Chapter 20 Suffer Not a Rapist to Live #2
The night is even colder when Brandon pulls me back into it, and goosebumps instantly prickle my skin.
He heads toward the parking lot, aiming for a large black G-Wagon, climbing into the driver’s side when we reach it, leaving me to go around to the passenger’s side.
I pull a vial from my stocking, unscrew the lid, and palm it, wedging it in my left hand between my pointer and pinky fingers with my others obscuring it. Then I climb into the SUV.
Country music blares to life a little too loudly when he starts the car. It’s one of those artists that racist white people love. I’m not sure which one—they all sound the same—but the kind who blends country with rock and hip hop and spews bigotry every time they open their mouths.
Brandon turns the music down as I fasten my seat belt, eyeing the half-full Gatorade bottle sitting in the cup holder.
If I can get him to drink it, that means I don’t have to wait until we get to his house before I drug him.
It’s better than my original plan to tell him I need a drink when we arrive and try to distract him long enough for the GHB to kick in. It should also cover up the taste.
“You said it’s twenty minutes to your house?” I ask, rotating my body to face him. I want to get the timing right. Too early, and he’ll crash the SUV with me in it. Too late, and I won’t be able to get away from him.
“That’s right.” He grabs my right arm, and it twinges as he pulls it across the center console to rest on his crotch.
“You can keep me entertained until then,” he says, leering at me.
He still hasn’t asked me what my name is, or shown even the slightest hint of interest in me beyond what I can do for him sexually.
Yup. Definitely want to get the timing right, I think as I unenthusiastically rub my hand against him.
We spend the next ten minutes with the horrible music as the only sound. Brandon seems content, either not noticing or not caring about my complete lack of enthusiasm.
Finally, I say, “You’ve got Gatorade!” as I remove my hand from his crotch, grab the bottle that’s in the cup holder between us and unscrew the lid.
I try not to gross myself out, thinking about his backwash as I take a few large gulps.
Then I pretend to screw the lid back on, upending the vial of GHB I palmed prior to getting into the car, dumping it in the Gatorade.
I thrust the bottle at Brandon. “Here! Have some. We wouldn’t want you getting dehydrated!”
He takes the bottle, finishes it without question, and returns it to the cup holder.
I tuck the empty vial back into my stocking and remind myself that I’ll have to grab the Gatorade bottle before I leave.
It has my DNA on it. The rest of the vehicle should be clean, though.
I’m wearing black satin gloves, so I won’t leave fingerprints, and my hair is under a wig, so there won’t be any stray strands left sticking to the headrest.
The clock is ticking now. In the next ten to twenty minutes, the effects should begin to show.
Thirty minutes from now, he should be on the verge of passing out.
I need to get him into bed before then and keep his hands off me as much as possible in the process.
I’m not sure how I’ll do it, but I’ll figure something out.
Eleven minutes later, at nine-twenty, he turns into his driveway.
His house is large, and the winding driveway allows enough of a view to determine there’s a clear Mediterranean influence.
It’s all terra-cotta-tiled roof and stucco walls.
The garage opens, and he pulls inside, almost hitting the wall.
Hopefully that means the GHB is kicking in, and dealing with him will be easy.
He gets out of the car first, and I follow. As soon as he comes around to my side, he grabs me—one hand in my hair and the other on my hip, forcing me against the side of the SUV, pinning me in place. The hand on my hip moves up to my boob, which he squeezes. Hard.
“Fuck,” I hiss. “That hurts.” Brandon doesn’t acknowledge that I’ve said anything, though. He simply squeezes harder as he grinds his hips into mine. He’s going to leave marks.
I place both hands on his chest and shove him away. He staggers, almost tripping over his own feet. Surprise is written across his face. “Let’s go inside,” I suggest. “You can show me your bedroom.”
He grunts something unintelligible but turns for the door leading into the house. I trail behind him. His feet are dragging with each step. I slide under his arm as he enters, and we ascend a staircase to the second floor together.
“You’re really pretty,” he says, repeating his words from earlier, sounding much more impaired this time. He leans over, trying to kiss me when we reach the top.
“Thank you. Where’s your bedroom?” I ask, aiming to keep him focused on what I want rather than what he wants.
He leads the way to the second door on the right, flinging it open so hard it bounces off the wall.
He takes several steps toward the bed and falls onto it, trying to pull me with him.
I duck out from under his arm in time to save myself.
He’s not that out of it, though, because he rolls over faster than I expected, grabbing me to force me to join him on the bed.
“Wait, wait. I’ll dance for you,” I tell him.
His eyebrows knit together as he seems to consider the idea. After a tense moment, his hand drops from my wrist, and he nods.
“Do you have any music?” I ask.
He pulls his phone from his pocket, and I watch the code he enters as he unlocks it and passes it to me—one-one-two-two-three-three.
I have to remove a glove to get the screen to register my finger, which is unfortunate.
It means I’ll need to take his phone with me and throw it off a bridge or something—I don’t want to risk some lab tech being able to retrieve touch DNA from it.
I spend a second racking my brain, trying to decide what song I should put on.
Eventually, I settle on Billie Eilish’s bad guy.
It seems appropriate. I tap the button to make the song repeat.
Hopefully, he’ll pass out quickly, but who knows.
I set the phone down and begin oscillating my hips slowly from side to side, while he leans back on his arms, watching me hungrily.
His eyelids are growing heavier by the second, and he slumps noticeably as I’m pulling my second glove off, finger by finger.
I stop and watch him as he falls back the rest of the way. I turn the music off, put my gloves back on, and count to a hundred before approaching him.
“Hey Brandon, are you awake?” I question.
He lets out a sound halfway between a moan and a grunt.
That’s good enough for me. I leave him on the bed and let myself out of the room, heading down the staircase, to the first floor, looking for the kitchen.
I didn’t bother bringing anything besides the GHB to kill Brandon.
His kitchen should contain everything I need.
While I could just press a pillow over his face and smother him, I’m going for something a bit more dramatic this time.
It is Halloween after all, and I want to make a statement.
It might be stupid. I might regret it. But Brandon will be the third player to die, leaving only Rhys Steichen and Garret Fischer—and I want them scared.
His kitchen is unnecessarily large. It’s filled with lots of stainless steel, which doesn’t fit the Mediterranean vibe at all, and there are two different stovetops on the kitchen island—one gas and one induction.
He could run a catering company from this kitchen if he wanted.
It doesn’t seem like he does much cooking, though.
Most of the drawers are empty, and I open one after another searching for the knives.
Even if he doesn’t do much cooking, he has to have a set of knives.
I find them in the sixth drawer and choose the largest, pointiest one from the set.
I briefly consider trying to find a pair of scissors to cut his clothes away, but I don’t have that much time.
Instead, I go back to Brandon’s room. He’s on the bed with his legs dangling over the edge, exactly how I left him.
I peel back an eyelid, and there’s no resistance.
He doesn’t stir at all. He’s well and truly unconscious, which is good news for him.
I slide the knife under the hem of his T-shirt, using the tip to pierce the fabric.
Once the slit is big enough to work my fingers into, I tear his shirt open.
It rips all the way to the neckline, and I use the knife to slice through the extra fabric there.
Then, I move the fabric to the side, exposing his entire torso.
I know I should feel bad for what I’m about to do.
But I don’t. Not really. This is karma. At least that’s what I’m telling myself.
If Brandon didn’t want to end up drugged and at my mercy, he and his friends shouldn’t have drugged and raped Katie.
They shouldn’t have drugged and raped anyone, because after seeing Rhys Steichen’s address book, I’m certain that Katie wasn’t the first, and I’m not certain she was the last. But I’ll make damn sure there aren’t any more.
I trail the knife down his torso. He’s thin enough and his body fat is low enough that counting his ribs is easy.
One. Two. Three. Four.
I move the tip of the knife just past his fourth rib.
To the intercostal space between the fourth and fifth ribs.
I palpate his chest to find the left edge of his sternum and place the knife to the left of that.
Then, I angle it slightly upward and a little more toward the left and press down.
The blade should pass straight through both the left and right ventricles of his heart.
He’s not conscious, but if he were, he’d be dead before he knew it.
There’s some initial resistance, and I lean my weight onto the knife.
Once I’m past that, it goes in easily. I leave it in his body.
His chest cavity is already filling with blood, but there’s only the faintest bit of red rimming the blade.
Gravity is working in my favor, and the knife is sealing the wound. It’ll be a very clean crime scene.
I wait a minute, and then feel for a pulse. The satin of my gloves is thin enough that I’d be able to feel it if it were there, but it isn’t. He was dead the second the knife slid into his chest. I glance at the time on Brandon’s phone. It’s nine-forty-three.
I’ve got a bit more than two hours to throw the phone off a bridge, make it back to my car, get cleaned up, and meet Mark.
I’d like to look through the contents of Brandon’s phone to see if I can find evidence related to any other women he and his hockey-douchebag friends may have raped, but I don’t have the time.