Master of Plagues by D. B. Reynolds (reading rainbow books .TXT) 📕

them inside this bag.”
Anthony stepped over to the bed. He pulled the covers further down the frame of the sex doll. An episode of surprise filled the eyes of Dana. “Where’d you guys get her from?”
“One of the best sex shops in all of Brooklyn.”
“You’ve got real taste. She’s certainly a beauty.”
“Stuart won’t have any complaints.”
“That is, until Stuart sees his dreamgirl is only a fantasy girl.”
A fourth conspirator walked into the sleezy motel room. She held a bucket in her hand. Prudence Penelope Cundy was the name she’d been given. Prudence had the looks of your typical average woman, still able to turn a few heads only on her best days. She kept her body slim. Feathery red hair and those cute little red freckles around her nose were the highlights of her average looks. Those with wrecked dental works would’ve killed to have her straight, gleaming white teeth.
“Where we stand, guys?” Prudence inquired of her other three co-conspirators. She looked over in one of the corners at the wide rathole.
Anthony hummed while he looked around the room. “It’s like this, Miss Prudence. Megan has her voice tuned to perfection. She sounds good enough to charm a billionaire right out of his life savings. Dana brought us the bag of creepy-crawly little things.”
“The maggots?”
“Oh yeah, the disgusting white slimy maggots.”
“Did you get what you were supposed to get?”
Anthony rolled back the padded covers on the bed. “Tahhhhh dahhhhh! What’cha think, Miss Prudence Cundy?”
“Must say she’s a true beauty.”
“Like I told Megan and Dana, the best any porn shop in Brooklyn had to offer.”
“Bet she cost a pretty penny.”
“A few bucks.”
More gunshots rung out within a much closer proximity. This put a huge fright on Megan and Dana and Prudence. A bullet completely shattered the window of a motel room right next door. The party of four hit the ground and sheltered themselves with only their arms.
“Whoa!” Prudence chanted with caution. “What the heck was that?”
“Prudence, welcome to the American Shore Motor Lodge at 33rd Street in the South Bronx,” Anthony scrutinized. “There’s enough dope being peddled around here to put every street pharmaceutical out of business. There’re enough guns in this part of the Bronx to put the entire Middle East to shame. Darling, this very motel complex is filled with everything under the sun.”
“But why pick out a rathole like this?” Prudence detested, growing scarier by the minute.
“Should I have picked out The Waldorf Astoria or The Hilton or The Ritz-Carlton?”
“Not necessarily.”
“Any of those upscale hotels in Manhattan would’ve been too risky. Did you bring what you were supposed to bring?”
Prudence stepped over by the door and lifted up a twenty gallon bucket. “Everything’s right here in this bucket.”
She raised the bucket up to waist-level. Anthony smiled and rotated the container in a three-sixty formation. “The slicker, the slimier, the better. This crap is slippery enough to make King Kong fall on his backside. Where’d you get it from?”
“At a hardware store over in Queens. My friend’s dad has an account there.”
The contents inside the bucket was a grayish slimy compound used to help seal up holes in walls and floors and the concrete. Anthony jerked his head from the floor to the ceiling and around the walls. Paranoia had gotten the best of him.
“Anthony, what’s the matter with you?” Prudence wondered, watching the master plotter breathe heavy and break out into a mild, cold sweat.
“This very room gives me the creeps. In case you didn’t know, rats, especially the really big ones, drives me nuts. I just saw one with big glowing eyes.”
“You’re from New York, Anthony. New Yorkers can’t help but have a fear of big rats. They’ll bite a hole into you the size of The Grand Canyon.”
“You’re right, Prudence. Us New Yorkers know about big rats.”
“I take it that big rats are your biggest fear, your number one phobia.”
“Yes they are!” Anthony spoke with tremor.
“Know what my biggest phobia is?”
“Tell me.”
“Bats.”
Anthony ceased from his brief tremor. He couldn’t believe what his ears had absorbed. “Did I hear you say that bats were your biggest phobia?”
“Yes.”
“Guess bats and rats can both be creepy.”
Megan didn’t quite digest what Prudence just told them. “Bats remind me of those old vampire movies.”
“Ironically, bats look like rats with wings.”
Dana belted out a strong giggle. “You guys, we’ve all got something that we’re in fear of. For example, I’m scared to death of bees. The little buzzing insects nearly have me jumping right out of my underwear everytime I see one or two or three or more.”
Megan conjured up her own worst living nightmare. “Ants are my biggest fear. Those little tiny critters send ice cold chills through my blood and spine. If I never see another one as long as I live, it’ll never be too soon.”
“Then, it’s official, guys,” Anthony affirmed. “I’m scared as hell of rats, especially the really big ones. Megan is scared as hell of ants. Dana is scared as hell of bees. Prudence is frightened out of her mind of bats. None of us would be human if we weren’t afraid of something. Does everybody know what they’re supposed to do?”
“Sure, I do,” Megan vindicated, her voice trained in preparation for the big prank. “My voice will be sweeter than cotton candy.”
“Dana, how about you?”
“The maggots will be crawling all under the sheets. They won’t be anywhere on top of the covers where he’ll be able to see them.”
“And you, Prudence?”
“The floor will be drenched with this slippery compound. Stuart will fall harder than he’s ever done.”
“I’ll be working the mechanical controls for the doll. Remember guys, we’ll all have to be working in unison with one another. Let’s get this prank over and done with, so we can enjoy a lifetime of something to laugh about.”
“Got that right, Anthony,” Megan agreed, eager to get the prank rolling. “We’ll sit around and tell our kids and friends about this prank.”
“Our friends and co-workers will be laughing their heads off when they hear about this,” Dana added, her hazel eyes looking like two glistening marbles.
Anthony pompously snapped his fingers. “I’ll be the one who’ll never use the term co-worker. No one with the Greenstein name will ever work for anyone else. That’s quite beneath my family. The Greensteins are natural born leaders, not born to be followers.”
Megan and Dana and Prudence knew they were in the presence of a young man with an ego bigger than the Chysler Building and The Empire State Building combined. The smaller people in life were of no account to him. They didn’t mind, knowing how throughout their college years, Anthony always picked up the tab for their conventional womanly and worldly desires.
“What’s the latest word on John and Taylor?” Prudence asked, her own safety issues of being in the South Bronx growing by the minute.
“They’ll be picking up Stuart from the pet shop in Manhattan.”
“Do they know the routine?”
“Like clockwork.”
Dana signaled to Anthony with a waving hand. “How about Abdullah and David?”
“What about them?”
“Do they also know the routine?”
Anthony released a gust of wind as though he’d grown tired of explaining himself. He couldn’t help it. It was just a part of his arrogant demeanor. “Guys, for the last time, John and Taylor will be picking Stuart up from the pet store. Abdullah and David will be controlling the lights and special effects we’ll have set up here in the room. By now, I would hope that everybody knows their part. We can’t screw things up, especially with all the money I pumped into making this prank work the way it’s supposed to.”
Anthony certainly put big money into making his pitiful prank a success. In fact, the cost ran into the lower thousands.
With hundreds of millions of dollars swollen into the family coffers, those very thousands were just tiny crumbs from off the Greenstein dinnertable. It had to be true in most cases. Rich kids were spoiled rotten and sometimes engaged in eradict behavior. Anthony was no exception.
“Abdullah and David are expected at what time?” Megan inquired, ready to leave on a moment’s notice.
“At least an hour before John and Taylor bring Stuart here. They’ll be hanging out in the pet store to sort of keep an eye on Stuart.”
“Then, I guess there’s nothing more to talk about.”
More gunshots rung out from down the street. Everyone in the room were desperate to leave until final plans were ready to be executed.
“Let’s get the hell out of here,” Anthony proposed to his other three co-conspirators. “This place is beneath me, quite a detriment to the Greenstein character.
The party of four exited the room. They jumped into their cars and didn’t look back.


CHAPTER—2

SET IN MOTION

The very person Anthony Greenstein and the other conspirators targeted was Stuart Duffelmeyer. Known as “The Whiz Kid”, Stuart worked hard to become a perfect 4.0 student. The soon-to-be NYU graduate would be the proud owner of a doctorate in veterinary medicine. The secret had gotten out he’d been a virgin throughout his entire teenage and young adult life. Things hadn’t changed up until the present. Stuart wasn’t a bad looking young man at all.
In fact, the women who ran close within his circles, they considered him to be somewhat decent looking. Except for glasses thick enough to see on the other side of the moon, and the dorkiest hairdo within decades, he