Out For Blood 52

‘How fast are we travelling Mr Kessler?’
Larry looked at the dash. ‘Sixty-five, why do you ask?’
Celia looked at her watch. ‘I’m trying to determine how much head start they have on us, and how long before we actually get there.’
‘Well we arrived at your place at around 6.50, at what time did Marianna leave for the lake?’

‘You must have just missed her; she would have left the house at exactly 7.00, she always does.’
‘So if we say they got Marianna as soon as she arrived at the lake, they would have left there around say… 7.20? We left the lake at around 8.15, it’s now 8.50. This gives them about an hours’ head start.’ Said Larry.

Celia was suddenly pulled back into her seat as Larry put his foot down and was now doing eighty-five mph. If the two hours Mason was talking about was at 55 mph max, then they should reach Martinsville in less than 80 minutes, give or take a few minutes.

Larry looked at Celia through the mirror. ‘I’m going to call Brenda, see how they got on with the police.’

That was something Celia didn’t want him to do. ‘The mountains make it difficult Mr Kessler, you’ll be lucky if she has any signal at all.’
Larry looked at his cell-phone, he had three bars. He pressed a couple of buttons and retrieved Brendas’ number from the memory and waited for the call to connect. After a few seconds he heard an engaged tone. ‘It’s engaged, I guess she must be trying to ring me!’ He said cutting off the call.

Celias’ eyes narrowed, she would have hoped by now that Mason had done as she had ordered. ‘Are you sure it was engaged? Perhaps you weren’t connected properly, try again Mr Kessler.’

Again Larry found Brendas’ cell-phone number, and again he got the engaged tone. ‘Nope, definitely engaged,’ he said cutting off the call once more.

Celia squirmed uneasy in her seat; if Mason had failed to kill the woman then Kessler could receive a call from her any minute now. ‘May I borrow your phone Mr Kessler; I left mine with Mason,’ she lied. ‘I will call him and see if he has any news.’

Larry looked again in the mirror at Celia. ‘What about the no signal thing with the mountains? Won’t his signal be poor also?’
Again she squirmed. ‘Quite true Mr Kessler… but you seem to have managed to get an engaged tone from Miss Wise, so perhaps the Goddess of communication is smiling down on us.’

Larry rolled his eyes and thought about saying something ending in “…my ass.” He then passed his phone into the rear of the Bentley; Celia took it and called Mason on his own cell-phone.

‘It’s Miss Brontrose Mason, I’m using Mr Kesslers phone as you have mine… is Miss Wise with you now…? Good, is she on the phone…? I see, when she has finished the call can you ask her to call Mr Kessler please…? Celia then looked at Larry and saw he was watching the road. She pushed a button on her door and the window silently opened, she took one more look at Larry then tossed his phone from the car. ‘Oh my,’ she said feigning shock.

‘What, what is it?’ asked Larry.
‘Your phone Mr Kessler, it slipped from my hand, I’m afraid it fell through my window, I’m dreadfully sorry!’

Larry immediately stopped the car and reversed back down the road. When he reached where the first part of his phone was he got out and began picking up the pieces. Celia got out also and helped. Eventually between them they managed to find all of it except the rubber number pad.

The small screen had cracked and so had the outer casing, Larry put it back together as best he could but without the number pad. Holding the loose casing together he switched it on, but because of the cracked screen he didn’t know if it would work or not, and he couldn’t dial a number to test it.

‘I’m very sorry Mr Kessler; the wind from the window must have taken it from my hand!’ explained Celia.
Larry wasn’t happy about the situation; a public phone will be no use to him as all his numbers were in the phones memory and not his own. ‘Well nothing can be done about it now Miss Brontrose.’ He replied.

‘I will personally buy you a new one Mr Kessler, as soon as this whole business is sorted out!’
Larry just smiled and got back into the car, Celia did the same. Only her smile was a genuine smile, a satisfied, genuine smile.

* * *

Mason ran up the few stairs to the deck of the Marianna II, he was covering his left eye socket with his left hand and had a gun in his right. He reached the gangplank and saw Brenda trip and hit the water, he looked over the side and for a split second he saw her pale face and bright green eyes disappear into the murky depths. He was just about to empty his gun into the water when…

‘Freeze!’ Shouted a voice from behind him.

Mason turned still covering the left side of his face with his hand, he raised his gun and was about to shoot when he was hit three times in the chest. He dropped his gun into the water and collapsed on the gangplank. Before the officer that had shot him reached the edge of the pier Mason was dead.

Another officer dived into the water and swam down to where Brenda lay. It was almost two minutes before he surfaced again with the lifeless body of the person he had just seen running from the man now lying still.

The officer that had fired the shots watched as his partner tried in vain to resuscitate the woman. ‘Dispatch… this is Officer Hinkler 41334.’
‘Go ahead Officer Hinkler.’
‘In response to the interrupted cell-phone call… we have two fatalities, one Caucasian male, with three gunshot wounds, and one Caucasian female, possible drowning. We require assistance at Greenview Lake; pier 17. Over.’

‘This is dispatch… please stand-by…’
Officer Hinkler looked over again at his partner and the dead woman. ‘Anything I can do to help?’ he asked.
‘No… I think it’s too late for this one,’ he said, although still trying to revive her. ‘…how’s the guy?’

‘He was dead before he hit the deck… so to speak!’
‘Dispatch to Officer Hinkler, you have paramedics on the way. Should be with you shortly. Do you require any other assistance? Over.’
‘Dispatch this is Officer Hinkler, that is a negative. Repeat a negative. Over and out.’

When Officer Hinkler had finished on his radio he searched the dead man for some form of ID, but found nothing. He stepped over the body and boarded the Marianna II, his gun stretched out in front of him in case others were on board.