On the other hand, it wasn’t as if Thelma hadn’t deserved what she got. She’d thrown in with Wesley, who’d murdered her own father and her own sister’s husband. Along with Wesley, she’d done some vicious, sick things to Billie, Connie and Kimberly. To those kids, too—Erin and Alice—not to mention helping Wesley murder their parents.
If that weren’t enough, she’d tried to kill me a few times—including the attempt at the lagoon that had nearly wiped out Connie. I was damn lucky to still be alive.
Also, it wasn’t as if I’d murdered her in cold blood. Our struggle in the cove had been self-defense, on my part. I’d only been trying to stay alive.
And the final deal with the machete had been sort of an accident. Which wouldn’t have happened if she hadn’t been playing dead, or whatever the hell she’d been up to.
She had nobody to blame but herself.
In a way, I felt sort of angry at Thelma for making me kill her.
In another way, though…
Maybe I’d better not write it.
Oh, why the hell not? Who am I trying to impress? The whole idea is to tell what happened—accurately, without any phoney stuff…
It’s not that I didn’t feel sort of rotten in some ways about killing Thelma. Especially because she was Kimberly’s sister, and I hated the idea of causing Kimberly any more grief.
But here’s the deal.
There was part of me that felt absolutely great about killing Thelma.
We’d gone one-on-one, her or me, a fight to the finish, and I’d wasted her ass.
Sure, I felt sort of horrified and disgusted and guilty and spooked and very tired—but holy Jesus I was so excited by it that I felt all trembly inside. As I walked through the grass of the back lawn, I clenched my teeth and pumped my machete at the sky and hissed, “Yes! Yes! Yes!”
One down, one to go.
And with any luck, the “one to go” might already be out of the picture. Wesley’d taken a major fall down those stairs. At the very least, he’d been injured so badly that Thelma’d gone after me without him. Maybe he’d broken a leg. Maybe his neck.
In a way, I hoped the fall hadn’t killed him.
Just busted him up enough to make him easy for me.
Even from the back yard, I could see light in a few of the mansion’s windows. Wesley or Thehna had turned on some lights to help them chase me down. From the look of things, nobody’d gotten around, yet, to turning them off.
A good sign.
It might mean that Wesley was at least disabled.
I planned to enter by the front door, so I walked through the yard alongside the house, past the window where I’d watched Wesley and Thehna brutalize Erin, and on past the corner of the veranda. The front area was still brightly illuminated by the spotlights.
On my way to the veranda stairs, I spotted my book bag under the bush where I’d left it. It could stay there until I’d finished with Wesley.
I also happened to catch a look at myself. My shorts had been so demolished by the outboard motor that they no longer had pockets. I’d lost Andrew’s lighter, Billie’s sunblock, and the snacks of smoked fish that I’d never gotten around to eating. A good thing I’d transferred the straight razor to my sock. The razor was still in place.
So little remained of my shorts after their run-in with the prop that they’d hardly been worth putting back on. Andrew’s belt was scarred but intact. Most of the area below the belt, however, was either shredded or completely missing. A few flaps hung here and there. Otherwise, there was nothing much save fringe and gaps and me.
Which I sort of liked.
I wouldn’t want to walk down Broadway wearing them, but hell, this was a tropical island. A wilderness. Nobody here but me and my women.
And Wesley.
Can’t forget Wesley.
Not quite yet.
Machete in one hand, razor still in my sock, I trotted up the veranda stairs. The front door stood wide open. Was that how Thelma had left it? Of course. She sure hadn’t slowed down to shut it after her mad dash onto the veranda.
I stepped through the doorway.
Looked all around, fast, to make sure nobody was coming.
Then turned my attention to the stairway. I could see to the top of it. But not to the place where Wesley had landed after tumbling down from the top story.
I sure hoped he was still there.
Very slowly, I made my way to the foot of the stairs.
There, I stopped and listened. My heart was thumping awfully loud and fast. That was about all I heard other than the outside sounds—the usual jungle noises—squeals and screeches and twitters and stuff.
Nothing inside the house.
Nothing that might come from Wesley.
I switched the machete to my left hand so I could use my right to hold the banister. Then I started to climb. I set each foot down with great care. Silently. Once in a while, a stair creaked under my weight. Each time that happened, I halted, waited and listened.
Nothing from Wesley.
Maybe he is dead, I thought.
Or just sleeping.
No, not sleeping. Not where I’d last seen him. I should’ve been able to hear his snores.
Which left three possibilities:
1. He was dead where he’d fallen.
2. He was too hurt to move, lying very still and silent, aware of my approach.
3. He was gone.
Number one would’ve been okay with me, but I was pulling for number two. Still pumped from my encounter with Thelma, I looked forward to dealing with him.
I did not want possibility number three.
But that’s what I got.
After all that slow sneaking up the stairs, I finally climbed high enough to see the next floor. I wanted— expected—really thought for sure that I would find Wesley’s naked body sprawled out there on the hardwood floor.
Crippled, but alive.
Or dead would’ve been just fine and dandy.
But not this.
I groaned and clutched the banister. Shivers scurried up my back.
He might be anywhere.
I twisted sideways and glanced down the stairs.
Thank God, he wasn’t sneaking up behind me.
Thinking that perhaps he’d managed to crawl a short distance from where he’d originally landed, I climbed the final six or seven stairs.
No sign of him.
He might’ve gone into one of the rooms off the hallway, or back upstairs, or downstairs… or anywhere.
Now what? I wondered.
Easy. I’ll find him, or he’ll find me.
I thought about doing a room-by-room search. But quickly gave up the idea. A search like that would be scary, dangerous and time-consuming. Possibly a waste of time, too.
