Mercy

Chapter 18

The woman said to El Cain, “Just so you know, we require a week’s worth of rent in advance. Cash, no checks, no credit cards ’cause the folks who stay here are dishonest as hell, and they keep ripping us off.”

She was short, pudgy, and thick-boned, in her early forties, with long, dyed blond hair parted in the middle, where her dark roots were waging a comeback. She had a spiteful look, and her tone was aggressive and unfriendly. She was dressed in faded jeans, a pair of black flats, and a sweatshirt silk-screened with, ironically, the image of a smiley face.

“Nice to know I’m moving into such a high-class place.”

“Thought you would’ve figured that out before you walked in here.”

“Do you live here?” asked Cain.

“God no. It’s not safe at night.” The woman added, “They did put a charcoal grill in the back, but you got to bring your own charcoal and lighter fluid. And you take full liability for any fires out of control or shit like that. And let me tell you, some drunk bastards have come close to burning this place down more than a few times while grilling hamburgers and hot dogs.”

“I’m a vegetarian,” Cain quipped. “And I never touch alcohol.”

“R-right,” said the woman, giving her a dubious look.

Cain paid the money and took the key to her new home. After doing her forklift gig, Cain had looked around and finally found this dump. It was in a horseshoe-shaped motel built in the 1970s that had been “renovated” into longer-term living arrangements, or so the woman had told her. Which meant, basically, that nothing had been done to it besides changing the name so they could charge more, a week at a time. The asphalt parking lot had long since been given over to dirt and weeds. She unlocked the door to number 110.

The room’s width was a little under twice as long as her height. The bed was a twin with a gauzy veil for a coverlet and a pillow that looked as flat as a gambler without a stake. The only other furniture was a small nightstand that leaned to one side, a scarred desk with a shiny green Gideon Bible on it, and a chair with its back partially hanging off. There was no carpet, but they had left behind the gray, scratchy underneath pad for what reason she didn’t know, other than it would cover the concrete slab below. The missing carpet’s tacking strip was exposed where the wall met the floor, its pointy nails like rows of puppy teeth. There was a tiny closet with a few metal hangers. The bathroom was basic: ancient toilet, stained sink, phone booth — sized fiberglass shower. Someone had left a half roll of toilet paper and what appeared to be permanent pee stains on the toilet seat. The window was open. Cain closed it and tried to lock it but that was a no-go. She would have to fix that.

She put her duffel and other few possessions on the desk, took out her Glock, and lay back on the bed with it in her hand. She was tired, worried, and fearful, not because of where she was now living. She was scared because the FBI was after her. There was no statute of limitations for killing someone; she knew that from watching Law and Order episodes.

But could they really get her for murder? They had kept her locked in a cage. Didn’t that give her the right to free herself and to defend herself against the Atkinses? She didn’t know. She wasn’t a lawyer. And people did whatever the hell they wanted and got away with it. Just like the Atkinses had for so many years.

The immediate years after her escape hadn’t been much better. She was a very tall nineteen-year-old with the mental awareness of a preteen and the emotional maturity of someone even younger. Her naivete had led her into treacherous situations. Her fear of the authorities had steered her to groups that had exploited her, damaged her further, chewed her up, and then spit her out. And then one day Cain had woken up and said to herself, Enough. And then she’d said it even more forcefully to the biker gang member she was shacking up with, leaving him a bloody, pulpy mess. It was the least she could do after months of beatings from him. After that, it was her, solo. It would be her solo until the day she died, she had promised herself.

Cain slept fitfully for a couple of hours and awoke ravenous. She splashed water on her face, and since the room rate obviously didn’t include towels or a washcloth, she used a spare sweatshirt to dry her face. She had purchased a new pair of shoes with her MMA purse and now slipped them on.

She drove to a nearby Wendy’s and had a chicken sandwich, fries, and a vanilla milkshake. She looked around at the other tables and saw moms helping kids with their food, wiping mouths and noses, and cleaning up spills, just normal stuff. Still, she felt something odd in her head. Funny scenes appeared there. She had had them before. Dim memories... of something... someone. A girl laughed and put her hands over another girl’s face. The other girl screamed with giggles. It was like a dream so vivid, it gave you the sweats. Yet when you woke up you could really remember nothing about it.

She left and drove back to her new home. The first thing that confronted her was the scream. It was loud, scared, and when it died out, she opened her car door and looked around for its source. There were other residents around, some sitting on fold-up outdoor chairs or on the ground, or on overturned five-gallon paint buckets while smoking and drinking and shooting the breeze. Two others were playing cards with piles of quarters as chips. Not a single one of them reacted to the screams. Cain wondered why. And she meant to find out.

Cain walked over to one of them, a burly guy in his fifties with thick gray hair poking out from under a John Deere ballcap and wearing a dirty T-shirt and old-style white painter’s pants covered with colorful splotches. He had a can of Bud in one hand and a cigarette in the other. His eyes were red and unfocused, and she wondered how many Buds he’d downed.

“What the hell is going on?” she asked him.

“What?” he said, looking confused at the query.

“The screams.”

He shrugged. “Ain’t none of my business, sweetie.”

“Not what I asked.”

He pointed his smoke at room 104, about the time another scream sounded from within. “Girl’s getting her punishment again.”

“What girl?”

“Ken’s girl.”

“And why is she being punished?”

“Cause Ken says so.”

“And who the hell is Ken?”

At that moment the door to 104 burst open and a young woman came running out, her hands over her head. She was dressed in her underwear and was barefoot. She was Hispanic, in her early twenties, with beautiful features and a sleek, lean body.

Coming out after her was, Cain assumed, Ken. He was in his thirties, about six feet tall, around 250 pounds, and built like a bowling ball. He was shirtless, which showed off his powerful arms and thick, heavily tatted shoulders, and muscular forearms. His beer belly was impressive, Cain thought. He looked pregnant with triplets. His shaved scalp and forehead had a large skull tat embedded on it. Among the other tats was a swastika on his right forearm. He held a belt in his right hand, and a cigarette dangled from his mouth. A knife rode in a holder at his waist.

“Get back here, Rosa; don’t make me chase you, girl. It ain’t gonna be good for you if I do. You ain’t got no clothes on, you dumb bitch. Ain’t you got no shame, woman?”

Rosa turned, spat at him, and hurled a machine gun’s worth of Spanish, none of which Cain could understand, nor, did it seem, could Ken. Cain could see the bright red marks on Rosa’s arms and legs where the belt had struck her. Cain involuntarily rubbed her arms where Desiree had struck her innumerable times with her damn belt.

Ken took out the smoke and ground it under his boot heel. He snapped the belt like a whip and growled, “I told you before, you speak American. You gonna make double trouble for yourself, you stupid tacohead.” He laughed at his insult.

“You are tacohead!” barked Rosa. “That’s why you’re so fat. You eat too many, you pig.”

His smile faded as his poor attempt at humor was thrown right back at him; he looked around at everyone staring. Cain knew that men like Ken had only one reaction to such public insult. His lack of wit and deep-set insecurities quickly gave way to his abundance of brute physical strength, and uninspired knee-jerk reactions, which would always be violence-based. Grim-faced, he advanced on her, while Painter’s Pants Man hurriedly retreated, and most of the other people got up and fled inside their rooms.

Cain turned to her left and saw the woman from the office staring at them outside the glass doorway and wearily shaking her head. Then she moseyed back inside like this was simply a daily event. And Cain clearly understood that it was. The Kens of the world all had the same playbook and never deviated from it. That made them dangerous, but predictable. And that made them imminently beatable, if you approached them just right. And Cain had a PhD in the subject of idiot boy-men.

As he advanced on a defiant Rosa, Cain stepped into his path. “Put down the belt, go back inside, get your head clear, and don’t do anything else stupid,” she said.

Painter’s Pants Man took another long step back and muttered, “Oh, hell, you dumbass woman.”

Ken didn’t say anything back. He just swung a lumpy fist at Cain’s head.