Obscene: A Dahlia Saga Novel

by Natalie Bennett

  “Do you have any idea how insane you sound? Were you the one behind the roses?” I held up the flower by its thorny stem. I knew the answer already, but I needed to hear it from him.

  “I gave you roses because they remind me of you. They represent new beginnings, innocence, sympathy, and purity. All those things relate to you. There’s more to them than meets the eye. They have a subtle beauty that can be overlooked by others.” He ran his thumb over my cheek, pressing a lingering kiss on my forehead.

  He sat the muffin on the tray before taking hold of my wrists and running his thumbs over the scars.

  “You’re so much more than the strange girl your mother tries to hide from the world. No one should be ashamed of you. Your flaws make you the closest thing to perfection I’ve ever seen.”

  “Mason.” Sighing, I rested my forehead against his. This situation was beyond normal; I gave up trying to make sense of it. The biggest question was why? Why did he have such devotion to my well-being? How the hell did he know I was in the hospital?

  “Why did you take me?” Pulling away from him, I looked into his eyes, searching for answers. Instead of responding, he cupped my jaw, adding pressure to force my mouth open.

  He brought our lips together, using his tongue to tempt mine. Wrapping my arms around the back of his neck, I mimicked his movements. Somewhere in the back of my mind, I registered that this was my first real kiss.

  He was my first everything, making me feel things I never knew I could. I hated it. This wasn’t normal. Why couldn’t I just be normal? He tasted like fresh cinnamon and mint; it would forever be my favorite flavor.

  His dark hair was still damp from a recent shower. When the sheet fell away, exposing my round breasts, I was too caught up in him to care. He broke the kiss off after a few minutes, nuzzling his nose against mine.

  “You have an amazing body. I want to paint you on a mural,” he murmured.

  It took me a second to understand what he meant.

  “You’re a painter?”

  He’s gorgeous, artistic, thoughtful, and he can make you come. Who cares how you got here? Why would you want to give that up?

  Mason leaned back, dropping his gaze to my chest.

  “I’m a lot of things,” he confessed, reaching out and tracing my breasts with his fingertips. Could he feel how fast my heart was beating?

  “Some people have vices that terrify those raised to believe certain things are right and wrong. I’m one of those people.”

  What?

  “What aren’t you saying?”

  “I like to take people apart for inspiration.”

  Fighting to keep my face impassive, I waited for further explanation. He couldn’t mean that literally.

  “I don’t…understand,” I said slowly when he didn’t elaborate.

  “Come on; I’ll show you.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  I had yet to see my reflection in the mirror, brush my teeth, or use the bathroom, but I was back in my robe, following Mason down the hallway.

  His large black dogs trailed behind us, moving almost as quietly as he did. Everything was silent aside from the soft tap of his dress shoes and the clicking of his dogs’ nails.

  “Here we are.” He paused in front of a large black door, entering a four-digit pin on an electric keypad. When the lock beeped twice and he pushed the door open, I didn’t want to believe what I was seeing. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing.

  Mason pulled me into a room that looked nothing like the rest of his house. The walls were stone, the floor was black and white tiled slate. There was various odd equipment placed around the room, and against one wall was an easel holding a blank piece of canvas.

  My mind rapidly worked to figure out why he would have a girl restrained in something that looked like a dental chair in the center of the room. She turned her head and stared right at me. The helpless despair in her eyes went straight to my heart.

  Her blonde hair was in messy disarray; she was completely nude.

  Dark mascara was smeared across her face, and a painful looking flesh wound was on her head.

  “Mason, who is this? What have you done?” Rushing to the blonde’s side, I reached out to help her but ultimately dropped my hands back down to my sides.

  Her restraints seemed like simple leather clasps from afar. Up close, I could see little rivulets of blood running from her wrists where they were embedded in her flesh. Another thick strap was wrapped around her head, covering her mouth.

  “I don’t know who she is.” He circled to the other side of the chair and ran the back of his knuckles down her cheek. The girl whimpered, turning her head away.

  Why is he touching her?

  I was instantly disgusted with myself. Why did that matter?

  “Mason, you have to let her go. The police—”

  “Katie-Kat, your concern is touching, but no one is going to come here looking for this girl. I saw her walking down the back road after I got rid of…took care of something else. I offered her a ride, and she got in.

  “Pretty girls shouldn’t get into cars with strangers.” He gave me a cruel little smirk, walking over to a cabinet that hung in the corner.

  I glared at the side of his face. That was a blatant jab at me. My mother’s words rang loud and clear in my head. She told me it wasn’t safe outside, that someone would take advantage of me and I would get hurt. I thought that was her way of trying to control me, but she was right. She’d been telling the truth.

  “I told you I like to take them apart. I get a better visual of what to paint.” He shrugged his suit jacket off, pulling things from the cupboard I couldn’t see because his frame was blocking my view.

  “It started as a hobby. My father encouraged me to nurture the skill set. One of his benefactors saw a painting I did, and the rest is history,” he continued explaining, walking over to a large metal tub and turning on the water. When he finally turned back around to face me, he held a scalpel in one hand and a capped needle in the other.

  “What are you doing?”

  He approached the girl, popped the cap off the syringe, and inserted it into her arm.

  “It’s a mild sedative. She’ll be relaxed enough not to feel anything, but still aware of her surroundings.”

  “Why are you showing me this?” I tugged at my hair until my scalp hurt.

  “So you would rather I keep it a secret, and you find out through some other means? You’re part of my life now. This,” he gestured to the blonde, “is your life now. You’ll learn to enjoy it. Give it time.”

  I knew the man was a little off. He’d kidnapped me, for fuck’s sake, and claimed I came with him willingly, but to this degree? He stood there humming a little tune to himself, about to play Hostel.

  I wish it were some sick ploy my mother came up with to torment me, but the blood was real. The blonde’s silenced screams and fear were real.

  “Mason. Don’t do this. This is wrong!”

  “This isn’t wrong,” he scoffed. “Life is full of death, and death is never happy or pretty. This is the easy part.”

  I stood, cemented to the floor as a scene straight out of a late-night horror movie played out in front of me.

  With quick efficiency, he buried the scalpel in her neck, hit a button on the side of the chair that freed her wrists, and did each of them next. I had never seen so much red in my life. Movies never showed someone’s body going into convulsions as they died.

  Bile rose in the back of my throat; her blood sounded like rain drops hitting the floor. This was his hobby? The metallic smell was too much. I began walking backward, searching for a door knob.

  It was then that I realized something was terribly wrong with me. Part of me wanted to worship the ground he walked on, bloody scalpel and all. The other wanted the man back from five minutes ago, and to remain oblivious to all of this.

  They’re the same damn person.

  “Katie.” He sat the scalpel down and stepped around the chair.
I retreated so fast, my back collided with the door.

  “Don’t run.”

  He didn’t have the second word out of his mouth before I was out of the room and racing down the hall.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Well, fuck.

  That went almost like I thought it would.

  Sighing, I looked at the lifeless blonde in my chair. I couldn’t leave her like this; that would ruin my whole process. Twirling the scalpel in my fingers, I brushed excess hair back from her forehead.

  Gently pressing the blade to her hairline, I made an incision all the way around, lifting her head up to get the back.

  I traced over the same line until the crown could come off with a firm tug. Gathering her blonde, bloody strands in my hand, I did just that. The sound reminded me of Velcro coming apart. There was a sweet little plop when I flung the round mass onto the floor.

  Pausing for a second, I listened for any sound from Katie downstairs. I wasn’t too concerned at the moment; it’s not like she could go anywhere. Lifting my cadaver from the chair, I carried her to the tub that was almost overflowing with hot water and submerged her corpse.

  After cutting the water off, I grabbed the hose from the wall and began to spray down the chair, thinking of how much worse things could have gone.

  The last two women I’d shown this room to both screamed for the cavalry and ran for the hills.

  Sadly, they were no longer among the living, but I honored them with a painting. They didn’t mean much to me; none of the women who came and went from my life did. I was still a man, though, and sometimes I hated being alone.

  People had a skewed sense of what was right and wrong. Society pushed its rules on them like a shepherd leading a flock of lambs.

  Understand that I am not psychotic, deranged, or mentally ill. I can stop at any time. I’m well aware of everything I do. It’s not me that has the problem. People who turn up their noses at what they can’t understand do.

  My avocation is much more relaxing than anyone else’s.

  I suppose my father could be the exception. He took the meaning of a snuff film to an entirely different level. Just because I didn’t like being on a live feed for an audience as I sculpted, it didn’t mean I condemned him for his work.

  Hell, I worked with him behind the scenes.

  I was over people screaming bloody murder when they found out the truth. Katie was a solution for many things, all of them selfish on my end. I didn’t feel bad about it, and I regretted nothing.

  I needed her and I would make her understand that we were in this together. She was just like me, and she needed to stop being afraid to embrace it.

  Shutting the hose off, I hung it back on the wall and started the process of draining the tub. While the water ran out, I laid my chair flat and covered it with plastic drop cloths.

  After taking a second to crack my knuckles, I retrieved blonde’s wet, nude corpse, and secured it again.

  Studying her for a few seconds was all the time I needed for my mind to start working out which pieces to keep and which ones to get rid of.

  Everything needed to go but her head and torso. Retrieving my scalpel from its resting place, I cut from the top of her chest to her waist. Once she was wide open, I switched out my scalpel for a medical mask and a hammer.

  Covering my face so I didn’t get a mouthful of noxious odor, I flipped the hammer around and used the claw to pull apart her ribcage. The gore never bothered me; neither did the sound of crunching bone. This was almost my favorite part.

  I glanced at my surgeon's saw, debating if I wanted to dismember her now or get cleaned up and find Katie.

  Unsurprisingly, Katie won. It would take me over an hour to cut through the sinew and remove her organs. Catching a glimpse of my reflection in the mirror, I flicked a chunk of something fatty off my ruined shirt.

  I decided it would probably be better to change clothes rather than hunting her down a bloody mess.

  Chapter Fifteen

  I nearly fell headfirst down the stairs, losing my balance after tripping over one of Mason’s dogs.

  I expected him to come after me, but he never did. I had to have run through his entire lower level at least twice, finding nothing but door after door that refused to open. My bare feet echoed off the black and white marble floor.

  Once I was back in the large open foyer, I went straight for the front door as if it had magically unlocked in the midst of me running around like a chicken with my head torn off.

  The knob turned, but the stupid thing didn’t budge. There was an empty space on the wall in the kitchen where the phone should have been.

  I couldn’t get kidnapped by a regular creep; life decided to gift me with Patrick Bateman reincarnated—only much better looking.

  “You’re not going to get out. I have the security system set to prevent that. Did you think I’d let you get away from me?”

  Whirling around, I spotted Mason on the stairs. His three shepherds were lined up behind him as if waiting for a command.

  “I wish you would calm down, Katie. I’m not going to kill you. Necrophilia isn’t my thing.”

  Ignoring him, I darted back through the drawing room, crying out when my hip smashed into a round side table.

  I didn’t know the layout of his home well enough to know where to go. I wasn’t even sure what I was running from. I wasn’t afraid of Mason; I was afraid of how I felt about him.

  How could I be so attached to a man I’d just met? After what he just did? I repulsed myself. I wished life had a pause button like a remote control. I just wanted everything to stop, so I could think clearly for once.

  I zipped through various rooms loaded with large furniture, each one of them oozing wealth.

  I had just turned another corner when a strong arm came around my waist, stopping me in my tracks.

  Mason hoisted me over his shoulder like I weighed nothing, carrying me back towards the foyer. I hung upside down, twisting and turning.

  “Calm down.” He smacked my butt hard enough to leave a stinging sensation when his hand fell away. A small yelp slipped out, and I went still. The robe had fallen almost completely open by this point; I fought to control my breathing, dangling over his shoulder like a limp noodle.

  He carried me back to the bedroom, shooing his dogs off and using his foot to shut the door. I was tossed down on the bed, landing on all fours. He shoved my face into the mattress, ignoring my screams.

  “Get off me!” Pushing myself up on, I barely turned my head before his hand was tangled in my hair and shoving me back down. For whatever reason, I noticed how clean he was now.

  “I would never touch you with the filth of another woman on me,” he responded to my unspoken thought, pulling the robe from my body.

  The sound of his zipper going down was the encore for what came next.

  My legs were nudged apart with his knee; he cupped my sex with one hand for less than a second before replacing it with the bulbous head of his cock.

  “Your pussy is dripping wet. You feel it, don’t you?” he taunted, running his length up and down my slit. Of course I felt it. My body was sore from the night before, but something inside me was begging for more.

  How did I go from working at a vintage diner to living a B grade horror film? I told myself count to ten and barely made it to two before I was flat on my stomach with him inside me.

  “You’re beautiful,” he soughed.

  “Mason.”

  Gripping the sheets, I half-moaned, half-screamed his name into the mattress from the harsh intrusion. Just like before, he gave me no time to adjust.

  He wrapped my hair around his fist and rocked into me, burying himself balls deep. I could hear how sopping wet I was every time he thrust.

  I was overflowing with him in every way. He was in me, stretching me, making me feel everything. It hurt and felt like heaven at the same time.

  All the old memories and thoughts in my head were wiped out and replaced with not
hing but him at that moment. Every thrust reminded me that I was at his mercy.

  When he snaked a hand between us to rub my clit, I was coming with a soundless scream in a matter of seconds.

  “Stop,” I gasped, fighting to get out from beneath him. It was too much; he was too much for me to handle. When his hand left my hair, I thought he was going to give me a reprieve.

  Instead, he gripped me painfully hard by the back of the neck, shoving me down more forcefully. I heard his other hand hit the headboard to brace himself.

  “But we just got started,” he sighed.

  Every time I told him he was hurting me, he hurt me a little more. If I fought back, he got a little rougher.

  I wore myself out and gave in to him. There was something inside me waking up, something that enjoyed the way it burned when his grip was too tight, and the bruises he left behind that proved this was real.

  Chapter Sixteen

  He left some time after midnight and had yet to come back.

  I figured out the door was locked later that night. There was nothing I could do but pace around the room, wondering what was going on.

  I couldn’t pinpoint what was happening, but when the sun came up, there was a subtle shift in the air.

  The dead silence had been replaced by the dogs occasionally barking, a lawn mower running, and doors opening and closing. It was as if the house had been at a standstill and was suddenly animated again.

  Yet, there was no sign of Mason.

  Pulling the heavy drapes to the side, I stared out of the arched window. All I saw was a meticulously landscaped yard surrounded by tall trees. Where in Redwood were there houses of this size with so much land?

  Nowhere.

  So, where the hell was I?

  Scrubbing a hand over my face, I walked to the bed and sat down. The whole situation was surreal. I still had zero answers. All I’d figured out thus far was that Mason decapitated people for fun and used sex as a weapon.