The Fourth Whore, page 4
She was surveying the damage when the screaming started, followed by a string of profanity-laden outbursts that clearly came from Gloria.
“Fuck,” Kenzi whispered and made her way around the corner to peek down the street. There was Gloria, going toe-to-toe with two of Silvio’s behemoths. She was distracting them and being loud enough to warn Kenzi. But these guys were nothing to mess with. If she didn’t back off, they’d kill her and Al both. Kenzi couldn’t have that.
“Hey. Assholes!” Her heart pounded. This was the dumbest thing she’d ever done. And that was saying a lot. The biggest one turned around, saw it was her, and headed toward her. The smaller one gave Gloria a shove before he, too, headed her way.
“You better run, honey,” Gloria yelled, hands still propped on her hips.
Kenzi didn’t need the advice, as she’d already stumbled backwards a few feet. The men slowly picked up their pace until they were jogging. The flight part of her central nervous system won and fight took a backseat. She ran.
Kenzi made it three blocks from the house before she slowed. Where was she going? Where could she go? It was getting dark and she had no friends, no family—no one who would take her in. Sure, she could probably go to Duke’s, but besides the possibility of being seen by more of Silvio’s goons, she would have to “put out” for the privilege of safety. Right now, the idea of submitting to that man, even if it meant life or death, was unimaginable.
“Hey!”
She knew the voice, but couldn’t place the name. It was the big brute with the gold tooth and knuckles the size of golf balls. She refused to turn around and look. Instead, she took a hard left. Brick buildings flitted by in a strobe effect; graffiti colors then light, dirty white-walled cement then colors again.
Dodging water-logged diapers and soggy bags of McDonald’s trash, she ducked into the space behind an abandoned nail salon and the fence that separated businesses from the housing projects.
“You better stop bitch, or you’re fuckin’ dead.”
That was the smaller one, still way bigger than her, but smaller than the other guy.
If she continued down this make-shift alley, she could take a left just before it opened to the highway and loop around all the way back to Duke’s junk-yard. It still held the same rusty shit it offered her as a child playing hide-and-seek. For someone who needed to escape, that kind of knowledge was life-saving.
Kenzi could navigate the skeletal remnants of vehicles, the old coke machines, and pinball games long since passed from rigor mortis to fossilization. She knew if she could make it there with even as little as a minute head start, she could find a way to disappear.
More than one set of feet chased after her, the thuds working together in a rhythm that mimicked her heartbeat until the harmony fell apart and she could count two, maybe three separate runners. She pulled the ninety-degree left and then another after passing the first building, to run back the way she’d come. She couldn’t waste time worrying about the perpendicular alleys between the two parallel ones that might give away her plan. She just kept going.
The chain-link fence glinted in the fading daylight like a military formation of fireflies. She picked up her pace. A child-sized hole in the far corner offered sanctuary. If she was going to get through it unseen, she would need to cut right and meander around the cars parked on the street, ducking down as if she was on the SWAT team.
She eyed a front loader washing machine that Duke had picked up when the local laundry closed up shop. Years ago, it was a perfect place for a quiet little girl to find peace away from her mother on a drug binge or one of the men of the week who weren’t picky when it came to the age of the pussy they tried to stick their dicks into.
Kenzi bet her life on her ability to still fit inside with the door closed. Without the rubber seal, the door gaped enough to keep a kid or young adult from suffocating. Her hand grazed the brick of the pawn shop when she made the turn, rubbing skin off her knuckles. Her sharp intake of air came at the same time that she heard two gunshots. She pitched forward and made a split-second decision. She let her body fall flat on to the pavement and army crawled under a car.
The slush of a late March thaw soaked into her sweats and long-sleeved tee, but there was no time to worry about skinned joints or wet bellies. She held her breath and stayed motionless, trying to keep her head down below the curb.
She focused her senses, listening for the footfalls that should be rounding the corner any minute but her nose demanded an audience in her brain. The smell of liquefied rot with its thick, throat-squeezing fumes writhed up out of the sewer grate beside her. The need to peek through the bars and assure herself there wasn’t some zombie or other such monster waiting for her overcame her.
She knew it was stupid, but one of her foster mothers (an elderly woman who insisted Kenzi call her “Nana” for the three mercifully short months she’d lived there) once told her the devil’s creatures lived beneath grates like these, waiting to devour bad little children. Nana insisted they could smell a bad child and would pull a lever which opened the bars, dropping the unsuspecting naughty bugger into their jaws.
On particularly bad sewage days, Nana would say “can you smell the fumes of Hell down there? I hope you’ve been a good girl this week.” From that day on, Kenzi never again stepped onto a sewer grate.
There was so little light beneath the car that she had no hope of seeing anything in the dark abyss but still she inched herself forward to where her eyes could peer over the edge. A small, white, oblong shape glistened in the gloom. Black orbs hovered side by side against a yellow-white beak. Kenzi shivered, unable to stay in this spot. The peeled-back piece of fencing was in a direct diagonal to the left of her head. It would take little maneuvering to wriggle her way over to it and through the small hole. Once she got that far, it would be easy to roll from one obstacle to another until she reached the washer.
Maybe she lost them. The usual sounds of music blasting from cheap speakers and screaming mothers threatening physical abuse continued without the interruption of footfalls or heavy breathing. Now was the time to break from the death car. She shimmied across the semi-frozen ground and pushed herself through the rusty-edged fence, tearing her shirt and the skin of her back in the process. The washing machine was further away than she recalled. Still, the road and alleys were deserted as far as she could see, so she risked a beeline run to it and climbed in, curling herself into a breech fetal position before pulling the door gently shut.
The smell of damp mold tickled her nose, coaxing a sneeze, but she willed it away. The dirty glass window beaded with condensation as the air warmed and then grew stifling. Kenzi’s hip ached. She straightened her leg a bit to adjust herself and felt the rusted wall of the tumbler give. She pulled her foot back before it broke through. Her hip screamed in protest at being put back into the same position and the dirty cuts in her back called out in response. Relax. Just relax and think she told herself. Relax, relax, relax.
Live bird, dead bird, live bird, dead bird. It felt like a sign. The Scribble Man had a bird like that black one she’d just seen. Those milky eyes peered into her soul. The bird, not the man, had given her the rabbit’s foot. Had she really dreamed it all up? So what if the bird pecking at her window had been her imagination too? “Stress-induced hallucinations” was the term the doctors had used when foster parents showed them her drawings of the Scribble Man with Robbie’s ghost inside his glass timer. Words, too. There had been messages to and from the Scribble Man. She remembered. Had she, as a child written notes to herself? Her skin itched. She wanted the foot, the claws that saved her, that had saved her so many times before. Where was it? She couldn’t get to it in this cramped space.
She needed to check on Gloria and Al, go home, and call an ambulance for Marilyn and get her admitted for the umpteenth time. Maybe even get to see that cute Indian doc—and hunker down in the hospital for a few days to buy some more time.
The door swung open easily but the pins and needles working their way up her feet and legs did not allow her to move. She tried once but fell. Slowly, she rose, adding her weight a pound of pressure at a time, letting her nerves come back to life. When she could trust her limbs again, she took a few hesitant steps. She worked her way through the labyrinth of junk to the far side of the fence where a bigger hole waited to let her escape.
The house closest to the junk yard and directly across the street from Gloria’s porch was boarded up, scrawled with spray paint, and filled with junkies and horny teens. The next house over used to be occupied by a mom with her six kids. Kenzi babysat them—most of the time unasked—while the mom was off getting high or sucking cock for crack. Then one day there were the sirens—police and an ambulance without its lights. After that, the house stood empty. Just another day in the hood. Hmm, might make a good book title.
This time, crossing through the backyard, it felt all too quiet. The air was thick and Gloria wasn’t there waving her in. Kenzi stopped at the top of the steps. The bloodied bodies of her friends lay slumped against each other. Al was dead. His left eye was nothing more than red stew in a black bowl and his forehead bore a red angry volcano spilling forth a dark ooze of lava. Gloria was swollen and mangled. Both eyes bulged closed like a newborn robin’s. Her arm draped seemingly boneless over Al’s legs, certainly broken. Her ample cleavage had caught and still held one of her teeth. She was breathing.
“Mama? Gloria? Hey, wake up.” Kenzi held the woman’s face in her hands and shook her ever so gently. Nothing. She pulled the woman’s heavy head to her chest and cradled it. Her hand was warm and sticky against Gloria. She held her tighter and as she increased the pressure, the woman’s skull crunched like eggshell.
“Oh god.”
She had no choice but to leave them there and get home to call 911. She crossed the yard without concern for the men who had been after her and leaped over the three steps to the door and shoved it open.
It took what seemed like hours to comprehend the scene. Every cupboard door was open. Broken dishes were everywhere. The chair that sat on a peach can was overturned and her mind noted in the chaos that another leg had broken off. We can’t afford two cans of peaches. The junkie who had so recently occupied it was sprawled on the floor. His forehead bore the same “we were here” hole as Al’s had. That wasn’t really a surprise to Kenzi, given both killers standing amongst the mess. Her mother, now very much awake and sober, was being held up in a headlock by the smaller one—a squirrely little white boy wearing a black skull cap. The bigger one—Marco. I think it’s Marco— held the gun pointed at her. Snot mixed with tears covered her mother’s bruised and bloodied face.
“Where’s the money, bitch?” Marco punctuated the question with a jab of his gun.
“Kenzi,” her mother whimpered.
“Shut the fuck up,” White Boy said and punched Marilyn in the head.
“I said where is the money?”
“Hold on a sec,” Kenzi said.
She leaped at Marco. The gun went off just as she slammed into him. She heard her mother scream, but it faded into a wet gargle followed by the thud of her body hitting the floor. The gun skittered across the linoleum. Suddenly, Kenzi was on the biggest thug like a monkey grabbing at his face and poking his eyes.
The next thud came from behind her and it brought her to her knees. White Boy had taken a bat or maybe a metal pole to her lower back. She tried to curl herself up, tucking her arms and legs in like a pill bug. The attack felt like it came from every angle. The bat and a knife took turns pummeling her. Her kidneys throbbed. She didn’t even know she could feel her internal organs until now. She’d have to thank Silvio for the medical lesson.
Marco kicked her in the ribs. At least one broke. It was hard to breathe. Each intake of breath caused a stabbing pain to rake through her. She got herself up onto her knees and he kicked her again, rolling her over onto her belly. White Boy had a knife—a big one, a jungle knife—pointed at her.
“Bitch, Silvio says you’re late with his money. Way we figure, you owe him an even K. You got two minutes to hand it over or you’re dead. You got it?”
She coughed. A thousand? No fucking way. It hurt so bad to breathe, but she took in what she could.
“Five hundred.” She coughed and spit a dollop of blood onto the floor.
She tried to get up, to face them. White Boy put his foot on her belly and pressed his weight into it. The sharp edge of a broken rib pierced something inside her and a deep cramp seized her belly.
“Uuughh,” she huffed. It came out involuntarily.
“The extra pays our collection fees.” He leaned closer into her face, the knife was now poking into her throat. “Damn, girl. Why your eyes all fucked up like that? You got cataracts or something?” He pulled back as if she was contagious. His foot came off her belly too and instinctively she took a deep breath. Something popped inside her and black edged into her eyes. If she didn’t do something soon, she was going to die. She slowed her breathing. She tried to take short quick sips of air. The rabbit’s foot was in her pocket—if she could get to it.
“They’re two different colors, asswipe.” She probably shouldn’t have said it to the guy with the knife but she needed the distraction and making them angry was all she could do. “It’s genetics. Science. You know, the reason your face is as ugly as your mother’s.”
“Listen here, freak, you go get that money, right now, and Imma let you live, I ain’t even gonna fuck ya ugly ass.” White Boy was down so close to her face she could smell the burnt plastic stink of meth on his breath.
She used the opportunity to wriggle her hand into her pocket. The foot almost jumped into her palm. She’d lost track of Marco, but there was little time to worry about it. She slashed out at White Boy with it and used the momentum to roll herself away from him. He screeched a high-pitched old lady squeal.
“ook ut at itch id oo ee.”
Kenzi hazarded a look back and saw him holding a flap of cheek up. She must have caught the corner of his mouth with the claws and literally ripped his face off—at least half of it anyway. Blood plopped on the floor from above her like rain.
“You fucking cunt!” Marco had the gun but White Boy got one good kick at the side of her head before falling down. A drop of his blood hit her face, or maybe it was her own running in her eyes. Her world turned red. Pain seemed to come from everywhere. She was going to die. The gun went off and she was shoved sideways. It stunned her diaphragm and when she was able to take a breath again it whistled. There was something hot inside her chest and it was squeezing her heart.
“Help me,” she whispered.
Somewhere in the distance the tapping started again. She heard glass breaking. There were muffled frantic voices in the background. Blackness swam into her peripheral vision as her brain began shutting down nonessential functions. She was going to die. Her life, filled with misery and pain would soon be over. She relaxed and quit fighting. This was the solution to everything.
The shadows in her vision began to move, coalescing into a vaguely female shape. She was probably hallucinating. This must be a stage in the dying process. Most people see a lighted tunnel, but she saw the form of a woman with a perfect body that she’d never had. It darted between her and her attackers.
Suddenly oxygen flooded through her like a tsunami washing the room in color. Once again, she saw a woman with black hair and tan skin standing over her. The crazy, white-eyed bird had tucked itself into Kenzi’s armpit and buried its beak into the whistling hole left in her lung by the bullet. Something cool brushed against her leg. She looked down to see a large snake wrapped around White Boy, squeezing the life out of him.
But none of this was real, was it? Surely, she was near death and just seeing things—bits of memories sewn together like a drunken dream. The dark-haired woman had Marco by the throat. He wasn’t even fighting. Suddenly, her mouth opened unnaturally wide. A universe swirled inside. That was the tunnel. Somehow, Kenzi needed to go there. She wanted to. But Marco was going there. As his body shriveled up like a skin wrapper, the rest of him was sort of sucked into that darkness inside the woman.
When Marco was discarded, the woman bent down to Kenzi. “Hello sister, and thank you.”
Before Kenzi could answer, the bird pulled itself out of her with a squelchy pop. The whistling began again. The sensation made her cough and she spat blood. Heat radiated off of her, she could almost see it, like a hot road in the middle of August, yet she shivered. She smelled the coppery scent of blood which over years of cutting had become aromatherapy. But this blood smell was all wrong. It was sour and metallic and much too raw.
Numbness blanketed her. Sounds were muffled against the roar of a sanguine ocean in her ears and the cacophony of a frantic bird cawing at the woman and snake. Some internal alarm was going off in time with her breathing: screaming siren, stop, siren, stop. Maybe the cops were coming.
“We’ll meet again soon, sister,” the woman said, her face just inches from Kenzi’s.
She tried to see her savior but everything was a crimson haze. A swooping sound like a fist or maybe a giant black bird came from just above her head, and then Kenzi’s world went black and there were no more thoughts.
Chapter 5: Book of Conquest 2
Burnt lamb offerings scented the air which drew Lilith to the village. The sign said Monroe St., which meant little to her. So many mortals—more than she’d ever known could exist—wandered amongst structures so tall they must touch the moon at night. The ground was firm, similar to the packed earth of the desert. The strange coverings on her feet kept her off balance. It was dangerous not to feel each step, yet all around her, the humans wore them. It was imperative to blend in. If they knew, they would try to destroy her. She needed to gather strength, just as she had so long ago.
