Invictus, page 9
One of the detectives, the one who Robbie put a dent in, approaches us and leans down to take him by the arm.
“Hey, what are you doing?” my brother asks, attempting to pull out of his grip.
I nudge him with my foot and shake my head firmly when he looks at me. The angry, troubled boy from my youth looks back at me from behind the thinly veiled sanity in his eyes, and I have to fight to keep the stern look on my face. If they’re taking him for questioning—and I’m certain that they are—I want him to go in angry and unrelenting. I want him to feel cornered and afraid; it’s the only way I know he won’t talk.
“You mad at me, Auggie?” he asks quietly as the detective roughly pulls him to his feet.
“No, but I need you to be strong, okay? Be strong and then we can leave together,” I promise him softly with a smile creeping into the corners of my mouth.
He nods and drops his head as he lets the detective lead him down the hall and into a room.
Alone.
Scared.
All of the things I promised him that he would never feel when he was with me and I don’t have a say in the matter. Robbie isn’t going to come out the way he went in and I wish to God that they would take me in his place, but he’s the one that spoke up about Atasha and her blades, and now he’s the one who has to answer the questions.
“Close your eyes, baby.” Mommy sniffles, her wide eyes peering back at me. His huge hand closes around her mouth, scabbed knuckles paling as he squeezes. “Just close your eyes.”
He shoves her down, out of sight on the bench seat. I do as I’m told, as if I can will him back into his car if scrunch my eyes closed hard enough.
Springs bounce, rhythmic and endless squeaking. He’s grunting and I hear her whimpering at first and then she starts to gag. I scream at myself to open my eyes, to kick him in the face…to undo my seatbelt and hit him with it. The sun is shining so bright that the back of my lids are fire engine red, but no matter how hard I try, I cannot peel my eyes open.
I hear him curse and the squeaking halts. He says her name over and over, first angry… then worried. A zipper and the jangle of a belt, then the car door opens and closes. I wait for Mommy to tell me it’s okay to open my eyes…like we’re playing a long game of peekaboo.
She doesn’t.
His car starts, and I finally peek as he peels away. His lights are off. His siren too. I pout. I love the flashing red and blue lights, and now I’m not only cold…I’m bored. My cup is empty, and I shade my eyes because the sun is shining right into my window again. Pieces of Mommy’s long curly hair hang though the gap between the passenger door and the seat. I try, but I can’t quite reach them. I call to her, but her hair stays right where it is.
I doze off for a while, and when I wake, I’m grouchy. We’re still in the clearing in the woods. We’d been on our way to get pizza and ice cream when he pulled us over, and my stomach growls. I want whipped cream and cherries.
“Mommy,” I whine, and undo my car seat. She swatted me once for undoing the belt before she was in park, but we’re not moving, so I figure it’s okay. I stand on the hump and peer over the seat.
A loud buzz bolts me awake. Disoriented, I blink several times in an attempt to adjust to the daylight. When the grating noise trumpets a second time, I launch myself from the couch, nearly tripping over August’s sleek coffee table.
My groggy brain finally finds a foothold, and I realize it’s a doorbell I’m hearing. Collapsing back onto the couch, I cover my head with the blanket and wait for whoever it is to go away. In my experience, anyone darkening August’s doorstep isn’t someone I want to meet.
When I hear a distant door open and the clatter of high heels ascending the stairs, my eyes widen and I sit up board straight.
“Auggie?” Her voice is aloof, almost aristocratic. For a few seconds I consider hiding in the closet, or locking myself in the bathroom. Disgusted with my cowardly instincts, I stumble to my feet and skitter to the landing at the top of the stairwell, nearly plowing into the new arrival as she crests the staircase. I spring back as she pulls herself up to her full height, cobra-like and well over six feet tall in her expensive stilettos.
“Where’s my son?” the woman demands, bearing a striking resemblance to a praying mantis in her oversized sunglasses, her silver blonde hair pulled back into a severe French twist.
“Not here,” I reply, assuming August wouldn’t want me to share that he’s locked up, even if she really is his mother.
Mommy Dearest places a heavily ringed hand on her hip with a sigh, as if I’m denying her access to her precious baby boy. Uncomfortable, I cross my arms over my chest. I’d opted to wear one of August’s shirts to bed, and I’m braless. Even though the shirt falls past the middle of my thighs, I feel exposed under this woman’s disapproving gaze.
“I need him.” She removes her shades, and if I’d had any doubt she was August’s mother, it dissipates. Her gray eyes are a blander version of his, and her full mouth is a lined and collagened version of his twisted brother’s. “Get him for me. We have business to discuss.”
“I’ll tell him you came by when he gets home.”
“Home.” Her incredulous tone makes me wish I had a tall cup of coffee. “Surely you don’t live here?”
“I don’t,” I admit, and turn my back on her as I go in search of caffeine for both of our sakes.
“Thank the Lord for small favors,” her droll murmur echoes off of the travertine floors, but I hear the click of her heels as she follows. “Do you even have permission to be here, or did he forget to give you money for a cab?”
I ignore her sniping as I reach for the coffee beans, assuming the question is rhetorical.
“Maybe I’ll phone him. Or better yet, the police. Perhaps they can sort this all out.” Her cruel smile transforms her radiantly. She’s truly in her element practicing bitchcraft, and I’m starting to formulate theories on why her sons are both mental.
“Do what you gotta do, lady.” I almost hope she calls so she’ll hear firsthand that her kids are in the slammer.
“How do I know you aren’t squatting here?” She’s holding up her cell phone, which appears to have a pearl studded case.
I know all manner of secrets about her darling boy that would be illuminating to her, as well as the authorities. Unfortunately, almost every one of them that jumps to mind incriminates me too.
“He has a port wine birthmark on his ass cheek,” I offer.
She cocks a micro-bladed brow and shrugs. “You’ve seen him naked. That hardly makes you special, dear.”
“He’s out with Robbie,” I say, and by the sour expression his name elicits, it’s evident that she’s as thrilled by Robbie’s homecoming as I am. She says nothing for a full minute, and while she processes her thoughts, I start a pot of coffee.
“Did they leave together?” She’s insistent and stressed, like I triggered some PTSD from Robbie’s formative years. It’s the first time she seems old enough to have given birth to August, who I guess to be a few years my senior.
I nod. “Yesterday afternoon. He expected to be back but they were…detained.” It’s the truth, but far from the whole truth.
She nods, but I can tell her thoughts are distant. Finally she squares her shoulders, regal and statuesque once more.
She pulls an embossed envelope from her designer handbag and places it carefully onto the counter, like it’s a detonator for a ticking bomb.
“See that he gets this. Tell him he’s expected to make and appearance. Tell—“ she cuts herself off, her gray eyes fixing on mine for one long and terrible moment. I see so much of her in that instant…too much. Cocktails with lunch, long afternoons at the club before dalliances with her tennis instructor. All of these things keeping her far too busy to have quality time for her sons.
As if sensing that I’m scrutinizing her as much as she is me, she once again uses her Jackie O sunglasses to camouflage her highborn features.
“Tell him it’s a black-tie affair and his father would greatly appreciate his attendance.”
I lick my dry lips and take a deep, soul-rattling breath.
For the first time in years, I don’t miss getting high.
My first few terrifying days in this modest prison, I suffered the agony of withdrawal. I’d have done anything for a taste then. He could have cut off my damn nose and I’d have thanked him for it if he’d been holding. My attack on him was not because I was afraid of him, even though I had every reason to be.
No. I was afraid of coming down.
The more sober I am, the more I want out of this place. Maybe that’s why he let me live. Maybe he sees why I am what I am, and this is his fucked up way of fixing me. Maybe that’s why he’s always humming what sounds like hymns and speaking in Latin…like he’s Saint Butcher, the Patron Saint of Crackwhores. Maybe this bullshit is my rock bottom and my salvation rolled into one.
I put a dab of mint toothpaste into my mouth and suck on it, hoping it will settle my hollow stomach. Rationing is a necessity, now that my captor is absent so often. I briefly wonder how toilet paper tastes. If this goes on much longer, I may find out.
This is a new low, even for me.
Who knew rock bottom had a sub-basement?
The blonde butcher hasn’t returned since breakfast, and the crack between the wall and the boarded-up window allows me to identify that it’s sunrise. Again.
Fuck…
My stomach growls in the process of devouring itself. I wish I hadn’t pigged out on the Twizzlers I’d been carrying when this crazy fuck abducted me. I’d been bored then, but not hungry.
Maybe he got pinched trying to pick up another hooker? Or maybe some pimp gutted him. Maybe even mine.
I know he isn’t doing this intentionally. My captor threatened to force feed me when I tried a hunger strike the first two days after he cut me. He wants me strong, though it makes no sense. But as of this morning, he’s missed three meals in a row.
If he’s dead, I’m dead. I’ll starve before anyone finds me. This guy isn’t exactly the type who entertains, and with good reason.
I run water into my cupped hands and drink, trying to fill the aching void in my belly. I tell myself to be grateful that I have something to drink at least, but I’ve never been the glass half full type.
I study my reflection, amazed that after all he’s put me through, I look better than I have in years. I’d push a little old lady into traffic for a motherfucking Pop Tart right about now, but my skin looks great.
Fury grips me, and I stumble to the steel door and pound on it with every fucking thing I have left in me.
“Hello!” I shout, my throat raw from lack of use. I beat on the cold metal with my fist hard enough I’m sure I’ll bruise. Every time he’s with me, he’s warned me to keep quiet. He says I’ll live through this if I keep it down. If he’s testing me, I’ve failed. I no longer give a shit. “Hello?”
Straining, I listen for any signs of life outside of my prison cell. I’m rewarded with a big fat nothing, and the notion that he may never come back makes my eyes sting.
Pressing my forehead against the cool steel, I fantasize about stuffing my hand into a can of Pringles and gobbling down a Big Mac. I wonder if anyone’s looking for me. I haven’t earned much the past few weeks since I had that cold sore followed by four fucking days on the rag. Maybe my greedy ass pimp hasn’t even noticed I’m gone.
“Motherfucking piece of shit!” I beat on the door, and the dull gongs reverberate melodiously. I slide down the door, landing in a heap on the floor. I still hurt when I sit, so I fall onto my side, unable to suppress the body-wracking sobs I’ve been waging war against for a while. I have nothing to distract me but grim scenarios of how I’ll meet my end. At this point, I’d welcome it. The anticipation is far worse than even this sick fuck can manage.
I’m so caught in my tantrum that I’m startled when I hear noises on the other side of the door. Someone’s descending the steps. I stifle myself with surprising speed, scrambling back in anticipation of his wrath. But it’s not the butcher. I can tell by the slow, small steps making their way in my direction.
Someone tries the knob, which shimmies ineffectually. My heart leaps into my throat.
I can’t speak. When I try, an anguished sounds blasts from me. My trembling hands reach out for the door as I suck a desperate breath through my narrowed throat.
“Hello?” Her voice is muffled, but the girl outside sounds raspy and young.
And more than a little bit worried.
Good.
That proves that whoever she is, she’s not an idiot. Because under his roof, it has to be far more dangerous on her side of the door than on mine.
Seated on the steps across from the police station, I mull over my lot, much like a damned prisoner listening as his gallows are being constructed. Mommy Dearest’s visit set me back some, and my morning discovery delayed me even more. When I finally arrived, I decided the Brothers Grimm could sing the blues behind bars just a while longer.
I can’t decide what troubles me more: having to prance past all those police cruisers with their hideous red and blue lights into a den of armed and aggressive machismo, or being the instrument who frees these two particular prisoners with whom I’d carelessly become entangled.
It’s not too late to walk away. With this much cash, I could be in Toronto by nightfall, cozied up to some gap-toothed goalie, getting all kinds of fucked up on Canadian whisky.
A splendid idea if I do say so myself.
But I just can’t. Like a kid watching their first horror flick, I’m peeking through my fingers at the Grant brothers to see what comes next.
I hold my head high as I stride across the street and into the cop shop. I tell them I’m here to bail out August Grant and his brother.
“Brother’s name?”
“Robbie? Robert? Trent? No idea.”
She furrows her brow, but her fingers never stop moving on the keyboard. “August and Trent Grant?”
“Sure,” I say, wanting to ask her if they have any other brothers or any other Augusts incarcerated, but somehow keeping my tongue.
I pay little mind to her slack-jawed stare as I count out the fifties until I’ve given her the staggering total. She scrambles to pick up the phone and I turn to walk away.
“Have a seat and we’ll get them for you,” she calls after me, but I ignore her.
I’m agitated. I avoid cops on principle, but I’m afraid I’ll run into the two who questioned me yesterday. More importantly, I don’t want to be waiting here when August gets out. He comes with a heaping side of Robbie, and if that guy gets within three feet of me, he’ll meet the sharp side of a cleaver.
I wonder if he’s told August I pulled the scissors on him. Probably. They’re thick as thieves, no matter what August says. And the way they look at each other makes me uneasy. Half the time, I’m tempted to tell them to get a room.
Don’t forget about that little surprise downstairs in the basement.
A chill runs the length of my spine as I recall the sounds coming from just down the hall where we had our way with the razors. Desperation through a golden keyhole. Curious as I am though, I’m not quite ready to hear an explanation. I have the distinct impression I’m not going to like what I hear.
I stuff the extra money into my bra just before a hand grips my elbow. I grit my teeth so ferociously that my jaw aches, but coach myself to keep it cool.
I take a breath and turn to see who has dared to lay hands on me. A freckled young rookie graces me with an appreciative grin.
“Why don’t you let me get you a cup of coffee while you wait for your friends?”
Friends…
“Nah.” I crinkle my nose as I back away from the uniformed officer. “I need a little fresh air. The smell of bacon always turns my stomach.”
I’m holding the white Styrofoam cup in my hand, tapping the side of it impatiently. I’ve been asked a thousand and one questions by now and each answer has been something they don’t understand. While I’m itching to get rid of Atasha, I can’t take her down without Auggie going with her, and I need him more than ever.
I want to know his secrets—what he’s hiding from me, and I want to him to know mine. I can’t have that fucking conversation with him if he’s sitting on the other side of a plexiglass window talking to me through a tapped makeshift payphone.
“When do I get to see my brother?” I ask Detective Dipshit for the fifteenth time.
He grins at me, almost like a predator baring his teeth, but I’m no prey. That’s a side of me I’ll be more than happy to show him if he doesn’t keep his end of the bargain and let me talk to August soon.
“A couple more questions first,” he says with a snide smile sitting on his face. It takes everything in me not to get up from my chair and beat him with it, but I hold onto the rhythm that my fingers are making against the cup and take a deep breath.
“No more questions. I’ve told you everything I know and if that’s not good enough for you, then you haven’t been paying attention to what I’ve said. I want to see my brother—now.”
“Listen you little shit—” Detective Dipshit gets to his feet, so I get to mine too just to show him that he doesn’t scare me, and remind him which one of us has the height advantage.
“Cool off, Camden,” Detective Spaulding says, re-entering the room. “I knew I shouldn’t have left you two alone.”
He looks at his partner and jerks his head toward the door. Dipshit gives me one last hard stare before he grunts and leaves us alone in the interrogation room.
“Sorry about that, kid,” Spaulding says, taking a seat and nodding at me to take mine. “Your brother is just outside this door with one of my officers, but before I let him come in here, I have to remind you that you’re being recorded in this room. See up there?” He points to the corner of the room to the right of the door and I see a large camera with a blinking red light keeping a watchful eye on us. “In other words, anything you two say in here can and will be used against you in a court of law. Understand?”
