Free Doomsday Warrior 10 - American Nightmare by Ryder Stacy Page B

the foul-smelling lobby of the hotel. A man at the desk looked up, sized him, shrugged. “Nothing fancy—four dollars for the night. Check-out is eight A.M. Don’t miss it, or you pay full day extra.”
    Rockson fished up the four bucks and went upstairs with the room key the man tossed him. The room was alongside the neon sign, and even with the dark shade down, the blinking leaked in. He sat down heavily on the bed. At least here, the music wasn’t very loud. The buzz of the neon light also tended to blot it out.
    His head hurt less. He lay down feeling less confused than when he had left work. It was the first time he was away from the music that everybody loved. He fell asleep.
    There was a noise. Scratch-Scratch.
    He awoke, sat bolt upright in bed. Raised the blind. It was still dark out—maybe after midnight. Yeah, the cheap alarm clock on the dresser said 12:10. The scratching that had awakened him was a note coming under his door.
    He went over and picked it up, opened the door a crack, but saw no one in the hall. Rockson closed the door, unfolded the note.
    If you need something, read the scrawl, knock on Room 6, Stella. Before 3 a.m.
    Need something? Oh, a prostitute. Suddenly he remembered Kim and groaned. She’d be missing him. What the hell was he doing here? Then he went into the little john, turned on the faucets, and threw water in his face. He looked at his face in the cracked mirror, his white-streaked hair, his mismatched dark and light blue eyes, and thought, Who am I? Who the hell am I?
    And dimly, a voice deep inside issued, Doomsday Warrior. Doomsday Warrior.
    He closed his eyes, squeezed them till he saw stars. What the hell is a Doomsday Warrior? He couldn’t remember.
    “Stella—maybe Stella knows,” he mumbled. “Maybe I’m here in this cheap hotel for some reason—to meet someone who knows . . .” He put on his shirt and shoes and went down the corridor to number six and knocked. A frowzy redhead in a black slip, about forty years of age, a cigarette dangling from her slash-of-red lips, opened the door.
    “Yeah? Oh, you’re room three? Come in, buddy. Say, you’re not bad, you know. It’s ten bucks extra for special things.” She sat down on the bed and started pulling the slip over her head.
    “I only have four bucks.”
    She laughed. “Down on your luck? Well, so am I, so am I . . . Tell you what, Mister Number Three, I’ll make you a deal: I get to keep all the money I find in your pockets, and that will be the charge. Okay?”
    She was disappointed to find that he told the truth, but said, “A deal’s a deal.”
    Before he knew what was happening, she was stripped. Naked. She was well-built, bony, hard eyed. He felt the urge—primitive, unbridled. He mounted her.
    “Never had a man like you,” she said afterward. She lit a cigarette with shaky hands. “You’re great! Where you from? Out of town?”
    “Out of town,” he mumbled.
    “Thought so,” she said, “Nothin’ like you around here. Say, you got a job or something? You want to live with me?”
    “No . . . got a wife,” he said. “Got a wife.”
    “Don’t they all,” Stella said, sliding her black rayon slip back over her tight body. “How about every Tuesday and Thursday, after work? Only ten bucks— Hell, that’s reasonable.”
    “Ten bucks,” he muttered. “Sounds . . . okay . . .”
    “Then, it’s settled, honey.” She came over and kissed him. “Say, can you stay out all night tonight?”
    “No,” he said. “Got to go home, home . . .”
    “Well, you come back tomorrow—Mr. . . . What’s your name?”
    “Ted.”
    “Well, see you tomorrow midnight, here, Mr. Ted.”
    He went back to his room and stared into the mirror. God, he was hungry, and the cheap whiskey he had swallowed in the redhead’s room was clawing at his gut. His pupils were like pinholes.
    He felt like he had betrayed his wife. He felt ashamed. He had wanted to ask Stella—something. And instead he’d had sex