Page 3 of Edge

Snarl’s fist plowed into Randall’s face, knocking him to the ground. “We don’t like being lied to.”

“I’m sorry. I thought it was tomorrow,” Randall whined. “I’ll figure out something and have it for you next week.”

“That’s what you said last week,” Muzzle said. “And the week before that. And the week before that. Time’s up, Randall. I’m going to ask you one last time. Do you have our money?”

Randall pushed himself off the floor and sat on his knees. After a few beats, he exhaled heavily and admitted, “No, I don’t.”

“When you started selling for us, what did we tell you would happen if you didn’t have our product or our money?”

Randall swallowed audibly. “You said you’d kill me.”

“Do you have any of our product to return to us?” Muzzle asked.

“No,” Randall said quietly.

“No product, and no money. Seems like there’s only one thing left to do.”

“No! Please, no!” Randall begged. “Do something, Evie. You have to help me.”

It was too late for me to do anything. He and I both knew that. I’d offered to help him months ago, but he wasn’t interested. After he stole my phone while I was sleeping and emptied my bank account, I was done with his shit. Instead, I focused my attention on working extra shifts and saving up enough money to get a new place for myself since we were about to be evicted. I didn’t care if he had to sleep on a sidewalk somewhere, I was moving out and he was not coming with me. The Randall I once knew was long gone, and I had no desire to be around the meth monster who had replaced him.

I gave Randall an apologetic look and raised my hands in surrender. “There’s nothing I can do.”

“No!” he screamed. “Don’t let them do this. Please. Please!”

I turned my head and closed my eyes. I couldn’t stop what was about to happen, but that didn’t mean I had to watch it. Or so I thought.

“Oh, no you don’t,” Muzzle said and roughly grabbed my arm to turn me back around. I struggled to break free from his hold, but was no match for his strength.

Snarl looked at me and grinned maniacally before he plowed his fist into my face. After the second hit, I agreed to comply with whatever they wanted.

“Good,” Muzzle said. “Here’s how this is going to go.”

As I listened to his plan, I tried to disconnect from what was happening. Randall was going to die, and there was nothing I could do about it. The only thing I could do was cooperate in order to save myself.

When he finished explaining, Muzzle looked at me expectantly.

“The knives are over there.”

It tookeverything I had to keep from vomiting. Twice, I felt bile rise in the back of my throat and forced myself to swallow it back down. I didn’t have time to be sick. I needed to get my stuff together and get the hell out of there as soon as possible.

When Muzzle and Snarl finally left, they promised they’d be back and told me to have the mess cleaned up before they returned. The mess they referred to was Randall’s dead body and the blood he spilled after having his throat slit. They didn’t specify how much time they were allotting me to dispose of the body and clean up the crime scene, but I didn’t want to wait around to find out. I also wasn’t going to do anything to disturb the plethora of evidence they left behind. Instead, I thought it would be better to pack my stuff and run.

As I was gathering my things, I realized how little I had left. Randall had stolen so much from me. I was partly to blame for letting it go on for so long. It took me a while to realize he had developed a problem. I started to suspect something was going on when he couldn’t pay his half of our bills. He hadn’t had a major unexpected expense, so there was no reason for him to have no money to contribute.

Then he started taking things from the house and selling or pawning them. First, it was things we didn’t use very often, likecertain small kitchen appliances and miscellaneous electronics. After he ran out of those, he moved on to things we did use. I caught on when the coffee maker wasn’t on the kitchen counter where it should have been. As I started going through the cabinets looking for it, I realized the coffee maker wasn’t the only thing missing from the kitchen. When I confronted him later that day, he was very apologetic and admitted he had a problem. I offered to help him in any way I could, but he said he needed to do it himself. Unfortunately, I didn’t see that for the red flag it was.

I thought he was doing better and even praised him for his hard work. Little did I know, the only thing he’d gotten better at was hiding his actions. It became clear when my debit card was declined during my lunch break at the hospital. I opened up the banking app to check my balance and almost died when I saw the amount available. Instead of having over two thousand dollars, I only had two dollars. After frantically scrolling through the transactions, I found a Zelle transfer for two thousand dollars to Randall Myers. I confronted him as soon as I got home from work. He denied stealing the money and became extremely defensive. When I showed him the receipt, clearly showing the money was transferred to an account in his name, he tried every trick in the book to blame anyone other than himself. But it didn’t matter. I was done. He’d stolen from me. Again. As a result, we weren’t going to be able to pay our rent and some of our other bills. When the eviction notice arrived, a part of me was relieved. I could move on without Randall and put the whole mess behind me. Little did I know, that’s exactly what I would be doing but in a very different way than I thought.

Carefully avoiding the area on the floor where Randall’s dead body lay sprawled in an unnatural way, I glanced around the small house one last time. I hoped I hadn’t forgotten anything, but I didn’t have time to double and triple check. I needed tohit the road and put as many miles between me and Fairbanks, Georgia as possible before anyone noticed I was gone.

As I drove away from the place that I called home for a large part of my life, my anger grew. I couldn’t let them get away with what they’d done. Yes, Randall owed them money, but it was for illegal drugs they shouldn’t have been selling in the first place. Two wrongs didn’t make a right, and two wrongs certainly shouldn’t go unpunished. And I couldn’t spend the rest of my life hiding from them. If they were in prison, I would be free to live my life.

Before I could think better of it, I pulled over at a gas station. Once I found a phone I could use, I called the Fairbanks Police Department and anonymously reported Randall’s murder. I identified Snarl as the murderer and Muzzle as the accomplice, as well as where they could find the murder weapon. Then I told them they abducted the other occupant of the house, and they could check the hospital surveillance cameras to verify. After answering a few questions and refusing to give them my name, I got back into my car and drove until I couldn’t drive any more.

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EVIE

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