Capture (35 page)

She holds it up. “You mind if I open this?”

“No. Go for it.”

Dawn finds a corkscrew in the kitchen drawer and carries the bottle and two glasses through to the living room, where Nick has slumped down on the sofa. She pours the wine, hands him a glass and raises hers. “To Bali.”

He smiles and she sips her drink and it tastes so damn good that she immediately has another slug. She takes her smokes and slides open the door to the deck, wanders across to the railing and fires up.

Nick follows her. “You can smoke inside.”

“Nah, I’m gonna kick it. I’m gonna smoke my last one before we get on that plane tomorrow.” She looks at the cigarette and then flicks it out onto the sand. “In fact, that’s it. I’m done. I’m an ex-smoker.” He’s looking at her, really staring. “What? Don’t you believe me?”

“No. I believe you.”

“What, then? You having second thoughts about Bali and all?”

He shakes his head and smiles away whatever’s hassling him. “No. No second thoughts.”

He moves in and starts to kiss her. She tenses, then relaxes and kisses him back, telling herself she can do this. Chill. Go with it. He’s one of the good guys.

There’s tongue action and they’re right up close, his hands everywhere, and she can feel him getting hard and she knows what’s gonna happen now, so better that she gets in the driving seat and controls things and she walks him backward into the living room, pushing him onto the sofa, his glasses sliding from his face, landing on the carpet, reflecting two hot little suns.

Dawn pulls his T-shirt off and strips him of his shorts and underwear and gets a handful of his veiny cock. Tries not to see the untold others over the years, shoved in her face and forced inside her, tearing her front and back, stinking things she learned to hate as much as the men they grew out of.

She shoves her curls away from her face and goes down on him, his blondish pubic hair surprisingly silky as it rubs her cheek. She runs her tongue from his balls up the shaft of his dick, the skin so soft, getting his salty, sweet taste in her mouth, feeling him clench his butt muscles as he says, “Jesus, Jesus, Jesus.”

Keeping him in her mouth, she frees her hands and loses her shirt and jeans, straddling him, gripping his cock in her hand, feeling it pulse, a drop of moisture like a teardrop rolling from the slit. She pushes herself up on her knees and works the head of his penis through her trimmed pussy hair and around her lips that are hot and heavy and sodden.

She breathes, loosens the pelvic muscles that have clenched with old fear, and takes him into her millimeter by millimeter, experiencing this like she never has before, trying to erase the past when all sensation was locked deep behind a barrier of hatred.

Really concentrating now. Feeling the walls of her vagina expanding as he fills her, feeling her swollen clit sliding down the length of him. When he’s inside there’s a moment’s fear, all the bad shit welling up, and she has to force herself to keep moving her hips, riding him and riding on through the darkness.

This is now, Dawn, this is now, she tells herself. She can feel his ass pumping and hear him sucking air and she has a choice, in that moment, to pull back and take herself into the safe place she lived in all those years, to protect herself, but she doesn’t and as she lets it happen, the past is gone, falling away and left behind.

It’s different to the other night, when this thing ambushed her. This time she wants it. Rushes toward it. That feeling rips through her and blows its way up her spine and she hears herself scream and laugh, and she’s sweating, slumped forward, her mouth eating his.

They lie there for she doesn’t know how long and then he sits up and pours wine and gives her a glass.

“That was nice,” she says.

“Just nice?”

“Listen, stud, don’t you start getting ideas, now. We’ll stick with nice.” But she smiles at him and puts her arm around his skinny ribs. He holds her tight and she falls asleep on his chest, feeling his heartbeat.

Brittany wakes up and her head is sore, and her tummy. To open her eyes is hard and when she does she sees a place she doesn’t know. She feels Mr. Brown fluffy by her hand and she picks him up and holds him to her chest.

“Mommy?” she says. “
Mommy!
”

Nobody says nothing to her, so she looks round and sees a room and a TV and the room is getting dark. She climbs down off the sofa, holding tight on Mr. Brown, and then she sees a old auntie lying on the floor, sleeping. So she goes to the auntie and pulls at her dress.

“Auntie.
Auntie!
” she says but the old lady don’t wanna wake up.

Brittany feels big tears on her face and she is very, very scared now. She goes to the door but the handle is too far away. She sees another door, open, and walks through and she’s in a kitchen and she has to chase away flies that buzz on her. Hates flies. They carry germs, her mommy says.

There’s another door, with a key inside it. Brittany sits Mr. Brown nicely down on the ground and she takes a kitchen chair and pulls and pulls and pulls, making a squeaky noise until the chair is by the door.

She climbs up and gets her hand to the key and it won’t turn but then it does and she opens the door till it bumps the chair, so she gets down and moves it so she can go outside with Mr. Brown and she’s in a small yard with sand and no grass.

The sun is going to sleep now, but Brittany sees an uncle standing by a shack, over a little fence. The uncle has got lots of pictures on him and he calls her, “Girlie, girlie, come here.”

So her and Mr. Brown go to the fence. “You want nice sweeties?” the uncle says.

She shakes her head. “No. I want my mommy.”

The uncle picks her up and flies her over the fence. “Come. We gonna phone your mommy.”

He carries her toward the shack door and she doesn’t want to go in there and tries to get loose and drops Mr. Brown in the sand and the uncle takes her through the door and closes it tight.

Chapter 54

Exley is roused from the deepest sleep he’s had in days by the sound of Vernon Saul’s drumming boots. He opens his eyes and sees Vernon heaving his uniformed bulk up from the beach and across the deck, walking straight toward the open door where he and Dawn lie naked on the sofa. 

Exley sits and gently lifts Dawn’s head, her hair spread out across his chest. “Dawn?”

“Mnnnn?” she says, her eyes closed, voice thick with sleep.

“Wake up. Vernon’s here.”

“Don’t let him in.”

“Too late, Dawnie, I’m already in,” Vernon says, removing his sunglasses, grinning at them.

“Jesus Christ, how about ringing the fucking bell?” Exley says, standing, stepping into his shorts, aware of Vernon’s eyes on his groin.

Dawn sits up, reaching for her T-shirt, fighting her way into it, her hair a bramble patch.

“Sorry, buddy. I was just checking out the other side of the rocks, thought I’d drop in and see you’re okay.” Uninvited Vernon sits and throws his bad leg out to the side, digging into the flesh of his thigh with his fingers, grimacing. “Bloody thing’s giving me grief today.” He sniffs the air as if he can catch the scent of sex. “So, what’s this, then? 
The Love Boat
?” Winking at Dawn, who stands, her T-shirt reaching halfway to her knees, her arms folded across her chest.

Vernon sees the suitcases and bags parked at the foot of the stairs. “Hey, you guys going somewhere?”

“No,” Exley says. “That’s Dawn’s stuff. She’s moving in.”

Vernon wags a finger at him. “Nick, I was a cop for too long not to recognize pure bullshit when I hear it. You’re ducking, aren’t you?”

What the hell, Vernon Saul can’t do a thing, Exley tells himself with a certainty he doesn’t feel. If he reveals any of it, he’ll be sending his own ass to prison.

“Yeah,” Exley says, shrugging. “There’s nothing for me here.”

“And you, Dawnie? Just fading away too?”

“Ja, Vernon. Leaving behind all the glamor.” She tries for throwaway, but Exley hears the tension in her voice.

“Hell,” Vernon says, “after all the good times we had.”

Exley steps between them. “I’d offer you a drink, but we’ve got a lot to do.”

“Sure, of course. I understand.” Vernon makes no move to go, settles deeper into the chair, his arms thrown out across its back. He looks from Dawn to Exley. “But there’s a couple of things I need to tell the both of youse. Updates, you know? You first, Nick.”

“What?” Exley asks.

“That night when your kid drowned out there,” jerking his head toward the beach, “you know I was up on the rocks?”

“Of course. So?” Exley says.

“Well, I was up there a whole long time. Saw your missus in the kitchen with that old guy she was shagging. Saw you and that Aussie getting your heads fucked up on weed. Saw your kid come to you and you send her away.”

“Vernon—” Exley says, dread uncoiling low in his gut.

Vernon holds up a hand. “Let me finish, Nick. You gonna want to hear this. I saw her go up on those rocks, your kid, after you ignored her. Saw her trying to reach out to that little boat. Knew what was gonna happen. I coulda shouted to youse. Coulda stopped it. But I thought, fuck it. Fuck these rich white cunts. They bringing this shit on themselves, so fuck them. And I just sat there. Watching.”

Exley’s face is bled of color as he stands over Vernon, feeling his throat constricting, like he’s going to pass out.

Vernon smiles up at him, relaxed, enjoying himself. “Then I saw her go into the water, your girl. Again, I coulda called. Or come down quick. But I just sat my ass there and waited. Saw her go under once, twice, three times. Saw your whore of a wife come screaming out and you going into the water, bringing the kid out dead. Then I came down and made like the hero. Funny story, huh, Nick?”

“Jesus, Vernon,” Exley says in somebody else’s voice. “Why?”

“Because I could.” Shrugging. “That’s why.”

The same rage he felt when he killed Caroline takes hold of Exley and he lunges at Vernon Saul, grabbing for his throat. The big man swats him aside and Exley hits his head on the tiles, stunned for a moment.

Vernon stands, unclips his pistol from the holster at his hip and points it at Exley. He cocks the gun and Exley looks past the black snout over at Dawn, who stands, frozen, a hand to her mouth, staring at him.

Exley closes his eyes and thinks of Sunny and sees her now: the flesh-and-blood Sunny, not the digital counterfeit. Sees her and waits to die.

Dawn knows Vernon’s going to shoot Nick. Can see it in his face that he’s tipped over some edge. Then he’ll shoot her, and Brittany will be left all alone.

When he works the slide on the Glock—a sound like a man coughing—Dawn looks for a weapon and there’s only the half-empty bottle on the table, so she grabs it by the neck and swings it, wine pouring down her arm, hammering it onto Vernon’s head.

The bottle shatters and she’s left holding the jagged neck. Vernon, bits of glass like highlights in his hair, wine and a trickle of blood zigzagging down his forehead onto his cheek, hardly even looks her way, his eyes and the pistol still on Nick.

Dawn sees the flesh of his neck rising from his body armor, sweat and wine and blood flowing into the creases in his skin. Knows she has just one chance. She jumps at him and slashes the broken bottle across his Adam’s apple, feels the glass bite deep and knows she’s done good when blood honest-to-God geysers out of him, spraying onto the white wall above Nick, and the Glock falls from Vernon’s hand and hits the tiles.

Nick is frozen, eyes still closed, so Dawn gets a foot in like a soccer player, kicking the gun, sending it clattering toward the kitchen, where Vernon, sagging to his knees, can’t reach it.

When Vernon hears Tony Orlando warbling “Tie A Yellow Ribbon” he knows he’s fucked. He’s on his knees, blood pumping in thick jets from his throat, fumbling for the Glock that’s not there no more. Vernon’s vision softens and blurs like he’s drunk and his mouth is full of something warm and salty.

When he tries to speak his tongue swims and the words won’t come. But this is important, what he has to say to Dawn. Wants her to know this thing.

“Dawnie!” he shouts, but all he hears is a wet whisper. “Dawnie, I took your girlie.”

He smiles blood up at her and she’s shaking him and screaming and hitting him but it’s not her he’s seeing, as he hears that song. He’s seeing his father, with his tattoos and his tongue and his fists and his fingers and his fat thing.

His father beckoning him, saying, “Come. Come, you little rabbit. I’m waiting. I’m fucken
waiiiii
—ting!”

And Vernon smells him and tastes him and feels him and then he’s there.

Jesus, more blood.

A lot of it. Vernon Saul going to his final reward in lurid, pulsing Technicolor. Exley, now that he understands that he’s not dead, convinces his limbs to move and gains his feet and crosses to where Dawn, a blood-soaked banshee from a slasher flick, straddles the dead man, shaking him, slapping his face, yelling, “Where is she? Where’s my baby?”

Exley grabs her from behind, his arms looping her chest, and tries to drag her off Vernon, saying, “Dawn, he’s dead. Dawn!”

She fights him and the tiles are slick with blood and Exley loses his footing and both of them end up sprawled across Vernon’s body like mud wrestlers. Dawn slips from Exley’s grasp and is back on Vernon, banging his head against the floor, the gash in his throat like a second mouth, gaping and grinning as she pounds away.

‘Where is she, you fucken bastard? What you done with her?’ She’s panting, spit dangling from her lips.

Exley lifts Dawn’s cell phone from the table and holds it out to her. “Dawn, call the babysitter. Maybe Vernon was lying.”

Dawn stares at the phone like it’s an alien artifact, then her breathing slows and she blinks and nods and comes back into herself. She takes the phone and stands, speed-dialing with a shaking red finger.

Dawn paces the tiles as she waits for the call to be answered, pushing her hair from her face with a bloody hand. Exley hears one side of the conversation, Dawn’s voice rising and sobbing, and he goes to her as she lets the phone slip from her grasp and clatter onto the table.