He sat up, which kept Patty in position near him and not springing up to call some dumb-ass paramedic. He faced her and said, “I’m not gay.”
She didn’t say anything, but the look told him he better come clean and explain that she wasn’t the reason he couldn’t get an erection the other night.
He just dove right in. “I used supplements for a long time. Stuff like Andro, anything that would give me an edge in the gym. Sometimes I can’t get it up easily.”
She just stared at him.
“I mean I can sometimes, but not in a pressure situation.”
“Was my bedroom really a pressure cooker?”
“No, not the room, the situation. I like you and didn’t want things to go wrong. But when you think about what could go wrong, nothing goes right. Know what I mean?”
A smile spread across her pretty face, and she nodded. “I know exactly what you mean.” She kept gazing into his eyes and said, “Why didn’t you just tell me the other night?”
“I was scared. I just got caught up in the wrong atmosphere at the gym. I used to eat supplements by the carload, and it’s embarrassing. You probably couldn’t understand something like that.”
She looked away and mumbled, “Yeah, I could understand.”
Mazzetti said, “So that’s my problem.”
“And I know how to fix it.”
“You do? How?”
She reached over and kissed him.
William Dremmel needed time to clear his aching head. But Stacey was advancing on him with the toilet now raised above her head for a vicious downward strike. He still admired the naked form of the woman before him now. With her arms raised, her breasts looked giant compared to her small body. He intended to pose her like this later after he regained control. Then the hard, heavy plastic toilet battered his arms that he held up to protect his head.
He reached for his stun gun, but a blow to his arms sent it skittering across the floor. He kept his arms up for protection. The blows hurt his right forearm but still didn’t strike his head, and Stacey looked like she was having problems raising it again. Then she surprised him for the second time. A sharp, compact fist struck him across the chin.
He blinked hard and scrambled to one side as she abandoned the toilet and started pummeling him with her fists and elbows. This girl was a wild woman, and he’d never suspected it.
As he rolled onto his back she fell on top of him, still swinging. He knew exactly what he had to do to reverse this situation.
Thirty-two
John Stallings couldn’t convince thin, dirty Dan to ride back to a homeless shelter with him. The skittish young man thanked him for dinner, then walked away down East Bay Street at a pretty good clip. If Stallings hadn’t been watching him leave, he might not have noticed the head inside a parked car down the street. There was nothing unusual about someone behind the wheel of a car except the car was dark and didn’t start while Stallings watched it.
He knew a surveillance when he saw one. Now the only question was if they were surveilling him. He made it a point to wave to Dan as he trudged away, making the occupant of the surveillance car think he was watching the young man and not the car. Sometimes cops who weren’t used to surveillance believed that dark windows hid everything and they were virtually invisible while watching someone from inside their car.
He took his time opening his car and driving off. The suspicious vehicle never moved. As he pulled away from the curb, just before he turned left, away from the river, he glanced in the rearview mirror and saw the car, which he now knew was a Buick, headed down the street toward him. Stallings didn’t speed up to lose them but instead slowed to give the Buick a chance to close the distance. They were on his turf, and he knew exactly where he’d lead them.
William Dremmel fended off most of Stacey’s blows but still worried about the lucky punch that could knock him unconscious or leave an obvious mark. He shoved away from Stacey to one side and started to rise when she turned back at him like a crazy woman, all fists, feet, and fingernails. Jesus, he wouldn’t have thought she was able to move like that.
He grunted, “Stacey, you need to calm down before you’re sorry.”
It was unfair, because he couldn’t punch her back. First of all he didn’t want to put one imperfection on that beautiful face; secondly he didn’t want to have to treat a wound while running his experiments because he didn’t know how the extra treatment might affect the drug trial. He also didn’t know how the wound would heal while she was under the effects of the sedatives. For all these reasons he took her blows and didn’t reply.
Then he glimpsed the stun gun off to one side. He could understand how they had fallen out of favor with police departments. The Taser created the same effect but from a distance. He wished he had some distance between him and Stacey now.
He threw her off him onto the mattress, then dove toward the stun gun lying in the corner on the floor. She followed him like a heat-seeking missile. She was no fool and knew this might be her only chance for escape. In some ways he admired her feistiness.
Dremmel had the stubby handle of the stun gun in his grasp as he felt the blow of Stacey’s whole body on his back. He felt for the trigger, reached the gun across his chest, under his left arm until he felt it make contact with the bare skin of her side. Perfect.
He squeezed the trigger and immediately heard the electric chatter of the gun like the sound cartoon characters made when they hit high-voltage fences. Only this wasn’t animated.
Stacey flipped off him onto the cold terrazzo floor, still convulsing. Her eyes rolled up in her head.
All Dremmel could do was stare in fascination as she twitched and gurgled. It almost looked like the orgasms he saw in the pornos he watched so often. He placed a hand on her shoulder to hold her down as she still convulsed, her breasts flopping from side to side. Then she went absolutely still.
“I told you to calm down. This is the kind of thing that happens when you misbehave.” He wondered where he had gotten his disciplinarian attitude. His mother had never threatened him. Then, for some reason, he felt his dick move.
He put his ear to her chest and heard a strong, if fast, heartbeat. This was mesmerizing. He could study a reaction like this for months.
Stacey’s eyes returned to normal as she tried to focus. She turned but made no effort to strike him again.
He felt a wave of disappointment, because he had enjoyed her reaction to the stun. Then he wondered how she’d ever allow him to resecure her to the shackles while conscious. It was more of a rationalization for what he did next. He looked her in the eye and said, “This is for your own good. Anytime you act up, this is what will happen to you.”
Without hesitation he stuck the small metal nodes of the stun gun on Stacey’s inner thigh, brushing his hand against her soft pubic hair. He kept gazing into her eyes as he squeezed the trigger again, sending her back into a convulsive stupor.
Maybe the drugs weren’t the only theory he could test on women over the coming years. There were definitely other fields in which he was interested.
Thirty-three
William Dremmel managed to secure the still trembling Stacey Hines before she regained her composure and fought him again. He’d gathered valuable information from his struggle and wouldn’t make the same mistake
