Shadow of Vengeance

by Kristine Mason

  He looked to the man. “Very well. But you do realize what this means, correct?”

  Junior nodded and hugged herself. “I’m sorry, sir. I didn’t want to bring him here, but I…I defended myself and after he passed out, I didn’t know what else to do.” Tears spilled down her cheeks as she started kicking snow. Kicking the tires. Manic, she pulled at her blond hair. “I was so worried if they found him, he’d lie. Tell them I…I don’t know. All I knew was that I couldn’t let them find out about us,” she wailed. “I’m so sorry. I’m so, so sorry.”

  As a victim of rape, he should empathize. Because he hated Junior, and planned to kill her anyway, he felt nothing. While he didn’t want to kill the investigator, and possibly place himself in a precarious situation, he abhorred rapists. No one knew about the old well on his property. The last person who had any recollection of its existence was dead. Her old bones mingled with those of his past pledges.

  “Enough.” He moved toward the motionless man and gave him a slap. When the investigator didn’t respond, he turned to Junior. “What did you do to him?”

  “I…I hit him with a baton the sheriff gave me to keep in my car. Thank God,” she finished with a shiver.

  “Let’s get him inside.” He reached for the man, Malcolm, if he recalled correctly, and hefted him from the seat. Malcolm roused a bit, but not enough. He gave him another slap. When the buffoon’s eyes slid open, then rolled back, he hit him again. Nothing.

  Irritation swam through his head, but he kept it in check. He shoved Malcolm from his seat and let him land face first in the small snow bank flanking the driveway. Malcolm raised his head and gasped.

  Grinning, he hauled the man up, steadied him, then told Junior to help. Together, they dragged him into the house. When they reached the trapdoor, Malcolm began to regain consciousness. “Quickly,” he told Junior. “Open the door.”

  “Wouldn’t it be easier to kill him upstairs? He’s heavy and I don’t see how we’re going to haul him back up the ladder.”

  “Now, Junior,” he ordered.

  She jumped, and did as he demanded. Idiot girl. Dragging dead bodies from the basement required minimal effort. His ancestors had ensured easy access to the root cellar after they’d blown a hole in the ground and erected the house. An exit stood in the far corner of the basement and led to the side of the yard. The door, while crude and in bad disrepair, had been kept hidden from sight by overgrown hedges for as long as he could remember.

  By the time he hauled Malcolm down the basement ladder, he’d wished he had used the old, outer door to the cellar. The man’s dead weight had been cumbersome, and had made navigating the rungs difficult. But he didn’t want Junior aware of the exterior door. He wanted her trapped in the basement with the others. If she were to escape, he had no doubt she’d run. Maybe not to the authorities, but that was a risk he wasn’t willing to take. After all, he had plans for a future outside of Bola.

  Breathing hard, he dropped Malcolm to the floor, removed the man’s gun, then placed it on the workbench. As he quickly retrieved rope, he noticed blood smeared across the sleeves and chest of the beige, wool sweater he’d put on before Junior arrived. A trickle of dread slipped down his spine. He would have to be careful. Junior had used more than a baton to thwart her attacker. Much more, based on the amount of blood.

  “Sir,” she cried. “Your sweater.”

  “Yes.” He began tying the man’s legs together. “Are you sure you only used a baton?”

  “He had a knife. I…he must have cut himself when we were struggling.”

  “And where is this knife now?” he asked as he flipped Malcolm over and twined the rope around his wrists.

  “I’m not sure exactly. I’ll go check the car.”

  “Leave it. We’ll take care of it when we’re finished.” With his breathing now under control, and his heart rate returning to normal, he stood and glanced at the pledge. “I can’t allow this minor setback to interfere with tonight’s initiation. My pledge has worked hard this week, and deserves to be honored.”

  He wiped his bloodied hands on a towel and approached the pledge. “This morning, we had a nice long talk, didn’t we?”

  Stony-faced, the pledge stared at him. “We did.”

  “So you know what’s to come?”

  While he kept his face expressionless, his Adam’s apple bobbed. “I do.”

  “Well, I don’t,” Junior whined.

  “Why don’t you tell her, Puke? Tell Junior the last details of initiation.”

  The boy kept his eyes locked to his. “Your father plans to rape me, as my father had done to him.”

  As Junior gasped, he touched the puke’s cheek. “It will be quick, but it will be painful. I’m sorry, Son. But, I have no other choice.”

  The boy’s eyes filled with tears. “There’s always a choice.”

  He smiled. “Not in this instance. But I did mull over your earlier request, and I’m very fond of granting a man’s dying wish. Understand?” He leaned forward and pressed his mouth against the boy’s ear. “She will die first. That is a promise I intend to keep.”

  He stepped back. “Junior, grab me the broom.” While he waited for his idiot daughter, he bent and began unfastening the boy’s ankle restraints. “If you believe in God, you might want to start praying for—”

  “Look out,” the pledge shouted.

  He turned, just as Junior slammed the broomstick against his head. Dazed, he shook his head and tried to push off the rock floor. She hit him across the back. He rolled to his side, and she cracked him in the groin. Howling in pain, he tried desperately to move, his sole intent on murdering the bitch he’d spawned. She jabbed the stick into his kidney. As he bowed, the broomstick clattered the floor.

  The boy grunted and pulled on his restraints. “Leave him alone, Melissa.”

  “Fuck off, ” Junior said, as she quickly snapped handcuffs around his wrists. “Bet you didn’t see that one coming, huh, Dad?”

  Stunned, he lay on the floor. Memories from twenty-five years ago suddenly came at him in a rush. Being held down, restrained and helpless. Being…violated.

  She bent down until they were face to face. “Hello?” She rapped his throbbing head with her knuckle. “Anyone home?”

  Her taunt, the evil lurking in her eyes, gave him the strength to push on to his knees. She stood and let him. “Comfortable?” she asked. “I hope so, because I’ve got one hell of a story to tell you before I rape and kill your pledge.” She looked over her shoulder to where Malcolm lay motionless on the floor. “Oh, and the private dick, too.” Grinning, she pulled a butcher’s knife from inside her coat pocket. “Don’t worry. I’m not going to kill you, Daddy Dearest. Someone needs to be punished for these murders.”

  The pledge whimpered and drew flat against the wall as she approached the boy. “So your dad raped my dad?” She made an X over the boy’s heart, but did not break the skin. “Kinda gross, don’t ya think?”

  “Melissa,” the boy said. “You don’t have to do this.”

  “My name is Holly, and that’s not what I asked you.” She sniffed. “God, you stink.” As she turned away, she chuckled. “Actually, I do have to do this. Just like my daddy had to do all of these dumbass Hell Weeks. See, when I met him and he let me in on his secret, he kept telling me that Hell Week would bring him full circle. What Daddy didn’t realize was that I was on the same mission.”

  His mind still thick and foggy, the rock bit into his knees as he swayed. “Junior,” he warned. “You’re making a big mistake.”

  She turned and pointed the knife at him. “No. You made the mistake. What’s funny is that you kept thinking I was constantly making mistakes.” She laughed, the eerie cackle bounced off the walls as she squatted in front of him. “Remember when I first came to you and told you my story?”

  He nodded. How could he forget? When she’d first arrived on his doorstep, she’d been a scared, pitiful, timid little mouse of a woman. She’d been abused by her m
other, accused of violent behavior toward children and animals, and had killed a man to save her virginity. Although he’d wanted nothing to do with his child, he’d hated that she’d suffered, hated that she’d been left powerless. Because he’d understood what she’d gone through, he’d wanted to give her the empowerment to take control of her destiny. Show her that she could be strong, and teach her that she didn’t have to serve as another’s doormat.

  Now, he tasted fear. The woman squatting in front of him was nothing like the one he’d met eighteen months ago. He’d once considered her harmless, pathetic. The smug arrogance in her crazed eyes told him otherwise. Junior had played him for a fool, and the game wasn’t over.

  “I remember,” he finally said.

  “Me too.” She grinned and flicked the knife against his sweater. “The way you ate up my story was priceless.” She glanced over her shoulder and looked at the pledge. “This brilliant, pompous academic believed every piece of bullshit I gave him. But now I know why.”

  Facing him again, she nodded. “Yes. Now I know why. You’d been raped during your Hell Week all those years ago. How old were you? Eighteen? Nineteen? Either way, it explains why you’re stuck in the past and why you’ve done these incredibly childish things to Josh.” A small smile tilted her lips as she leaned forward. “I didn’t know about Hell Week when I found you. Honestly, I planned to kill you the day we sat on your porch and drank your shitty iced tea. But you intrigued me that day. I knew you were hiding something dark and I wanted to know all about it. And once you finally told me your dirty secret, I knew killing you would be too easy.”

  He sat on his heels and considered what she’d just said. “Why did you want to kill me?”

  Her eyes narrowed as she pursed her lips. She cocked her head and also sat back on her heels. “Josh’s dad raped you, right?”

  He nodded.

  “Once? Twice? Were there others?”

  “Once, which was more than enough.”

  She smiled. “So true. But imagine it happening on a weekly basis for…oh…let’s say eight years.” Her face contorted into a sarcastic wince. “Yeah, I think I’ve got you beat.” She stood. “In more ways than one.”

  Junior moved to the corner of the room, and retrieved the metal bat. “I’ve pictured slamming this into your head more times than I can count.”

  “I don’t know why,” he said with honesty. He might have been, on occasion, a little rough with her, but he’d never struck her or touched her in a sexual way. But it sounded as if someone had molested her for years, and that violation to her body and mind had warped her. In a small way, she’d piqued his curiosity, yet the need for survival overrode his need to know what had caused her to seek vengeance against him. He thought about the hidden door in the back of the basement. While fear lingered on his tongue and tightened his chest and throat, survival had his stomach jumping with awareness. When the moment was right, he would take his chance and run.

  “He doesn’t know why,” she said on a chuckle. “Hello? Because you gave your parental rights away when I was born, my stupid mother not only married a pedophile, but let him adopt me. My entire life I thought he was my real dad. During those eight years when he abused my body…it sickened me that a father would treat his own flesh and blood in such a vile and disgusting way.”

  After pocketing the knife, she raised the bat. “Then one day, I was in the attic. Hiding.” She twirled the bat like a baton. “How pathetic…twenty years old and hiding in the attic because my molester was home and I was alone in the house. But something good happened that day. While I sat there for hours, waiting for him to leave or for my mom to come home, I started sifting through boxes. That’s when I discovered you.” She stopped twirling the bat, then pointed it at him. “That’s when it all clicked.” She cocked her head. “Or, maybe the better word is snapped.”

  The disturbingly sinister way she said “snapped” caused his skin to crawl with dread.

  “Yeah. I admit, I definitely snapped. I thought…how could a man give his own child away to a monster?”

  Guilt settled in his chest. “I didn’t know. If I had, I would have—”

  “What? Taken me in? Or put me in the system so I could go into foster care? Because I have a feeling that’s exactly what you would have done. You didn’t want me. Not then, not now. The only one who wanted me was that sick fuck, Artie.”

  “Who?” he asked, keeping his eye on the bat and preparing for a blow.

  “You didn’t even know who adopted me? And you thought I was pathetic.” She pounded the tip of the bat against the floor. When she calmed, a serene smile crossed her face. “Remember the man I told you I killed? Well, I kinda lied about that. Not about killing him, trust me, Artie is dead. But I was no virgin. He took that from me when I was twelve. So you know what I took from him?”

  His head swam and his stomach grew nauseous. He didn’t want to hear anymore and hoped to God she’d shut the fuck up and move on with her business. Kill Malcolm or maybe the pledge, so he could run. He glanced away and caught sight of the investigator’s gun on the workbench. Too far away. Too risky. The woods were his only safe bet. He knew them like the back of his hand. He would lose her in them, then when it was safe to return, rid his basement of any evidence of Hell Week, then leave this godforsaken town.

  “I’ll tell you what I took from him.” She smacked the bat against her palm. “His teeth, his eyes, the skin on his face…his dick.” Smiling, she gripped the bat. “Then I took care of my mother.”

  A fuzzy image of Vivian shifted through his mind. He hadn’t seen her in twenty years, had never felt any emotion toward her then, but hated her now. She should have done what he’d asked her the moment she’d told him she would be expecting their baby. She should have aborted and saved them all from having to ever endure…Junior.

  “That was another lie,” Junior said. “Mom needed to pay. She’d brought that piece of shit into my life and she needed to pay for what he did to me. Now you do, too.”

  She spun, then swung the bat, hitting the pledge in his exposed stomach. As the boy grunted and cried, she leaned against the bat as if it were a crutch. “Wow, that felt good. I really want to do that to your head, but you did teach me one good thing. Patience. And my patience is paying off quite nicely.”

  He ignored his pledge and focused on Junior. At this point, her arrogance might be his only salvation. She thought she had him cornered, but didn’t know about his escape route. She would slip up and he would be ready.

  “Patience is a good virtue to possess,” he said. “I’ve spent twenty years perfecting it.”

  “Funny, it only took me eighteen months.”

  “Yes, and your patience has paid off. You have me trapped and at your mercy. But, have you thought about how this will look once the authorities arrive? You claim that I’ll be held responsible for these murders, but what about you? Aren’t you worried I’ll tell them about you?”

  He’d expected a flicker of self-doubt, but had been wrong. Junior straightened her spine, then tossed the bat aside. “Those mistakes you accused me of weren’t mistakes. I purposefully took Sean Davis because I knew who his sister worked for. Yeah, Sean bragged about the fancy private investigation firm she worked for and I wanted her involved. I wanted you worried and nervous, but you, in all your pompous arrogance, didn’t blink an eye. So I had to up the ante. I drugged the security guard with the same stuff I used on the boys, then used his truck. I could have let him live, because I know I didn’t leave any evidence behind, but that was just too easy. Did I mention that I left a note on Bill?”

  Fury replaced his fear. “You stupid bitch.”

  She wagged a finger. “I’d say I’m far from stupid. Guess what else I did. I took a picture of Josh hanging against the wall, and pretended it was sent to the sheriff.” She gave him a big grin. “Brilliant, huh?”

  Although he seethed with hatred, he returned the smile. “No, Junior. You set yourself up as my accomplice. You sa
id yourself that the state police were involved. Did you consider that they would analyze this note you left behind or the photograph? A handwriting analysis will prove—”

  “Jack shit,” she shouted. “It’ll prove nothing. Yes, they’ll be looking for an accomplice, but they won’t be looking for me. I’ve already set someone else up to take the fall, and it’s working out quite nicely.”

  “How nice for you.”

  “Thank you, I thought so.” She pulled the knife from her coat pocket. “Now that you know all the gory details, let’s get…gory. Who should I start with? Your precious pledge or the private dick?”

  Owen played opossum, and fought the urge to move. Xavier Preston had bound his hands and wrists. Preston’s daughter—Melissa/Holly—had taken him by surprise in the SUV and had cut and bludgeoned him. He’d lost blood. How much? He wasn’t sure if the ache in his head and sheer grogginess was due to the baton she’d cracked against his skull or the wounds to his thigh and arm. Either way, it didn’t matter. At this point, he needed to find a way to stop her before she killed him and the boy.

  “Well,” Melissa began, “I’m thinking I should go for your precious pledge. He’s been pissing me off all week.”

  “He’s done nothing to you,” the dean said, his tone desperate but laced with anger.

  “And you’ve done nothing to him,” she countered. “You talked a big game, but instead all you did was hose him off and feed him gross food. Oooo, scary.” She laughed. “What’s even scarier is that I get the impression you actually like him. Hell, I think that even if I didn’t fuck you over, you’d feel more for him than me. So, yeah. I think Josh needs to go first.”

  Metal scraped against rock. Owen couldn’t see her from his position on the floor, but pictured her running the blade of the butcher’s knife along the wall next to Josh.

  “Wait,” she said. “You never told me…how do you normally kill your pledges?” When the dean didn’t answer, her footsteps echoed on the floor as she moved into his line of sight. She picked up the bat. “Do you need a little encouragement? Or are you going to answer me?”