Bonne Femme

Chapter 23

Final Mistake

 

        Richard took the steps three at a time and slammed a shoulder into the door.  Dry wall shattered by the doorknob skittered across the floor as he staggered inside.  He saw Mic whirl in surprise, and beyond Jill cringing in the corner, her robe hanging open and her bare legs spread as she braced herself against the walls---her eyes wide and unfocused.  She finally reacted, her head snapping around to his direction, her lips parting in surprised relief.

        Mic saw Richard in the doorway, gasping for breath and glaring at him as he gripped a large metal flashlight.

        He quickly processed the situation.  No gun.  I put a knife to her throat and he'll cave.

        He pictured Richard tied to a chair watching as he did it.  Then he started recalculating.  He knew he could gain control the two of them, but maybe Marta was with him or maybe had called the police.

I haven't done anything that they can prove.  They don't have a thing on me.  Nothing.

With a smirk, he stepped back and dropped his hand.

        Jill scrambled around the table, almost upsetting it as she ran to Richard.  He hugged her briefly without taking his eyes from Mic before putting her behind him. 

 

383.

"Did he hurt you?" he asked, his voice low and hoarse with emotion.

"No," she said breathlessly.  "Where is Marta?"

"In the car.  Where's JR?"

"He wasn't there when I called.  They said they would tell him." 

        As he listened to the exchange, Mic congratulated himself on his correct assessment of the situation.

"She called me over, Ricky," he said.  "We thought you'd be gone longer."

Richard ignored him.

"He came in through the back," said Jill.

"He's not buying it, Baby Doll," said Mic, his voice lilting in parody of juvenile humor.

        "Sorry you had to find out this way, Ricky.  Take a good look at the little slut.  What do you think she had in mind?"

        Richard expected Mic to be frustrated and furious.  He decided that the talk was meant to lull him.  He suspected that Mic would maneuver closer for an attack. 

Mic merely nodded toward the couch.

        "She makes you sleep out here," he said with a smirk.  "What?  You think she's like a virgin or something?  Believe me partner, she ain't.  When we were---"

        "You screwed up this time, Mic," said Richard, interrupting the performance.

"Really?" said Mic, aping fear.  "What you gonna do, Ricky?  You gonna holler at me?"

Richard braced himself as Mic sauntered forward.

        "Let me guess," he pitched the belt to Richard.  "You're gonna tell your friend, JR, on me again."

Richard gripped the flashlight tighter.

        Since he had arrived Richard had wondered about the .45.  When Mic turned to come around the sofa he saw that it wasn't stuck in his belt at the small of his back.  He decided that Jill had probably lain it down in the kitchen or bedroom.  If JR came he thought he could have Mic arrested for breaking and entering.  Once in custody, and once it was understood what he had done tonight, they might be able to hold him long enough that they could get enough evidence to charge him with one of the murders.  He began to hope that Mic might never be free again.

        

384.

        First things first.  He had to get the women safely away.  Then he would try to find a way to keep Mic in the house.

"Go to the car," he told Jill.  "If he comes out, drive straight to the police station."

"No," said Jill.  "I'm staying here."

He leaned close to whisper. "Listen.  I've got to keep him here until JR comes."

"He wants to fight you.  Can you not see that?"

"You'll get me killed if you stay.  Now go."

Reluctantly, she left the house.

        "What are we gonna do now, Ricky?" Mic mocked when they were alone.  "Talk some more?"

        "Yeah.  About how you screwed up tonight.  I've got to hand it to you for the job you did on the security system.  I'll bet there's not even a fingerprint to show you were there."

Mic smiled.

"Too bad Marta saw you take my keys."

The bluff caused the smile to slip, but only for a moment.

        "No.  She was in the bedroom with you when I took them.  You see?  I don't care if you know.  I want you to know."

        "They know too, Mic---not just JR.  West Virginia, the Walker police, they've put it all together.  They know about Rose Ford, the Palmer girl, even about Carly Williams."

Mic stared at him a long moment, and then shrugged.

        "You've been busy, Ricky.  But you see, if all that was true---I mean if they could connect me to even one of them then I wouldn't be here, would I?"

        "It's a matter of time before they lock you up.  I think tonight just about cinches it."

        "So she says I broke in, and I say she let me in.  Hey, there's not a mark on her.  Given the history of the relationship between the three of us, I don't think I have to worry about a thing.  There is no evidence, Ricky---absolutely none.  To an impartial observer, it's all just coincidence and your twisted imagination."

 

385.

"You and I aren't the only ones who know, Mic."

        "They don't have a thing on me.  All they got is you pushing them!"  Mic said indignantly.  "You're really big now, aren't you?  Think you're gonna scare me, you pathetic coward?  You come in here and find me with your little honey pot against the wall with her legs spread for me, and what do you do?  Do you fight?  Hell no!  You talk!"

He looked at Richard contemptuously.

       "Can't even come at me like a man.  Just like in the Mog.  You sneak around telling stories---getting others to do your dirty work.  You didn't think I'd ever find out, did you?"

The sudden realization of Mic's reason for coming to Cartier stunned him.

"Like Scott?" he said.

        "Yeah.  And sooner or later you're gonna pay the same price as the shrink, and you're not going to do anything.  You think you can get JR or somebody to take care of this for you.  But it won't work.  I'm too good, Ricky.  I'm real good.  Now get out of my way."

"You're not leaving."

Mic laughed.

        "I'm supposed to be afraid of you?  Why would I be, Ricky?  You're only a back-stabber.  Even she knows that."

        Richard thought momentarily of clubbing Mic with the flashlight if he tried to leave, but decided that he couldn't afford to be the one to initiate a fight again.  Mic brushed past, but couldn't resist one last shot.

"You'll have a front row seat when I finish her,"

        Richard lunged impulsively with the vague idea of restraining Mic until JR got there.  He caught him off guard.  Clamping his right forearm under Mic's chin and bracing his left on the back of Mic's head, he hauled him off his feet and drove him into a sitting position on the stoop with his right knee planted in the man's back.  Adrenaline fueled his rage and frustration as he pushed Mic's head sideways with every intention of breaking his neck.  After the first rush of outrage, however, Richard had time to think. 

        He eased off and evaluated the situation.  A quick glance toward the street showed him that the women were still there.  Mic wasn't drunk this time.  If he gave up his advantage, he was no match for him.  He had to restrain Mic until JR arrived.  The problem was that the hold he had was a killing one, not a restraining one. 

 

386.

         Mic clawed at the arm crushing his windpipe.  His face felt ready to explode.  A cloud of pinpoint lights swarmed in his vision as his consciousness slipped away.  He kicked and thrashed in terror just as he had seen his own victims do.  He tried to dig his heels for a lunge backward break the deadly embrace, not quite believing that Ricky could be doing it.

        Richard had leverage, but Mic was stronger.  Struggling to maintain his advantage, he felt cartilage crack against the sharp bone of his forearm.  He knew that a sudden wrench would either crush the man's throat or break his neck.  The feel of another human being struggling in his grasp kept him from doing it.  It wasn't in him as long as there was an alternative.  He let Mic breath.

Mic felt the pressure at his throat ease.

He can't do it!  he thought with wild elation.  He can't!

        A quick rasping gulp was all he got before the pressure was reapplied.  The horrible truth hit him.

He's playing with me!

He felt the knee in his back as Richard's forearm crushed into his larynx again.

        A memory flashed brilliantly into focus:  A blonde woman, pinned by a knee in her back, thrashed in death throes while he hauled back on a noose.

        The tiny lights spun as his world narrowed and the sounds from outside came from far away.  He was at the bottom of a deep well, the light of continued existence visible, but impossibly far away and above him.

It isn't right!  Not me!  Not me!

        A scream echoed in his skull.  Then he finally thought about the switchblade.  In desperation, he managed to force his right hand into the tight pocket of his jeans, but could only touch the top of it.

 

Richard held on tenaciously as Mic bucked and rocked from side to side.

Don't make me do it, he thought.

 

        Mic's heel finally found purchase on the sidewalk.  He lunged backward, almost freeing himself. 

        Please!  Please!  Please!  Just give me a chance, he pled as he thrust his hand deeper, seeking to clutch the knife.

 

387.

       Yes!  The thought screamed through his mind as he pulled it from his pocket.  I've won!

        He flicked it open and quickly sliced into the forearm clamped at his throat, expecting an immediate release.

 

        Hot pain stunned Richard, but he held on grimly.  The slashed arm lost most of its strength immediately, but it was the wrong arm.  In his panic Mic had forgotten that the hold was maintained by the arm clamped behind his head.  Richard now had no choice.  He increased the pressure.

 

        Surprised that he wasn't free, Mic changed tactics, bringing the knife up and around in a wide arc seeking Richard's neck.  The blade sliced instead through the scalp to the Richard's skull.  The long slash brought a spray of warm blood, but didn't free him.  Lost in panic, Mic forgot who was tormenting him, what he had planned to do, about everything.  His whole consciousness now strove only to survive.  He slashed again and again, wilder and wilder.

He has to quit!  He has to!

 

        Richard hunched his shoulders to protect his vulnerable neck.  The knife sliced up the back of his left shoulder, cutting to the scapula.  The searing pain from numberless cuts began to dull.  Encroaching lightheadedness told Richard that he was losing a lot of blood.

I can't go on much longer.

But with sudden clarity he saw what would happen if Mic killed him.

He'll kill them both.

        He burrowed in further, oblivious now to the slashes opening new wounds.  Pushing with his head to force Mic's neck further into the vee of his forearm, he exerted the last remnants of his waning strength, seeking to finish it.

 

 

388.

         The slashes became wilder and slowed as Mic's oxygen-starved brain began shutting down.  Then it rallied for one last grasp at continuation.

 Help me!          Help me, Mommy!         Mommy, Please!

        Beyond the onrushing darkness came a pulsing red glow below his feet, and horrified shrieking that filled him with terror.  Suddenly he understood the fiery glow.

Hell!

As the darkness came, there was only a childish whine.

It's not fair!

 

        Not knowing that Mic was already dead, Richard put his remaining strength into a last desperate wrench.  The last thing he felt before losing consciousness was the dull snap as the vertebrae separated.

 

        The Ranger's dash light cast crimson flashes across the lawn, lighting the house front.  The bodies lay like a heap of blood-soaked rags on the stoop.  JR fell on the slippery sidewalk as he hurried after Jill.  Marta's screams continued to fill the night, bringing people out of their houses.

        Too much blood, he thought as he reached the stoop where Jill sat with her robe gaped open.  Oblivious to her exposure and the cold, she was trying to staunch the worst of Richard's wounds.  He felt Richard's neck, but didn't bother with the glassy eyed Mic.

        "You're doing good," he said to Jill before running down to call for an ambulance and get his first aid kit.

        A crowd was gathering in the street.  He past Marta, now silent, stumbling barefoot up the walk.  When he came back up he examined Richards wounds and instructed her where to apply pressure with the gauze pads.  There weren't enough. 

        An eternity later he heard a distant siren, but he knew it was too late.  There was simply too much blood on the ground, and none of it was Mic's.  Long minutes later, the ambulance arrived.  Covered with his blood, Jill held Richard's lolling head in her lap, still trying vainly to staunch the flow even as the EMT's pulled her away.

 "I can't believe we've got a pulse," said one.