Page 14 of Crawl
She scowls at me, then stomps toward the door.
“Better hurry,” I say. “They close in about twenty minutes.”
The truth is that I don’t care about buying the dry cleaning shop. With my status, I can develop anything I want, transforming the crappiest, oldest buildings into pure gold. But I enjoy messing with Remedy. Seeing her pissed off. Panicked. Frustrated. There are so many things you can do to a person’s physical body, but the mind? The mind is harder to break. And so far, she’s an exceptional challenge.
I’m supposed to head to a project site to meet with the lead contractor, but I text him:Emergency. Reschedule?Then I drive to Dry & Clean, speeding to catch up with her.
Remedy pauses outside of the door and glances at the road; the shop is only a block away from her rental house. Her focus reaches the horde of people lingering on the side of the building, trying to catch the glimpse of the corpse. She lifts her nose and walks inside like she doesn’t have a care in the world. She acts like the killer doesn’t faze her because she could be a killer too. And that interests me: she’s drawn to violence. She’s even willing to kill to protect her friend. But I know, deep down, that shewantsto kill, even if it has nothing to do with vengeance.
My primary phone buzzes, knocking me out of my trance.Rescheduling again?the lead contractor texts. I ignore it, stuffing the phone back into my trousers with my other phone. But what am I doing watching her anyway? This is why it’s annoying to get close to victims. You think they’re intriguing until you realize you’re wasting time watching them going through the motions of daily life.
I need to get out of here.
The drive to Miami takes three and a half hours without traffic, but I don’t care. As long as I’m out of Key West, I won’t follow Remedy or be tempted to show her exactly where I left the body.
By the time I arrive in the heart of the city, the club lights flash to each side, women in slinky long dresses with big asses prance down the sidewalks, tan muscleheads chasing them like flies. It’s so different to Key West lately; with a killer on the loose, fewer and fewer tourists ventured out. In Miami, they have other worries, but no serial killers. I maneuver the car out of the main stretch, then find the strip mall. Most of the storefronts are empty. The building is a couple of decades old, but the rent is too high for most to occupy. A place that’s perfect for the Winstone Company to take over.
But at the far end of the lot,Spa and Massageis lit up on one side,Rebecca’son the other.
I slip inside of the massage parlor, swarmed by the floral fragrance of lotion.
“Hello, sir,” one of the workers says, giving me a knowing smile. I pass her, immediately using the door to the side, weaving between the dimly lit cubicles. In the darkness, the slap of hands cracks through the murmurs of conversation. I take an unmarked door in the back.
A two-way mirror covers one wall, a bench seat on the other. Gray and white tissues scatter the floor, crumpled and sticky. Burnt hair and semen waft through the air. I slump down onto the bench, the wood digging into my ass, then I palm my thick dick. On the other side of the mirror, a red-headed sex worker rides one of her clients on top of a massage bed.
In the past, I participated myself. Transactional interactions are what I prefer. It’s better than fucking a victim; the physical stimulation with a sex worker does the job, letting me focus on what truly excites me:killing.
But now, I enjoy the detached nature of watching. Any glass barrier will break with the right amount of force, and those two on the other side—the red-headed sex worker and the old john under her—they know voyeurs are watching. And yet they have no idea that someone like me sits behind the glass. The only reason I’m not killing them right now is because it’s a hard situation to clean up. There are too many witnesses. Otherwise, I would let them fuck each other to death while I jerked off.
But that’s an idea for another day. Perhaps with Remedy.
At the realization that the redhead isnotmy dark-haired Remedy, my dick falls limp in my hand. I squeeze the head until my dick swells with blood and turns purple. Then I stare at the sex worker, but instead of her red hair and beady black eyes, I see Remedy. Green eyes full of venom. Her breasts swinging as I pump my cock deep into her cunt like one end of a spit roast. Her thick, tawny hips reddened from my firm grip. The lace tattoos sprawling across her chest gleaming in the light, all the way down to her furry pussy, drenched with sweat. The blood vessels popping in her eyes as she strains against a noose around her neck, wanting more of my cock, knowing that the closer she gets to coming, the sooner it will be over.
A sourness fills my throat, the lust getting to me. I need to wait before I see Remedy again. Make her think that I’m not that bad. That our fuck-doll arrangement is only to watch her. Until one day, I’ll make her so hot, she’ll beg for it. Then, I’ll let her take the blame for those deaths, or I’ll kill her.
But my dick twitches, ignoring that logic. In my mind, Remedy’s body weight slams into me as she rides me, her neck circled with a rope, the blood rushing to her head, painting her in such pretty red and purple hues. I can’t stop fucking myself.Come for me,I’ll demand as I fill her up with my come. Because I own her. A knife against her throat. A gun to her temple. Her nails piercing my flesh. I own her even as her pussy constricts the blood out of my cock, threatening to dismember me.
I zip my trousers, then head out, pounding a hundred on the front desk before disappearing into the parking lot. It’ll take hours to return to Key West, but the convenient part of having a personal assistant is that they’re always on standby. Even in the dead of night.
***
Remedy
“In here,” Cash calls from upstairs. I swallow, then rub my eyes, still groggy with sleep. Even though it’s past midnight, the windows are open. A light, salty scent filters through the house. A car rumbles by, but it’s quieter than usual for the nightlife in Key West.
I tuck loose hair behind my ears, knowing that Cash apparently does not care about the Key West Killer, but at least with the two of us, there’s less of a threat. Each step up the stairs shakes me into lucidity. What am I doing here anyway? Is he finally going to force me to be his fuck doll?
I have it on good authority that you like it rough. So do I.
He irritates me. He thinks he knows me just because he heard some rumor.
A rumor that is true, yes, but that’s beside the point.
Upstairs, the bedroom door on the left is still closed. A magnetic force draws me to it, beckoning me in my half-conscious state tojust freaking open it.My heart races as my fingers land on the handle, the grip cold and smooth. It jiggles, but it doesn’t budge.
He locked it.
I pull a bobby pin from my hair, bending it into an ‘L,’ then quickly flatten the other pin and remove the rubber tip. I ease the second pin into the keyhole, finding the first locking pin—
