The Odds - Jeff Strand Page 0,25
scare his wife, he at least wanted it to be when there was legitimate reason to be afraid.
He tried various tricks to fall asleep, but none of them worked. This wasn’t fair.
He finally drifted back off to sleep just in time to be tired as hell when the alarm went off.
He went with energy drinks instead of coffee at work, though they didn’t seem to work any better. He really hoped Rick didn’t call, because unless the challenge involved losing consciousness, he was screwed.
Rick didn’t call.
When he got home, Ethan napped for an hour and felt a little better. He’d thought about stopping by a pharmacy for some sleep aids, but what if Rick contacted him while he was dosed up? More people could die.
At six o’clock, while Jenny was making dinner, he called.
“Hello,” said Ethan.
“Hello. Did you enjoy your day off?”
“Yes, it was very relaxing.”
“Well, it’s time for the next round. Report immediately to the strip mall on 237 Weston Highway.”
“What’s the challenge?”
“You’ll be told when you arrive.”
“Hold on, that’s not how this works,” said Ethan. Jenny was staring at him, so he lowered the phone. “It’s work,” he told her. She immediately turned her focus back to preparing dinner. Ethan walked back into his bedroom. “What are my odds?”
“You’ll find that out when you’re told about the challenge.”
“Tell me now. I’m allowed to say no, right?”
“That’s right.”
“And what happens then?”
“Things proceed the way they would if you didn’t participate.”
“So you’re saying that you would’ve—” Ethan lowered his voice to a whisper “—buried the woman alive even if I declined?”
“Correct.”
“Then I don’t really have a choice, do I?”
“You still have free will, Ethan. It’s not my fault if you have a conscience.”
“You’re a piece of shit. Have I told you that today?”
“Not today. So I can expect to see you at 237 Weston Highway, departing immediately?”
“Yeah.”
Rick hung up. Ethan cursed and walked back into the kitchen. Jenny looked over at him, not doing a very good job of hiding her concern. “Do you have to go in to work?” she asked.
Rick nodded.
“For how long?”
“I don’t know. For however long they need me. I’ll call when I know more.”
“All right.”
“I’m sorry to miss dinner. It smells delicious.”
“I’ll leave a plate in the refrigerator.”
Ethan walked over and gave her a kiss on the cheek. He wanted to whisper something reassuring to her, but that would be too risky.
“I have to go in to work,” he told Patrick and Tim, who were in the living room playing a gory video game. “Don’t eat all of the tuna noodle casserole.”
“We won’t,” said Tim.
“Why do you have to go back to work?” asked Patrick.
“Things are crazy there right now. It shouldn’t last much longer.” On the screen, a barbarian decapitated an armored knight in a cartoonishly large spray of blood. “Did your mom buy you that game?”
“No, you did.”
“We’ll talk about this when I get back,” he said.
Ethan drove to the strip mall, which had a couple of restaurants, a nail salon, a tax service, and a party supplies shop. He parked in front of the nail salon and waited for Rick to call.
Instead, Rick walked up to his car. He knocked on the window, then opened the door and slid into the passenger seat.
“I get to see you in person this time,” said Ethan. “What an honor.”
“Don’t get used to it.”
“What’s the challenge?”
“Stop being so impatient,” said Rick. “We’ll get to it. There’s something I want to discuss with you first.”
“Okay.”
“You know we’re monitoring you, right? That’s no surprise. We wouldn’t set the rules if we couldn’t verify that you were following them.”
“I assumed you were listening in, yeah.”
“And watching.”
“Oh. I didn’t know you were watching.”
“I made it clear that I was when I made the comment about you having spaghetti for dinner. ‘I can see you’ is exactly the message I was trying to convey.”
“Sorry. This is about last night, right?”
“Yes.”
“Sorry. I thought that make-up sex would keep her from asking more questions. I apologize if you’re mentally scarred by what you saw.”
“We didn’t see anything. You kept it under the covers.”
“I hope you’re not asking me to ditch the covers next time.”
“No, Ethan, I am not.”
“I didn’t realize there was a no-sex rule in place. You said to behave the way we normally do, and normally we do what married couples do. Now that I know you’re being a Peeping Tom I obviously won’t do it again. I’m just glad you saw a halfway decent performance.”
Rick stared at him for a