Final Cut Read online

  Final Cut

  By T.S. Worthington

  Copyright 2016 by Make Profits Easy LLC

  [email protected]

  Table of Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 1

  “She Loves Me Not”

  Was it love?

  Bill Russell wondered these words, almost wondered them aloud as he drove along Route 339 on his way out of Beverly, Ohio moving towards his home in Crestwood Falls. He had just left the home of Nancy Atkins. She was possibly the love of his life, but he had not been sure of this notion until just now while lost in his thoughts driving along the desolate road at ten o’clock at night, his belly still full of the meatloaf that Nancy had prepared before they retired to the living room for some quality time on the couch. Later they had retired to the bedroom.

  But of course Bill could not stay. He was never allowed to stay for the whole night, even though Jake Atkins was not supposed to be back from his current trip until tomorrow evening. It felt wrong sneaking around, but Nancy wanted it that way.

  She was afraid of so many things associated with their forbidden relationship. She was afraid of someone in her neighborhood finding out, even though her nearest neighbor was almost a quarter mile down the road. She was terrified of someone from her church finding out. She was scared of her family finding out. And most of all she was afraid of Jake discovering her secret.

  She and Jake had been married for almost two years, but the relationship had been rocky and tumultuous from the start. She claimed that before they were married it had been perfect but within a few months after they’d tied the knot Jake changed. He started drinking a lot more and he had become controlling and physically abusive. She had shown Bill the scars and the bruises several times in recent months. Every time she showed him a new batch of bruises he snapped and he wanted to go after that bastard and put him in the ground where he could never again lay his beefy hands on this woman.

  But Nancy would not hear of it. She had been raised in a strict Catholic upbringing that did not believe in divorce. Every time she and Bill made love he could see the shame on her face because of the adulterous sin that she was committing in the eyes of God. Bill hated that she felt that way, and he had tried to make her understand that she needed to get away from Jake. The Bible might have disapproved of divorce but it disapproved of abusive husbands even more. She knew this. Bill understood the psychology of what she was going through. He remembered a few things here and there from his psychology classes he had taken at the community college during the two years that he had decided he might have some academic potential in him. This did not last long as he quit pursuing higher education after receiving his associate’s degree in Industrial Technology. This basically qualified him to be a low level flunky in the automotive repair industry or the woodworking industry.

  He had decided on neither. Bill’s passion had always been woodworking and carving. He loved the smooth feel of the wood under his hands, the fact that he could create something beautiful out of nothing, and he loved the isolation of working alone in his shop all day long. His father had been a wood shop teacher and amateur woodworker as well. He remembered a lot of weekends while the other kids were playing ball and he’d be holed up with his dad in the garage watching his dad work on some new piece of furniture or sculpture that he would sell for a pretty penny to someone in town who had commissioned him for the project. Bill knew from an early age that was what he wanted to do.

  He wished his love life had been more clear cut and was as easy to manage as a piece of wood was in his hands. He’d met Nancy at Roy’s, the local bar that he frequented one night after a long day of work. This was a usual routine that he adhered to a few times a week; especially on Thursdays when the Roy’s had their all you can eat BBQ wings special. The best wings he’d ever put in his mouth and he often ate about five plates full and washed them down with two pitchers of beer. Luckily Roy’s was within walking distance and he hardly ever drove there, just in case he was a bit too much under the influence of fried wings and beer when he rolled out of the place a few hours later.

  When he’d met Nancy she was there with her cousin Linda. Linda was visiting as she passed through on her way to Columbus for a new job that she’d been offered. Linda was from Ripley, WV –a town about forty miles south. Bill had been through there a time or two and it was a town where nothing really happened at all. Nancy was from there as well and it was no surprise why anyone would ever want to get out of it.

  Nancy and Linda had been sitting at the bar just having a few drinks and eating some sandwiches. Linda seemed to be having a blast and darting her gaze around the bar to see if it landed on anything interesting. And it landed on Bill’s own gaze that night. Linda was just his type at first glance. She was sexy and confident, with a pretty face, a full chest and the kind of curves that Hollywood plastic surgeons dreamed of creating.

  As he sauntered over to ask her if he could buy her a refill Bill noticed Nancy for the first time. She was looking away nervously, as if she was embarrassed for Linda that a strange man was approaching her. There was something about the way that Nancy glanced around nervously as if she did not realize the power of her own beauty. She and Linda actually looked a lot alike, but where Linda was overflowing with confidence, Nancy was overflowing with self-doubt. For whatever reason her shy, introverted nature drew him to her and he almost ignored Linda after introducing himself to both girls.

  Nancy began to loosen up a little bit after Linda convinced her to pour a few more beers down her throat. She was still crazy shy, but she began to respond to his advances a little more and after Linda started talking to some other guy Nancy began to focus a little more on Bill. They moved over to a smaller table away from the noise of the bar to talk. Bill found out later on how nervous Nancy had been talking to him. He thought it was obvious that she was just shy, but she later told him she was terrified that someone she knew might see her, even though they were in a bar in a town about twenty miles from where she lived. That was the only way Nancy had agreed to go out with Linda. She knew that Jake would never have approved of her going out to some bar without him, especially being with Linda who he had always referred to as a Jezebel whore.

  Bill left with her email that night. He found it odd that she did not give him her number, but she would not hear of him calling the house and Jake finding out some way. She had a fake email that she used mostly for junk mail that her husband did not know about. Bill was surprised when she answered his first email. They began to chat back and forth as often as they could. It was a bit slower than Bill was used to with women; an IM would have been much faster but Nancy was not at all comfortable with that because she felt it might leave a trace of evidence that Jake would stumble upon.

  Bill was a bit surprised when she told him that she was married, but it did not necessarily bother him. He was not the type of guy to go around trying to steal women away from their husbands or wreck families, but he was intrigued by Nancy and saw no harm in just chatting with her for a bit. It was harmless fun. Besides within five minutes of finding out about her marriage he could tell that she was insanely unhappy.

  He had been around enough to know the signs of a battered woman. In fact, Bill had grown up watching his own mother get bullied and beaten by his deadbeat father. He knew the type very well and he hated those kinds of men to his very core. Anytime he saw a woman getting hurt by a man it
was all he could do to keep from wringing the bastard’s neck. A man who hit a woman was the lowest scum of the earth.

  By the time he was fourteen he was big enough and strong enough to intervene without getting his own head bashed in. He remembered the last time his father had laid a hand on his mother. She had overcooked the chicken a bit and his father began to get worked up in his drunken stupor as he always did. Bill did not blame the alcohol on what his father was, but it was like pouring gasoline on a fire that was already pretty damn big.

  His dad pushed his mother across the kitchen, her frail body slamming into the counter and bouncing her to the floor. Bill jumped out of his seat and tackled his dad to the floor. His father had not expected Bill to jump him that way and in his drunken state he had been fairly easy to knock down, even though Bill was about fifty pounds lighter.

  Bill seized the opportunity as his father’s head hit the lower cabinets and he came to a rest on the floor. Bill kicked his father hard in the face, shattering several teeth and breaking his nose. The old man looked up at him bloody and dazed, his eyes a mixture of rage and defeat. Bill told him to get the hell out.

  The old man quickly packed a bag and walked out the door and out of their lives for good. Bill had heard that his father passed away from cirrhosis of the liver a few years ago. He did not think of shedding a tear.

  Bill could see the wonderful person that Nancy was right away and when he really thought about it he knew that there was a special spark between them from the start. He had never really felt a strong connection to a woman after just barely meeting her. It was a new experience and he was welcoming it with open arms. Bill had been in love just twice in his life. The first was to his high school sweetheart who he thought he was going to marry after graduation, but she decided that college was more important and she had walked out of his life.

  The second was a woman he had dated about a year before he met Nancy. He had walked into the apartment they shared after coming home from class early one day when the professor had called in sick and he had caught a friend of his in bed with his woman. He had replayed the scene in his mind over and over again and he could not believe how calmly he had acted at this sight. Instead of getting mad and yelling at the both of them or telling Traci what a whore she was or even bashing the skull in of Evan, who he had considered a good friend, he just smiled and shook his head as he walked out the door. It was good to know what kind of a person they both were instead of finding out later after he’d married the girl and really had something to lose.

  But there was something different about Nancy that he just could not put his finger on. She made him feel happy to be him. He had always been secure with himself and he was secure in what he did for a living, but something about being with a woman like Nancy just made him feel a little more special and put an extra spring in his step. He knew that was what women were supposed to make you feel like when you found the right one. Bill had never considered himself a hopeless romantic or anything of the sort, but he knew how he felt and how he wanted to feel. And with Nancy he had that.

  They had finally agreed to spend an evening together about a month after they met. Jake was a long haul truck driver and he was going to be gone on a trip for several days. So Nancy finally bit the bullet and agreed for Bill to come over.

  That night was perhaps the most amazing night he had ever experienced and he knew instantly that Nancy felt the same way. The two had not really looked back since and every time that Jake was going to be away for several days Bill and Nancy got together. Sometimes it was her place and sometimes it was his. Bill would not have minded picking her up and bringing her to and from her house every time, but Nancy had eased up a bit on the restrictions and allowed him to come to her place where she would usually cook an amazing dinner. They would then watch classic movies from the forties and fifties. For some reason Bill had always loved the style and the relaxed tone of old movies. You could really sink your teeth into the characters and watch the humanity happening behind the plot line. It was refreshing.

  Nancy loved it also. She told him how Jake never appreciated anything except wrestling and movies with lots of killing. That was not really a surprise given what Bill knew of Jake. The man had no taste and sounded pretty one dimensional.

  Bill wasn’t sure how long this was going to go on with Nancy before she finally just decided she had to make a break and leave the prick. Bill knew that it was nothing to do with him or her feelings for him holding her back. It was just the fear that Jake had instilled in her. He had her too scared to take a long breath without his say so. The least little thing would set him off and he would go off on a tirade that often ended in violence against Nancy. But Bill knew that battered women had to make the decision for themselves and if they were lucky enough to live through it until they reached that breaking point then they would one day decide that they’d had enough.

  Bill just hoped it was soon. He had fantasies of what the life that he and Nancy could lead would be like. It could have been perfect. But he knew as Nancy did that even if she did leave Jake he would never leave her alone. A man like that had to be put away and if it came right down to it, Bill thought he could make it happen.

  He turned off 339 onto 550 and began the last five miles of his journey to reach Crestwood Falls. He lived just on the outskirts of it in a medium sized house with a fairly large garage that was perfect for his work space. Bill had been renting the place for almost a year and he liked it fairly well, but he was hoping for something bigger one day. Especially if he ever had a family. He couldn’t see raising a family in a house that size. Plus he was starting to outgrow his garage and hoped that he could one day find a house with something a bit bigger.

  He couldn’t wait to get to sleep soon. It had been a long day and an even longer week and he just wanted to relax with a couple of beers and possibly fall asleep in his comfy easy chair recliner. He slept more in that chair than he ever did in his bed. There was just something about how comfortable the thing was that once he was settled into it he never wanted to get out of it and get moving to go to bed.

  “Don’t fucking move!”

  The voice growled in his ear as the barrel of the gun simultaneously poked against the back of his neck. The gun was cold and it felt like death brushing along the base of his neck sending stabbing spikes of fear echoing up and down his spine.

  Bill could not see the reflection in the rearview mirror. The voice did not sound familiar either. How had this person gotten inside of his car? He thought he had locked it at Nancy’s.

  Bill licked his lips aware suddenly of just how dry they were. “Who are you—“

  “DON’T FUCKING SAY A WORD!”

  The voice was hissing loudly in his ear, the gun jerking hard against his neck with every syllable of rage that spewed from this man’s mouth. The man was insane and for a moment Bill had the image of an escaped lunatic who was on a killing spree and he was going to be the next victim. It was like an episode of The Hitchcock Hour that he watched on Netflix sometimes.

  He wanted to communicate with this man and find out what he wanted and how he could make this whole situation be over as quickly and as easily as possible, but he knew that if he said anything he would agitate the man and the gun might go off accidentally—or not so accidentally.

  “You piece of shit…” the man hissed in a low grunt that sounded almost as if he was trying to disguise his voice. The voice sounded more snake than human, like what one might imagine a talking serpent to sound like tempting the good in man in a Biblical Prophecy.

  Bill gulped as he concentrated on holding his body as still as possible. He did not want to give this man any reason to think that he was going to try anything or that he did not fully intend to cooperate. The man just needed to know that they were on the same side and he wanted him to have whatever he wanted. That was what Bill wanted to communicate to this person. And since the psycho would not permit him to speak, he had to just show cal
m and steady movements. That’s right. They were just a couple of guys chilling out and relaxing on a nice little road trip. That was all.

  “You think you are something, don’t you? You think that you can just do whatever you want in this world and not have any consequences. Well, asshole that is not the way the world works.”

  This guy was really starting to freak Bill out. The man was under some sort of a conspiracy kick or was suffering some sort of delusions of righteousness where he had a vendetta to settle with the entire world and right now that entire world was Bill Russell.

  Bill’s mind began to leap into overdrive as he madly thought of ways that he could end the whole situation. The man was not wearing a seatbelt and was leaning in from the back seat. It might be plausible to step on the brakes and send the moron flying through the windshield. Bill was pretty sure he had seen this in a movie somewhere at some time. But he was honestly not sure that would work and if it didn’t then the man would just become more enraged and probably shoot him where he sat in a heartbeat.

  But was the man that crazy? Was he of sound enough mind to realize that if he killed Bill then the car would go out of control and they would both be killed? Did the man have enough foresight in him to realize any of this? That was the million dollar question that dictated how well Bill was going to get out of this alive and what the possibilities of the hand was that he’d been dealt.

  “Well, this time you are going to pay motherfucker!” The man continued his rant from the backseat. His breath was hot and had a foul odor as it blasted into Bill’s ear and echoed forward past his face. He tried to hold back a gag.

  The guy was going off the rails. He had stopped taking his medication or something. He was obviously a paranoid schizophrenic and Bill had seen enough new specials to know that these people are highly volatile and not to be reasoned with. He might just have been screwed.