Vile Blood (10 page)

Not since her mother died had Skye been cradled in a woman’s arms. Her mother’s sister had done her duty by the foundling child, but Aunt Ellie had not been demonstrative. A kiss on the cheek on birthdays and Christmas the extent of her displays of affection. So lying on Minty’s big bed, on a plump floral comforter, the older woman holding her and touching her hair, Skye was lulled into a sense of unearned comfort.

The room was almost oppressively feminine with its frilly cushions, rose petal wallpaper and vanity table with curly legs and hinged scalloped mirrors spread like wings, the surface a litter of tubes and lotions and lipsticks and face paint, the air in the room thick with Minty’s perfume and cigarettes.

From the moment Minty had rattled up to Gene’s house in her little Japanese car—Skye standing outside with her backpack at her feet—she’d been sure that Gene had thrown his sister out because she’d dallied with the man in the RV. Skye hadn’t argued. What else was she meant to tell Minty? That Gene had ordered her out because he was afraid she’d butcher his son like she’d butchered the men in the old Dodge? And butchered her own daddy, way back when?

“How was he, anyway?” Minty asked.

Skye stared up at Minty, who had reclaimed the cigarette and was squinting at her through the smoke.

“Who?”

“Mr. Brad Pitt, honey, the love God in the RV.”

“Nothing happened.”

Minty waved that away with her cigarette, a pellet of ash falling onto the comforter, Minty cursing and scuffing it away with her painted fingers. Skye used the opportunity to rise from the bed and take a drink from the mug of lukewarm coffee standing among the debris on the make-up table. She sat down on the stool, nervous that she’d get too comfortable. Too trusting.

Minty finished the business with the ash, and lay on her stomach propped up on her elbows, her stockinged feet kicking up behind her like a sorority girl. “Honey, this ain’t my first hoedown. You and Mr. Pretty all alone in that big old RV?
Somethin’
musta happened.” Sucking on the smoke, one eye closed. “Details, girl, gimme details.”

“We kissed,” Skye said.

“
Kissed?
That’s all?”

Well, I tore a chunk of flesh from his neck.

Skye nodded. “That’s all.”

“You get scared?”

Skye looked down, worrying at a button on her shirt. Nodding.

“Ah, baby, that’s natural too. Don’t you fret, there’ll be another time. Plenty of other times, pretty little thing like you.” Minty stood. “I’m gonna get me a teensy-weensy vodka tonic. Can I fix you one?” Skye shook her head. “Mnnnn, maybe better I don’t, your lawman brother’s likely to jail my butt for corrupting a minor.”

Minty left the room and Skye heard the clink of a bottle and the slam of the icebox. She stared at herself in the mirror, the soft light giving her a sharper view of her face than she’d ever had in the chipped looking glass back in her room in Gene’s house. Something had changed. Her eyes were clearer, the blue more intense. The little pockets of puppy fat padding her cheeks and jaw were gone, and her skin seemed stretched tighter over her bones. The scatter of zits that had traced her hairline had disappeared.

My new diet, she thought. And came close to laughing.

That was different, too, she realized. A confidence. A boldness that she’d never felt before. Then she flashed on Timmy’s face, sleeping. Smelt his milky smell as she got him into his pjs and the confidence evaporated and she saw a desperate and loveless life stretching ahead of her.

Minty was back in the room and Skye sat forward letting her hair cover her face—hiding the tears that had welled up—pretending to sip from the coffee mug.

“Something I been meanin’ to ask you, hon,” Minty said.

“What?” Skye said, peering out through her curtain of hair.

“What was Gene doin’ with Dellbert Drum at Earl’s? Thought those two were mortal enemies?”

Skye shrugged. “Some lawman business, I guess.”

“That Drum creeps me out. Plays all down-homey, like if dumb was dirt he'd cover an acre, but there’s somethin’ else goin’ on in there. Something mean.”

Minty was interrupted by the trill of her cell phone and she dug it out from under the comforter.

“Hel—
lo
.”

Minty’s voice got all sugary and she winked at Skye, taking her drink and cigarette with her as she walked through to the kitchen, talking into the phone in a throaty whisper.

Skye lay back on the big bed knowing she’d sleep
in it
alone tonight. She closed her eyes, the day weighing heavy on her, and she almost drifted off. Not to sleep, but into the place where The Other lay coiled and restless, a
prowling
shadow within her.

She opened her eyes and sat up, her heart beating a panicked rhythm. She stood and walked through to the kitchen, hearing the sound of water
running
into the tub, Minty shouting from behind the closed bathroom door.

“Sweetie, an old beau of mine is in town for just one night, would you mind awfully if I go and see him?”

“No,” Skye said, brewing up some strong coffee. “You go. I’m terrible company, anyway.”

“Tomorrow will be girls’ night, I swear. I’ll give you some real pamperin’.”

“Okay,” Skye said. “It’s a date.”

Skye felt a moment of dislocation, a dizziness, and had to grab hold of the counter. Then a terrifying hunger welled up. The Other left aroused and unsatisfied after the incident in the RV. She could smell the meat of Minty’s naked body through the cigarette smoke and the perfumed bath soap and something that wasn’t Skye was urging her forward, the lust for flesh
overpowering
her.

She heard the bathroom door open and the sound of Minty’s bare feet padding toward the bedroom and Skye was halfway out the kitchen, the banshee wail of Minty’s hairdryer loud in her ears before she could gain control again and drag herself back.

She stood a moment with her forehead against the cool metal of the icebox, hearing the whirr of the motor, the faint vibration soothing her a little.

Then Minty clattered into the kitchen on vertiginous high heels, wearing a dress that barely covered her pubes. She spun and presented her back to Skye, her flesh exposed from neck to buttock by the gaping zipper.

“Zip me up, hon.”

And it was The Other that turned from the icebox and stepped toward Minty, and Skye could feel the rush of strength and swelling of her frame as it awoke and invaded her. Her hand was almost on Minty’s skin when the doorbell chimed and Minty shot off, laughing, not looking back.

“Oh, that’ll be Donny. I’ll let him do it, always good to give a boy a peek at the merchandise.”

In that moment Skye found purchase again and she fought her way upward, like she was swimming to the surface of the ocean from way down in the dark depths, her legs weak and her forehead beaded with sweat.

She heard the low rumble of a man’s voice and Minty’s giggle and then the front door slammed and she was alone. No, not quite alone. The Other was still ranging, threatening to return.

Skye turned and opened the icebox, the yellowish light washing a piece of raw steak laid out on a plate, thawed and ready for cooking.

She had grown up vegetarian, had always been unable to stomach the idea of ingesting meat and the flesh lying in a little pool of blood sickened her. But she brought it to her mouth and tore off a
chunk
, gagging, feeling the blood on her tongue. She tried to force it down but she couldn’t, almost as if she were rejecting it on some deep, animal level.

As if this cow’s flesh were kin.

She spat the meat into her palm and threw it in the sink, letting the garbage disposal shred it to nothing. As she ran the faucet, rinsing away the last of the blood, she knew with a sickening certainty that the only flesh that would satisfy her now was human.

19

Drum could smell cunt on the reverend. Cunt and firewater. Tincup met Drum beside the empty swimming pool, wearing his creased black suit and his dog collar, his leading man’s hairdo mussed, a lick dangling like a noose over his right eye. A shaft of yellow light fell in a rectangle from Tincup’s room, just bright enough to show the sheen of sweat on the man’s flushed face.

There had been a debauch, Drum knew. And this pleased him. He’d sensed the preacher’s frustration these last weeks. A frustration that had dulled his faculties to the point where Drum had begun to question his usefulness.

But the man was rejuvenated as he dragged a steel chair away from the broken tiles at the edge of the pool and sat down, waving Drum toward another seat. Drum shook his head, knowing the rusted wire wouldn’t hold his weight, and crouched down on one knee, the lone star on the Milky Way
neon flickering fitfully above his hat.

“You saw our friend Martindale?” Tincup said.

“Yessir, I did.”

“And he’ll co-operate?”

“Yessir, he will.”

“Good. I want you to take him and go up to the city. To see the man who sent that trash down here.”

Drum was caught in the act of lighting a cheroot, the flame of his match frozen halfway to his face. He stared at Tincup, then willed his arm on and fired up the smoke and shook the match dead, giving himself time.

“Now, what man would that be, Reverend?”

“There’s always a man.”

“I grant you that, but kindly explain yourself.”

“Let me ask you a question.”

“Ask.”

“If you were that man up in the city, and you sent your emissaries down here and they ended up as hamburger, what would you do?”

Drum pondered this. “I’d send down harder men. More skilled.”

“Exactly. And you’d charge them with two tasks. One, to avenge their dead comrades. And two, to drive an even tougher bargain with us.”

“I think I’m understanding you, Reverend.”

“We can’t afford that, Drum. We need to press our advantage. Make an approach to this man, tell him we now have free passage for our product. And our product isn’t just what we cook here,” he waved a beringed hand at the ruined motor court. “We can offer a greater variety, can we not, now that we own the interstate—heroin and cocaine from across the border? You have the contacts, don’t you?”

“Yessir, I do.”

“As I thought. So, you use the telephone you took from Holly and you phone that bar. You set up a meeting with the man. You take Martindale and get him to vouch for the safe passage. You impress on this man that you now have two counties under your control, and you negotiate a deal on these terms: sixty percent for him and forty percent for us.”

Drum smoked. Exhaled. “Sounds skewed to me.”

“Don’t fret Drum. Forty percent of what we can ship up there will leave us in high cotton. Trust me. And the man in the city will understand that you are not there to insult him. That you are there to do business. He’ll accept the offer.”

“You believe this to a certainty?”

“I do.”

“Then we’ll take us a road trip.”

“Good.” Tincup stood, tugging his dog collar away from his throat. “You’re sure about Martindale?”

“I got that little doggy on a tight leash.”

“Then I wish you godspeed, Sheriff. Keep me informed.”

The preacher walked over to his room and Drum stood a while, looking out into the darkness, thinking about the dead men spread like landmine victims around the old Dodge. Thinking about luck, good and bad. He heard female laughter from inside one of the rooms, and the distant call of a coyote. He heard a brief snatch of a Spanish ballad, a woman sobbing words of love and loss that were silenced in mid-sentence.

Drum ground the cheroot dead and walked back to his vehicle, a falling star streaking across the sky before it burned away to nothing.

20

Gene was left holding the dead cell phone to his ear, Dellbert Drum gone now that his demands were delivered. When Gene lowered the phone its glow caught the side of his face and he saw his father reflected in the living room mirror. Then the cold light died, and as he stood in the dark listening to the hollow tick of the wall clock and the low hum of the icebox in the kitchen, Gene entertained the idea of unlocking his gun cabinet, loading the Remington pump action and driving through the empty night to Drum’s house and taking care of this business. Like his father would have done.

When he found himself with his palm pressed to the clammy glass of the cherry wood cabinet, he had to fight down the wild, murderous impulse. It was only when he thought of Timmy asleep upstairs that he regained control of himself. Drum was a threat, yes. Venal and corrupt. An abomination. But he was still a man, with a man’s vulnerabilities.

So Gene would go with him tomorrow to the city to visit this drug merchant, play his part in the charade, biding his time until he could take down Drum and Christ-sick crony. Meanwhile, he had to protect Timmy from a greater threat.

Gene, despite his almost religious dedication to all that was rational and real, couldn’t stop the coil of dread stirring a precognitive flash in the mud of his bowels. He could smell the sourness of fear rising from beneath his uniform shirt. Fear that a darkness was on the prowl and Timmy was its
target.

Gene calmed himself, unlocked the cabinet door and took the Remington from where it rested beside the old Hamilton Model 27 boy’s rifle he’d once intended to restore for Timmy to hunt rabbits and
birds
when he was older. B
ut he’d
lost the inclination, not sure if he wanted to initiate his son into the business of bloodletting.