Twisted Secrets: Book 3 of the Twisted Minds Series- THE FINALE

by Keta Kendric

  Another rapid round of shots sounded, causing me to cringe and grit my teeth. I hated guns, and if I was hearing shots underground, it meant the world as I knew it was crumbling. A rare smile crept across my face at the idea of the farm being destroyed. If my family’s enemy happened to find their way into the cellar and found me, my only wish was that they killed me fast.

  However, if they wanted to take me as a hostage, it could possibly lead to my freedom, since I was essentially already a hostage. How horrible a thought that my capture could well lead me to my escape from the tight grip my family had on me.

  The top of my head struck the wooden underside of my bed when an alarming, earth-shaking blast erupted, shaking my surroundings. The faint sound of particles sprinkling from the ceiling and hitting the linoleum floor sounded, making me inch myself further under the bed, sliding on my stomach. My skin grazed the floor making a squeaky noise.

  As I waited with baited breath, a line of sweat inched down my forehead, making my eyes twitch. The tight space under my bed didn’t leave me room to swipe at the irritating drizzle, and the sound of my harsh breaths would have alerted anyone sweeping the area for captives, so I fought to quiet myself.

  Was that the sound of footsteps growing closer or was my mind messing with me? I tilted my head, searching for the sound and waiting for the unknown.

  My dilemma grew more intense as the dust I’d disturbed when sliding under my bed started to settle at the back of my throat. My body lurched in preparation for a sneeze, but I slammed my eyes shut and covered my nose and mouth, stifling what demanded to be let out. A muffled groan-sneeze escaped as the sound of footsteps grew louder and stopped. They were standing right outside my door, and I didn’t know if it was the enemy I knew or the unknown enemy attacking the enemy I knew.

  “Regina! You okay?” came a loud whisper through the cracks of my door.

  It was Bradley, one of my family’s guards. He checked on me from time to time, taking it upon himself to stick around and chat with me. His presence made me uncomfortable, and I was sure the only reason he cared enough to keep me company was because he wanted to sleep with me. It was hard to miss the way his gaze stalked my body or the way his tongue slithered around his mouth and lips when he was near me.

  Although he made me uncomfortable, I’d never pushed him away. When you were stuck in the cellar on your family’s farm, burning dead bodies for a living, you tended to appreciate any company you could get, no matter their intentions.

  “I’m okay, Bradley,” I called out to him. My head slid from my hiding spot when he shoved my bedroom door open. The dim shadow of his head came into focus before he leaned inside and shined a flashlight around my dark room. He aimed the light on my face, as I remained prone under my bed, squinting my eyes against the brightness.

  “What’s going on out there? It sounds like a war,” I asked, my voice rushing out, anxious to satisfy my need to know.

  “It was a damn war,” he confirmed.

  Was that all he was going to say? The guards rarely talked to me, so I was sure they had been ordered not to interact with me unless it was necessary. Therefore, Bradley was breaking one of the warped rules my family had set in place where I was concerned.

  My face drew into a tight frown at the sight of him, standing there holding my door open. What the heck was he searching for inside my room if there was a war raging outside?

  “We managed to get things under control after backup arrived. We hunted those assholes down like dogs and ran them into the woods.”

  The smugness of Bradley’s voice wasn’t lost on me as he talked about my family bringing in backup criminals. My chipped nails clawed at the floor as I struggled to pull my body from under the bed.

  “I thought no one knew about this place?” I asked, hoping Bradley would give me more information. “Were they trying to take the meth supply?”

  He hadn’t turned the damn flashlight off, and I didn’t miss the way he moved the light up and down, taking my room and me in fully. He’d never been past my bedroom door, so his interested gaze studied the dark interior.

  “They weren’t here for the meth,” he finally answered. “They came here to rescue their friend, a biker that your cousin was trying to get information from.”

  Based on the sound of things, I was going to be swimming in dead bodies. After eight years of school and graduating in the top ten from medical school, I’d been forced to ditch my dream of becoming a heart surgeon to become an undertaker of sorts for my family.

  “You may want to get prepared,” Bradley suggested, stating the obvious. “A lot of bodies are coming your way.”

  A deep sigh didn’t help the tension that started to coil in my neck and shoulders. I nodded towards Bradley to acknowledge his warning. He stood, eyeballing me in that creepy way he always did, making the hairs on my exposed arms stand before he spun out of my doorway and eased the door closed behind him. The light thump of his steps faded, and I released another agonizing sigh.

  With my face raised to the ceiling, I took in several deep breaths, preparing myself to spend my morning with a group of fresh dead bodies my family had created.

  Chapter Two

  Regina

  The blasts of weapon fire had finally ceased. Although I couldn’t see a trace of daylight at my level, I sensed that the sun had started to light the sky. To keep my mind occupied, I cleaned, spraying and wiping everything with industrial strength disinfectant.

  My workspace was a dreary room that was the perfect motivator for depression, a morgue and on occasion, a hospital if my family needed it to be. The vast room was equipped with a large metal autopsy table that sat in its center. There were four body freezers built into the wall and varying types of medical equipment and supplies spread throughout the room. There was also an incinerator, its smoke and debris fed into thick pipes that led to the surface.

  Over my sturdy, dark jeans and long-sleeve cotton pullover, I wore my thick plastic coveralls. My instrument table was lined with a bone saw, bread knife, skull chisel, hammer, rib cutter, scalpel, and three types of scissors, just to name a few. I rarely used all the tools since I wasn’t performing full autopsies, but I had them at my disposal anyway.

  The large shiny metal table that sat in the center of the room waited patiently for the bodies that I would undress, clean, and pluck bullets and metal from.

  The guards who worked for my family usually thumped down the steps to enter the cellar, but they also had the option of an elevator that was installed for easier access and body deliveries. The hum of the elevator was followed by the sound of the squeaky wheels of the large cart they carried bodies on.

  “Oh joy,” I mumbled sarcastically as I rolled my eyes to the ceiling.

  My job was to prepare the bodies of my family’s victims or casualties so that I could burn, bag, and tag the ashes. What a job. I’d gone from promising heart surgeon to the spooky bag-them-and-tag-them lady. And my family ensured I stayed busy, dragging bodies at various stages of decomposition in from unknown locations at any given time.

  The clunk of the cart hitting the double doors that led into the room sounded before a tall, beefy guard with a deadly gleam entered. The bars of the cart were gripped tight in his hands as three dead men lay in a heap in front of him.

  The guard didn’t bother greeting me as he wheeled the stack of dead men to within a few feet of the autopsy table. The disgusted frown on his tightly pinched face indicated he had no intention of unloading the men with dignity.

  He proved my point when he grunted and bared his teeth before shoving the handles of the cart up and dumping the men into a pile at the foot of the table. The clattering of their bodies hitting the floor sounded as he jiggled the cart to ensure he’d gotten them out. He glanced up at me and smirked after he’d completed his task. Without a word, he turned and headed through the metal double doors, bumping them open loudly with the mouth of the cart on his way out.

  The sound of the squeaky wheel
s called back and may as well have been curse words as I stared at the stack of dead men in front of me. All three appeared to have died as the result of gunshot wounds to the head, although the rest of their bodies were littered with bullet holes as well.

  The sight of one’s brains smeared all over the face of another who was missing a part of his jawbone would have given most people nightmares for weeks. However, I’d seen so many horrific scenes of death that I was afraid I’d eventually become immune to what was supposed to be horrific.

  Two black circular gunshot wounds marred the face of the third man. He’d lived long enough with his wounds that his face had swollen to twice its normal size and was painted in hues of purple and blue. Beautiful colors that sat painting the surface of death.

  Their bodies lay in a bundle that I eyed at different angles, attempting to figure out which to yank from the pile first. I’d gotten used to dealing with the dead, but there was one thing that still creeped me out: their eyes. There was something ominous about the ones who died with their eyes open. There was also a lingering sadness surrounding them that squeezed my chest and made it difficult for air to get into my lungs.

  I was convinced that remnants of the dead lurked in this space, spying on me. My bedroom was only steps away on the other side of these walls, and some nights the haunting feeling of being watched would feed my insomnia.

  One of the men’s head was thrown back so it hung upside down. Thankfully, his eyes were closed, but his chest poked out like he was fighting to take a breath.

  “You don’t hear him breathing, Regina. You always do this.” I reminded, talking to myself in a low tone.

  Restricted mostly to the cellar at my family’s farm by order of my cousin, Sorio, I was only allowed to leave my subterranean home on a few occasions. I could leave to gather food from the main house and sometimes my cousin would make me sit with him and have lunch or dinner. The endeavor was often emotionally painful as Sorio always found ways to belittle me or call me names.

  My family was the infamous DG6, which meant they were as close to being above the law as any family could get. Some people called them a gang and others labeled them a cartel. For me, being in the position I was currently in, I feared the only way I’d get away from them was likely in death.

  They had the meth industry in the palm of their hands. They killed anyone who challenged them and crushed any competition in the meth market because of the secret ingredient they added to the drug. As a result, my family had the most loyal addicts and a reputation for being the most vicious killers out there.

  Two of the main chemists who cooked the batches of meth were my cousins. However, unlike me, my cousins were proud of the work they did for my family.

  Casting aside thoughts of my evil bloodline, I prepared for the job at hand. I swiped the face of my phone to fill the lifeless space with music. Kendrick Lamar and all the best hip-hop and pop were about to keep me company. I gloved up and tied my mask tightly around my face.

  “Girl, bend your knees and do a proper lift. These dead men are heavy and don’t care about your back,” I told myself out loud.

  I laughed, amusing myself easily. The longer my family kept me at this farm, processing their dead, the more it seemed I was losing my grip on reality and my ability to interact with normal society.

  The rusted scent of blood and the rotten aroma of exposed brain matter climbed up my nose like a living creature, tightening my throat as saliva flowed over my tongue. The odor opened my tear ducks, flooding them with water, but I swallowed my reaction and proceeded with my job.

  My hand slid under the stiff shoulders of the man who hung slightly off the top of the pile. His legs were entangled and covered by the lower body of the brain matter leaker.

  “Work smarter, Regina,” I reminded myself.

  Putting a halt to the heavy lifting I was about to do, I wheeled over the smaller metal collapsible table that was perfect for moving and lifting the dead onto the autopsy table. A grunt escaped me, scratching my throat as I yanked the heavy man free of the pile and dragged him onto the smaller table. His body was bulky from all the gear he wore that obviously hadn’t protected him from death.

  When I finally had his crumpled body aligned with the large autopsy table, I repeatedly shoved until he rolled into place. His head slid across the metal of the larger table, making a wet swiping sound as I continued to shove, finally getting all of him onto the table.

  I made quick work of cutting away the man’s clothes and spraying him with the cleaning solution my cousins had formulated and insisted I use on each body before I burned them. I attempted to but failed to ignore the hissing and gurgling sound that invaded my ears. It was the man’s bowels releasing. The mask on my face could only do so much to protect me from the bodily gases that were as toxic as the most potent chemicals.

  I wasn’t sure of what my cousin’s cleaning solution contained, but it worked wonders on cutting into the vile odors that I’d never gotten used to. I sprayed the man liberally with the solution, glazing him like a cook would prepare a turkey for the oven.

  Once I’d cleaned the man and his blood and bowel movements were mixed and sucked down the drainage at the foot of the table, I prepared to extract the bullet from his head. Another of my unpleasant tasks would involve checking the rest of him for other metals.

  When I reached towards his head with the scalpel, his eyes popped open with a low flick. “Whooh!” I shouted before I jumped back. Jesus! I should have been used to this by now, but the eyes got me every freaking time. And this man’s eyes seemed to be following me. He couldn’t get any deader than what he was, so why was I letting this freak me out?

  I closed my eyes and took a deep breath, filling my lungs with the rotting aroma of the dead before I reached out again. I place my gloved fingers over the man’s eyes, holding them down for a few seconds before I let go. Maybe his soul was just leaving his body because the hairs on my arms started to move, springing up in patches as a chill crept down my back and made me shiver.

  Surrounded by the presence of death, I glanced around every corner of the room, knowing that something outside the spectrum of my vision was lurking. I had the sense that the evil deeds of these dead men had seeped out into every crevice and surface of this room.

  My stomach rolled, making me breathe harder as my hair prickled up on my neck, and it felt as if icy fingers were walking down my spine. The scalpel between my fingers shook across my view, as the tremble in my hand grew more intense.

  I couldn’t shake the presence of evil surrounding me, suffocating me. I sat my scalpel on the instrument table and marched out of the room. Inside the dark hall, I breathed a little easier as I filled my lungs with fresher air.

  “Come on, Regina. How many freaking times have you done this? Get it together,” I urged, attempting to motivate myself. It wasn’t like I could quit, so I turned back, shoved the doors open, and prepared to continue my task.

  After checking the man for metals, I prepared to roll him back onto the smaller metal table, so I could get him into the incinerator. Thankfully, his eyes hadn’t popped back open.

  This was my life. I was nothing more than the undertaker for one of the biggest crime families in the country. There were occasions when I was called upon to performs blood transfusions, treat gunshot wounds, and perform other medical procedures, but since I’d been transferred to the farm, those occasions had become few and far in between. Besides, we had other family members who gladly provided their medical expertise.

  I cared nothing about earning my family’s loyalty. All I wanted was to be set free. I wanted a normal life. I wanted the boot my family had on my neck taken off.

  At twenty-eight, I had a lot more living to do, but living under my family’s rules had condemned me to an inmate’s life. My quest to escape my family wasn’t ever going to be over. I was going to find a way to escape them even if it killed me.

  Chapter Three

  Regina

  If I
weren’t so damned lonely, I’d be rude and insist that Bradley leave. Instead, I had a dead man’s genitals staring up at me as Bradley stood watching. The man I was preparing was one of my family’s guards. I’d never known his name, and here he was, bared in front of me in the most intimate and vulnerable way possible.

  “I’ll go and get the last of them,” Bradley stated as if he were doing me a favor.

  “Mmmm,” I mumbled without glancing up at him. Bradley’s stalker-like ways were starting to make me consider the loneliness of my situation. Eventually, I was going to have to tell him to stop hanging around and talking to me.

  After the chill that Bradley left clinging to my skin wore off, I maneuvered the guard onto my rolling table and prepared to turn his two hundred pounds of flesh, blood, and bones into a few pounds of ashes.

  I wheeled the man over to the incinerator that had already eaten five of his buddies or enemies. My fingers slipped into my thick flame-retardant mittens. I opened the incinerator, and the intense flames inside the small glass door danced and called my attention.

  Squinting, I reared back and away from the heat as I shoved the tip of the table over the lip of the entrance and proceeded to push the man by his shoulders. Once I’d gotten him most of the way in, I hit the red button, and the flaming hot metal conveyer inside the fire pit easily sucked him the rest of the way into the flames. Once I secured the door and aligned my rolling table back in its proper place, I prepared to work on the next poor soul who was fool enough to work for my family or fight against them.

  As I walked towards the next two, one caught my full attention. Blood, at some point, had poured from his head and crusted against his face and neck. His torn black shirt and likely most of his back appeared to have been covered in blood as well. His skin was pale white, but he didn’t…