Free Single White Psycopath Seeks Same by Jeff Strand

and wait for a chance to escape.
    “I don’t want him hurt,” I said.
    Daniel gave me a quizzical look.
    “Not yet,” I amended.
    “Well, of course. Gotta keep him in good shape for the games, so we can really hurt him. But you’ll learn all about that later.”
    Foster slid open the van door, shoved Roger inside, and got in after him. I flinched as he slammed the door, and prayed that Daniel didn’t notice.
    “Where’s your suitcase?” Daniel asked.
    Thomas had packed a suitcase, just for show. But it was in the trunk of the rental car, and Thomas had the key. “One of those bums stole it,” I said angrily. “I would’ve gone after him and sliced his homeless head off, but I couldn’t leave Roger. Why did you have me waiting in there, anyway?”
    “Just wanted to get your vacation off to an exciting start. I promised you a wild time, and I aim to deliver. Did you lose anything essential?”
    “Just clothes.”  I pointed to some spots of blood that led down the sidewalk. “Looks like he left a trail, though.”
    Daniel grinned. “Wanna go after him?”
    “You better believe it.”
    “Race ya!”
    Daniel started running down the sidewalk. I took a step and nearly slipped. I was wearing sneakers, which weren’t the best footwear for sprinting down icy sidewalks. While my chances of getting the gun away from Daniel were better if we were out of sight of the van, it wasn’t exactly credible that a serial killer who could decapitate five people so effectively couldn’t run down the sidewalk without falling on his ass. I took another step, nearly lost my balance again, and decided to give it up.
    “Nah, don’t worry about it!” I called after him. “He’s long-gone. Everything he took is replaceable.”
    Daniel slid to a graceful halt. “You sure? We could cause him some big-time pain. It’d be fun.”
    “I got here early, so it’s been almost an hour. Actually, I’m freezing to death out here. I hope we’re going someplace warm.”
    “I don’t wanna wreck the surprise. Let’s get in the van.”

    WHILE I feel guilty admitting this, the simple truth is that I’m a darn good liar. Now, Helen does tend to catch me on occasion, and I know I’m caught when I’m treated to The Gaze, but when my spouse isn’t involved, I can fib with the best of them. I am certainly not proud of this, and if I could change my ways I would, but the fact remains that I’m a good liar, and Daniel was buying my story.
    Well, he acted like he was buying it, anyway. But he also made no secret of the fact that he still had a gun, as did Foster in the back. Even if I could wrestle the gun away from Daniel, which I probably couldn’t, I’d end up taking a few rounds of semi-automatic fire from Foster. Some might say that it would serve me right for all that lying, but that’s beside the point.
    As Daniel drove, I explained how everything I’d become famous for was really a distortion of the truth. Yeah, I’d stopped the snuff film creators and distributors, but only because they tried to screw me out of my share of the profits. Nobody left alive knew the truth, not my wife, and especially not Roger. And I told them all about Ned Markstein, my second identity in Manhattan, complete with four (count ‘em, four!) girlfriends. Then I told them about the murders. I’d spent three days quizzing Thomas, so the details weren’t difficult to recall, though getting the attitude right was tough. I basically just tried to sound very proud of my accomplishments, as if I were talking about the time I caught sixty-three pieces of popcorn that were tossed across the room in my mouth, and really only missed the sixty-fourth because of a bad throw on Roger’s part.
    Roger remained silent in the back of the van. I sincerely hoped he knew I was making up the story to help us both get out of this, and not to save my own butt. He wasn’t trying to sabotage my web of lies, so I assumed that he knew. I still felt like a total