The Society Series Box Set 2

by Mason Sabre

  I’m going to have to bury him. Hide him. She realised. She leant over, elbows on her knees as she pressed her face into her hands and tried to visualise doing that. She lived in the woods, but these were hunting grounds. Grounds where shifters came. Shifters with great fucking senses of smell. How long before they found his body? She’d have to bury him in Human lands. But shit, that came with its own risks, too.

  Louise was lucky. She passed as Human, and unless they specifically needed to know, no one was any the wiser. That was why she worked in a lingerie shop and not a food store—stupid paranoid Humans and their beliefs that Other, was a disease that could be passed along to them with their chips and coffee.

  “Oh shit. Work. Fuck.” She grabbed her phone, flicking up the time. Not late. Thank god. Without thinking, she dialled her work number.

  “Marcy?” she said when the phone was answered after the second ring. “It’s Lou.”

  “Lou,” she heard the smile on the woman’s voice, even from that. That woman would probably smile at a funeral. She was always happy. “Everything okay?”

  “Yeah. Um. I think … I can’t come in today. I’ve just been hurling my guts up.” It wasn’t a lie. Of course, she didn’t add, because of the dead man in my bed. “Can I call in sick for the day?”

  “Aw, love. Do you think you’ll be okay tomorrow?”

  “Yeah. Twenty-four-hour thing.” Twenty-four hours if she wasn’t arrested and executed that was.

  Marcy hung up on the other end and Louise’s phone flashed back to the holding screen. She had a picture of a grimalkin there. All red fur, bright green eyes and razor-sharp teeth. Story books called it the Cheshire cat, because of the grin. But it wasn’t the grin that put people off these cats, especially shifters, no, it was the taste and the smell of them. That was why she used them to guard her property and her tree. She was a woodland nymph. Her very mortality tied to the Oak tree not so far away. She needed something that wouldn’t get eaten to guard it.

  Enter, the grimalkin.

  Staring at those big green eyes, Louise frowned as her stomach flipped like a trapeze in the air. “My grimalkin,” she said slowly, eyes widening, flashes of eyes coming into her mind as the key of her memory unlocked. “My fucking cat. Someone killed my fucking cat.”

  Louise stood, not knowing exactly what she was going to do, but she had to do something. Right then, someone rapped on her front door, sending her heart racing. They rattled the metal grate that was against the frame, trying to get her attention.

  Louise froze.

  Chapter 4

  Louise pulled the bedroom door firmly closed before going to see who was knocking. It felt odd to leave it open, like whoever was at the door would know, and the body would pull them to come and look, like a magnet calling their name and showing them what she had done. It was crazy, but it was there. The guilt and paranoia rolling into one, telling her that even if it was just the postman knocking on her door, he would see her guilt. A fucking flag, waving at him and saying, hey, the body is in here.

  She hoped it was just the postman, though. She wasn’t expecting anyone else. He probably had a package that was too big for her box outside—something that Lee had ordered while he was away. He did that. He’d work away for weeks and by the time he got home, he would have a huge stack of deliveries. He was a weird gadget addict.

  Checking herself in the mirror before she went to the door, she looked for blood and bruises. Signs that would give her away as a killer–she wasn’t a killer. She hadn’t even touched the body. Her whacky mind told her that maybe she would be covered in evidence. That somehow, she was covered in blood. That would be a great way to open the door—like something out of Frankenstein’s butchery.

  “Just answer the door, Louise.”

  She could leave it, she realised. They would just think she was at work or something. It wasn’t unusual for her not to be in when Lee’s things came and then he would just pop them into the small woodshed at the side of the house—of course, then he would come around back, look through the window and see the naked body in the bed.

  Shit. She had to answer it.

  Whoever it was, though, hadn't knocked a second time. Maybe they were gone. She could hope at least. Or, maybe she was just hearing things.

  Pausing with her hand on the lock, she stared at the back of the door like she might see through it to who was lurking on the other side. Why didn’t she have a peep hole fitted? She had meant to. Another thing on her list of things she needed to do and never got around to–the list she had been growing and adding to for at least a decade now. She pressed her ear to the door instead, listening for the sound of anyone there—someone ready to pounce on her, or, the police. Yes, the police, ready to come and arrest her for the body in her bed.

  Pressing the handle down, she slid the deadbolt out of the way and inched the door open, her heart screaming in her chest to just close it and go back to what she was doing.

  But … there was no one there.

  No one. Not a damn single person or a box by her door.

  Nothing.

  Adrenaline surged through Louise making her head swim. A mixture of relief and torment in her mind, sending her giddy. “God.” All she would need now was a box on her doorstep with a head in it and her day could be complete.

  She pulled the door open and glared out into the sunny morning and the vacant spot by her front door. “Hello?” she said, peering out, trying to see around the corner in case it had been the postman and he had gone to her shed. But there was nothing, and she hadn't heard anyone driving away … although, she hadn't heard anyone pulling up, either.

  She leaned out more, wanting to check that whoever had knocked, had gone. But everything looked so undisturbed. She was seeing things. Hearing things. She had to be. Maybe the door hadn’t rattled to begin with.

  But the postman had been, she could see. Louise didn’t have a letter box on her door like most people. Just a box at the gate to her garden, where the mail would be dumped and she would get it when she was ready. He would stick the brick on top of it if she had something inside. The brick was there now.

  Sometimes, though, Louise left the mail there. Like she wasn’t ready to face outside communications—perhaps whoever sent mail would know that she had opened it and she would have to deal with it right then.

  Could one be an introvert when it came to the mail? Louise certainly managed it.

  When she was sure there was no one around, she let herself run down the small path to the box. Her bare feet hitting the cool stones. In the box was just an envelope. Small, sealed. The brown kind that usually brought bills, except this one didn’t have a window on it for the name and address. It was addressed to her. The writing on it was scruffy, slanted. Like someone had rushed writing the name. There was no address. She could just about make out the L. And … it was hand delivered. The spot where there was meant to be a stamp, someone had drawn on the picture of the Queen’s head. The childish manner she recalled doing when she used to play houses with her friends.

  “Is anyone here?” She called out, looking up and clutching the letter to her chest. It suddenly felt like there were a million eyes on her. All of them watching, ready to pounce. She took a step back towards her house, ready to run if someone or something moved in a way she didn’t like. “Whatever it is that you want, you need to just tell me. Stop playing games,” she called. All around her house were woods. Normally, it was perfect, serene even, but right now, it was eerie and isolating. “Hello?”

  No one answered. She was like the girl in the horror film who goes outside and the bad guy is hiding with his hatchet, ready to take off her head. And there she stands, shouting “Hello?” like an idiot when she should be back in the house, calling the police. She couldn’t call the police, though, could she? She couldn’t call anyone.

  “Get lost. Whoever you are,” she called, before walking backwards into her house and locking the door again.

  She didn’t go bac
k to her room, instead, she went to the kitchen and got out one of her knives to slip under the flap of the envelope and open it. She didn’t need to take the contents out for her eyes to catch the picture at the top—the picture of her. “What the hell is this?” she cried, dropping the envelope almost instantly and backing her way up to the fridge as if she might get away from it. Her eyes fixed on the pictures that spilled out onto the counter. “How?” She shook her head in disbelief at the images there. It was lies. All of it. Somehow, they had made these lies.

  Inching closer, Louise reached out like someone had sent her a snake rather than pictures. There were three of them, and she slid the top one closer to herself to look at it. It was the blond, the one dead in her bed. Only in this picture, he was very much alive with his arm across her shoulders. He was smiling too. So was she. She peered closer, she couldn’t see her face in this angle, but she could tell she was smiling. She didn’t remember this. Not an ounce of it, but clear as day … or night, there she was, head back, leaning on the blond’s shoulder at the front door to her house.

  Her stomach rolled at the sight of the next one. The blond again, and her. His arms around her waist … her almost bare waist. She still wore her black jeans, but her shirt was off and she was leaning into the man with just her bra on. This was her lounge too. Her back was to the camera, but it was very clear that she was kissing the man … this man.

  She quickly grabbed the last picture. “No.” She covered her mouth with her hand, gasping for breath as she stared. No. This wasn’t right. It wasn’t. She wouldn’t. But how could she deny it. Fuck. If this had been Lee and not her, she would never believe him telling her it wasn’t true—that he was innocent. Yet, she would tell him that, if he saw. She would tell him that she didn’t do this. She would scream and shout and demand this was all lies; the picture was made up. It had to be. She would never cheat on Lee.

  In the picture, she was sitting—straddling the blond’s lap, her hands resting on his shoulders for support. They were in her bed, and he was looking at the camera, stupid doe-eyed expression on his face like a man caught mid-orgasm. He had his hands on her backside, cupping her bare cheeks and she looked like she was riding him. Her long hair flowed down her naked shoulders. Her head was back, like she was enjoying herself.

  This couldn’t be true. Whatever it was. She hadn't done this—she wouldn’t. She slammed the pictures down on the counter, turning them so that she couldn’t see them, and backed away out of the room. She stopped at the doorway, though, turning, her eyes going over the room, suddenly seeing things she hadn't picked up before. But she hadn't been looking before, had she? On the back of the sofa was her bra–her fucking bra … hers. She hadn't taken it off. She hadn't put it there. She shook her head. “I’m not accepting this.” On the floor, along the visual path between the front door and her bedroom, strewn in the manner of a couple caught in the midst of passion and no time to stop, were her clothes and his.

  She kept shaking her head at it as if she had to make herself believe that all of this hadn't happened. She couldn’t believe it. She wouldn’t do this. She would never cheat on Lee. No matter what. She’d leave him first if her attention was caught by someone else. They had promised each other that.

  Her mind flashed like a lightbulb—flashing images of the night before at her. The cat. She could see her cat and the eyes and the … scratch?

  “The scratch?” Quickly pilling her robe to one side, she pressed her hand to her thigh. She had been scratched, hadn't she? The grimalkin … shit. Maybe one had bitten her? They were poisonous like that. She twisted so that she could see where she had been scratched. Nodding, relieved, she found the mark. It wasn’t deep, but it was fresh. That was why she couldn’t remember.

  But then? That didn’t explain the man, did it? No. Crap. “It has to be a mistake.” She dashed back to the pictures and the envelope and opened it, determined to find what these meant. She wouldn’t sleep with someone else and even if she would, the blond? What was he doing here after she had been caught by one of her cats?

  She tore the paper open. There were no more pictures, but there was a note inside it. Just a folded piece of paper with the same scruffy scrawl that had been on the envelope.

  Your choice. You can have the negatives, or the DSA can. Meet me at The Boar Restaurant. Tonight. 6 pm.

  Chapter 5

  The first thing Louise did — after a lot of swearing, a lot of disbelief, and whole bunch of mental visualisations of what she would do to the person who had created this mess, was get dressed. Yes, she got dressed with the body in her room. Yes, she got dressed right in there, although, she did turn herself away from him just in case he was looking, even though he was dead. It didn’t have to make sense, not to her, not to anyone, but Louise didn’t care. It made her feel better, and God, if her mind wanted to come up with a million, different idiotic scenarios, it would. She figured right about now, she had the right to go a little crazy. It wasn’t every day a woman woke with a body in her bed and pictures of her having sex with him right there, before his death.

  She was going to dispose of him. It bothered her, although she tried to tell herself it didn’t. But, the problem in her mind was that she knew he wasn’t just a drunken idiot who tried to buy her a drink last night. He was somebody’s son, somebody’s brother perhaps, maybe even somebody’s husband. Whatever he was, he was somebody’s something, and she was about to drive him out to West Valley and hide him like he was nothing.

  It made her want to be sick.

  She shut her eyes and tried to not let herself think about it. She had to think of herself first, and he was already dead. But … she had never disposed of a body—never for a moment thought she ever would. She kept seeing those damn pictures, though. If she called the DSA now, they would never believe her. They wouldn’t care what she said, and they wouldn’t care how much she pleaded. She’d be guilty in the eyes of everyone.

  She toyed with the idea of taking him and just hiding him in her shed. Maybe then she could meet whoever was doing this, and after all the pictures of her were taken away, she would be able to make them do the removal. But the more she tried to think of things, the more she knew that’d never happen. This person had put the man in her bed. He had killed him. She had to deal with the body herself.

  West Valley wasn’t so far away. It wasn’t human land; it was just land. She could burn him there, like they did with burning slabs. Anyone finding his remains would just assume that he was a stray and not care. Burning slabs were the arrangements for Others. Others didn’t get graves or funerals. They got the baker. They got wrapped in old trash and set alight. The Other was gone and Humans could rest easy knowing that the Other couldn’t rise from the grave to steal their children or eat their new-borns, or some shit like that.

  After she dressed, she wrapped the man up in her bed sheets. God knows, she wasn’t going to use those again, and if Lee suddenly decided to ask what happened to them, she would tell him she spilt food on them or something. Not that he would ask, of course. He wasn’t crazy enough to come home and do a checklist of everything that was in the house. Nope. That would be her. Maybe she could change the actual bed—burn it. She frowned; Lee would notice that one, but how was she going to lie in bed and know that where Lee was sleeping, there had been a dead man?

  “It doesn’t matter, Louise. It really doesn’t matter,” she said, shaking her head at herself. She’d drive herself mad with all of these thoughts.

  When he was wrapped, bloodied pillow and his clothes all bundled up with him, she went to the closet in the laundry room. She needed something to secure him. It would be great to be dragging his body and then the sheets came off. She grabbed a rope from Lee’s box. He used it for towing stuff around—now, that he would notice. But she could replace it later and he wouldn’t be any wiser.

  She used the rope to secure the man’s ankles, his waist, his torso and then around his neck. She had to pause with that one. Visions of decapitati
ng him flooded her mind as she fastened the rope. What if his head rolled away?

  “Stop it.”

  Pushing him to the floor, Louise paused at the sound of the thud he made, her heart leaping into her throat as if someone would hear it and know she was about to move a dead body, even though she had no neighbours. When no one came rushing to her front door to see what the hell was going on, Louise dared to check the mattress. “Oh, thank God,” she said. There had been a lot of blood on the pillow, but it hadn't gone through.

  Attaching another piece of rope to the binds around his ankles—another piece she would need to replace, Louise used it to drag the man towards her back door and out of the house. She would have used the front door, but that was just too odd. Too much like she was out in the open for everyone to see.

  It was easy enough to get her car around the back. The way she and Lee had created their home was that they had a fence going all the way around so they could lay claim to the land surrounding them. They had sectioned off a big piece for a garden out back, although, they hadn't done anything with it, yet. The plan was to make it into a self-sufficient kind of thing, where they could have chickens and livestock to feed them.

  Dragging him from the house and to her car was the easy part. Lifting him up, so much harder. The man had been about the same height as her. Louise was tall, slim. She worked out, but shit, this guy, dead weight … she realised now where that term came from. It was like he had died and suddenly was filled with bricks.

  With much swearing, and shoving and some minutes of, was this really worth it? She managed to get him onto the backseat of her car, bend him at the knees and then close the door. She stood, wiping her brow with the back of her hand, panting. Her guilt ebbing away a little now that he wasn’t out in the open and in her garden, but rather tucked in the back, with another sheet to hide him.