Rooms Like Coffins

“Fuck, yes, I’m gonna come, fuck. Take it, you fucking bitch,” the fat man grunted as he thrust one last time and his prick throbbed inside her.

She arched her lower back and forced a few exaggerated moans of feigned pleasure. The man rolled off her and lay on his back, panting heavily; his protruding gut was mimicking Mt. Vesuvius right before engulfing Pompeii in fiery death.

“Did you enjoy it, baby?” He asked.

“Oh, yes, it was great.”

“Was I the best you’ve ever had?”

“Yes, of course. The best,” she replied. She was still able to inject some passion into her voice, making each client want to believe she was being truthful. “Will I see you again?”

“Definitely. Next week. My wife has to attend a company meeting and will be gone for four days.”

The mattress moved when he got up. Naked, sweaty, and exhausted, she watched him get dressed and walk out of the small motel room, leaving a fifty-euro bill on the stand next to the door.

She rubbed her eyelids and checked her phone; twenty minutes until the next client arrived. Even though all she wanted was to lie there motionless and stare at the ceiling, she forced her carcass out of bed and into the bathroom. She took a shower, fixed her hair and makeup, and checked her notebook to see if the next client had any outfit preferences.

No special preference, so she just put on the same tiny black dress and stiletto heels she’d worn for the fat man. She took a good pull out of a half-empty bottle of cheap supermarket vodka and walked out on the yard of the circular motel to smoke a joint.

It hit all the right spots, numbing her brain just enough to prepare her for her next client.

“Good evening,” Peter’s voice had her spinning around on her heels. “How’s it going?”

“How do you think?” She retorted. “It’s good weed, though,” she raised the joint and mellowed down her voice.

“Always the best for my friends. Ah, hey, John,” he greeted the young man slogging towards them.

The newcomer’s clothes were dirty, and his hair and beard looked unkempt and unwashed for weeks. Peter shook his hand, like a magician passing him a small plastic bag full of crack, and the distraught young man, whose hand was quaking violently, gave him some money.

“See you tomorrow?” Peter asked the man who was already staggering away.

“Yes,” was the dry response he got.

“Do you ever feel bad about what you’re doing?” She asked.

“Not really. I’ve been in his shoes, all their shoes, and I know how it feels. I also know it’s ultimately a choice. A bad choice, yes, but a choice nonetheless. I’ve never shoved drugs in anybody’s face. I’ve never forced anybody to take anything. They choose to do it. I’ve been doing it for years but I’m still here, right? If they can’t handle it, if they can’t afford it, it’s not my problem.”

“How long have you been doing this?”

“Started doing drugs—hard drugs—when I was nineteen. Learned how to cook rock at around the same age. Started dealing when I was twenty-three, when I realized it’s the only job I’ll ever be able to do. So, it’s almost ten years now.”

“You think I’ll get as cynical as you if I keep doing what I do?”

“I’m surprised you’re not already a cynic. You’re seeing men at their most animalistic, and often at their worst, daily. Don’t tell me you still feel something for them.”

“For some of them,” she admitted, timidly. “For those that come to me because they can’t get laid for free.”

“I’d say fuck them…but that’s exactly what you’re doing,” he chuckled, then frowned when she glared at him. “Look, what we do is…we sell fake happiness. We’re not that different from all those life coaches on social media, or pharmaceutical companies promoting new legal drugs that combat depression or make you lose weight fast. The only differences are that we don’t rake in millions and that some idiots have decided our products are illegal. John is gonna smoke his crack, he’ll feel much better for a while, he might even get ideas about becoming a productive member of society…then, he’ll crash and want more. He could be doing that with Prozac; he’d get similar effects. But the company making Prozac earns billions, while I barely scrape by. Besides, my drugs are clean, I never cut blow with rat poison or whatever bullshit others use.”

“You’re selling healthy drugs, then,” she giggled.

“Nothing’s healthy, baby. Everything can kill you. It’s just that some things might kill you faster. They also help make your short life a little bit brighter. Besides, we could all die tomorrow by something out of our control. A car accident, an asteroid, a nuclear war, some armed moron going on a rampage…fuck all that, I’d rather die by my choices than allow randomness to decide how I go.”

“How drunk are you?”

“Comfortably enough, why?”

“You only start philosophizing when you’re drunk, love.”

“Fair enough. I have to go grab my bottle, to keep the buzz going.”

She dragged long from the joint and stared into the dense plume of smoke that rose in front of her face. With a downward twitch of her lips, she glanced over her shoulder at Peter’s half-open door, dreading the day he’d stop being around. Deep down, she knew that that day was not very far away.

He came back out while taking a pull from a half-empty bottle of Jim Beam. “Want some?” He offered, and she shook her head. “Trying to stay sober for work?”

“Something like that. Being numb is more than welcome; being full-blown drunk is a recipe for disaster.”

“Makes sense. So, how many more clients are you expecting tonight?”

“Two.”

“You’re getting off early, huh? We can hang out afterwards, have some real drinks, and enjoy the…cloudy night. Fuck this fucking weather,” he spat in exasperation.

“Sounds nice, yes,” she smiled and tucked her hair behind her ear.

“Is the penguin yours?” He asked and gestured toward the man in an ironed tux coming their way with slow, hesitant steps, constantly looking around.

“Don’t think so. Never met my next guy before, but he didn’t sound like a tuxedo man.”

“You Peter?” The tuxedo man asked in a raspy voice. His clean hands were shaking, and the paleness of his face made him resemble a ghost struggling to maintain some semblance of physical presence.

“Maybe. Who’s asking?”

“Big Mads sent me to you. Told me you’ve got…stuff.”

“I may or may not have stuff. I’ve got bourbon, as you can see. Okay, this is the point where I’m asking if you’re a cop and you have to respond truthfully.”

“I’m not a cop, man. I’m just…I’m a banker, if it makes any difference. Look, my investments failed, okay? I’ve been buying cocaine from Big Mads for years, but now I can’t afford it anymore. He told me that I can get something cheaper from you.”

“You can, yes,” he said and took a swig from the bottle. “Follow me.”

She’d seen the same damn thing happen too many times. Affluent people get hooked on cocaine, enjoying the perks that come with a blow-loaded lifestyle, but when their money runs out, they can’t deal with withdrawal and have to downgrade their habits. As she tossed the joint down on the ground and crushed it with her shoe, the two men came out of Peter’s apartment.

“Thank you,” the tuxedo man muttered. “I guess I’ll see you again.”

“I’m always here,” Peter said and raised a fresh bottle of Jim Beam, right before taking a long swallow. “He’s got no idea what he’s getting into.”

“It’s his choice, isn’t it? Oh, that must be for me,” she said when a tall, rather chubby man walked across the yard, wearing black sweatpants and a light-brown hoodie.

“You Tiffany?” The pallid man asked and tucked his dark-brown hair away from his forehead.

“The one and only. You must be Nicholas. Come with me,” she said after the man nodded.

Something about his timidity made her uncomfortable. Perhaps, it was his first time with a whore. She definitely hoped it wasn’t his first time. He locked his arms around her shoulders and tried to plant a kiss on her lips; immediately, she pulled back and pushed him away.

“Sorry, baby, no kissing.”

“Oh, okay,” he said and lowered his gaze to the floor, looking downtrodden.

“It’s just the rules, nothing personal. Now, how about you sit down and let me take care of you, huh?”

With ease, she pushed him on the mattress and, without wasting a second, she turned around and started shaking her ass and bending over. Looking at him while biting the corner of her lips, she softly rubbed herself, noticing how fast a shade of scarlet colored his cheeks.

She turned around, flipped her hair, and got down on her knees on the shag rug deliberately placed right by the bed’s edge. He leaned back on his elbows and let out a moan when she jerked his sweatpants down.

“My God, it’s so big,” she exclaimed as she grabbed his prick with both hands and started slowly stroking it. It’s the same goddamn lie everyone sitting on that bed has heard; never mattered if the cock in question was four inches or ten. They all got the same compliment; alas, sometimes it was more genuine.

She took his dick in her mouth and started bobbing her head, exaggerating her gagging and gurgling sounds while maintaining eye contact with him. After putting a rubber on his prick, she rode him. Even though she was able to dictate the pace, for a change, her mind still wandered to completely different thoughts. While her pussy smacked against his balls, and his grunts turned deeper and louder, she contemplated which movie to watch with Peter after she was done for the night.

After a while, the man pulled out of her and rolled her off of him and down on all fours. She arched her lower back and rested on her elbows, reminding herself to let out a few loud screams. Perhaps Peter and she could watch something classic, like Leaving Las Vegas. Or something new, a movie neither of them had watched.

The man’s fingers dug deep in her waist as he planted himself balls deep inside her when he started throbbing. He howled at the ceiling, and she put her head down on the mattress, biting the sheets and letting out stentorian orgasmic cries. He pulled out, tossed the filled condom in the trash bin, put the money on the table, and walked away after muttering a “thank you, good night”.

After he closed the door, she slithered out of bed and hopped into the shower. She had to find something else to do, some other way to make a living. She was reaching the point where sex would cease being pleasurable even if she did it for free, and with someone she genuinely liked.

Wrapped in a damp towel, she checked her notes for the next client; no special requests either, which meant she could wear the same dress one last time before she had to put it in the laundry basket. She grabbed her cigarettes and a pint of vodka and walked out in the yard.

Peter wasn’t there. She lit a cigarette and chased the first puff with a good hit of vodka. She saw her old self, a young girl in pigtails and checkered dresses running around, playing, and laughing without a fucking care in the world; if only she could go back in time, to when nothing really mattered.

Maybe, if she miraculously found a time machine, she’d go back to slap her fifteen-year-old self hard, preventing her from running away from home because of a thirty-year-old scumbag for whom she, admittedly, fell hard. Too many things she could change if someone provided a way to travel back in time.

Since she couldn’t fix any of her past mistakes, she drank some more and dragged a long puff, waiting for the last client of the night to show up so she could be done with it. Tomorrow would be yet another parade of the same old, hours upon hours spent on the old, creaking mattress, spreading her legs for desperate strangers. If only she could find the strength, or simply a good reason, to leave everything behind and start anew somewhere else—anywhere would do.

Vodka failed to wash the memories away, but, at the very least, it numbed her mind and body just enough to get her in the mood for going through the last client of the day, while kindling the sparks of desire for what might come afterwards, if she could talk Peter into spending the night with her.

“You Tiffany?” A dry, crude voice caused her to jump and she almost dropped the pint of vodka. 

“Yes,” she replied, instantly forcing her lips to curl up into a bright smile. She ran her fingers through her hair as she looked at the tall, slim, young man towering over her, wearing a clean, ironed white shirt and black jeans. He looked too neat and handsome to be seeking out her services, but it wasn’t her job to question her clients’ motivations.

Her job was to offer them sexual release. “Follow me,” she said and led him to her room by the hand. After a final swig from the pint bottle, she shoved him onto the bed and, for the thirteenth time for the day, she started dancing and bending over.

“Hey, what are you doing?” She asked and gasped when he grabbed her from behind, fondling her tits and pressing his crotch against her ass. “Take it easy, we’ll get there.”

“Fuck that. Don’t want you undressing, baby. If I wanted to make love, I’d stay home with my wife.”

“Take it easy, will you?” She protested when he pushed her against the wall, his fingers digging painfully into her breasts. “That’s not what we agreed on, that’s…”

“Shut up, bitch. You’re a whore, you’ll do whatever I want. I’m the one paying, I can do whatever the fuck I want.”

“That’s not how it works, that’s…” the rest of her protest was interrupted by a groan as a sharp jolt of pain caused her to flinch when he shoved her face against the wall.”

“I’m paying, so I can fuck you up as bad as I want, okay? Good,” he barked and unzipped his pants with one hand, while holding her tight by the throat. “And scream all you want. I wanna hear you cry; I’m sure nobody will give a shit.”

He squeezed her throat tighter, muffling her screams and causing her eyes to bug out. His cackles reverberated in her ears like violent sirens. Her heart pounded in her chest, and her legs began to shake. Her mouth gaped as louder screams wanted to escape her blocked windpipe when he thrust himself inside her.

The moment he loosened his grip from around her throat, she let out the most violent, barbaric bawl she could muster.

“Scream all you want, you dumb whore,” he spat at her and guffawed. “Who will give a fuck?”

It didn’t take more than a couple of minutes—even if they were excruciating for her, as the man continued raping her with increasing brutality—for the answer to come. She never locked the room’s door when she was working; Peter stormed in, and a resounding thud was followed by silence and motionlessness.

“Are you okay?” He asked after pushing the stunned and grunting man to the floor. “What happened?”

“He raped me,” she explained while panting heavily. “He…that’s all, he raped me.”

“Is that true, asshole?” He asked the fallen man after lifting his head off the floor by his short hair.

“I didn’t rape her. She’s a whore, man, this is what she’s supposed to do,” the man shouted.

“Okay,” Peter nodded, then drove the thick end of the baseball bat onto the man’s mouth, smashing almost all of his teeth. His wails echoed across the room, potentially rattling everyone in the motel. “Not gonna give you a moral speech, mate. All I know is that you raped my best friend. So…” Without another word, and a shrug of his shoulders when the crying man batted his eyelids at Peter’s calm, cold expression, he got up and started hitting the man with the bat, first all over his body, then on his head; until the stranger lay motionless under a pool of blood that stained the dirty wooden floor. His chest kept on heaving, albeit ever so faintly.

“Shit, Peter,” she cried in exasperation. “What are we gonna do? He should go to a hospital, but we can’t take him there.”

“He doesn’t deserve to be hospitalized. We’ll just dump him somewhere. Gonna give a friend a call, he’ll help us take him to the pier. I’ve helped him with that before.”

“You’ve what?” She gasped.

“Never mind. If he starts moving, hit him, okay?” He instructed her and handed her the bat, then walked out of the room while already making the necessary call.

“Please, I’m sorry,” he mumbled with a lisp, and the coughing fit he burst into expunged crimson fountains that showered his face and shirt.

She gagged and tightened her grip around the bat; it was impossible to raise the bat and hit him.

“Alright, Jim will be here in ten minutes. He’s still conscious?” He pointed at the man who had moved his head sideways, coughing more blood all over the floor. “Impressive. May I?” He opened his hand and offered her a warm, comforting smile.

Her hands trembled as she handed him back the bat, unwilling to support what was going to happen. She flinched and looked away when a wet thud filled the air as the wood met the weakened skull. 

“What are we gonna do?” She asked in a broken voice, while sniffling her nose.

“Jim will help us dump him into the sea. Then, it’ll be over. We’ll come back here, have a few stiff drinks, and go to sleep.”

“He mentioned a wife.”

“Doubt he told her where he was going. Chances are, she thinks he’s working late or having some beers with his friends.”

“What if the cops trace his call to me?”

“You can tell them you recognize him, that you did have sex with him, and that he walked out of the room when he was done.”

“What if they don’t buy it? I mean, we’ll have to clean up the room thoroughly.”

“I might have been a bit rough with the bat, yes,” he admitted. “We’ll scrub it clean tomorrow morning.”

“We’ll do it tonight,” she snapped, constantly keeping her gaze fixed on the closed front door. “No way I’ll let the blood sit all night long; it’ll dry up.”

“Okay, we’ll get rid of him, and then come back and clean the room. Then, we get petrified drunk.”

“You make it sound so fucking simple,” she groaned and rubbed her forehead, failing to release even a sliver of the tension threatening to make her head explode.

“It is, love.”

“I don’t know if you don’t care about ending up in prison, but I’m not fond of the idea.”

“Why not? Rent-free room, free meals…and our prisons are not hellholes; we’ll get private rooms, with a TV and access to all the books we want…say, should we just call the cops and surrender?”

“Stop joking, please,” she cried.

“Fine. What do you propose?” He resigned with a sigh and lit a cigarette.

“We let Jim take care of him, we clean the room—and I mean clean—then…then, we leave. We get the fuck out of here.”

“Out of the motel?”

“Out of town. Out of the country. Let’s drive south to Germany; or even better, north to Norway. Find a little place out in the wilderness.”

“Where we’ll do what exactly? I’m not sure prostitution and drug dealing are high in demand in remote Norwegian towns. And I don’t know how to fish or hunt; do you?”

“We’ll figure something out. We’re not dumb, baby.”

“Okay, okay. One step at a time, okay? Let’s wait for Jim first. Once he’s gone,” he pointed at the half-conscious man writhing and coughing blood on the floor, “we can figure out our next step.”

“Yo, open up,” a voice from behind the door said after a discreet knock, and he rushed to answer. “Hey, man, how’s it going?”

“Fantastic,” Peter scoffed at the man in a black suit who sauntered into the room. His receding hairline made his wrinkled forehead look like a small airfield, and his grey stubble added at least ten years to his appearance. “I’m stuck here with a half-dead asshole that raped Gina, and with Gina freaking out about the whole damn thing.”

“Hey, Gina, don’t worry. We’ll take care of it, okay?”

“You’ve done this before, haven’t you?”

“Of course. Peter, why isn’t the motherfucker dead?”

“Honestly? I think he’ll suffer more if we toss him off the pier alive.”

“What if he swims away?”

“Aren’t we gonna make him wear cement shoes?”

“Sure. Let me just go grab my Tommy gun from the trunk and call some of the mob guys. We’re not in Chicago, and we’re not living in the roaring twenties.”

“Which is a fucking shame. Anyway, how about we break his legs and arms? No way he’ll be able to swim.”

“Wait, no, please,” the rapist muttered under his breath, trying to squiggle away from the men towering over him. “Let me go, please. I have a wife, two kids…I’ll pay you, I promise. And I won’t tell anybody about what happened, about…”

“Wife and two kids, huh?” Peter chuckled as he knelt next to him. “So, you’re a respected member of society, that’s what you’re telling us? And yet, you came here to rape a hooker. Not very respectable…nor something a family man would do, wouldn’t you agree?” He asked Jim.

“I’m saying we’ll be doing your family a favor, man. If we don’t take care of you now, you could snap in the future, do some horrible shit to them. They’ll be better off without you; and if you’ve got money, even better for them.”

“Shall I start breaking?” Peter asked and cracked his knuckles.

“Not here, you dumbass. His screaming and crying will alert everyone. Someone might call the cops. No, we’ll do it at the pier. I’ve made sure it’ll be deserted.”

 The two men picked the rapist up and put his arms around their shoulders. With fast steps, they left the room, with Gina following closely.

“Drank too much, mate,” Peter said, rather loudly. “Told you not to mix tequila and whisky.”

“Come on, let’s drive him home,” Jim added.

Jim had parked in a dark street a couple of blocks away from the motel; with no lit windows around, he opened the trunk and shoved the man in; Jim landed a punch on his head for good measure. Then, they got into the car, and Jim drove away.

“How many people know he was there?” He asked as he drove into town.

“Nobody,” Gina said. “I don’t think he’d tell his wife he’d visit me.”

“Nor his friends, I assume,” Peter added. “Don’t think guys would brag about visiting whores.”

“Fair enough,” Jim nodded. “Okay, so, when his family declares him missing, no one will be able to connect you two with him.”

“Unless they see that he called me.”

“His phone’s on him? Shit,” he spat and took a sharp right into a small street, under the cacophony of honking and expletives from the drivers he almost hit. “If they track his SIM card, they might find his location. We’ll have to destroy it, preferably in a place far away from the motel. Time for a little detour.”

“Where are we gonna go?”

“To the west side of town. A lot of crime there. We’ll throw his phone in a shrub or something. His wallet stays with him. Let the cops scour that neighborhood, instead of yours.”

“How about we just leave him there, too? Stab him or something. Make it look like he got mugged.”

“I just punched him, and I imagine you two have touched him—without wearing gloves. Yeah, our DNA’s on the motherfucker. His body has to go. I just wish I knew somebody with a big vat of acid.”

“Me too,” Peter chuckled.

“We’re thinking of different kinds of acid. Anyway, we’re almost there. Now, to find a nice, peaceful corner so we can search him. By the way, how did he come to the motel?”

“I don’t know,” Gina shrugged her shoulders. “Why?”

“If he came with a car or a bike, we’ll have to get rid of that, too.”

“A car, we can perhaps find it from the keys. Especially if they’re one of those electronic ones. But a bike? Or a bicycle? And I don’t think we can get rid of every vehicle near the motel.”

“We could try…okay, yes, you’re right. Let’s hope the fucker drove there, or at least walked. Okay, this is a nice spot.”

He parked on a small, dark street near a parking lot, away from condominiums and any stores that could potentially have CCTV systems. After checking around for passersby, they got out and opened the trunk. The man remained unconscious. Jim patted his pockets, fishing out his phone and a pair of car keys for a Mercedes.

“Okay, good. This is a good place, right? Dark, somewhat isolated, someone can easily get mugged here.”

“I’m almost expecting some fuckers to mug us.”

“That’d be fun, huh?” Jim cackled and tossed the phone towards the edge of the parking lot, where a line of tall shrubs separated it from the street. “We’ll have to park his car here.” He walked toward the street sign and noted the address. “Okay, let’s go. Too much shit to do.”

The traffic was pretty light, so they made it to the port on the north side of town in less than fifteen minutes. One of the guards at the entrance saw Jim, nodded, and opened the security gate.

“How many people are on your payroll?” Peter asked.

“Do you really want to know?”

“Probably not.”

“Good. Okay, here we are,” he said as he drove into the farthest pier where no boats were docked.

She did not want to get out of the car as the two men were already taking her rapist out of the trunk. They were all in this together, and as an act of solidarity, she clambered out of the car. She had to look away when Peter made sure the rapist lay sprawled out on the asphalt while Jim went ahead and grabbed a cinderblock.

“I think that’ll do it, huh?” He asked, struggling to draw a breath as he held the heavy cinderblock.

“If it doesn’t, this guy came out of a comic book.”

Jim dropped the cinderblock, letting it crush the man’s left knee; his bawls had them all jump, and they started looking around to see if anyone would come check what the hell was going on. Nobody showed up, so Peter and Jim lifted the cinderblock together and repeated the process of dropping it on all of the rapist’s limbs. He didn’t even whimper when they did it on his arms, as he had already passed out.

She kept her hand over her mouth, fighting back the urge to hurl as she could not stop glancing at the pulverized limbs of the man who had violated her early. Regardless of what he’d done, she still thought Peter and Jim were taking things too far. No backing down now, though, so she kept her mouth shut and followed them as they dragged the man to the edge of the pier.

“Wake up, asshole,” Peter kicked the man’s ribs, to no avail.

“We just crushed his arms and legs, man. The shock might have already killed him.”

“Guess it was a more excruciating way to go than drowning,” Peter shrugged his shoulders and let out an exasperated groan. “Got a knife?”

“Why do you need it?” Jim asked as he handed him a small knife with an alabaster handle. “Okay…you do realize we’re not in a zombie flick, right? Guy’s not coming back from the dead,” he added when Peter sliced the man’s throat.

“Just making sure he won’t somehow manage to swim or float to safety.”

“Float? Right, hold on,” Jim snapped his fingers and lunged away.

“What else are we gonna break?” Peter asked when Jim returned with the cinderblock.

“Nothing. We’ll just tie this on him, so he’ll go down. We don’t want the currents to take him ashore. His disappearance must remain a mystery for years to come; something TV channels will make documentaries for even after we’re dead.”

“There are a fuckton of bodies down here, aren’t there?”

“Again, do you really want to know?”

“Got a rope?” Peter asked, changing the subject.

“In the trunk. Hold on.”

Gina simply stood on the side, watching them do their thing with horrifying calmness, with dread in her heart and a knotted stomach. Their insouciance forced her to question every decision in her life. Even her affection, if not love, for Peter began to fade. She’d always known he was not a stereotypical good guy, but she had never thought he’d be capable of this kind of violence.

On the other hand, he did save her. If he hadn’t entered her room, the nameless man, ready to go down to the bottom of the sea, would have raped her and probably hurt her badly. She ought to be grateful. Peter and Jim used the rope to tie the cinderblock around the man’s waist, making sure the knots were tight. The splashing sound his body made when it entered the frigid water echoed in her head as a gunshot.

“Well, that’s it,” Jim said and wiped his forehead with the back of his hand. “Motherfucker’s gone. It’s a shame we don’t have sharks in these waters, but the small fish will do the job, eventually. Besides, no one’s diving here.”

“Are you sure?”

“Have you ever heard about an underwater graveyard?”

“So, back to the motel?” Gina asked, eager to leave the pier. Perhaps, it’d help her appreciate what the men have done for her.

“Yep,” they both said.

“You know,” Peter said as they drove away from port, “we could have also buried him.”

“You think it’s easy to dig up a grave? Besides, we’d have to do a deep one, so he’d go deep in the ground, then bury a dog above him. And I’m not killing any dogs.”

“Neither am I,” Peter nodded. “Okay, yes, the watery grave was the best idea. And easiest.”

“The mobsters of the twenties were no dummies.”

“Can you please stop talking so casually about this?” She erupted. “We just killed a man.”

“A man who was raping you, love,” Peter reminded her. “Who knows what else he’d have done.”

“Still,” she said dryly, then closed her mouth. He was right; she knew he was right. Sadly, it didn’t make things easier.

“Look,” Jim said in a calm, fatherly voice. “After Peter hit him the first time, you could have called the cops, right? Say he raped you, and that Peter only defended you. He’s got a family, probably a good job. Maybe, a lot of people know him; hell, he might even donate shit in charity events or something. You are a prostitute living in a cheap motel known for criminal activities. Peter probably has enough drugs in his room to get the whole town high for a day. Who do you think they’d believe? They’d say that you got into a fight over the price, or something, and that you hit him because he refused to pay you or whatever. He’d have gone back to his family, while you and Peter would have been arrested and probably tossed into a jail cell without any proper proceedings. Our way is the only way justice’s actually served.”

“I still don’t like it.”

“You don’t have to,” Peter said. “But you’re the one who told me you didn’t want to go to jail, love. We’re just making sure that you don’t.”

For a moment, she hated them with all her heart, not because of what they’d done, but because they were right. She loathed that their reasoning behind killing a man made perfect fucking sense. She drew a deep breath, pursed her lips, and just stared out of the backseat window as they drove through the downtown area.

Seeing people walking the streets, some coming out of restaurants while others were heading to bars, made her wonder about what a normal life felt like. Going to work in the morning, making good money while doing something honest, then going out with your friends in the evening, or staying at home with your family, oblivious to the despicable things taking place just a couple of miles away from you. She’d never get that kind of life, not because of the murder, but because she was not created to have such a life. She was born to be in this car, with these two men. Everything she’d ever done led to this moment.

“Okay, here we are,” Jim parked in the motel’s parking lot, and they all got out. “Let’s see…there it is,” he exclaimed when a Mercedes S-400’s alarms blinked when he pressed the key. “The guy’s probably rich; his family will do fine without him.”

“How do we know that?” She asked. “I mean, his kids are orphans, they just don’t know it yet.”

“Their dad had a vicious side,” Peter explained, again. “He was able to hide it from them, presumably, but he’d lash out one day. We saved them. They’re gonna live the rest of their lives thinking of their father as a decent person and not the monster he truly was.”

“Besides, how do we know the guy has a family?” Jim added. “He could have been lying to save his ass. Maybe he was one of those stock-market psychopaths. Or the car’s stolen, and he was just a bum pretending to be someone else.”

“That’s the thing, isn’t it?” She said. “We just killed and disposed of somebody without even knowing who he was.”

“It’s better this way,” Jim said. “Not knowing will help you forget about it. So, I’m gonna take the car to the parking lot where we ditched the phone. You?”

“First, we have to clean her room. Scrub away the blood, make sure it looks pristine. Then…”

“We go to Norway. I’m not staying here anymore. If you don’t want to come, fine. I’ll go alone.”

“Fine,” he resigned with a groan. “We go to Norway, to become hunters or fishermen, or whatever, in a remote village. It’ll be so fucking fun.”

“Take my car. I have five more,” he added when Peter refused. “You can’t take the dead man’s car, they’ll put an APB on the license plates when they realize he’s gone missing. How about money?”

“I’ve been living frugally for a few years now, saving up most of what I make. Some guys are gonna be pissed about my being gone, but…I’m gonna leave the drugs in the room. Tell Big Mads to come get them in the morning.”

“You didn’t give any ID when you got the rooms, right?”

“Are you fucking kidding me?” Peter guffawed. “This is one of the few places in this town where you can stay anonymous. It’s probably why none of the residents bothered to check on what happened when they heard her scream earlier. Half of these people have killed somebody; the other half have probably raped someone, or mutilated cats, or something equally despicable. Yeah, no IDs. Not even real names.”

“Good, good. So, even if the cops track him here, and they come to check, it’ll take them a long time to identify you. They’ll only have to go by the owner’s description.”

“With the way he drinks, he might even say I have two heads and that she has three boobs and two pussies.”

“All right, then. Guess, this is goodbye, huh?”

“Unless you come visit us.”

“Maybe one day.”

The two men hugged for a couple of minutes, saying goodbye to a friendship born out of sharing the same barroom for a few years—and of helping each other out in illicit activities.

“Are you gonna be okay?” Jim asked her before giving her a quick hug.

“I’ll be fine, yes. Living with Peter…I’ll be better than fine.”

“We’ll make it,” Peter added. “Right, love?”

“Right,” she nodded. Her previous thoughts had dissipated just as fast as they had arrived. The prospect of escaping everything had elevated her mood. Now, she was already picturing a small house in a tiny village deep in the Norwegian woods, spending all her time with Peter and doing whatever normal couples do. Her lips twitched up in a smile.

“We should start cleaning. Get things done before sunrise.”

“Take care of yourselves, will you?” Jim said and shook Peter’s hand.

“You, too. Killing somebody is fucking hard work, isn’t it?”

“Killing someone’s fucking easy,” Jim corrected him. “Getting away with it is the pain in the ass.”

ART BY PAUL WARREN

George Gad Economou has a Master’s degree in Philosophy of Science, currently works as a freelance writer, and has published three novels and three poetry collections. His latest book isSmoking Rot Gut Drinking Junk (Anxiety Press). His work has appeared in various places, such as Spillwords Press, Ariel Chart, Cajun Mutt Press, Fixator Press, Horror Sleaze Trash, Outcast Press, The Piker Press, The Beatnik Cowboy, The Rye Whiskey Review, and Modern Drunkard Magazine.