Sex and Murder Magazine

By Mark Smith-Briggs

“You sure you want to be sitting so close to a killer?’’ Martin asked the preacher as he settled beside him on the bed, “They say I’m dangerous.”

The preacher laughed, loosening his collar and dropping a bible onto the bed.

“I’ll take my chances,’’ he said.

He removed a faded set of leather gloves and pulled a pack of cigarettes from his shirt pocket.

“Besides, there’s nothing ruthless about doing what needed to be done.”

The preacher lit a cigarette, inhaled deeply, and blew smoke across the cell.
Martin studied him closely. His face was calm, but his eyes burned with a strange, knowing intensity. He was like no man of the cloth Martin had ever seen.

“So, you really think I’m worth saving?’’ Martin asked.

The preacher dropped the cigarette, butting it out on the floor with his shoe.

“I make no promises of salvation,” he said, “I just want to hear your story.’’

Martin pushed off the bed.

“Then pick up a paper. It will tell you all you need to know.’’

The preacher shook his head.

“I don’t trust the things. They tend to twist the facts to their liking too much. I prefer to hear things from the source.’’

The preacher waited, taking out a second cigarette. This time he offered one to Martin.

“So, what do you want to know?’’ Martin asked after a long time.

The preacher rested his head against the wall and checked his watch.

“We’ve got plenty of time. Why don’t you start at the beginning.”

*****

One Year Ago.

Martin awoke sluggishly, welcoming the New Year with a pounding hangover. The kind he got after especially big nights out, where his pulse pounded the inside of his temples like a Congo drum and his past two meals rested uncomfortably against the back of his throat. He groaned, suddenly regretting that last shot (he always blamed the last one), and buried his head into the pillow. The pungent odours of cheap perfume and day-old beer wafted from the fibres.

With a great effort he managed to lift his head and glance at the bedside clock. The world swam, and it took a moment for his brain to join them from its burrow in the pillow. The vomit rose further in his throat, threatening to spew out from the corners of his mouth. The feeling passed and the LCD digits came into focus. It was 11:43 am. No wonder he felt like shit; he’d been asleep for less than five hours.

He rolled over, expecting to snuggle into the warmth of his sleeping wife, but only found a cold, crumpled pillow. She’d obviously snuck out of bed early. But had she even gone to bed with him? Martin wasn’t so sure. The later stages of the night were a blur at best. Disappointed, he hugged the pillow anyway, distracting himself with the sounds of the forest life outside.

The quiet motel in the hills had been the perfect idea; a way to escape the usual bustle of inner city living and chill out for a few days. After two peaceful nights alone they’d welcomed in the New Year drinking and dancing with a few of the motel staff and guests at the site’s small restaurant and bar. After years of formal parties and black tie events, the relaxed celebrations had been more fun than all the other festivities combined. His wife, Jen, had been the life of the party in a stunning, hi-cut, silk dress that fell just below the curves of her ass. Martin was told more than once how lucky he was to have such a woman at his beck and call. He smiled, remembering how cute her butt looked against the drape of the fabric.

A low gasp emitted from the next room, dragging Martin back from his daydream. He shot bolt upright and listened. Bed springs squeaked. Someone was in the spare bedroom.

“Hon,’’ he called, “Is that you?”

The squeaking stopped. Voices drifted in hushed tones from the other room. Martin froze. Was that a second voice he heard? The room fell silent. Martin waited. After a few minutes a female, (his wife?) giggled. The squeaking started up again.

Bad thoughts ran through Martin’s head. It couldn’t be what he thought it was; could it? His mind racing, Martin slid out of bed and crept across the polished floorboards. The spare room door was shut. He pressed his ear against the wood and listened. The squeaking grew in intensity, joined by several sharp gasps. Even through the door he recognised the voice. His wife was in that room.

Martin grasped the handle and held his breath. His head pounded, but it was no-longer from the hangover. A welt of rage bubbled inside. He turned the handle, putting the full weight of his shoulder into the wood as he burst open the door.

His wife knelt on all fours across the side of the bed. She was still wearing the high-cut black dress. Its shoulder strap had been torn and her breasts tumbled out of the fabric. The hem was crumpled up to expose her buttocks and groin. A young, naked man (Martin recognised him from the night before) supported her from behind, thrusting greedily. Jenny moaned at each thrust, tilting her head back in erotic pleasure. It took a moment or two for the couple to realise that they had been sprung.

His wife screamed at the sight of Martin and pushed away from the naked man. Her hands raised in a defensive half guard.

“Honey, it’s not what it looks like.’’ she said.

Martin spied the bulging erection of the stranger on the bed, his penis slick from the juices of their lovemaking.

“I can’t believe you.’’ he said, talking through gritted teeth. “The nerve! In here, while I sleep?”

A thousand bad thoughts bubbled through his brain. It took every ounce of self-control not to just charge the bed and throttle them both.

“Did you think I wouldn’t find out?”

Martin pounded his leg with a closed fist. The slap of flesh against flesh echoed across the room. It reminded him of the sound his wife and this man made while they fucked.

“It’s not her fault.’’ the workman said.

“Don’t say a word!” Martin warned.

He felt the rage shutting down his thoughts, clouding reason and logic until instinct was all that remained. He started towards the bed. His toe smashed against something hard. A workman’s belt full of tools and a crumpled hotel maintenance uniform littered the floor. Martin howled in rage, bending down to massage his foot. Instead, he felt his fingers grasp the black rubber handle of a hammer.

“Now calm down honey,’’ his wife pleaded. Her eyes wide with fright as she watched Martin fumble through the workman’s belt, “You’ve got to hear us out.”

Us? You and the workman are an us? Martin wanted to scream. Instead, he heard a cold, calm voice vibrate from his lips.

“I don’t really feel like talking right now hon.’’ it said.

Martin didn’t know where the voice came from, but it seemed to be handling the situation better than he was. He felt his legs carry him closer to the bed; to his darling wife, all filthy and exposed. His arms raised the hammer.

The workman lunged between Jen and Martin.

“Come on now,’’ he said in his best ‘let’s all be friends’ now voice. “Nobody wants to do anything stupid.’’

“It’s too late for that,’’ the new Martin said.

He couldn’t tear his eyes of the workman’s engorged prick. It degraded him in ways he never thought possible. It was a shining beacon of the workman’s triumph and Martin’s failure; an insult to Martin’s own limp existence.

Martin swung the hammer.

*****

He came to in a room slick with blood and gore. The workman’s face, or what was left of it, was twisted awkwardly into the pillow. Fragments of brain and bone splattered across the sheets and bed head. A second pool of blood massed around the man’s crotch. Martin’s wife was no-where to be seen. He still held the hammer; its surface stained auburn red.

He dropped the hammer and vomited, emptying the contents of a booze-laden night down his chest and onto the floor. The nausea quickly changed to fear. He stood and called to his wife. No-one answered. Slowly, he walked to the other side of the bed, fearing her mangled corpse would be strewn out across the floor. It was empty. The bedside clock read 12:15 pm. Half an hour had passed.

There was a knock outside the door. Flashing lights pulsed through the window. Martin collapsed onto his knees as the door was kicked in. A number of uniformed officers, protected by helmets and bullet-proof vests stormed the room. They tackled him head on, smashing Martin’s face into the worn, checkered carpet. From the doorway, Martin’s wife screamed.

*****

The trial was over before it began. The media hyped the killing as one of the most brutal and vicious attacks recorded in Victorian history. Public outcry from across the country demanded the ‘Claw Hammer Killer’ pay for what he’d done. He was convicted in less than three weeks. The case also coincided with a much larger, more important event – an election year.

The Federal Government in power, a dominant force for many years, had been staring down the barrel of a likely defeat. So, in an unprecedented 11 hour move the Prime Minister vowed, if re-elected, to re-introduce capital punishment and make Martin pay the ultimate price.

The voters swung in droves and on a triumphant election night, the Prime Minister announced to the country that Martin Claw would be put to death by lethal injection at 12:01 am on January 1, the very minute that the capital punishment laws came back into effect.

Martin was locked away in Victoria’s highest security prison and kept on 24-hour suicide watch to ensure the masses that they weren’t short changed of their justice. The public went back to their day-to-day lives, happy to have been distracted from the tax hikes and booming petrol prices for a while. Martin waited for death.

*****

“And I’ve been locked in this hole 23 hours a day for the past three months just waiting to die.’’ Martin finished, “So tell me preacher, you still think the lord will save me?”

The preacher shrugged.

“I never said he could.”

Martin slammed his fist into the mattress.

“Then why the hell are you here?”

“To see if you qualify.”

There was a bang on the cell door.

“It’s show time Claw.’’ a guard yelled.

The preacher slipped on his gloves and snatched the bible from the bed.
The cell door opened and two guards entered the room.

“Ready for the finale?” one of them asked.

Martin shrugged.

The preacher grabbed him on the arm.

“You mind if I stay with you to the very end?’’ he asked.

Martin wanted to tell him to fuck off, but figured what’s the point.

“Whatever takes your fancy,’’ he said.

The guards let Martin walk unshackled two feet ahead of them down the prison halls. The preacher stayed with him each step of the way.

“So, preacher,’’ Martin asked, just quiet enough to be out of earshot from his escorts, “what exactly am I supposed to qualify for?”

The preacher smiled.

Martin was led into a small, bricked room in the basement of the prison. A small, glass viewing room had been hastily created in the far corner. In it sat Jen’s father, sister, and a bunch of faces Martin didn’t recognise. Each glared with a hateful satisfaction in their eyes.

In the centre of the room was a crude metal chair. The guards strapped Martin to it as a prison doctor fiddled with a bunch of IV drips.

The priest stayed by his side as the doctor searched for a vein to attach the first IV drip. The anaesthetic would do little more than dull Martin’s senses. Its purpose was to reduce the convulsions once the true drug was administered; making for a more pleasant viewing experience for the box seat guests.

Martin felt the drug work its way into his system. A gentle haze swept through his body and he unwillingly relaxed into the seat. The doctor attached a second drip to the IV and produced three needles on a tray. Each was filled with a different drug: sodium thiopental to put him in a coma, pancuronium bromide to paralyse his respiratory muscles, and potassium chloride to insure he was well and truly fucked. Martin knew what they were because he’d had plenty of time to read up on lethal injection procedures since he’d been in prison. Plus, the papers hadn’t been shy of promoting his imminent death in grave detail. He should have been terrified, but this knowledge gave him a strange sense of control over his fate. The doctor picked up the needles as the clock struck midnight; keen to inject the first of the lethal doses. The priest cut him off.

“Do you mind if I have a final word with the prisoner,’’ he asked.

The doctor grunted, clearly annoyed his show was being interrupted, “Just keep it quick.’’

The priest grabbed Martin’s head with both of his hands and spoke softly into his ear.

“You wanted to know what you qualified for?’’ he asked, “A second chance.’’

The words swirled in Martin’s head.

“I think it’s a little late for that, preacher man.’’ he said.

“What is the one thing you would change if you could.’’

“This year,’’ Martin said. “I wish this year never happened.’’

The priest nodded and removed a glove, slicing a cut into his palm with a jagged fingernail. He did the same to Martin’s palm, mashing their blood together in a firm handshake.

“Done.”

The preacher’s eyes danced in the dim light.

The embrace was broken by the prison doctor who shuffled the priest out of the way.

“It’s time,’’ he said, injecting the first of three needles into the drip.

Martin’s thoughts remained on the preachers eye’s as the drugs sent him into an eternal darkness. They were like no man of God’s he had ever met.

*****

Martin awoke sluggishly, welcoming the New Year with a pounding hangover. He was in a motel room of some sort, just like the one he and his wife...

“This can’t be,” Martin whispered, ignoring the flare in his temples as he rolled over.

The bed was empty. An LCD bedside clock displayed the time—11:43 am. Martin shot upright in the bed. He’d been sitting in the chair. The preacher had been there. He dabbed at the sweat trickling down his brow. It must have been a drunken nightmare. His dreams were always more vivid when he was plastered. Martin laughed. It never really happened. His wife was probably off somewhere getting breakfast while he slept, that’s all.

Martin reached for the TV remote. A low gasp emitted from the next room.






































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