The Confessors' Club

SIXTY-TWO

I came to on my belly, trussed like a hog. My wrists were tied together behind my back with rope that was then crisscrossed down to tug up my ankles before it was knotted behind my knees. A blanket was thrown over my head. I could barely breathe through the suffocating wool. I couldn’t see a thing.

‘Dek Elstrom to the rescue.’ The unnaturally high voice giggled faintly.

‘You’re a shit, Delray,’ I said to the floor.

‘You’ve brought treasure?’ His voice was skittish, insanely wrong.

‘Wendell Phelps.’

‘The money, honey,’ Delray sang.

‘Wendell,’ I called into the floor.

In an instant, a steel rod, likely the barrel of a gun, was jammed through the wool into the center of my neck. It surprised me. I thought Delray was across the room.

I didn’t resist, concentrating instead on keeping my body loose. There was play – an inch, maybe two – in the rope. Tugging would only tighten the loops around my wrists and ankles.

He pressed down on the big knot. Pain like I’d never known shot through my shoulders and legs as they were drawn closer together. I shut my eyes, and tried to focus on sucking more air through the wool.

‘The money!’ Delray screamed, so seemingly distant. Strangely, he’d said nothing about me arriving hours early.

‘Wendell!’ I shouted. ‘Tell me where he is, and I’ll tell you where I’ve got the money.’

He pressed harder on the knot, ripping new pain into my shoulders, knees and legs. But there had been a lag for just a fraction of a second. For sure there was play in the rope.

‘The money,’ he called out in that faraway voice.

‘Wen-’

A gun fired just above my ear, shattering glass somewhere and filling my head with thunder.

I yelled fast, for surely Delray had gone insane. ‘Follow the road to town, go into the fire lane. My Jeep’s there. I buried the case at the base of a tree, fifteen paces perpendicular to the right front wheel.’

‘See?’ Delray shouted from far away. ‘All is good!’

Footsteps, loud in heavy boots, thudded across the plank floor. The door creaked open.

The gun fired twice, something thudded, and the door slammed shut.

The thud, I was sure, was the sound of a body falling. Wendell.

‘Damn you to hell, Delray; damn you to hell,’ I managed, in little more than a whisper, beneath the wool. ‘Damn you too, Wendell; damn you as well.’

I had to get away. Delray would come back to kill. Ten, fifteen minutes was all he’d need to get to the Jeep, walk off the paces, paw through the leaves and find the metal case. He’d check it and he’d come back, wild-eyed and furious, eager to torture. He’d want everything, and then he’d want me dead.

‘Delray!’ I shouted, to be sure.

No answer. He was gone. I was alone, but only for a few minutes more.

I tried to roll up onto my side, to shake away the suffocating blanket. Pain tore at my shoulders as the weight of my legs tried to tug them from their sockets. I teetered up for only an instant before I fell back on my belly, still covered by the blanket, and now even more desperate for air. I counted one, counted two, and lunged again. This time, I made it up on my side and held. The blanket fell away.

He was slumped against the front door. Laying on the floor, all I could see were his pants, his shoes. And the fresh blood puddling back toward the center of the room.

I took in a breath, and another. Another precious minute had gone, maybe two. Delray was pacing off the steps to the tree by now.

I flexed my shoulders back. Daggers shot deep into my back and arms, but the rope slipped an inch. I flexed again and my legs dropped another inch. I raised them back up, as tight to my back as the pain would let me. It was enough. The rope slacked enough to get my thumbs inside the loop around my wrists.

My mind flitted to the dark fury that would be contorting Delray’s face when he returned. I bit at my lip, pushed the image away, and kept working my thumbs. They were numb, unfeeling stubs, but somehow the cord around my left wrist loosened even more, and then my left hand slipped free. I pulled the cord from my right wrist, and then from my legs. I almost wept.

I rolled onto my knees and started to stand. Too soon. I fell back. I crawled across the room.

The body had two gunshots: one to the head, one to the heart, leaking red on the floor.

Not Wendell.

Delray Delmar looked back at me through dead eyes.