Afternoon sunlight leaks through closed curtains. She fights to stay awake, sinking into the recliner's supple leather, socked feet against the rug. Remote in hand snaps the widescreen television on. CNN's prim-voiced newscasters are a welcome break in the apartment's quiet. Luxurious and still, the empty rooms had been napping with her. In her state of exhaustion the veneered walls resemble the inside of a casket, the relaxed waking death far too pleasurable.
Her arrival in this chair marks the end of a two-hour crucible, which Ashley began in the master bedroom's bed. She had been lying sideways, tangled with jersey sheets and wool blanket, head confused among broad pillows. She'd been sleeping, yes, but is such rest -- the sort of rest we take in the middle of the day after complete exhaustion, the sort of rest in which our minds drink wetly inked dreams the way a man dying of thirst will drink water, the sort of rest where to move our bodies is akin to a move through thick syrup -- is such rest simply sleep? This is the sort of rest Ashley had been having, in complete darkness cocooned within a four-poster Victorian bed and flannel pajamas.
While outside it has been at times near zero degrees, Ashley had been on the bed, cradled by the periodic hum of a fan blowing warm air into the room. The sound came from the depths of the building somewhere, the concept itself one of sublime calm: an unseen relay's response to the change of a few hundred billion electrons, closing the circuit for the fan's motor to spool up and scoop upon its blades warm, invisible air.
She would wake, look across the room at bright blue digital numbers, realize the entire morning slipped by her and promptly go back to sleep. This clock awareness ritual occurred many times. The last time, Ashley slunk out of the bed's side and onto the floor, crawled into the living room where, squinting against shafts of light coming through the bay window's blinds, she eventually crawled into this leather chair.
She now sits, legs slightly parted and hands wrapped about the remote control which is entirely too heavy. Ashley has no desire to open those blinds up to the late afternoon winter sunlight of Hoboken, New Jersey where she knows the air is frigid and restricting. Were it not for Stryker she would have taken herself immediately and without delay back to Tasmania a long time ago.
Electronica filled the darkness; laser-lit and tobacco-smoked with neon billiard balls on black felt. She played well and time marched on. She gambled her body against the male cash dressed in expensive colors, silver and tattoos. She won so much; she nearly always won after taking care of the details with a cue stick rocking in one hand and the other draped over a muscular shoulder as she whispered into an ear the prizes she'd forfeit if she lost. (She had lost, once, third shot with nothing but the eight left it dangling just a bit too close to a side-pocket and the man with the denim and giant muscles gently took her to one of the sofas and she wrapped her lips around him, not at all unpleasant, as people hid them). The music sounded to her a mix of natures both carnal and spiritual. Church music, if desire were God and made sense to worship at two and three in the morning while smoking tobacco and warring on pool tables. She did not need the money. Stryker questioned nothing and handed her stacks of green hundreds whenever she asked. She often gave away entire rolls to homeless people on her walk home. Last night, she hadn't. Reeking of smoke, other women's perfume and dry ice as the sun rose over Manhattan she went into an Alphabet City diner, wearing stiletto-heeled boots, leather pants, a shimmering blue top and a biker's jacket. She ate slowly and to her fill. A cab ride back into Hoboken saw her home at close to seven in the morning. Immediately she stripped, showered and crawled into bed. Stryker wasn't back yet. Stryker returned not long after, she knew she hadn't been sleeping, exactly, but hadn't been awake anymore either. She could hear the thunder of his boots in the living room and heard him cursing under his breath. "Wake up," he said as he entered the room. "I'm awake," Ashley answered. He'd sat in the chair in the corner of the room and started to unlace his boots. "Then sit on your knees, face away from me and pull your pants down." Ashley's heart pounded and her mouth went dry. Shaking, she sat up in the bed and as a wave of dizziness threatened to topple her, she pulled pajamas and panties down below her buttocks and fought not to shake. "That's better." Whisper of cloth sliding off him. "Your pussy had better be wet by the time I get there." Ahsley tried to swallow; her vagina was as dry as her mouth. She heard him stand up and march to her; bare feet somehow more menacing as his weight fell onto the carpeted floor. Then his calloused fingers ran the length of her lips and his breathing turned deep, and desperate. And hungry. An arm surrounded her, its bicep thick and flexed. Smell of cigarettes and sweat and feel of his skin, hot against her own "Oh, that's just wonderful", he said, and Ashley knew, could feel the burn of his fingers against her dry flesh. But before his hand came down on her ass, stinging, her nether lips soaked the insides of her thighs and she cried. "I'm wet, Stryker...I'm wet now..." though she knew it to be too late. He smacked her buttocks over and over again and she clawed at his arm with her hands and couldn't move the solid muscle there and the harder she got hit and the tighter he squeezed the more aroused she became. And the harder she cried. Her mind stopped gripping reality, somewhere, and came back just as the air against her buttocks stung and he swung her around and pointed at his hard, erect penis. "Suck it," he said. Eager, tired, in need beyond anything she dared examine with intellect, she took the head of his penis into her mouth and caressed it, working at it slowly and wrapped her hand around the shaft. She tried (now as always) to pay attention to the moment, the sensation itself, of his penis entering her but lost track as she nearly always did and soon she laid on her back, wrists immobile above her head in his hands and orgasms simply a constant part of her innards. She'd slept, then, remembering Stryker's muttering something about a meeting in less than an hour, much to his dislike.
"So who we waiting on, again?" Stryker asks, using his fingers to pop another piece of the smoked salmon into his mouth. The subterranean room is dark, with forest green walls and a shag black rug. There is every type of food available on a back table, from the smoked salmon Stryker is gorging on to pastries, egg and cheese vretád and benedict, sliced meets, and fresh fruit. The men sit on burgundy leather covered furniture, the lighting coming from green-shaded brass lamps. A monolithic desk of dark wood and recessed leather blotters is against the back wall, its high-backed leather chair empty.
Bill coughs, Mathew mutters and Rick adjusts in his char. Stryker shakes his head. "Yeah, whatever." Another piece of salmon. "Anyone even know what this is about?" More coughing, muttering, and adjusting. Then it hits him. "We're waiting on Dramius. He's the only one not here." Carlos Ignacius Dramius, second in command of the NYPD's narcotics division and unofficial general of the BLOODS. Stryker likes Dramius, aside from the guy's constant need to appear so god awful mysterious. Like now. It's no mystery he's the one who's called this meeting, but Christ lease out his cross before Dramius admitted to it.
Luckily for Stryker, Dramius likes him back. Stryker is certain the other three men in this room live in constant fear of the big black man, and for good reason: Dramius has a habit of killing those from whom he feels even a minor threat. The thought leads Stryker to the nine millimeter Smith & Wesson Dealerker-clutched under his nylon flight jacket, as though such a weapon would be remotely effective against whatever organization of human sociopathic monstrosity Dramius would send to kill Stryker, were Dramius to feel the need. For that matter, Stryker has never fired the gun at anything but paper targets. The gun is just another part of the game; another bit of the excess characterizing his chosen profession, not dissimilar to the gigantic array of gourmet food on the back table which would in its overwhelming majority end up in the garbage.
Stryker is also the only one dressed as he is, in black cargo pants, black leather infantry combat boots, a long-sleeved black thermal stretch top, the nylon flight jacket and the logo-less black baseball hat. The other three clowns are in wool suits, each purchased at a cost near or equal to a brand new compact automobile. Stryker eats more salmon in an effort not to laugh.
"Good morning, gentleman," Dramius says as he enters the room, filling it with both his presence and his bass voice. The three men stand. Stryker doesn't need to; he hasn't sat down yet. "I hope everyone is enjoying the holidays. Stryker. Glad you could make it."
"Like I had a choice," Stryker says, and smiles when Dramius laughs. None of the other three could have said it.
"Very well then," Dramius says, sitting behind the desk, "let's get down to it. A few loose ends to clean up and we'll all be able to return to our loved ones for the holidays." Dramius simply folds his giant hands, his wedding ring and NYPD ring glittering. There's no paper for meetings like this. "Everything delivered?"
"Everything's delivered," Rick answers.
"The guy from the D.E.A," Dramius says, staring at Mathew, "he bought yet?"
"We're set up," Mathew answers, "but we're a day late. He couldn't clear the last slip before the sixth. Is that acceptable?"
Dramius pauses. "Do we have a choice?"
Mathew shrugs, "Always," he says, "but it'll take a lot more money, and another week to set up."
Dramius stares at his desk. After a moment, he starts nodding. "No, the sixth is acceptable." Then, "Bill. What's the current status with Alonzo shipping?"
"Mr. Alonzo cashed the check, himself, this morning."
Dramius nods again. "Then we're finished." He stands. "Gentlemen, have a very Merry Christmas and a wonderful new year. Stryker, I'd like to see you before you leave. The rest of you, I appreciate your time and attention."
Great, Stryker thinks as the other three leave the office as quickly as they dare, fucking great. Dramius comes out from behind the desk and sits on it. "How is everything, Stryker?"
"Everything's fine, Sir," he says, "except that my girlfriend is waiting for me in Hoboken and I'd really like to do something with her for Christmas this year."
Dramius chuckles. "I understand. I haven't seen my wife and daughters for a week. Listen, Stryker, I have a small favor to ask of you."
"A favor?" Stryker asks, "that means I can say no?"
Laughter, this time, actual laughter with an accompanying smile. "Yes, Stryker, you can say no. My feelings won't be hurt. It's a simple thing."
"What is it?"
