THREE TIMES A LADY Read online

  Dana tightened her grip on the armrests at her sides and glanced across the aisle. The rumpled businessman who’d elbowed her in the back of her head a few hours earlier was tilting back his head and finishing off the last of his latest drink, a glossy sheen sparkling in his badly bloodshot eyes. From the seat in front of Dana, little Bradley asked his mother, ‘Are we almost home yet, mama?’

  The woman’s voice sounded almost as frightened as Dana felt on the inside. Still, to her credit, the woman tried to play it off. ‘We sure are, honey. Shouldn’t be too much longer now at all.’

  ‘But I can’t see my daddy when we get there because he got dead, right?’

  Through the crack in the seats, Dana watched a sad look flash across the woman’s face, and she empathized with her at once. Because Dana had seen the exact same look on her own face in her bathroom mirror each and every morning for the past thirty-five years now, ever since the night she’d watched her parents viciously murdered by a deranged madman who still haunted her dreams to this day. ‘That’s right, baby doll,’ Bradley’s mother answered softly. ‘Your daddy died, but he’s always looking down on you from heaven, so you need to remember to always be a good boy, even when you don’t think anyone’s watching you.’

  Bradley sighed audibly, further bruising Dana’s already-bruised heart. She bit down hard into her lower lip and felt her eyes well up; not knowing how much more bruising her heart could possibly take. As things stood now, her heart had already been lumped up worse than an overmatched prizefighter who’d just gone fifteen lopsided rounds with a Muhammad Ali in his prime. ‘What does my daddy do in heaven, anyway?’ the little boy asked. ‘Is he still a baseball player like when he was with us?’

  The woman nodded and tousled her son’s hair. ‘Yep, he sure is, slugger. More than that, he’s the best baseball player in all of heaven. Even better than Babe Ruth, some say. Your daddy and Babe Ruth play on the same team, you know.’

  ‘What team do Babe Ruth and my daddy play for? Does my daddy still play for the Cleveland Indians?’

  The woman smiled gently. ‘Nope. Not anymore, buddy. Your daddy was traded to the Angels, so that’s the team he’ll play on for the rest of for ever now.’

  Heartbreaking as the conversation was for her to listen to, Dana felt infinitely thankful for the mental break it provided, however brief. Looking out her window, ten miles to the east she saw perhaps a dozen airliners circling the bright-blue skies above Hopkins, each taking its position in the mile-high queue and waiting its turn to land.

  Dana checked her watch. Burke Lakefront was located fifteen miles west of Hopkins. The DC-10 in which they were flying had a maximum speed of six hundred and ten miles an hour, though Dana guessed they were only doing about five hundred miles an hour right now. That should give them approximately one minute until they made it to Burke Lakefront, a small commuter airport usually reserved for personal aircraft and corporate jets.

  The pilot’s voice came over the intercom again just as what Dana assumed to be a military jet suddenly came roaring up along their left side, giving her heart a terrible start and flipping it over inside her chest like a gyroscope. High-pitched shrieks immediately sounded from all around the cabin. Pure pandemonium followed after that.

  From the signage on the sleek gray fuselage, Dana identified the military aircraft as an F-16 fighter. Probably scrambled from Wright-Patterson Air Force Base out in Dayton. Nothing to worry about, her ass. There was plenty to worry about here, obviously. And that would have been putting things extremely mildly. A rounded bulletproof canopy couldn’t obscure the helmeted pilot inside the F-16, dark sunglasses and all. The DC-10 pilot’s voice didn’t sound quite so calm this time.

  ‘Flight attendants, please ensure that everyone onboard is buckled up, then take your own seats and prepare for an emergency landing. Passengers onboard Flight 942, this is not a drill. Please do everything your flight attendants instruct you to do. We are unable to operate the landing gear properly and an in-flight refueling can’t be performed at this late juncture. Therefore, we’ll be touching down in a water-landing on Lake Erie. When we hit the water, use your seat cushions as flotation devices. Slide the straps over your shoulders and activate the light beacon located on the left-hand side. Please secure your own flotation devices before attempting to help out children or fellow passengers. Exits are clearly marked and located at the front, middle and back of the plane. Please try to stay as calm as you possibly can. The Coast Guard is standing by. May God have mercy on our souls.’

  The intercom clicked off and Dana’s breath hitched in her throat. She looked out her window again and felt her heartbeat notch up another fifty levels in her chest. In the distance, two Coast Guard cutters were steaming full-speed ahead toward an undetermined rendezvous point somewhere out on the menacing, gray-blue expanse of Lake Erie. Choppy waters threw around the massive cutters like toy boats bobbing up and down in the bathtub wake of a giggling, squirming child.

  A massive adrenalin dump flooded into Dana’s veins and left her arms and legs tingling and feeling weak as a flight attendant in her mid-twenties charged down the aisle checking seatbelts; glancing first to her right and then to her left with a look of absolute terror etched into her pretty face. Thirty seconds later, the plane angled sharply downward and began its stomach-turning descent.

  Dana’s heart did a quick series of quick somersaults in her chest as they went down, back-flipping across her ribcage like a highly trained Olympic gymnast springing handstands across cushioned mats. A moment later, an oxygen mask dropped down in front of her from a hidden compartment in the ceiling and dangled before her eyes. Reaching out with shaking hands, Dana fastened the plastic cup over her mouth and nose with the elastic drawstring while her mind flashed back to the story of Captain Chesley ‘Sully’ Sullenberger, the former Air Force fighter pilot who’d been hailed as a hero for crash-landing his plane in the Hudson River in 2009 without incurring any fatalities or major injuries to the one hundred fifty-five souls aboard US Airways Flight 1549, Charlotte to New York City. Dana only prayed that the passengers onboard Continental Flight 942, nonstop LA to Cleveland, would prove every bit as fortunate.

  They didn’t.

  When the plane slammed down into the water fifty seconds later, it did so with enough force to rearrange Dana’s insides as though they’d been crammed into a gigantic blender turned up full-speed. A sickening rollercoaster feeling stabbed her deep in the gut. Unearthly sounds filled her ears: the screams of her fellow passengers; the rumble of an unimaginably powerful earthquake, as though some unseen giant had torn the Earth off its axis and was now shaking the world like an insignificant snow-globe he’d idly plucked off a big-city department store’s pristine shelf. The unbearable screech of twisting metal as the interior walls of the plane bowed and moaned and sagged. The whine and pop of rivets that suddenly transformed into deadly projectiles that whistled and shot through the confined space of the cabin like bullets fired from a gun.

  Dana gripped her armrests with all her might, digging her fingernails into the plastic hard enough to draw blood. A sliding, disorienting sense of movement racked her body as the plane plowed even deeper into the murky water. The very last thing she remembered hearing was little Bradley’s terrified yelp of fear in front of her.

  That’s when everything around Dana went pitch-black and dead silent. There were no more screams in her ears. No more rumbling in her belly. No more screeching of metal as the plane came apart at the seams. No more whimpering from little Bradley in the seat in front of her as Dana’s head slammed violently into the window out of which she’d been staring during various parts of the long flight. Just an unfamiliar sense of weightlessness in her limbs and head and torso as she floated away softly on a black cloud into a dark place she’d never before visited – and damn sure never wanted to visit again.

  CHAPTER 4

  Claire Bishop moaned groggily as the date-rape drug she’d been given wore off and she came to, but her
moans sure as hell weren’t coming from sexual anticipation this time. Not even close. After all, it was pretty hard to feel horny when you were tied spread-eagle and standing up, barefoot on a cold metal floor in the middle of a walk-in freezer with a boy you’d just met half an hour ago behind a dumpster at McDonald’s. Especially not when the boy you’d just met half an hour ago behind a dumpster at McDonald’s was holding a meat cleaver in his right hand, wearing a dress and smiling at you like a maniac while the two of you were surrounded by huge chunks of bloody red meat that hung from sharp steel hooks positioned all around the room.

  ‘You’re going to be up there pretty soon too, you know,’ the boy said, gesturing idly to one of the empty steel hooks with the sharp silver cleaver in his hand. ‘Didn’t your mother ever tell you to never take rides from strangers, Claire? You really should be a lot more careful in the future, my dear. Not that you have much of a future left any more, I’m afraid. At least, not one that extends much past the next ten minutes or so.’

  The boy paused and corrected himself. A sardonic smile crossed his blood-red lips. ‘Well, I guess that’s not entirely true. I suppose you have a future when you get to heaven. Or to hell. To tell you the truth, Claire, I’m not quite sure which one you’re heading for at this point. But I’ll bet you have a pretty good idea of the answer to that question, don’t you?’

  Claire’s breath hitched in her throat as the boy leaned down and adjusted the hem of his designer dress, affording her a clear view of the false breasts tucked away inside a delicate black-satin bra, small lace bow positioned in the middle. Lifting up his stare to meet hers, he froze her in his icy gaze. ‘So which one’s it going to be, Claire? Chilling out with God for eternity or sweating your ass off in the ninth circle of hell with Satan? Which one of those two fates do you think you deserve?’

  When Claire didn’t immediately answer him (mostly because she lacked the requisite breath for it) the boy looked down at the floor mournfully, as though the responsibility that had fallen squarely upon his slender shoulders was almost too much to bear. Shaking his head sadly, he said, ‘For now, I suppose I’ll have to be your god and your devil. Which one do you think it should be, though? To be perfectly honest with you, I’m a little bit stumped on this one and I could really use your input. I can either have horns and a pitchfork or I can have a long white beard. Totally up to you at this point.’

  He paused again and looked down at the wickedly sharp cleaver in his hand, shifting the thick black handle back and forth in his palm and studying the glinting edge. ‘Seems to me that I already have the pitchfork handy, though.’

  Claire Bishop finally screamed then – screamed as loudly as she possibly could – and she didn’t stop screaming for thirty solid seconds, until her throat had been rubbed as raw as the beef all around them. Not that it did her any good. The walk-in freezer was like a soundproof booth.

  The boy watched her silently until she’d finished. Then he laughed disgustedly. ‘Just shut up, Claire. Just shut the fuck up or I’ll chop off your disgusting little tongue for you with this handy pitchfork of mine. Nobody’s going to hear you anyway. I’ve made damn sure of that.’

  Claire tried her best to take in a deep breath for a second round of screaming but couldn’t manage it. It felt like a thousand-pound weight was pressing down hard on her chest, strangling her lungs into submission and making it impossible to get enough oxygen into her system. Worse, what little breath she did manage was painfully cold; hurt her insides; froze them together.

  ‘But why?’ she finally sobbed as the drug-induced fog in her brain cleared and the first tears of horror began to leak out of her big blue eyes, streaking her heavy mascara in thick rivers of dirty water on her smooth cheeks. Saltwater droplets slid down her face before falling to the metal floor at her feet like the first raindrops of an impending storm dotting a sidewalk. ‘Why me? I didn’t do anything to you. I don’t deserve this. I was nice to you.’

  The boy shook his head and waved the cleaver distractedly in the air, like an irritated professor who’d just been asked a very inconvenient question from an ignorant student that seemed to poke holes in a theory upon which he’d just taken great pains to expound. Light from the network of noisy fluorescent bulbs overhead bounced off the cleaver and stabbed Claire’s brain through her glistening eyeballs.

  ‘Did you just ask me why?’ he asked incredulously. ‘You actually have the nerve to ask me something like that after everything I’ve done for you, you ungrateful little brat? And if you think that being nice to me has anything to do with this, then you’re even stupider than you look.’

  He paused and shook his head. ‘And I’ll tell you something else, Claire. Judging from the look of you, that’s quite the feat to accomplish. Quite the feat to accomplish, indeed.’

  Claire sobbed and pulled hard against the thin ropes that were biting deep into her wrists and ankles like poisonous snakes, at the same time looking around frantically for any possible avenue of escape. There was none. The only way in was the same way out and the boy was blocking it. All she could do now was wriggle around like a worm that had been impaled on a sharp steel fishing hook. But doing that only tightened the knots and cut off her circulation even more, turning her fingers and toes a deathly blue.

  The boy pressed his lips together into a tight line while he watched her squirm. Then he shook his head again. ‘Well, since you insist, Claire, I guess I’ll tell you exactly why I’m doing this to you. I’m doing this to you because you’ve been a very naughty boy here today, that’s why I’m doing this to you. You’ve committed a great sin in the eyes of God and now you need to be punished for it. Tell me, son, are you ready for what you deserve? Are you ready for me? I know that you and your brother like it. Don’t pretend you don’t. I’ve seen the way that you two boys have been looking at me lately. Disgusting, foul little perverts. Don’t you know that little boys aren’t supposed to look at their mothers that way? It’s unholy.’

  Claire Bishop stared in amazement at the figure standing before her. Not only was he wearing a dress, but jewellery and make-up too. Bright red lipstick covered his mouth. Rouge coloured in his cheeks. Expensive silver bracelets dangled from his delicate wrists. His fingernails had been painted the same dazzling shade as his lips.

  And the kicker about the whole thing was that he actually looked good that way.

  Claire sucked in a sharp breath through her nostrils, freezing all the tiny hairs lining the inside of her nose and catching the unmistakable scent of Chanel No. 5 floating softly on the cold air. Her tortured breaths materialized as puffy white clouds of swirling vapour in front of her face. ‘Why are you dressed like a woman?’ she breathed.

  Without warning, the boy sprang forward and lifted the knife as an almost inhuman glitter twinkled in his sparkling emerald eyes. Claire jerked back in horror as he sliced deftly through a spaghetti-thin strap on her halter-top with a quick flick of his right wrist, exposing the top of her right breast.

  An angry look flashed across his face. ‘I’m dressed like a woman because I am a woman, you fucking idiot,’ he snarled. ‘Can’t you fucking see that? I’m a woman and you’re a boy. What part of that equation don’t you understand? You’re almost nine years old, for Christ’s sake. Get your shit together already, why don’t you? I’m a patient woman and all, but you’re really starting to get on my nerves, boy. I swear to God, sometimes I can’t even see straight because of you.’

  Claire Bishop closed her eyes as tightly as she could, tried to squeeze the eyelids right off her face, attempted desperately to transport her body to another place. Anyplace but here. Try as she might, though, her confused brain refused to even consider the possibility that this could be real. This was just a bad dream – a horrific nightmare – and pretty soon she’d soon wake up from it. If she closed her eyes as tightly as she could, maybe when she opened them up again everything would make sense and she’d be safe at home in her own bed. She didn’t even care if her mother’s boyfrien
d forced her to give him blowjobs every day for the next month. Anything was better than this.

  But when Claire opened her eyes again she saw that she wasn’t back home in her bed. Far from it. She was still standing in a walk-in freezer with an insane boy she’d just met half an hour ago behind a dumpster at McDonald’s. An insane boy who was dressed up in women’s clothing, smelled of an expensive perfume made famous by Marilyn Monroe and who was now slicing through the other strap on her halter top.

  The boy smiled and pulled down Claire’s destroyed shirt around her waist. Her nipples immediately hardened into painful diamond points as they made contact with the frigid air. No doubt a well-placed flick of a finger would have shattered them clean off into a million tiny pieces.

  ‘Nice tits, Claire,’ the boy said after a moment, running ran his gaze admiringly over her naked chest while wave after wave of painful goose flesh danced across her bare skin and stitched it up tight. ‘Real nice tits, as a matter of fact. Some of the best I’ve ever seen.’

  The boy reached out his free hand and tested the firmness of her breasts, squeezing gently and lifting first the flesh of her right breast, and then her left. ‘Much better than I thought they’d be. But to tell you the truth, I didn’t think boys were supposed to have tits. What are you? Some kind of freak? Some kind of transsexual or something?’

  Claire fought back the overpowering urge to vomit. Stomach acid crept up her throat and burned the thin lining of her esophagus. ‘I’m not a boy,’ she whimpered, swallowing back the acrid fluid she tasted in her mouth and finally reduced to acting her age now. ‘I’m a girl. You’re a boy.’