One Night Stands & Lost weekends - By Lawrence Block Page 0,20
I was still able to stand still and not do anything about it. But now something snapped, as if his insult had hit home and I had to do something about it.
I rushed him.
I came in low and the gun sounded like a cannon when it went off. The shot missed and he pulled the trigger again when I was within a foot or two of him.
The hammer clicked on an empty chamber.
I crashed into him and he rolled over on his back. The gun dropped from his hand and I reached for it, managing to pick it up. Then he was on his feet again and coming at me.
Behind me Rita had started to scream.
“You punk,” he snarled. “I’ll kill you for that.”
When he charged me I swung the gun like a club, putting everything I had into it. I had to nail him fast. If he got in one punch he could kill me.
The butt of the gun caught him on the side of the head and knocked him to the ground. It would have killed an ordinary man, or at least knocked him out. But he was shaking his head at once and on his feet a second later.
“Okay,” he said. “Now you’re going to get it.”
I was still holding onto the gun as he came in for the kill. He was wary now, knowing that I had the gun and that I wasn’t afraid to hit him with it.
Out of the corner of my eye I could see Rita. She was standing in the same place as before and she was stark naked, screaming her lungs out.
But there was no one around to hear her screams. I cursed myself mentally for parking so far away from town. I had wanted privacy—now I wished I had settled for a nice quiet spot on lover’s lane by the river.
It was too late to wish. He stepped in closer, swinging his left like a meat cleaver. When I ducked it he threw the right.
I ducked under the punch and stepped out of the way. He had put his whole body into the blow, expecting it to connect, and now he couldn’t stop. He went on right past me and I brought the gun down with all my might on the top of his head.
He dropped like a stone.
I knelt down next to him; he was unconscious. Then everything that had been bottled up inside me let loose and I rolled him onto his back. I brought the butt of the gun down on the bridge of his nose as hard as I could and I heard bone snap.
When somebody who knows judo does that with the side of his hand it can kill a man. I didn’t know any more about judo than I had read in detective stories, but I wasn’t using the side of my hand. I was using a gun butt.
I felt for a pulse. There was none.
He was dead.
When I straightened up she was in my arms, warm and sobbing and unconscious of her nakedness.
“Jim,” she said. “Oh, God!”
I didn’t feel anything. “Relax,” I said. “He’s dead. He can’t do anything now.”
“You were wonderful,” she said. “You…you killed him.”
I nodded.
“You knocked him out and you killed him.”
I nodded again. My arms slipped around her and I stroked the smooth skin.
“He was horrible,” she went on. “I…never met a man like that.”
I mumbled, “He had a few good ideas.”
“What did you say?”
I told her again.
She drew away from me. “What do you mean, Jim?”
I ignored her question. Instead I reached out a hand and took hold of her the way he had.
“He’s right,” I said. “You are nice.”
She didn’t know how to react. Finally she smiled. “I’m glad you think so.”
I didn’t smile. I tightened my grip on her the way I had seen him do it and she writhed in pain, staring at me.
“Does it hurt?”
“Yes,” she gasped. “What—”
“If you weren’t such a bitch,” I said, “we wouldn’t be here tonight. All this wouldn’t have happened.”
“I…let go, Jim.”
I didn’t let go.
“Jim—”
“We’d have been in bed, Rita. My bed. We never would have seen this guy.”
She stared at me. I think she was beginning to catch on.
“Let go,” she said. “I have to get dressed.”
“Don’t bother.”
“I have to get some clothes on.”
“I’ll only rip them off again.”
Her eyes opened wider. “Jim—”
“He had some good ideas,” I said again. “I’m sick of necking, Rita. When I want something I’m going to take it.”