Updates EVERY Monday | Wednesday | Friday
Chapters: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 |10 | 11
Chapter 12
Myra felt guilty.
She wasn’t there for Dixie when he needed her. Myra knew that Dixie would sometimes “blank-out” – for lack of a better term – when he caught a particularly interesting scent, the result of which was a total loss of self; control, identity, inhibitions – all that mattered was following the scent. That is why she always stuck so close to him, to keep him safe when that happened – as he had kept her safe in the past.
But this time he assured her the crime scene was too old and he was sure all exotic trails would have dissipated already, while they both knew full well he actually wanted to spare her the grim scene of blood and gore that he was sure would conjure up images best left buried in her sub-consciousness. A six hour old crime scene was nothing to a man with Dixie’s talents – a week might have been a challenge.
She knew this but was just too happy to oblige, and now look what happened. Dixie was stuck in a Hospital bed at Cape Town General with a broken leg and she knew the smells were going to drive him crazy when he woke up.
Myra lazily read a book as she waited by Dixie’s bedside, but the words in the novel made no sense to her. Her mind was involuntarily being pulled back into the past and she could not help but reminisce about the night she first met Dixie Bannerman.
Myra was a beautiful woman – not exotic beauty mind you – but the girl next door kind. Her olive skin glistened in the sun and her big emerald eyes were always friendly and inviting. She had an infectious laugh which she used often and her small frame was well toned by regular exercise.
It were these characteristics that first drew Simonstown’s resident bad-boy McMillan to her. At that time Myra was only twenty one and she was working at the local shoe store. She was an innocent; not wise to the ways of the world.
As a result, when the dark and muscular McMillan showed the slightest interest in her, she was instantly swept of her feet. He would pick her up after work on his black Harley Davidson and they would drive all along the Cape Coast for hours. McMillan offered Myra the world and she readily accepted.
She felt confined and restricted from new possibilities and adventures by her day to day life. Their parents died when they were only nine, and even though they stayed with their grandmother, Dusty looked after her ever since. He was too overprotective at times and he did not approve of McMillan at all. Myra could never break free from the boundaries of Simontown, and in McMillan she saw a chance for a different kind of life – For some excitement.
She just didn’t know how exciting until that one evening when he forced her to help rob a convenience store in Hermanus.
Everything was going great that day; they were riding on the Harley and even had a picnic that morning as they were whale watching. McMillan was his normal charming self and he promised her the world. They laughed and kissed and made love on the beach when nobody was looking, but when the sun began to set McMillan’s demeanour changed.
Myra had never seen such a complete shift in a human being. Darkness came over him and he got up to get something from his duffle bag. McMillan came back to where Myra was sitting with two ski-masks and a pistol tucked in his jeans.
He said it was time for her to be a good girl and earn her keep. He hit her very hard in the face when she refused, thinking the whole thing was a joke. Her eye was swollen shut and blood gushed from her nose like a waterfall.
He laughed when he saw her terror.
She was dragged, kicking and screaming, all the way towards the Convenience store. There he forced her to pack the money in a bag and she could only look on when he shot the store clerk and an elderly patron – her punishment for putting up such a fuss.
The honeymoon was over and she finally saw McMillan for the devil he truly was. Her mind raced with thoughts of her brother and grandmother – will she survive this and ever see them again? Looking in McMillan’s monstrous eyes she was certain she would not.
They embarked on a crime spree the likes of which the Western Cape had rarely seen – sleeping in cheap motels at night where questions were never asked and only eating at greasy fast food joints when the hunger got too bad. Whenever she tried to get away he would beat her mercilessly and he even shot her in the leg once. This period of terror lasted about a month and she wondered what Dusty was thinking. Did he think she finally abandoned him and ran away, never to be heard from again? She hoped her brother would know her better than that and would try and find her.
Then, one evening as they were doing a home invasion in a quiet suburb of Houtbay, McMillan really got crazy. He tied up the whole family and dragged the father into the bedroom. There he proceeded to torture him into giving up information on where he kept his valuables. As he was busy Myra decided that she could bear this no longer, even if it meant her life. She quietly cut loose the mother and her two children and hurried them towards the back door through the kitchen.
McMillan was blocking their exit with a smirk on his face.
He grabbed Myra by the hair and whispered in her ear: “You seemed to have forgotten what happens when you disobey me. Now these people have to pay for your sins.”
McMillan worked on the family with a kitchen knife, laughing like a maniac all the time. Myra curled up in a corner as she watched the blood splatter all over the kitchen, the mother contorted in an unnatural position. She wanted this all to be over and started to black out.
Myra suddenly came to her senses as she heard a crash and saw a man standing in the doorway of the kitchen. He moved quickly and quietly towards McMillan who looked surprised at the intruder’s appearance. She had never seen an expression of uncontrolled rage as she saw on the stranger’s face that night.
McMillan rushed the man but he gracefully evaded his clumsy attack and proceeded to take the knife from him. Myra could not remember everything clearly, but she did see McMillan’s nose was broken and his eyes were swollen shut. When this happened in the exchange she could not say.
The stranger stood in the middle of the dark kitchen and surveyed the situation around him. McMillan was huddled in the corner opposite Myra and was now crying and begging like a little child. The man turned towards Myra and said: “Don’t worry; this will all be over soon.”
He then turned around and knife in hand gave his full attention to McMillan for over two minutes. She has never heard a grown man scream like her captor of the last month did that evening. Her fragile psyche could not handle it anymore and she finally passed out.
The rest was history.
Four days later she woke up with her brother by her side at the hospital. They didn’t talk for awhile and only hugged each other fiercely. Later that week, she formally met Dixie for the first time and hugged him for what seemed like a lifetime, tears streaming down her face. A couple of days after that, when she realized she had lost her job at the shoe store due to being AWOL for over a month, Dixie came to her rescue once again and offered her and Dusty – who was also unemployed at the time – jobs in his newly erected Diner.
He was staying in Simonstown, and she could not be happier. When she once asked her brother how Dixie came to help them he looked slightly embarrassed and avoided the question. She decided that she would not ask again and didn’t care. He was in their lives and she was fine with that – More than fine.
Myra was pulled from her thoughts as Dixie started to stir. He opened his eyes and gestured weakly for a sip of water. She held his hand as he drained the glass in three big gulps. They sat for awhile just looking at each other. Minutes passed, but he finally found his voice and pulled her closer: “Dark room chemicals. That was the smell. Tell the cops we are looking for a photographer.”
Can’t Wait for it to finish? Buy for 99c on AMAZON (kindle), SMASHWORDS (multiple devices), Sony E-Bookstore
