboard box in a corner of the living room.

Yes. My daughter Farley.

Farley?

Jeff had a good buddy who lost his legs over there. She’s just two and a half, and, well, you can see I’m not exactly living the OC lifestyle."

Who is around here? He gave her a squeeze.

She jutted her chin in a westerly direction. Over in Rossmoor, they are. Them and their wall.

Screw ’em, Randolph said. They think they shit gold. She snuggled closer to him, putting a hand on his thigh.

Jeff’s mother, Karen, has recently stepped up her campaign about how she knows it’s tough for me to get by alone and be able to feed and raise Farley. How she can provide for her and all that. Her third husband, not Jeff’s father, owned a firm that supplied some kind of guidance system for missiles. Anyway, he dropped dead of a stroke and left her sitting pretty in a mortgage-free McMansion in Irvine. That’s where Farley is now.

She rubbed his thigh and eyeing him said, I didn’t plan on seducing you, Avery. But Karen suddenly showed up yesterday when I went to pick up Farley from the sitter after work. And, well, she demanded time with her granddaughter. She lords it over me what with her paying for the child care and other things for Farley.

She scooted over to her pressed board nightstand, and opening a drawer, took out a digital print. She handed it across to Randolph, who smiled at the photo of a bright-eyed toddler held aloft by her beaming mother. She took it back, lingered in it, then replaced it in the drawer.

So I was just a way for you to blow off steam? A revenge schtup aimed at your mother-in-law?

She shoved him playfully and clambered on top of him as he lay on his back, enwrapping her in his arms. How observant of you, Dr. Phil. They kissed eagerly as he undid her robe.

On a Thursday evening several days later, they lay in bed in Randolph’s apartment near the race track. Intermingled yells of delight and disappointment could be heard through his cracked sliding window over his bed as the last race finished.

Randolph dialed the radio from the news on the rock station McLaughlin had put on to the jazz station from the college campus in Long Beach. Suddenly, a McCoy Tyner number was in mid-play. He let his mind drift as the pianist-composer did his thing.

You bet much? she asked, lying partially on him, his finger gently following Tyner, stroke for stoke, on her shapely butt.

Now and then I go over there, but I play the ponies like I know poker, not too damn good. He stopped playing and began kneading her flesh, getting aroused.

She nuzzled his neck. What if you could make about thirty thousand on a sure thing?

You know a horse doper?

"I know where to get sixty, maybe seventy thousand tax-free dollars. Half for you and half for me, Avery. Between your couple of nights a week at the Seaside and substitute music and civics teacher, you’re not living la vida loca either."

He stopped rubbing and focused. What are you talking about, Lori?

Remember I told you about Emerald Valley?

The dog food company.

The owner, Brice, he’s an old hippie, still smokes marijuana, gives his money to saving the rain forest and all that crap.

Okay. But I’m not comprehending.

He has a safe in his office. He’s still down with the people, don’t trust the system, so he’s always kept cash around, different places, you see? One of them is his office ’cause he’s always got some burned-out acid head or old surfing bro falling by for a touch. She paused, placing her hand firmly on his chest.

Even gives it up to an ex-employee or two, she continued. I had to go see him for a loan, and he’s always had a thing for me. Gave me a handful of those Cialis pills, saying to leave a trail of them through the forest, and he’d find his way to me. Laughing and having a good time. His tone frosted.

This about keeping Karen at bay?

She’s told me she’s going to initiate, her word, legal action. If I just show her I can afford a lawyer, she’ll back down. I know how her wormy mind works. She’s cheap in so many ways.

Why not ask Brice for the loan? Sounds to me like he’d do it for you and not sweat when you couldn’t pay him back. The good fight and all that.

She pulled slowly on his limp penis. Because he’d want something in return, Avery. Brice is a freak, get it? He’s been in trouble in the past for beating off in his office in front of females. He’d want me to do kinky things to him regularly for repayment. Do you want me to do that? She started to stroke him slowly. His breath got short as he got hard. I might be willing to be a thief, but I’m no ho.

She continued with her hand job. Unless you’re going to bitch up. Turn your head when I have to shove a studded dildo up his ass and hear him scream ‘Mommy.’ Make like I’m not your woman. She took his balls in her hand.

Not likely, he groaned as he put his fingers to her throat and applied pressure. She gasped, and he leveraged her under him.

Fuck me rough, baby, she demanded—and he did.

The plan wasn’t elaborate. It was straightforward and textbook efficient—if it was a chapter from a manual on thievery. Emerald Valley Premium Dog Foods was in a seventeen thousand square foot, one-story landscaped building on the cul-de-sac end of an industrial park not far from a 605 freeway off-ramp. Lori McLaughlin had made a Sunday after-hours rendezvous to get the money from a thrilled Brice Hovis. McLaughlin told Randolph he’d insisted that she think of the loan as a long-term investment in her and her daughter’s futures and to come by his office to finalize the deal he’d said.

McLaughlin knew the layout of the factory, and once she got Hovis wound up, she’d said with a sneer, she’d leave a side door that let in from the parking lot, used by employees when they had to work overtime, unlatched.

Dressed in overalls obtained that day from a thrift store and wearing rubber dishwashing gloves, Avery Randolph gained access to the facility at the appointed time. Inside, he easily spotted the thin strip of light coming from the slightly ajar office door at the far end of the plant. He eased forward on tennis shoes also obtained at the thrift store. His outfit would be burned afterward.

Randolph passed belt feeders, tall stainless steel devices that had large conical-shaped vats atop them, automated packaging stations, and long, heavy-looking machinery bolted to the concrete floor with drive shafts that led to partially encased circular rotors he took for chopping and grinding up the meat Emerald Valley turned into dog food. Stilled circulation fans were set at various strategic locations in the ceiling.

McLaughlin had explained to him the business, like a lot of pet food manufacturers, bought rendered meat from elsewhere and this was shipped to them as were grains and cereals from other suppliers. Randolph was pleasantly surprised the air in here smelled like cheeseburgers.

Coming to the end of a large box-like machine on stout legs, a dryer he could tell from its stamped label, he was near the office. He halted, shutting out all distractions, getting it together for his performance. It’s all about the in-between, man, a jazz guitarist reminded him on a studio gig.

He heard Hovis moaning in pleasure between whaps. The tang of marijuana cut through the burger aroma.

Goddammit, yes, oh yes, doctor.

Randolph stepped into the light to see Hovis leaning over his desk in a stripper nurse costume, short skirt up over a thong, with high heels and a red-haired woman’s wig lopsided on his bald head. McLaughlin, in her underwear beneath an open lab coat, was holding a dog hair brush, the kind with short wire bristles. She’d been using that side on the man’s tenderized rear end. There was a strap-on dildo and a plastic enema bottle filled with s clear liquid occupying the paper-laden desk.

Hovis straightened up and stammered, Who, what is this? There was a good-sized alligator clamp dangling from his encased penis.

By then, Randolph, trying not to giggle too much, had covered the distance between them and squirted liberal amounts of pepper spray into the man’s eyes.

This is not safe, the dog food man blurted, hands grabbing at his face while he did a run-in-place dance of pain in his night nurse uniform.

McLaughlin slugged him over the head with a smoking bong, shattering it. Hovis ran and crashed into a tall file cabinet, knocking it and him over.

Don’t either one of you fuckin’ move, Randolph blared. He quickly tied a handkerchief around the downed man’s tearing eyes, and McLaughlin made sounds like she was being manhandled. Randolph tied Hovis up with cord he’d brought along and got a ball gag strapped around his mouth. He writhed and whimpered on his side on the floor, then lay still.

Where is it, bitch? Randolph growled, giving it his best Steven Segal guttural rasp.

I don’t know what you’re talking about. She slapped her thigh for effect and grunted.

We’ll see about that. Come here, let me show you what me and that dildo are gonna do to you. He marched her out of the office and, after a suitable period, returned and began tearing up the office. He knew where Hovis kept the money from McLaughlin but had to sell the search.

He kicked over a surfboard leaning in a corner. Above that, in a compartment Hovis had installed, was the cash hidden in the ceiling. Well, what do we have here? He walked over to Hovis and kicked him. He got a stifled yell for a response.

Clever cocksucker, aren’t you? Randolph said to the trussed-up owner. Your girlfriend held out but it’s a good thing for both of you I got eyes. He placed a chair under the area of the ceiling and, pushing up on the acoustic tile, revealed a large fishing tackle box. He took this out, assessed the contents, and exited the office.

Hovis didn’t know that McLaughlin knew where he kept the money. She’d spied once when she’d worked at the company. Though naturally, he’d suspect her, there had been an employee she told Randolph he’d fired a few months ago and she’d make sure to subtlety train his suspicions in that direction. Or so she’d said.

On the darkened factory floor, he removed his disguise of bushy afro wig, false goatee, and Halloween rubber nose. McLaughlin, in her bra and panties, stilettos off so as not to make noise, came over to him, and gave him a passionate kiss. He rubbed his hand between her legs.

Better get going. I’ll meet you back at my place, Avery.

I like it when you say my name, he whispered back.

I know.

He punched her hard, twice, in the face, reeling her back while she held onto him for balance. Like a boxer clearing their vision, she shook her head and then broke one of her heels off. She put the shoes on and wobbled into the office while Randolph turned toward the way he came in.

Brice, Brice, are you all right? she screamed, running into the office. McLaughlin’s face rearranged itself from mock concern to icy resolves. Briiice, she drew out, hand beside her mouth but barely saying his name. Briiiice, my demented shithead, can you get up? She guffawed and removed a dagger-shaped letter opener from a pen caddy on the desk. The blade was in the style of a medieval knife, and she withdrew it from its sheath. She sauntered over and cut Brice Hovis’ legs loose and removed the ball gag and handkerchief. His hands remained bound.

Oh my God, are you all right, Steph? His eyes were red and wet. He looked from her to the open ceiling and back.

Her fingers trilled the tip of the letter opener. I’m fine, Brice. Real fuckin’ good. She flicked the blade and nicked his thigh. Crimson ran behind the black mesh stocking material.

Hey, he said, backing up, this is no time for that. Untie me, would you?

Swaying her body, she stepped closer, waving the letter opener around like a drunk musketeer. And what if I don’t, Brice? What if I take it too far this time? She took another nick out of him, this time from his chest.

Brice looked about panicked while backpedaling in his heels and skirt. Quit fucking around, Stephanie.

I’m serious as a fever, Bricey. Come on, beg for your life. She placed her hand on her mound. It makes me wet. She lunged forward and tackled Hovis, who went over, McLaughlin straddling him.

Down