Nine
NINE
Sophie Masters sat perched alone at the edge of their king-size bed circling her hands across the white silk, tracing the lines of golden stitching, lost in her memories. She caught sight of the silver-framed picture on the nightstand and picked it up. It showed a slimmer Jimmy dressed in a smart grey suit carrying her across the threshold of their new house, this house on their wedding day. It had been the happiest day of their lives, almost five years ago now. It was their anniversary the week after next... would have been. So much had changed, so fast. The picture fell from her grasp and slipped face down on to the plush deep-pile carpet as she wept, clattering against the empty bottle at her feet. Her fists balled as tears rolled dark trails of mascara down her cheeks, staining the sheets. She thrashed wildly at the bedspread and screamed at the photograph, or at least at what it represented.
“You selfish prick!”
A great sob heaved through her as she rolled on to her back and stared up at the rendered ceiling. Her bags sat packed by the door; why wouldn’t he come home so she could tell him how much she hated him? She pounded at the mattress again, spreading ripples across the bedspread in her wake, drowning in a sea of betrayal.
She knew that Jimmy had found the note she’d left on his pillow that morning; he’d stormed out, leaving spilt coffee all over the breakfast bar like a big dumb baby man. She curled up into a ball and wrapped herself in the duvet, waiting for the phone to ring. The conversation with the strange man danced through the periphery of her mind like a fevered dream. Her liver hurt. The stranger was a controlling asshole for sure, but something about the way he spoke had caught her attention.
A knock at the door startled her straight. She peered out of the window, craning her neck to see the door step. From above, she could see a tall, thin man dressed all in black and wearing some kind of old-school black hat like a figure from a black and white detective movie.
She crept down the stairs slowly, trying not to make a sound so she could get a glimpse of the stranger’s face through the peephole before deciding whether or not to open the door. The red and green stained glass panel in the door suddenly turned dark with movement the other side. The shadowy figure lurched about beyond the glass like a drunken spectral cowboy. Sophie felt sick; she just wanted to lie down and close her eyes. The treads creaked beneath her feet, giving her away. He knocked again, louder and longer.
“Mrs Masters?”
“I’m coming!”
Sophie adjusted her blouse, brushed down her skirt and quickly wiped away the smudges of make-up on her cheeks with a tissue in the hallway mirror. She didn’t look good, but she looked good enough. A baseball bat stood incongruously in the umbrella stand amongst the classy parasols. At least one of Jimmy’s paranoid delusions might come in handy in a pinch; she’d been pretty handy on the rounders pitch at school. She chanced a look through the peephole just as he knocked again, causing her to leap back in fright. All she had seen was that same weird hat pulled low over the guy’s eye and a stubbly, weak-looking chin. She could take him. She gathered her courage, touched the wooden bat for luck and opened the door a crack, keeping the chain sealed against salesman, Mormons, heavies and freaks.
“Hello?”
Bruce stopped knocking just short of crashing his prosthetic fist through the wooden door. Sophie peered out at him around the edge of the door. She was a beauty, no doubt about it, but one that was fading fast. Her big deep blue eyes were tinged pink with recent tears and crow’s feet spread from the sides through her pale skin. Her blouse was heavily creased and she looked as though she hadn’t slept. Given what he’d done to her fat husband, she probably hadn’t. He could smell the sharp odour of strong spirits through her perfume. He’d driven her to drink.
“Mrs Masters? I called earlier; I have news about your husband.”
The guttural growl came more naturally at her doe-eyed display. She had a pretty smile. He shifted his feet further apart and hooked his thumbs through his belt loops; play the cool guy, get her interested.
“Who are you?”
“My name is Bruce. Von Toose, Private Investigator. I’m sorry for your loss, madame.”
He took his hat off and held it down low in front of his waist, fiddling with the brim.
“May I please come in?”
Sophie thought for a moment before she pushed the door closed. Bruce could hear a metallic scrabbling and then she opened the door to him and stood aside. He walked across the doormat and into the hallway. She quickly closed the door behind him and reapplied the chain. He waited patiently and took in the decor. The hallway was pretty bare, white walls, neutral tones, a big wide mirror and polished wooded floor; an estate agent’s dream.
Sophie’s mood softened as she studied her visitors bulging biceps. He had a weak chin, but so what? Jimmy had two. She led him through into the lounge.
“Make yourself at home, Mr von Toose.”
Sophie busied herself around the lounge area, picking up the magazines and cups that she had left there strategically an hour earlier. Being a housewife was a bit like being a ghost, doomed to create and repair the same problems to pass the endless time. She floated toward the kitchen door as Bruce sat down in a plush cream-coloured leather armchair. There were rows of cheap-looking ornaments arrayed in a dark display unit to his left that were totally at odds with the rest of the stylish decor.
“Would you like a cup of tea, Mr von Toose?”
“Two sugars, please. Actually, make it four. No milk. And please call me Bruce.”
He placed his hat on his lap and adjusted his underwear to accommodate his testicles comfortably as Sophie disappeared into the kitchen. She was older in real life than in the photograph, prettier too. How the hell did a warthog like Jimmy end up with a woman like her? It seemed to happen all the time, the big, ugly guy and the beautiful woman pairing up; it had to be genetic. His bionic hand suddenly pinched him rather harder than he had been expecting, crushing his balls between his metal fingers. An explosion of pain wobbled through him, pricking tears from his eyes as the terrible throbbing pulse between his legs quickened and worsened. He felt really sick; he had to man up, and fast. The clinking sound of finally stirrings in the kitchen meant he was out of private time. He gritted his teeth hard and tapped at the armrests frantically, concentrating on playing a rapid, swung rhythm to distract himself from the atomic jelly bomb exploding deep within his loins. Sophie flitted around the kitchen, passing in front of the open doorway holding a tray. He wiped the tears from his eyes with his sleeve as the pain began to subside.
He managed to regain a measure of composure by the time she returned with the tray bearing two steaming blue-and-white striped mugs. She carefully handed him his tea before sitting down on the sofa opposite, her long, black stocking clad legs stretched out lithely to the side of her on the white leather upholstery. Her toes wiggled as she took a sip. His balls ached, and not in a good way. He took a sip. The tea was pallid and watery; it hadn’t been brewed long enough. They sat in silence for a little while longer, sizing each other up. Sophie made the first move.
“Isn’t technology wonderful? My new kettle just told me it cost three pence to boil the water for our tea, that there’s a full moon tonight and to have a great day. It even knows my name!”
The Internet of Things was taking off in a big way. Everything was connected to the internet nowadays; toasters, phones, consoles, TVs, washing machines, fire alarms, teddy bears... you name it, it was online. Even Bruce’s bionic arm was always online, constantly updating the software and patching the glitches. He would personally draw the line at toilets that knew your name and... habits, but the world didn’t seem to agree; Apple had just announced the iPee.
“Yeah, it’s great I guess, if you don’t mind pictures of your ass ending up on Reddit.”
She wasn’t listening. She took another sip of the horrible tea, biding her time, making him sweat. He put his mug on the table, right next to the coaster.
“Do you have any official ID, Mr von Toose? I’m sorry to ask, but I’m afraid I haven’t heard of you before and the police told me to be wary of strangers.”
She smiled at him sweetly.
“Call me Bruce please Mrs Masters; Mr von Toose was my father.”
“Do you have any official ID, Bruce?
“Sorry Sophie, but there’s no requirement to carry any, I’m a private citizen like you, not a cop.”
“Call me Mrs Masters please. You don’t have a badge or something? No driver’s license?”
“No, sorry, I left my wallet back in the car.”
“Could you just go and...”
Bruce cut her off.
“Look, I came here to ask the questions lady. Forget the ID; I’m me, you’re you and Jimmy’s still dead.”
She flinched at her late husband’s name, spilling a little tea on the upholstery. He pressed on as she reeled.
“What do you know about Mastah Blastah? I mean, except that he made your husband a whole bunch of money that probably paid for that white elephant of a couch?”
The leather creaked as she leant forward.
“Mastah Blastah? What do YOU know about Jimmy?”
Her hand shook violently as she spoke, spilling more tea onto the assembled glossy fashion magazines spread across the low glass coffee table between them.
“I’ll get to that Mrs Masters, be patient. Let’s take one thing at a time, lay all our cards on the table.”
Sophie stared through him; she had a glazed expression like a rabbit caught in the headlights. Bruce kept on driving.
“I’ll start shall I? I know that you were fucking Mastah Blastah before he disappeared last week. I know that you know Jimmy withdrew ten grand from your joint bank account last Wednesday, and that you sent him a note to tell him what you thought about that.”
Bruce pulled the note from his pocket and dropped it onto the coffee table.
“Exhibit A. What I don’t know though is what you got out of it. Blastah was fatter than your husband and had a mouth full of gold. He was a big-time crack-head with a penchant for little fluffy dogs. At least Jimmy still had all his own teeth. Was he just not man enough for you? Was that why he had Blastah killed?”
Sophie snapped.
“What the fuck are you talking about?”
She leapt to her feet, incensed. Her mouth flapped incredulously like a fish out of water.
“WHO THE FUCK DO YOU THINK YOU ARE?”
She was utterly steaming, sloshing tea onto the carpet.
“Calm down, Sophie, we’re just talking here. You’ll have a goddamned heart attack. Do you want to join Jimmy in a cold drawer for two down at the morgue? Who will dust all this pointless shit then?”
“DON’T THREATEN ME!”
She lunged across the table at Bruce, her sharp fingernails eager to bite into his fleshy neck.
With one fluid reflex, he stood bolt upright, grabbing the back of Sophie’s neck and swung his prosthetic arm downward, slamming her clean through the coffee table. Sharp glass shards and fashion magazines scattered across the beige carpet as he fell to his knees and she fell to the floor. He picked her up bodily with his bionic hand and, in one movement, flipped her over so that she faced him, his cold metal fingers wrapped tightly around her throat. Her eyes were closed. His heart was pounding in his chest; this was not a good scene. He let go of her neck and shook her gently by the shoulder.
“Sophie, wake up. Sophie? Mrs Masters?”
No response.
“Why did you attack me like that? Sophie, don’t you want to know about Jimmy? Wake up!”
He shook her again harder, nothing. She wasn’t breathing. A dark pool of blood spread out from beneath her. One of the shattered table’s legs jutted out from a deep gash in her stomach. He stood up, brushing broken glass from his jeans. She was innocent; she was dead. He’d killed her. She looked so fragile, so sad, bleeding out on her well-kept carpet like one of the baby birds he’d left on the roof of Paradise Records. He felt dizzy. What the hell just happened? He staggered away, out into the hall.
Walking had never seemed so surreal, so unusual. He placed one foot in front of the other like a newborn giraffe and climbed the stairs. Sophie hadn’t done anything wrong, nothing at all. He felt sick to the pit of his stomach.
He had to try to man up, to move on with the investigation, search for clues and the like. Maybe it wasn’t a wasted journey, a waste of life. Maybe he’d find a missing piece of the puzzle, maybe it would all just go away. He had Sophie’s blood on his hands, both figuratively and literally. The staircase seemed to stretch endlessly in front of him as his progress slowed with every step. Her face; all he could see was her face.