The Mole Chap 2

CHAPTER TWO

Florida

The security lights of the Devtech factory burned bright against the evening sky as Wilfred Anderson surveyed it from the tree line. Over his shoulder was slung two hundred feet of cabling, enough to complete his data connection deep into the Devtech network, and back to his lair. His hair was growing much too long. His disheveled hair was by design, because in the event he needed a sudden change in his appearance, a quick buzz with the electric clippers would render him bald. Bald is beautiful, so they say, at least a beautiful option.

As Wilfred watched the factory slowly turn to the night shift, the change of security guards, and noting the time, his thoughts drifted quickly to a balmy night in Florida 1999, , and the day he met Dominic Judge, the man who changed his life and taught him everything he would ever need to know about living the life, and covering your tracks.

August 17th. Florida was still hotter than hell, and the deserted roads around Orlando provided a haven for the homeless. They lived, darting the countryside, like fleas on a dog, and they bit into society and gave nothing back. Instead of terminating the problem, state and local residents attempted to "Help the Homeless". For some, the choice to live like a beggar, off the grid, outside of conventional rules, was a choice like a temperature on a prime cut of beef steak. Thanks to Reagan's budget cuts in the '80s, funding for mental health care dropped thousands of drug and mentally handicapped transients on the streets of the Sunshine State in record numbers. No recovery was ever successful to any degree. Thanks Ronald. Despite the thongs of homeless living in the surrounding woods and abandoned structures lining the I-4 corridor, the blend was perfect for a guy like Wilfred, who just turned fifteen.

Killing was something he saw in a movies, or late night TV shows. Violence depicted in the media was always sugar coated, rampant in its deficit of authenticity, unless you were homeless, then life took on a much different tasting caramel coating.

Wilfred's bastard stepfather, Henry Peters, raised his fist, the anger seeping out of his pours as he held Wilfred down. On all fours, straddling a frightened teenager, the paunchy, thin man threw what little weight he had behind the punch, which landed cowardly against Wilfred's sweaty, waiting cheek. The bony fist slipped quickly off and onto the dirty kitchen linoleum with a seventy's gold and brown pattern. If you stared at it long enough, it looked a bit Turkish, its cheapness even more apparent.

"I ain't gonna take yer lies anymore, yer just like your momma, useless!" Henry, the bastard, squawked down at him. Wilfred moved to defend his face from another blow, when his hand moved over his jean pocket, the outline of his knife calling to him. In one swift motion, Wilfred did it. It was all to easy, but not like the movies. Not at all. The knife sunk deep into the paunchy belly, the bastard staring in disbelief as he reached to grab Wilfred's wrist.

"What the hell, why you little fuc...", the bastard screamed.

In a flash, the knife exited the bastards belly, and hissed through the air to his waiting unshaven throat, the swift incision spreading quickly. The bastard grabbed at his bloody neck, attempting to hold in his life, but the damage was done. Wilfred kicked his knee upwards, the bastard hardly noticing the blow to his balls as he stumbled up and backwards, blood spewing out and down into the dirty Turkish kitchen linoleum. Wilfred was on his feet, staring at the bastard, who's eyes were wide in terror, unable to speak as he slowly weakened, his knees buckling as he slid down the wall.

August 17th. The day he killed the bastard, and Wilfred learned he could live anyway he wanted too, and he was done taking shit from anyone. He was also scared shitless. He stuffed the knife back in his pocket and grabbed what few possessions he owned and burned the trailer to the ground. The smell of cheap linoleum and the burning bodies of thousands of fleeing palmetto bugs that infested its walls, he would carry with him forever.

His K-mart backpack pressed against his back as he viewed the motel just off of route 50 in south Orlando. Dawn was coming close to revealing itself, the morning splendor, a stark contrast to his shaking, blood stained hands. He waited for his moment. The early morning business travelers began checking out as he stalked the place, their doors quickly opening, as they scurried to their rented cars. He hid his hands as he walked the cracked concrete in front of each door, waiting for the sound of luggage being dragged, maybe kids yelling to go to Disney World to their exhausted parents. Whatever. Soon, a door creaked open, and a business man walked out, never noticing the spry teenager stopping his rented motel door from actually closing all the way as he talked quietly into his cellphone. As the man drove off, Wilfred slipped into his used room, like a leech.

#

The room smelled cheap, the taste of cigarette smoke and scotch whiskey still in the air. There was another smell too, the sickening stench he would grow detect with experience. Death. The business man long gone, Wilfred's eyes adjusted to the darkness just as the dim morning light began to filtered through the drawn, ugly green curtains. The rumpled bed was strewn about haphazardly, the body of a naked brunette interwoven in its grasp. His mouth gaped, his eyes darting at the evolving, terrifying scene before him. He quickly ran to the curtains, the thought of running away raced through his mind, yet the lure of the unexplained horror drew him back. She lay peaceful, like a statue cast in white stone, the raw, red traces of being strangled, still around her delicate china neck. Beside the statue, on the thin, dull sheets, lay three hypodermic needles, all pointing in different directions. A forth was jutted into her skinny, bruised arm, like a badly thrown dart. Pills and other small drug bags were scattered on the floor and on the crumpled bed. In stark contrast to the bloody scene of the bastard's demise, this appeared clean and neat. A fun night gone wrong? A sad accident to someone so young?  Her cloths were missing, and the room was bare except for the usual suspects of any cheap motel, a bed, TV and a bathroom.

Hurrying, Wilfred started to clean the bastards fresh blood off himself in the meager bathroom sink, his hand still shaking. All at once, a strange idea crossed his young mind. Almost without thinking, he ran back to the body of the dead young woman and ran his wet, blood stained hands over her lifeless skin and anything bastards blood would cling too. Acting almost on impulse he seeded the crime scene, confusing what he knew would be a detective's nightmare to solve. He would help the real murder out just a bit, and himself even more. He surveyed his work, taking one last sad, but curious, look at the dead lifeless corpse of what most certainly was once a beautiful young woman. Wilfred closed the motel door quietly behind him as he slipped out of the horrid crime scene, the early morning Florida sun piercing his tired eyes as he crept away.

                   

#

Wilfred Anderson sat quietly in the Denny's booth, waiting for his pancakes and eggs to show up. The man coming in the front door stared directly at him, never shifting his eyes. Wilfred glanced away, as his memory crunched away as to why he recognized him, and what did this man want. He didn't have long to wait. Dressed in a nice suit, the balding man walked straight to his table and slid into the seat directly in front of the shocked fifteen year old, never breaking his intense gaze.

"Don't you dare move," the man whispered threateningly.

Wilfred felt his body grow cold, the dry voice of the man more offending then the slight hint of costly aftershave that filled his presence.

"You were in the motel room after I left this morning, weren't you?"

Wilfred, a terrified look spreading across his face, thrust his hands between his cold legs and shock his head no.

"Don't lie to me you little fucker," the man hissed, his grinning, yet refined stare fixated on Wilfred.

"I-I don't know what you're talking about Mr, I just got here, I been at a friends," Wilfred lied.

"Not bad. Almost convincing. But you left out the part where you are going to threaten me, call the police, scream, anything. I mean, a strange man sits down in your restaurant booth, and you just sit there, like a useless bag of shit. You should be outraged, mad. But you're not are you, no your scared shitless, and I know it. So. Lets try this again. You have seen me before haven't you?"

"No, sir, I don't know what you're talking about," Wilfred said, knowing he was trapped, but not clear headed to think of what to do."

"Relax," the man said smiling, "Here comes your food."

Wilfred was freaking out. He knew he was busted, this was the same man who left the motel room earlier int he morning. How did he know? How?

"Hi love,..." the man said sweetly to the overweight and tired looking night shift waitress, "...bring us a pot of coffee too please." He smiled a wonderful grin, like it was the best day ever to be alive.

"Sure thing, hon, be right up," the woman smiled back joyfully.

The man's jaw dropped as she trudged away, "Where's the briefcase, you little shit..."

"I don't know what you are talking about man, I told you!"

"Keep you voice down," the man hissed, "It was under the the left side of the bed. I know you saw what was in the bed..."

At this Wilfred's eyes grew wide, and fear streaked across his white face. He lost any appetite he may of had and sat looking down at a deep, old ding cut in the drably table top. He started to run his finger inside the damaged area, his eyes fixated on it.

"I thought so..."the man said dryly, and took a sip of water, an evil smile spreading across his face. “I don’t know if I should kill you or not, guess it will depend on you…now won’t it? Start by telling me the truth, firstly, about the dried blood under your finger tips. There’s something else going on here my little friend, and you’re going to tell me all about it…”

“Did you kill her?” Wilfred whispered, his eyes tearing up.”

“No. But someone did, and I cleaned up the mess for him, for a price. It was perfect too, because I needed a body for a frame job, and she was perfect, that is, if you didn’t disturb anything in the room?”

Wilfred quietly looked up at the man he would learn much later to trust. Dominic Judge.

“What’s in it for me?” Wilfred said sheepishly, but a hint of daring escaping out into the wild.

Dom smiled quietly, “Now, you’re learning…” 

                                                  

Now, sixteen years later, he could still hear Dom’s dry voice still echoing in head, and his step father’s bastard blood trickling across his shaking hands as he swung the rusty door open, feeling the cool night air rush in and down deep into his hidden lair. He swung the door shut quietly behind him and dialed the number, the cell phone light dimly illuminating the rotten tunnel he called home.

“Dom, it’s me, Wil. Yes, I’m ready here, I got the data all set; let me know when you want the setup to go down, he will never suspect a thing…”



                                                  

<<<<>>>>