I hope I don’t have to wait here much longer, Paul thought. I’m burning up in here.
Paul was not only growing irritated at the heat. He was also growing irritated at being forced to wait for his 11:00 P.M appointment after he had made a great effort to be here on time. He checked his watch. The time was 11:13. The individual that he was supposed to meet here was late. That person was the mysterious Sandman.
Paul heard a noise from behind. He turned to see that the Sandman had finally arrived. Dressed in his black pants tucked into his black knee high boots. A black shirt and necktie. And black gloves. The most striking part of his attire was the long black hooded cape that he was wearing. The hood obscuring the features of his face.
A cold shudder ran up along Paul’s spine as he watched the Sandman walk over and take a seat at the opposite side of the table. What the hell am I getting myself into? Paul thought. This guy looks like the angel of death. Maybe it’s not too late to back out.
The Sandman placed his gloved hands down on the table. “So you’re Paul. Nice to meet you. Sorry that I’m late. I was dealing with another customer. A difficult case. Some people are just too hard to please.”
“Paul was still so nervous that his words froze in his throat. “No problem,” he croaked out. “I didn’t mind waiting. But I was waiting so long that I have to go to the bathroom. Is it ok if I step out?”
“Step out?” asked the Sandman. “You’re not thinking about backing out. Are you?”
“No. No,” Paul stuttered. “Not at all.” Great. So much for that idea, he thought. Now I’m stuck.
“Then let’s get down to business,” said the Sandman. “So your E-mail on my website told me that you have an issue with your Ex girlfriend. Care to elaborate?”
“Yeah. My stupid, ungrateful Ex. Brenda. I did a lot for that miserable cow. I let her and her stupid kid live in my apartment. I give them free room and board. I gave her money when she needed it. And how does she repay me?”
“By getting an protection from abuse order against you,” the Sandman concluded.
Paul was stunned that the Sandman knew this detail. A detail that he would rather keep hidden. “What do you mean? I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Come off it Paul. This is just between us. I always like to get a little background info on all my clients. I’ll consider this little P.F.A thing as just a warped sign of affection on her part. After all, you two did have a bit of a stormy relationship.”
“I wouldn’t exactly call it stormy,” was Paul’s humble reply.
“You wouldn’t call it stormy?” the Sandman returned. “You’re kidding, right? I’ve seen more love and affection during a Steelers, Ravens game than compared to your relationship. And most of the rough stuff was of your making. Am I right?”
Paul was ashamed to admit any guilt in abusing Brenda. “I never wanted to raise a hand against her. But you have to admit that there are times when you have to keep a woman in line.”
The Sandman nodded. “Tough love. I get it. And I assume that also applied to her little girl too.”
“Lacy,” Paul said. He became angered at the thought of the child. “The damn kid was a yoke around my neck. All she did was whine and cry. Whine and cry. She got on my nerves. There’s times when a kid gets on your nerves so much that you have no choice to punish her. You know what I mean?”
“Actually no. I don’t have kids. Just an iguana and some guppies.”
“I thought that I could cope with Brenda having a kid. But it just didn’t work. They both got under my skin. Between the two of them I was ready to explode at times.”
“Understandable,” the Sandman said. “I also understand that your drinking had a bit to do with your anger issues as well. So much in fact that one night you were oblivious to the fact that you gave Brenda a black eye and nearly broke Lacy‘s arm.”
Paul sank down in his seat. Ashamed to admit any guilt to the Sandman’s charge. “That wasn’t my fault. The kid fell.”
“The kid fell.”
“Yeah. It happened in the bathroom.“
“And she slipped on a bar of soap,” the Sandman added. “I’ve heard that one before. Who would think that a bar of soap could be more dangerous than a 12 gauge shotgun. So just what do you want me to do about Brenda and Lacy?”
“I don’t want you to do anything to them personally. That’s my job when the right time comes. But leading up to that I want a way to keep tabs on Brenda.”
“Ok. Let me get this straight. You want to spy on your Ex. I don’t exactly see the point. If you weren’t getting along with her and her kid then you should be glad to be rid of them.”
Glad? Paul was tempted to laugh at that notion. “This isn’t about being glad. This is about getting satisfaction. I took Brenda and her brat in. I gave them a home. My home. And all I did for them wasn’t appreciated. Brenda thought that she could just walk out on me like I’m some trash can on the street. Women don’t just walk out on Paul Jones.”
“If I recall she took a taxi,” the Sandman replied. “I usually don’t psychoanalyze. But it sounds to me that you’ve got an obsession.”
Paul denied that charge. “Obsession? No.”
“Then just out of curiosity have you gotten any new dates since you gave Brenda the boot?”
“Not really. Since then I’ve been really busy with work. And as far as dating is concerned it really hard to find the right person.”
The Sandman crossed his arms against his chest. “I can understand that. Since the violent drunk dating site went down the singles scene is a little bleak for guys like you. But if you want me to set up some way to spy on Brenda then so be it. But it will cost you.”
Now here comes the creepy part, Paul thought. “Yeah. Just like it says on your web site. You’ll trade one of my dreams or nightmares for a wish.” Paul had to think for a moment to recall his most recent dream. Then one came to his mind. “How about this one? I saw myself working in some department store. I was stocking shelves with this other guy. Then I hear this voice on the loudspeaker telling everyone to leave the store as quickly as possible. So we both start to walk out. We’re walking down this isle and we come to these two other guys. They’re wearing black overcoats and they have their backs turned to us so we can’t see their faces. So I say to them, hey the store is closing. You have to leave. Then they turn around and I see their faces. These guys are like zombies. Their faces are like rotted skulls. And they’re covered with maggots. Then one of them reaches out to grab me. That’s when I wake up. What do you think?”
“For starters I think that you should avoid getting a job in retail.”
“I’m an assistant manager at Wal-Mart,” Paul confessed.
“Lucky for you I deal in dreams and not premonitions. You’d really be screwed. But what you’re offering isn’t bad. It looks like you have a deal.”
Paul smiled with joy at this news. “Great. So you’re going to give me a way to keep tabs on Brenda. What’s it going to be?”
Suddenly Paul heard the faint ringing sound of his cell phone going off inside of his coat’s lapel pocket. He brought out the small, blue device, annoyed at whoever might be calling him at this time. Paul was surprised to see a pair of eyes with red, vertical pupils staring back at him from the black background of his phone’s screen. “What the hell is this?”
“It’s a cell phone app just for you. It’s Jake 6.66. Jake is designed to help you keep tabs on your Ex girlfriend. Jake can tap into her cell phone conversations.”
Paul gazed back at the two reptilian eyes that were staring at him. He jumped back in his seat as the right eye gave him a quick wink. “I’ll be damned.”
“Plenty of time for that later,” replied the Sandman. “Try it out.”
Paul pressed the screen. The eyes vanished and were replaced by a white screen with Brenda’s name. Below her name was her phone number. Then Paul heard a familiar female voice over the phone. “Brenda?” he gasped out.
“Don’t worry. She can’t hear you,” The Sandman said.
Paul began to listen in on Brenda’s conversation as she was speaking to a male on the other line.
“I had a really great time. Thanks again. I can’t wait to go back to the Meadows again next weekend,” Brenda said.
“Neither can I,” replied the male voice. “And maybe the next time we’ll actually win something. But we’d better be careful. This gambling thing can grow to be a bad habit.”
“You’re a bad habit,” Brenda replied with a laugh. “I’ll call you in the morning.”
The call ended.
“Well I’ll be damned,” said Paul.
“You keep saying that,” replied the Sandman. “You know something that I don’t?”
“No. I mean I’ll be damned. She’s dating some loser. Did you hear her?”
“Yeah. I heard. She’s got a date and you’re at home alone watching I Love Lucy re-runs. At least Ricky didn’t have to slap Lucy around to get a little respect.”
“I don’t get to watch much TV,” Paul returned. “He took a long look at his cell phone while recalling every word of Brenda’s conversation. “I definitely won’t have time now.”
Paul returned to his apartment in McKeesport with the anticipation of hearing more conversations between Brenda and her new boyfriend. His mind was divided between a voyeuristic curiosity and rage over something that was rightfully his, but was now out of his reach. He wondered if Brenda gave her new boyfriend more respect than she ever gave him.
Paul awoke the next morning with the thought of Brenda on his mind. He looked over to his nightstand at the right side of his bed. He had left his cell phone there last night before he fell asleep. He received a surprise when he saw the phone standing up on it’s end. The two red reptilian eyes were staring at him. The right eye gave him a wink.
“What the hell?” Paul said to the phone. He had placed the phone down on it’s back last night. Now here it was standing up. And it had turned itself on. “But since you’re already on it’s time to go to work.”
He pressed the eyes on the screen to bring up the Brenda page. He held the phone up to his ear to once again listen to a conversation between Brenda and her new date.
“I really enjoy our time together. And I really appreciate how gentle and considerate you are,” Brenda said in a soft voice.
The male voice laughed. “You’re making a big deal out of it. I’m only treating you the way you should be treated. It’s only natural.”
“Being nice wasn’t natural to that ogre I was with,” Brenda returned.
“I keep telling you not to talk about him. He’s in the past now. He can’t hurt you.”
So I’m an ogre, thought Paul. Insulted by that title. The next time I see you I’ll show you what an ogre is really like.
“You’re right. He’s out of my life for good. And Lacy is glad to be away from him too. She used to be so afraid of him. But lets change the subject. Something more cheerful. Like our next trip to the Meadows.”
“I’m looking forward to that,” said the male voice. “What about getting together tonight?”
“Tonight’s not good. I’m working a late shift. Tomorrow night is open. I’ll have to get my mom to look after Lacy.”
“Well, speaking of work I’ve got to get moving. I’m car pooling with two other guys. They’ll kill me if I’m late.”
“Alright. I’ll talk to you later,” said Brenda.
And I’ll listen to you later, thought Paul. He placed his phone back onto the nightstand and then looked up to the ceiling. He began to seethe with anger after listening to Brenda’s conversation. So she thinks I’m an ogre. And she’s so pumped up about going out with this idiot. She wasn’t so pumped up about being with me. All she did was bitch, bitch, bitch. Her and her whiny ass kid. I should have taken care of them both when I had the chance. But I was too nice. I won’t make that same mistake twice. She’s pumped up about going to the Meadows this weekend? She’s not gonna make it.
Paul started to get out of bed. He took a second look at the nightstand and his cell phone. He was again surprised to see that it was standing up on it’s end. The two red eyes were again staring at him. Paul snatched up the phone. “What the hell is this? I laid you down flat. I know I did.”
As Paul expected, there was no answer from the phone. He dismissed the matter and then got out of bed.
Paul showered and dressed in his grey suit with a white shirt and black necktie. And his black shoes. He ate a quick breakfast of waffles and a cup of coffee. Then he left his apartment to drive to work. He got into his black SUV and looked at his watch. The time was 9:01 A.M. He did not have to be to work at the West Mifflin Wal-Mart until 10:00. This gave him enough time to go to the Integrity Bank’s drive through and withdraw some money that he needed.
Paul’s SUV approached the Integrity Bank on Walnut Street. He drove up to the side of the building and was glad to see that there were no other vehicles at the drive through window. Service with no waiting. Just the way that Paul liked things. Paul stopped at the large window. Behind the thick glass was a young black female teller in a green dress. She greeted Paul through the intercom.
“Hi. Welcome to Integrity Bank. How may I help you?”
“Withdrawal. $200,” said Paul. He took out his wallet from his coat’s lapel pocket and removed his bank card. He waited for the teller to extend the metal drawer beneath the window. The drawer came out and Paul dropped his card inside. The teller retracted the drawer and then took the card so that she could complete the transaction. After a minute the teller looked up at Paul and spoke to him through the intercom.
“Sir. I’m sorry. But it’s showing that you have insufficient funds to take out $200.”
Paul was confused. “What? What he hell are you talking about? The money’s there. Try it again.”
“I can’t try it again, sir. I’m looking at your account right now. You don’t have enough money to take out $200. Do you want to try an different sum?”
Paul became angered as well as confused. “No I don’t want to try another sum. What the hell is this? Last time I checked I had over $7,000 in there.”
“Right now it’s saying that you have just $12.98.”
“No! No way!” Paul shouted. He was wondering if an identity thief had raided his account. He was determined to get to the bottom of this problem. “Look. I wanna know what the hell is going on. I know I had $7,000 in my account.”
“You did at one point, sir. But looking at your account I see that there has been some recent transactions.”
“What kind of transactions?”
“It’s showing transactions on some website called Online Casino. This was in the last five hours. It’s drained most of your account.”
Paul’s anger was growing. “I don';t know what the hell is going on but when I find out I’m gonna kick somebody’s ass.”
“These transactions took most of your money, sir. Maybe you should talk to your brother about it.”
Now Paul’s confusion was growing. “My brother?”
“Yes sir. These transactions are all under the name of Jacob Jones. Maybe you should talk to him.”
Jacob? Paul thought. This doesn’t make sense. Who the hell is this Jacob jackass that drained my account? I’m gonna eat his liver when I get my hands on him.
Then the thought came to Paul. Jacob. Jake. Jake, his new cell phone app that he was using to spy on Brenda. “No. No damn way,” Paul exclaimed. He took the phone out of his coat pocket. The two red reptile eyes were once again staring at him. Once again the right eye winked. Paul gave a shriek and then dropped the phone. He turned to look at the teller.”
“Sir. Is everything ok?” the teller asked.
“Yeah. I’m fine,” said Paul. “Just gimme back my card. And can you keep checking on this for me?”
“Yes sir.”
The teller extended the drawer. Paul took back his bank card and then drove off to work.
During his day of work at Wal-Mart two issues dominated Paul’s mind as he completed paperwork in his office and then helped some of the employees to stock items on the shelves. The first was Brenda and her new boyfriend. He was determined to see that she did not make her date with him to the Meadows this weekend. The second issue was concerning his bank account. What had happened to the money? As Paul was walking through the store’s busy isles the thought came to his mind that somehow Jake, his cell phone app was responsible. Paul shook his head and laughed at that notion. No. No freaking way. It’s just a program on a cell phone. Somebody else is behind this. I’m gonna track them down and then take that $7,000 out of their ass one dollar at a time.
Then his thoughts switched back to Brenda. He took his cell phone out of his back pocket and saw that it was already on. The red eyes staring back at him. “Don’t you ever shut off?” Paul asked. He tapped one of the eyes to bring up the Brenda page. Her voice came in over the phone. He brought the phone up to his ear and listened in.
“No. No scary movies. You know I don’t like scary stuff,” Brenda’s gleeful voice said.
“No. We had a deal. Our last movie we went to see some girlie film that you liked. Now we go to see a horror film. That’s our deal,” a male voice responded.
Brenda let out a groan. “Ok then Freddy Kruger. You win. Tomorrow night we'll go see your stupid mivie. But just you wait until I get the next movie pick. I have to go. My break is almost over. I’ll call you later. Bye.”
Paul gnashed his teeth and growled in anger. “Damn. I just missed her.” Not only was he angry about just hearing the tail end of Brenda’s conversation but he did not like the content of what little he had heard. “So now tomorrow she’s going to a movie with this jerk. If I could find out which theatre you’re going to I’d take care of your sorry ass right then.”
Paul’s anger was still mounting at the thought of Brenda. He thought that it would be a good idea to change the subject to something that would generate less rage within him. His mind went back to the missing money in his bank account. He pressed the numbers on his cell phone to call the McKeesport branch of Integrity Bank. He listened to the phone ringing. Then a female voice answered.
“Hello. This is Integrity Bank. How can I help you?”
“My name is Paul Jones. I was at your branch this morning. There’s $7.000 missing from my checking account. I’m calling to see if you guys have found out what the hell is going on.”
“Yes sir. I heard about that. For security can you give me your Bank card number, Address, and the last four digits of your social security number?”
Paul gave the information that the female bank employee requested. Then he waited for several seconds. The female employee’s voice returned to give him startling news.
“Sir. We’ve checked your account. You currently have $20.000.”
“What?” Paul shouted into the phone.
“You have $20,000.”
Paul was almost too shocked to speak. “$20,000? What the hell is going on? How?”
“From what I can see there was some activity on a website called Online Casino. There"s one recent deposit of $5,000. And there's a second deposit of $15,000. Both within the past eight hours. And I'm seeing a name Jacob Jones here. I'm assuming that this is a relative."
Paul was ecstatic over the prospect of having $20,000 in the bank. “Yeah. Good old Jake. That’s my bro. Are you sure that this isn’t some kind of mistake? Somebody punched in a wrong number or something?”
“No. From what I can see there’s no mistake.”
“Ok then. Thanks,” said Paul. He ended the call. Then he turned his thoughts to his sudden windfall as he stared at his cell phone. “$20,000. This is too good to be true. Not only can I keep tabs on that dumb cow, Brenda, but I get $20,000 as a bonus. I got the cell phone that laid the golden text.”
Paul was in a good mood for the rest of his work day. When he got off work at 7:00 He was still in a good mood during his drive home. He plans for the evening was to break open a bottle of Jack Daniels and then try to listen in on another one of Brenda’s cell phone conversations.
Paul parked his SUV in the small lot next to his apartment building. As he got out of the vehicle he noticed two men in dark clothes standing in the middle of the parking lot. One of them was a six foot tall white male with short black hair. The other was a black male who was much larger. By Paul’s estimate he was standing six feet, five inches tall. With a thick body and huge, muscular arms. He was definitely someone that Paul would not want to confront.
The two men approached Paul. The white man smiled and addressed him. “Excuse me. Are you Paul Jones?”
Paul was apprehensive about answering this stranger. “Yeah. That’s me. Who’s asking?”
“That’s not important,” the smiling man replied. He and his partner stopped three feet away from Paul. “I’m looking for your brother, Jacob. he’s got something for me.”
My brother Jacob. There it is again, thought Paul. What the hell do I tell this creep? Paul’s quick solution was to simply lie. “I don’t know where my brother is.”
The man’s smile started to fade. “That’s not what I wanna hear. He told me to come here and wait for him. He gave me your name and told me that you can help me out if he’s not here. I came for my money.”
Paul was confused. And growing uneasy being with these two men. “Your money?”
“Yeah. I loaned your brother $15,000 last night. He said that he needed to cover some bets that he was making. He also told me that the loan was short term. And that he was going to pay me back the next day. Today is the next day. So where’s your brother?”
Paul was unsure as to the best way to answer that question. “Where is he? Hell. I don’t know.”
“You don’t know? Well he told me to meet him here. And he said that is he wasn’t here then to talk to you. So if your brother’s not here then I want to talk to you. So let’s talk about my money. Are you guys able to pay up? With interest involved you owe me $20,000.”
“$20,000? Paul squawked in disbelief. “Are you high?”
The man smiled again and turned to his huge partner. “Did you hear that? Am I high he asks. Sounds like we got ourselves a funny man here.” He looked back at Paul while pointing to his partner. “I didn’t introduce you to my friend Horse. Horse has no sense of humor and he doesn’t like funny guys. Aint’ that right Horse?”
“I don’t like funny guys,” Horse muttered. "I don't like cartoons either." He took a closer step towards Paul and threw a punch into his face. Paul’s vision went black as his face was flooded with pain. he did not even register the sensation of falling backward and hitting his head on the pavement. When Paul opened his eyes he saw House lumbering over him. He reached down and grabbed Paul’s neck in his huge hand to pull him up from the pavement. Paul attempted to struggle against Horse, but he learned that fighting against a larger male was a different matter from getting physical against a smaller female or an eight year old girl. He was helpless against Horse as the huge black man began repeatedly hammering that beefy fist into his face. Paul cried out against the abuse while hoping that someone would walk by rush over to help him. No such help came.
After several seconds of giving Paul a beating Horse stopped and dropped him down onto the pavement. Pain flowed through Paul’s face as freely as the blood that was now running out from his nose. Paul was too weak to do anything else except wait to see else these men would do to him. The smiling man stepped closer to Paul and stomped his foot down on Paul’s left hand. Paul cried out as he registered a different sensation of pain. he felt as though his fingers were being crushed under the man’s shoe. The man leaned down to speak to him.
“Now the way that I see it you got two options. You can either tell me where I can find your brother. Or you can pay me my money. Either way would be good for you. Screwing with me is an option that’s not on the table. Now I’m willing to give you a break since your brother is the one who I made a deal with. You just tell me where he is and I’ll go easy on you.”
Paul was trapped in a bizarre situation. he was wondering how he could tell these men that his brother, Jake, was actually an app on his cell phone and not get a bullet in the brain afterwards. The smiling man’s foot brought more pressure down on his fingers. Paul cried out.
“Where’s your brother?” the smiling man asked. he raised his foot and stomped down on Paul’s fingers again. Once again Paul cried out. “Where’s your brother?” he repeated. He reached into his back pocket and brought out a large switchblade. It’s long shiny blade sprang out. The man leaned closer to Paul. “Tell me where your brother is or I’ll start carving your face. What’s it gonna be?”
Panicking at the sight of the knife Paul relented. He was intending to tell them the truth about Jake and hope that they would believe him. “Ok. Ok. I’ll tell you.” Paul reached into his coat’s lapel pocket and brought out his cell phone. As he expected the phone was already on, with the two red eyes staring back at him. He showed the phone to the two men. “You want Jake? Here he is!” Paul screamed out.
The smiling man looked at Paul’s cell phone. “Ok. Fine. Call him.”
“No!” Paul shouted. Pointing to the eyes on the phone. “Here’s Jake! He’s here!”
The smiling man nodded. “Yeah. Ok. So call him already.”
Paul pointed again to the phone. He spoke louder. “No! No! Jake is here! He’s here! Don’t you get it?”
“No. you don’t get it,” the smiling man said as he pointed a finger at Paul. His smile vanished. “You don’t mess around with me.”
“The hell with this. Let’s shoot him and go,” Horse suggested.
“No. Right now this idiot is more valuable to us alive. But that’s gonna get old really fast. We’ll give him an hour to straighten up his act. When we come back and he doesn’t have either the money or his brother, Jake, then we send him to a fishing trip to the bottom of the Mon River.”
Horse gave a nod. “Yeah. I can work with that. Can you work with that, funnyman?”
To drive his point across Horse gave Paul a sharp kick to the right side of his torso. Paul groaned under the pain throbbing in his ribs. He continued to lay on the ground as the two men walked away. In addition to the pain he was feeling from his beating Paul felt weak and helpless. And doomed. He could not think of anything to do to avoid getting worse treatment from these two when they returned. He needed help. And the only help that came to his mind at this time was the Sandman.
Paul remembered the Sandman’s phone number from exploring his website a day ago. He pressed the numbers on his phone to call the Sandman. He put the phone to his ear and listened to it ring twice. Then came the voice of the Sandman.
“Hello. Sandman here.”
Paul stuttered into the phone, “Sandman. This is Paul Jones. We met a day ago at that Fallen Angel bar on the North Side.”
“Hi Paul. How’s it going? What the hell do you want? I’m kind of busy right now.”
“Paul whined into the phone, “These two guys just kicked my ass in the parking lot.”
“Really? Thanks for the heads up. I can’t wait to watch the story on CNN. Is that all you called to tell me?”
“No. You don’t understand. I got my ass kicked because of this cell phone app you gave me. It’s doing weird things.”
“No way. You think so? You have an app on your phone that lets you spy on you ex girlfriend’s phone calls. You’re just catching on to it being weird?”
" No. I mean it’s doing really weird things to screw with me. It gambled and lost all my money. And then it took out a loan from these two thugs. They want $20,000 or they’ll come back and kill me.”
“Ok Paul. Let me give you a clue here. Do you have the money to pay these guys?”
Paul remembered his bank account. “Yes.”
“Then pay them and they’ll leave you alone. Was that so hard to figure out? I’ll talk to you later.”
The Sandman ended the call.
“Wait! Wait!,” Paul shouted into the phone. The Sandman was gone. But he did give Paul a useful solution. Paul already had the money in his bank account. But his only problem was that at this time in the evening the bank was closed. But the ATM located at the side of the building was still available to him. Paul was not sure if the machine would allow him to withdraw the full $20,000. But he had to try. His life was depending on the effort.
Paul struggled to rise up from the pavement. He staggered forward to reach the Integrity Bank building which was half a block away. When Paul arrived at the bank he looked through the glass doors and it’s huge window to see that it was dark inside. A clear indication that the bank was closed. But the light coming from the ATM machine at the right of the window was a welcome sight. He rushed over to the machine and took out his bank card from his wallet. He placed the card into the machine and then punched in his pin number on the small numeric pad at the bottom of the screen. One the screen a short list of options appeared. Paul pressed the first option to withdraw money from his checking account. Then he pressed in the amount of $20,000 on the numeric pad. It’s worth a shot, he told himself. Paul could hardly breathe under the suspense as he waited to the machine to process his request. Then he received a bombshell in the form of a message. Insufficient funds.
“What?” Paul gasped. he pressed the screen to summon the option to view his account balance. Paul waited in suspense again. Then he received his answer. It was a second bombshell. His account balance was a mere twelve cents.
Paul felt like fainting when he saw this. He shook his head in denial. “No. No way. No.” He took his cell phone out of his pocket and shouted at it. “You did this! I know it was you! What the hell did you do with my money? Why the hell are you doing this?”
Paul's only response from the phone was to hear Brenda's voice. He was receiving one of her calls as she was speaking to her mysterious new boyfriend.
"Paul was such a monster. THere were plenty of time when Lacy and me would dread him coming home from work. it was like a horror story."
"Too bad I wasn't there to help you," said the male voice. "I would have loved to see how tough he is against another guy. Dudes like that are always wussies."
Paul was angered by that insult. He shouted at his phone, "So I'm a wussy? I'm a wussy? Really? Come meet me here and I'll show you how big a wussy I am!"
Paul’s eyes caught a glimpse of two men walking down the sidewalk at his left. He turned to see that it was the two thugs that had assaulted him in the parking lot. The smiling man and his partner Horse. Paul again Panicked.
Paul heard the voice of the smiling man calling out to him. “Hey. Funnyman. Is that you?”
Paul was determined not to be caught by these two again. He began to walk away from the ATM and head down the street.
The smiling man called out again. “Hey funnyman. I'm talking to you. Are you getting my money?”
Now Paul began to run.
“Hey. Where the hell are you going? Bring your ass back here. I’m gonna kill you.”
Paul was now sprinting down the street. He already had some distance between himself and the two thugs. But he was not sure if he could out run them all night. He was dreading the thought of being caught by them with nothing to offer except for a futile effort to beg for his life.
As Paul was running down the sidewalk he looked to the street he noticed a black four door car driving along in the right lane. The car was driving slow to keep pace with him. He heard it’s horn honk twice. Then a black haired woman leaned her head out of her driver’s side window to address him.
“Hey! Get in!”
Paul looked back at her but did not answer.
“Get in!” the woman insisted.
Paul ran into the street and made a dash for the car. The car slowed down enough for him to open the left rear passenger door and hop inside the car. The car then sped off.
After this fearful chase Paul felt grateful for a chance to rest. He was gasping for air. He looked at the back of the woman’s head as she kept her back turned to him and continued driving.
“Thanks,” said Paul. Still panting for air.
The woman responded. “No problem. You’re Paul Jones. I recognize you from the photo I got. What a coincidence.”
“What? You know me?” Asked a surprised Paul. “What am I now? A celebrity?”
“Not exactly,” the woman replied. “So, you want to tell me what that little chase scene was all about?”
Paul gulped in a lungful of air. “These two creeps said that I owe them $20,000. They were gonna kill me.”
“$20,000? Now that’s another coincidence," said the woman. She slowed the car down and parked it at the side of the curb at the right. She turned and looked back at Paul. $20,000 was the same amount that your brother, Jake paid me to kill you.”
“What?” said a shocked Paul.
The woman produced a gun. She aimed it at Paul’s chest and then fired. Paul felt the pressure of a bullet stabbing through his body and penetrating his heart. He leaned back into the seat. He was now feeling weak. Weak enough to die. He only had strength enough to take out his cell phone and look at the red eyes staring back at him. Then they gave him a final wink.
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