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= THE HILL CLUB =

a Night Shots short story (Suspense)

by John Argo

10.

Stunned, Lou was only a spectator for the next minute or so. A light went on overhead, and Marie leaned out the window. "MOTHER!" Linda yelled, pushing Lou away. Lou turned, realizing he and Linda were naked and in a compromised position. Marie's eyes were blazing, her mouth a thin slit of trembling fury. "MOTHER!" Linda yelled again. "YOU SEE WHAT I'VE BEEN TELLING YOU ABOUT THIS GUY?"

Lou felt heat turn to rage and he wanted to strangle the girl.

At that moment, the lights of a police car began to twirl red white and blue in the parking lot behind the wall and the fence, beyond the bushes that surrounded the pool. Must be parked on the lawn just beyond the garden wall, Lou thought. Before he could do anything, he heard the boy's voice: "Freeze, asshole. One move toward Linda and I'll blow your head off. Get away, Linda, I'm going to read him his rights."

"What for?" Lou said holding his arms up. "I haven't done a thing wrong."

"You get out of that pool, shithead."

Marie threw down some jeans and some shoes. "You get out of my life, you bastard. And away from my daughter."

"You can't arrest me," Lou said. "There are no charges."

"Just get out of our lives," Linda said loathing him. She started to sob with rage and humiliation, and the sound of her crying filled the air like wailing. Sirens.

"All right," he said. "Just let me get my things." He went up to the bedroom. Marie was in the bathroom with the door locked.

The boy was behind him. "You have five minutes, you prick. Then I'll figure out some reason to haul you in."

Linda argued. "We don't want him in, we want him out. Run him out of town."

Lou found his wallet. He still had over a thousand bucks. A sweater. There was nothing of his that could be identified. He left his name on nothing. He left most of it, the fine shoes, clothes, luggage, colognes, as if shedding a skin. The cop stood in the hallway, gun hanging in his hand, waiting as if to offer a ride. Lou walked past him without a look back. He pushed them, all of them, out of his mind even as he stepped onto the sidewalk and headed toward town on foot. He'd stolen nothing here, so this wasn't one of those then to now things. For the first time, he was actually going somewhere rather than running blindly away. He held his head high.

He rented a car with one of Marie's cards—the only one, which he didn't know he had, she'd lent it to him, and he left it at the rental place. He bought some colas and a sandwich and some apples and a banana and drove out of town. He had a full tank, and the next city was an hour away. He could ditch the car and fly, who knew, across country maybe. He checked his wallet again. Counted the thick wad of bills again. Then he remembered, and that changed everything. Everything! Laughing, he drove with the window open, the radio blaring, the wind in his hair toward the mass of lights. When he got into town, he ditched the rental car. Then he paid cash for a flight to Las Vegas. He felt relaxed, and unhurried, and full of anticipation. This was like nothing he'd ever done or felt before.

He pulled out his call phone and dialed while waiting for a taxi on the corner in front of Caesar's Palace. Traffic roared around him at midnight in this city that never slept, and the air was wonderfully alive with the ringing of slots, the babble of tourists wandering by, the smell of exhaust, always the promise of the next yank on the one-armed bandit. Somewhere quiet, after a few rings, she answered in a sleepy voice, "Yes?" with her tongue catching on the back of her upper middle front teeth in that tiny hint of a lisp, like a child's.

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Copyright © 2018 by Jean-Thomas Cullen, Clocktower Books. All Rights Reserved.