Brittany
Wexton swung the dirty canvas bag full of money and smacked her younger
sister in the face with it. “You dumb little bitch.”
Anastasia
Wexton tumbled to the ground, the car keys flying out of her hand.
Forty thousand bucks carried some weight and she felt a trickle of warm
blood leak out of her left nostril where the bag had caught her.
Brittany
picked up the keys and hovered over her, the bag now slung over her
shoulder. “I told you not to tell him. I told you.
Over and over. ‘Don’t tell Dwayne.’ Isn’t that what
I said?”
Anastasia
brought her hand up to her nose. “Yeah, but...”
“No
buts. I said don’t tell him and you did.” Brittany
stomped her boot against the parking lot. “Dammit.”
Anastasia
pulled her now blood-smeared palm away from her face, wiped her hand on
her jeans and got to her feet. “He won’t do nothin’, Brit.
I swear.”
Brittany’s
face contorted into a condescending scowl. “Just get in the
fuckin’ car.”
She
walked around to the other side of the beat up Trans-Am and slid into
the driver’s seat. Anastasia slid into the passenger seat,
tilting her head back in an attempt to stop the blood from exiting her
nose.
Brittany
turned the key and the engine rumbled to life. She flattened the
accelerator and the tires screamed against the asphalt as the car
jettisoned out of the parking lot, away from the check cashing
storefront.
Brittany
thumped her hand against the steering wheel. “When did you tell
him?”
“I
dunno,” Anastasia said. “A week ago maybe?”
Brittany
glared at her sister, her teeth bared, wondering why her sister was so
stupid. “A week ago? Your retard boyfriend has known we
were going to rob that place for a week?” She laughed and pushed
herself back into the seat, her arms locked and rigid between her body
and the wheel. “I’m stunned that the fuckin’ cops weren’t
waiting for us.”
“Dwayne
ain’t gonna say nothin’” Anastasia said. “I know he
won’t.”
The
Trans-Am hit a dip, the bottom of the car scraping against the road and
propelling them airborne. The wheels hit the road again, the car
fishtailing to the left before Brittany straightened it out, the
accelerator still pinned to the floor.
“Goddamn
right he ain’t gonna say nothin’” she said, yanking the .38 from
the waistband of her jeans. She waved it in the air like she was
going to throw it. She knew she was losing her cool and that
wouldn’t work. She took a deep breath and tried to calm herself,
putting the hand with the gun back awkwardly on the wheel.
“Okay. We left two bodies back there. One more ain’t
gonna matter.”
Anastasia
looked at her, horrified. “Brittany. No! You can’t
kill Dwayne! Please!”
Brittany
jerked the steering wheel to the left and the car swung hard around the
corner. She’s so pathetic, she thought. Useless.
Other than working at the check cashing joint, she hadn’t done a damn
thing worth thinking about in her entire nineteen years of living.
The four year age gap between them sometimes felt like twenty.
“If
you think I’m gonna let that little retard walk around knowing we’re
the ones that did this, you are dumber than I ever thought,” Brittany
said. “As dumb as him.”
“He’s
not retarded,” Anastasia protested.
Brittany
eased off the accelerator as they approached a four way stop. The
intersection was empty and she floored it again, ripping through the
street.
“He
is retarded,” Brittany said. “Idiot can’t spell his
own name, much less walk without drooling.”
“He’s
just slow is all,” Anastasia said and it came out like a whine.
“I
don’t give a shit what he is,” Brittany answered.
“Other than the two of us, he’s the only other person that knows
about this.” She pointed the gun at her sister, as if it were
her index finger. “You think when the cops find those two dead
guys he’s gonna be able to keep his mouth shut?”
Anastasia
turned away from her sister and stared out the window.
Brittany
felt a momentary pang of sympathy for her sister. She’d talked
Anastasia into applying for the check cashing job. She’d talked
her into paying attention how the money was handled. And she’d
talked her into robbing the place with her so they could get out of this
backwoods shithole of a town.
Of
course, when push came to shove, Anastasia hadn’t been able to walk in
to do the job. But Brittany had planned on that and told her to
stay outside and keep an eye out. She was comfortable taking care
of business on her own. But after Brittany had hustled out the
back with the money and Anastasia had blurted out that Dwayne knew,
Brittany had lost it. She could excuse her sister for being
ignorant. But she couldn’t excuse her being downright stupid.
Anastasia
wasn’t hard like Brittany and that was alright. She still
thought she could do something with her life. Talked about being
an actress once they got out to L.A. Brittany didn’t fool
herself with such fantasies, but she secretly admired her sister for
holding onto things like that.
Brittany
yanked the wheel to the right and the car squirreled around another
corner. Her sister had the looks to be an actress, that was for
sure. She knew they looked similar – blond hair, blue eyes,
bodies that boys stared at – but somehow it worked better on
Anastasia. Whether Anastasia could do the acting or not, that was
another story. But Brittany would help her if she could.
Going to L.A. had finally been what had convinced Anastasia to help her
rob the place and helping her out would be Brittany’s way of thanking
her.
But
now they had to deal with Dwayne.
“Is
he at home?” Brittany asked.
Anastasia
didn’t move.
“Is
he at home, Anastasia?” Brittany repeated.
Brittany
saw a tiny nod and thought she heard a sob. She cut her eyes away
from her little sister, shut out the sympathy that was knocking on the
door and refocused on the road.
Killing
Dwayne might be tough on Anastasia, Brittany thought, but it would be a
helluva lot easier on her than prison.
*
* *
Dwayne’s
house was a small cinder block square two blocks from the highway.
Brittany figured they could get it done and be back on the road inside
five minutes.
“Get
him in the living room,” she said. “I’ll come in the back
door.”
There
were tears in Anastasia’s eyes. “Brittany. I
can’t...”
Brittany
put a hand on her sister’s shoulder. “Just get him in the
living room. You can come back to the car after I get in there.
So you don’t have to watch.”
The
tears streaked down Anastasia’s cheeks.
“You
made a mistake,” Brittany said softly. “It’s alright.
But we need to get out of here and we can’t leave him behind.
I’m sorry.” She put her hand on Anastasia’s chin and gently
turned it toward her. “The sooner we get this done, the sooner
we get out to Hollywood and make you a big star. Right?”
Brittany smiled at her. “We don’t wanna keep all those
directors waiting, do we?”
Anastasia
whimpered and turned to the window. Brittany couldn’t help but
feel like she was trying to coax a puppy into doing something for the
first time.
“I’m
telling you, those directors are waiting for you and they are
going to make you a star,” Brittany said, watching her sister.
“But it can’t happen unless we get this done.”
Anastasia
turned toward the house, biting her lip. She looked at her sister
again and wiped the tears off her face. Brittany could see that
she’d weakened her, that she would get her way. Like always.
Anastasia
put her hand on the door and pushed it open. “Okay. I’ll
see you inside.”
Brittany’s
smile widened and she nodded. She watched Anastasia exit the car,
walk up to the front of the house and disappear through the front door.
Brittany
opened the cylinder on the .38, eyeing the four remaining circles of
yellow brass, then slapped it back into place and headed for the rear of
the house.
*
* *
The
backdoor was unlocked. Brittany slipped inside quietly, the gun at
her side. She was in the kitchen and it smelled like ripe trash
and burnt bacon. Empty food cartons and paper wrappers were
everywhere. Dishes were piled high in the sink. She wrinkled
her nose. Not only was Dwayne a dumbass, he was a pig, too.
She knew it was Anastasia’s own insecurity that let her fall in with a
loser like Dwayne, but it still irritated her. She’d tried to
point out all his shortcomings – besides being dumber than a pipe, he
wasn’t much to look at with the potbelly and hair that always looked
sticky and unwashed – but Anastasia had only seen a guy that was
interested in her.
She’d
find a better guy for her little sister in California, Brittany thought
as she crept into the hallway. Someone that deserved her.
She
heard Anastasia sniffle in the front room and slid along the wall.
She didn’t hear Dwayne’s voice. Dumbshit was probably sitting
there just staring at Anastasia like he normally did, she thought.
Brittany
peered into the room. Anastasia was sitting on the tattered sofa,
but she didn’t see Dwayne. She leaned further into the room and
looked in both directions. She still didn’t see Dwayne.
Brittany
felt the anger rise up in her gut. She stepped into the room and
stared at her sister.
“Where
the fuck is he?” she hissed.
Anastasia
looked up, a blank expression on her face.
“You
said he’d be here,” Brittany said through clenched teeth.
“Where is he?”
“Right
here,” a voice said from behind her in the hallway.
Brittany
was halfway around when Dwayne squeezed the trigger on the shotgun.
An explosion of red splattered on the far wall like someone had thrown
it from a paint bucket and Brittany fell against the front door. A
bloody smear on the wood followed the already dead Brittany down as she
slumped to the ground.
Anastasia
and Dwayne stared at her.
“Should
I do it again?” Dwayne asked, his voice flat, the shotgun still aimed
in Brittany’s direction. “To make sure?”
Anastasia
stood. Her older sister’s body was twisted into an awkward
position. The blood was rushing out of her chest.
“No.
Get me a towel,” she said.
Dwayne
set the shotgun next to the wall, walked into the kitchen and returned
with a small hand towel.
“I
did good,” Dwayne said, handing it to her. “Right,
Anastasia?”
Anastasia
picked up Brittany’s gun with the towel, careful to keep her own
fingers off of it. “Yes, Dwayne. You did good.”
A
crooked smile emerged on Dwayne’s face, pleased that he had satisfied
his girlfriend in following her orders.
Anastasia
raised Brittany’s gun and fired twice into Dwayne’s chest.
He
stumbled back, clutching at the wounds. He crashed into the wall
behind him and slumped to the floor just as Brittany had, the crooked
smile still on his face but the life extinguished from his eyes, the
blood seeping out of his body.
Anastasia
carefully used the towel to clean the trigger of Brittany’s gun, laid
it down next to her dead sister and stood to survey her work.
She
looked down at Dwayne. Had anyone really thought she could like
him? He was disgusting. Fat, ugly and unclean. And
Brittany had probably been right in calling him retarded.
She
laughed and turned to Brittany. Had her big, tough, gun-toting
older sister really thought she hadn’t learned anything from watching
her ways? Brittany had mocked her for being too afraid to go into
the check cashing place. She’d completely missed how smart
she’d been to stay outside where no one could see her while Brittany
did the job.
Couldn’t
have worked out any better, she thought. Anybody walking in would
just think they’d shot each other. She was a little disappointed
that she’d have to stick around for another couple of weeks and play
the grieving sister and girlfriend, act like they’d betrayed her in a
couple of ways. She was anxious to get out to the sunshine of
California. But staying in town for just a little bit longer was a
small price to pay to make sure she’d be in the clear.
Anastasia
shrugged and headed for the back door, thinking of that forty thousand
in the backseat of the Trans-Am. Splitting it one way sounded a
lot better than splitting it in half.
It
would set her up nicely in Hollywood.
And
she sure as hell wouldn’t have to spend any of it on acting classes.
Copyright 2006 by
Jeff Shelby
Jeff Shelby is the author of the
novels KILLER SWELL and WICKED BREAK. He grew up around the beaches of
southern California and graduated from the University of California at
Irvine. Visit his blog at http://firstoffenders.typepad.com
