Blossom

'You ever let them see you?'

'Who?'

'The women. The women in the windows.'

'No. I wouldn't want…'

'You ever take it out, play with it…while you watch?'

'Nooo. No. I just wanted to… see them…see what they look like…just…'

'Okay. You were scared…when you went out walking?'

'Not…scared. Like, uh…nervous, you know?'

'I know.' Shifting gears— same highway. 'Those magazines. The ones the cops found in your room. Where'd you get them?'

'I sent away for them.'

'What kind of magazines were they?'

'About…women. I…'

'There's more of 'em over in the corner— found 'em down in the basement.' Virgil's voice. Like saying the milk was in the refrigerator. 'You want to see them?'

'Yeah.'

He got up, came back with a foot-high stack, bound with twine. Dropped it on the floor next to my chair, pulled at the cord. A knot unraveled.

'Lloyd know these were here?' I asked him.

'Yeah. Never touched them either,' he said, answering my next question.

I shone my pocket flash on the first one. 'Beauty in Chains.' Women bound, gagged, blindfolded. In street clothes, some half dressed, some nude. Bent over chairs, standing on tiptoe, hands suspended over their heads, hog-tied. Helpless. Ropes, straps, handcuffs. They were all like that. All the same. Some had the covers pulled off. A few had pages ripped out. Not neatly cut. Jagged edges. Torn.

'How much did these cost?' I asked Lloyd.

'Twenty-five dollars was the most. Some were fifteen, one was only five.'

In the underbelly of the human heart, dirt isn't cheap.

'You look at these?' I asked Virgil. Buying time. Something about the magazines. Something past the obvious. The way inside.

'I looked at them.' His voice was flat, giving nothing away.

I lit another smoke, turning the pages, getting the feel. Lloyd watching me. Waiting for the judgment.

It came to me. 'The pages you ripped out…where are they?'

'I threw them away.'

'No you didn't.'

'I did! I mean…I didn't throw them away exactly…I…burned them.'

'Where?'

'In the woods. Just past the dunes. I made a campfire. Every time.'

'Every time?'

'Every time a new one came…with those pictures.'

I dragged on my smoke, looking down the white barrel of the cigarette, visually placing the red tip in the center of Lloyd's out-of-focus face. Like the laser-dot from a sniper rifle. Zeroing in. 'What was in the pictures, Lloyd? The pictures you burned up.'

He made a strangling sound deep in his throat.

I felt Virgil settle into himself. Knowing it was important, not knowing why. Knowing he had to wait. He had a hunter's patience. I had a convict's.

Lloyd felt the weight. 'Could I have a smoke?'

'When it's over. What was in the pictures?'

He took short, shallow breaths. The blankets were coming off and he knew it was going to be cold.

'The pictures…they were getting hurt.'

'The women?'

'Yes. I couldn't look at them.'

'Who was hurting them?'

'Men, mostly. Sometimes other women.'

'Tell me.'

'They beat them. Whipped them. Even…c-c-cut them once. Ugly. So ugly…'

He was crying. Not a sociopath's tears. Crying for someone else. It felt right. I had to be sure. I probed the wound, watching for the runoff. Clean or dirty. Blood or pus. 'You don't like other people in your pictures, Lloyd?'

'Other people…?'

'You can't own the women if there's somebody else there. They wouldn't be all yours.'

'All mine? They're not mine. I just wanted to see…not be so…'

'Afraid?'

'Yes.' Sobbing now.

'When they're helpless…tied up…you can look all you want? Like when they're in the windows?'

'Yes.'

I couldn't close the wound until it was clean. The scalpel probed again. 'Lloyd, you ever see a dead woman?'

'No.'

'Ever want to see one?'

'No! God. No. Dead?'

I zoned in on his face, going into his skull, reaching out, searching to see if that maggoty little worm of evil was there. My voice was soft, smoothing the road, stroking the beast to full boil. 'A dead woman, Lloyd. A dead naked woman. Just lying there. You could do whatever you wanted. She'd be all yours. She'd never say anything. Whatever you wanted to do…'

He stumbled from the chair, staggering past me, making wounded-animal sounds. I held up my hand to stop Virgil from going after him.

We heard him hit the floor in the bathroom. Heard the low grunting scream— ripped from his guts like he'd ripped the pictures from his tortured mind. Projectile vomiting, his lungs hitting the top of his throat.

When he got his breath, he used it for crying.

32

AFTER A WHILE, the crying was over. My work wasn't. I nodded to Virgil. We walked around the concrete corner, found the kid sitting in his own stink, face in his hands. Drained.

'Get on your feet,' I told him. 'Clean yourself up.'

He made noises. Didn't move.

'Now,' I told him, voice hard.

'I can't.'

I turned on the shower full blast. Virgil grabbed the kid under his armpits, hauled him to his feet. I turned the hose on him. He sagged in Virgil's hands. The water hit him clean, ran off foul.

We let him finish the job himself. Waited while he toweled himself off. He came back inside wearing an old red flannel bathrobe. I pointed at the chair. He sat down again.

Virgil tossed him a pack of cigarettes. It landed in the kid's lap. He didn't move, didn't raise his head.

'It's okay, Lloyd,' I said, propping him up for what had to come.

'I told the truth.' His voice was thin, sad.

'I know. But we're not done. Can you light that cigarette?'

'I don't know.' Fumbling in his lap.

'Try.'

A wooden match flared in Virgil's hand. He was kneeling next to the kid, one hand on his shoulder. Lloyd got