Kallista
AT FIRST THEY THOUGHT it would be difficult explaining to the police how Bart Wild got tied up in the closet with a katana in his neck. When the police arrived, however, they found Bart in Kallista’s bedroom. From the position of his body, it was clear he had fallen on his own blade.
Kalli and Mike did not tell the police anything different; they were just thankful that spirits knew how to clean up their own damn mess.
They got the warrant to search the house next door. At first the only thing they found was that Bart had indeed been living there all along, which was how he had watched Tatum and then Kallista, Mike and Darren. Then, upon closer inspection, Kalli found the floor board under the bed with the jars filled with tongues, not only of the victims they were aware of, but of other victims. DNA tests revealed victims from elsewhere.
That was how he had remained so quiet after Tatum’s death; he had gone out of the area to throw suspicion off anyone local.
It took them weeks to wrap up the entire case, to share all the information and to figure out a good way to explain how they came to the conclusion that it was Bart Wild who was the murderer.
Then came the awkwardness of what was next.
They were in Kalli’s house still, lounging in the bed one Saturday evening. Kalli was cuddled up to Mike, her head against his chest, and he was stroking her back.
He smiled and said, “What about if you move here and be my partner?”
“I’m a profiler, Mike, not a cop.”
“Same difference,” he scoffed. “We can swing it.”
“Maybe, or maybe I’ll solve cases across the region and just use this as base camp.” Mike pulled a face and she giggled. “We’ll see. I have spent my entire life with a plan and right now I just want to wing it.”
Mike kissed her head. “Okay, love,” he said, settling back.
KALLI WOKE UP WITH a start.
Sometimes that still happened. PTSD could do that to a person. You see things, or imagine things, from a traumatic event that happened in your life.
She put a hand to her chest; she was sweating and her body was soaked. She climbed out of bed quietly, not wanting to wake Mike, and went to the bathroom to wash her hands and face. When she turned to leave again, she noticed marks on the tiles by her feet. She frowned and reached for the door. After shutting it, she turned the light on.
It was bloody footprints, it was her bloody footprints.
She panicked and checked her feet quickly. They were covered in blood, but it wasn’t her own. It then dawned on her that her hands, her legs, were covered as well. There was blood everywhere. She closed her eyes and counted slowly to ten. She opened them and looked in the mirror.
There was still blood there.
She needed Mike; he would make her feel better.
“Babe!” she screamed as she flung open the door.
Mike’s body hung from their light fixture, the fan above their bed. His head nestled on the pillow where he had been sleeping, his mouth open in a silent scream, his tongue missing.
The blood from his body had absorbed into the bed and coated her.
She screamed.
Not sure what was going on, she ran for her phone. It wasn’t where she left it. She sprinted out of the room and downstairs to use the landline. When she picked it up there was no dial tone, but she could hear breathing.
She was frozen in fear.
“Death comes to those who do not see, Kalli,” Bart’s voice breathed from the handset.
It was a nightmare, she conceded, and pinched herself. She felt the pang of pain and tried again, and again and again.
Then she heard his footsteps.
He stomped down the stairs; the sound of a blade being dragged from stair to stair could also be heard. When she looked up though, she didn’t see anything.
She ran for the back door and opened it, only to have it slam shut on her. She turned around, looking for a place to hide. She opened the pantry cupboard and crawled inside, closing the door behind her. His footsteps had turned towards the kitchen and were coming.
Why this was happening? She couldn’t understand how it was happening, because she knew the sick psycho was dead ... but Robyn had been dead too.
“Death comes to those who do not see,” he whispered in her ear.
Her eyes widened with fear and a hand clamped over her mouth. She was pulled from the pantry and saw the ghostly apparition of Bart in front of her. He was smiling brightly. There was a hole in his neck where Robyn had pushed his katana through to kill him.
He smiled madly. “You’re next,” he said.
Kalli tried to scramble back, but he approached her.
“It itches, Kallista. It itches and I need it scratched.”
Epilogue
Sylvana could not believe that she had to come back to this horrible town to mourn the death of another of her siblings.
Her mother’s heart could not take Kalli’s death; two days after finding out that Kalli, along with her new boyfriend, Mike, had been murdered by a copycat killer, Luell died in her sleep. The doctors said it was natural causes, but Sylva knew it was a broken heart.
First she had put her mother to rest and then she returned to her old neighbourhood to bury her sister. She could have stayed at their old house, but didn’t want to, not after losing two sisters there the same way.
The authorities had needed Sylva to identify her sister’s body. She noticed where they had reattached her head to spare her the full brutality of what happened, but Sylva had seen Tatum strung up in her closet, her head at her feet, so she knew what Kalli must have looked like.
It gave Sylvana goosebumps to think that their family was being haunted, cursed, by serial killers, and she could not wait to get out of town.
THE DAY OF THE FUNERAL dawned like any other. Sylva hadn’t been in town as long as her siblings and the only things she remembered about this town were Girl Scout meetings and burying her father, her sister’s friends, her teacher, her eldest sister and now Kallista. This town held so many bad memories for her; she wanted nothing more than to leave to return to art school.
Her boyfriend, Paul, stood next to her as they watched Kallista’s coffin being lowered into the ground.
They had picked out the plot next to Tatum’s. Sylva thought they would have liked that. Because he had hardly anyone in his life, she had used some of her inheritance to bury Mike next to Kallista.
She held Paul’s hand until both coffins were buried. He let go then to give her time alone, telling her he would wait in the car.
Sylva stared at her sisters’ graves, and Mike’s. She then took a short walk up the cemetery to look at Roger’s. He had been Tatum’s first and only love. She saw Darren’s grave next to Jacqui’s and remembered how they all thought Darren had been the killer, but it turned out to be Mr Barker’s brother. She hadn’t even realised he had a brother.
The wind picked up and she turned back, walking towards the car. As she did she glanced back and saw a man standing there. She shivered when she saw him. It was like she could see him, but at the same time her brain was having a hard time focusing on his features. He seemed familiar, but she couldn’t quite place him. From what she could make out, he stood near the Wild plot, where Ricker, Barker and the murderous Bart were all buried.
It gave her the creeps.
She picked up speed and made a beeline for Paul
He hugged her. “Everything okay, beautiful?” he asked.
“Yeah,” she said. Glancing back, she could not see the man anymore. “Let’s get out of here. We have a trip to Paris to plan for.” She smiled and kissed him.
He opened the door for her and she climbed in, putting her safety belt on. Paul went around the car to get in.
While she waited for him, she stared out the windscreen. When she looked at her sisters graves, she got a fright. The window suddenly misted over and words appeared - ‘Death comes to those who do not see.’
Freaked ou
t, she gave a small scream.
Paul ducked his head into the car and said, “What’s wrong?”
Sylva looked at him and then her window, but it was clear.
She shook and burst into tears. “I’m sorry. I’m just so tired. I thought I saw ...”
Paul quickly climbed in and put his arms around her. “It’s okay, shh, it’s okay. We’re going to be okay.”
Sylva nodded and wiped her eyes. Paul sat back, put on his safety belt and started the car. As they drove off, Sylva looked out over the cemetery. Standing over her sisters’ graves was a girl. Her face was painted like a skeleton. Her blonde hair was gelled back. She wore a black dance leotard with black ripped stockings. Sylva craned her neck and saw she had black boots on.
She shook her head, not sure what to make of the strange girl. She shrugged it off and settled back, putting her hand on Paul’s leg.
She didn’t notice the shadow sitting in the back seat of the car with a shadowy katana across its lap.
Other Books by this Author
HORROR TITLES
The Kiara Books
Ensnared
Liberation
The Butcher Books
Tatum
Kallista
Sylvana
The Asylum Series
Asylum I
Asylum II
The Watcher Series
Watcher
The Watched - Coming Soon
To Watch - Coming Soon
The Demon Cat Khristmas Specials
Killer Kitteh Khristmas
Merry Meow - Coming soon
Jingle Fur - Coming soon
Stand Alones
The Culling
#RIPJohn
Belladonna
Buried - Coming Soon
Hex - Coming Soon
Shh... - Coming Soon
The Priestess - Coming Soon
The Reaper- Coming Soon
The Witch in the Woods - Coming Soon
FANTASY TITLES
A Spacehiker Adventure
Unlikely Hero
Hidden in Plain Sight - Coming Soon
Homeward Bound - Coming Soon
MURDER MYSTERY TITLES
Bullseye
Stones - Coming Soon
GENERAL FICTION TITLES
Balancer Books
Neutral Ground - Coming Soon
Holy Demons - Coming Soon
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
HAILING FROM JOHANNESBURG, Southern Africa, Sian B. Claven has enjoyed stories for all her life, whether she was reading them or making them. She has written for as long as she can remember, but Ensnared is the first book she decided to publish. Moving towards writing more for a horror genre, when Sian isn’t thinking of ways to terrify people, she enjoys writing science fiction stories, poetry and rather long and gushy birthday wishes. When she isn’t working on her writing you can find her knitting, scrap booking, reading, or playing Xbox. Sian was previously a reviewer for The Blithering Bibliomaniacs and clearly doesn’t know what the words rest and relaxation mean, at least not in the traditional sense.
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