by L. L. Foster
When it was well deserved.
The others crowded closer. He felt their palpitating fascination. Slanting his gaze to the side, he saw one woman lick her lips and stroke her own nipples.
His cock hardened.
His pulse thrummed.
Filling his mouth with the metallic blood, he sat up and let Georgie, now a lifeless entity, drop limply to the floor.
He turned to the woman—her name escaped him—and saw her big breasts were heaving, her eyes slumberous with sexual excitement. Many would see her as a perverted soul, defective in her desires.
Fabian relished her reaction.
He grabbed her wrist and hauled her in close, then closed his mouth over hers and let her take Georgie’s blood directly from him. It was the rarest of gifts he bestowed on her, and she didn’t disappoint him.
She moaned, choked, and then her tongue slicked over his, over his lips and chin. He ripped her shirt away and squeezed her nipples, twisted. Crying out, she bit his chin, launching into her own primal derangement.
Fabian liked it that everyone watched them, that he would be the center of attention as befitted his importance.
With Georgie no longer a viable member, he had an audience of six, which was perhaps one too many.
He shoved his hand beneath the woman’s skirt and fingered her roughly through her panties. She panted, fell back with her legs spread.
A dangerous offering to a man in the middle of a bloody fete.
Fabian smiled and bent to her hot, fleshy thigh. He licked, nuzzled, testing the give of her soft body, aware of the warmth from her own flowing blood just beneath her smooth, silky skin.
He looked up at two other young men, both of them wide-eyed with fascination, watchful with expectation. As he recalled, one was an accountant, the other a cashier for the local grocery.
They were both easily led. “Hold her.”
At his order, the woman jerked with new awareness of her precarious position. Now panicked, she tried to fight, but oh, it was far too late for that.
His minions were quite willing to do as he bid them, if for no other reason than a macabre curiosity as to his intent.
One of the lads held her arms against her furious struggles; the other caught her free leg and pinned it back painfully so she couldn’t kick Fabian.
If she did, he’d kill her for certain. In fact, her outcome was yet undecided. But he inclined toward leniency; after all, they needed a new source of nourishment and Georgie was dead.
With her plump proportions she’d likely suffer them for a week or more, especially if they showed due moderation.
Salty tears, blackened with makeup, tracked her cheeks, mixing with the blood on her mouth and chin. She sobbed and pleaded to no avail.
Beside her, the scent of Georgie’s body, his blood and his violent death, spurred on their passion.
“Silence her,” Fabian said, and someone cupped a hard hand over her mouth, muffling her entreaties for a mercy that none of them possessed.
Hooking his fingers in her panties, Fabian pulled them to the side, exposing the soft white groin, the thin skin and most fragile flesh. He could see the delicate blue veins, could almost feel the life flowing through her.
His heart threatened to erupt with the grisly provocation of it.
Her snuffling sounds of terror blurred in Fabian’s mind, receding until all he could envision was the steady pumping of her blood through her veins. Slowly, relishing the moment, he bent and sank his teeth into her groin.
He could smell her pungent, aroused sex, and taste the piquancy of her luxuriant fear. The sensual, potent medley put him into an anesthetized languor.
She screamed in agony, but the sound only incited them all.
She wouldn’t die, Fabian decided; he wouldn’t allow her that easy release. Her exquisite taste would not be squandered in a loss of control.
Her wound would heal, and she’d be anointed in the ritual of serving others.
Seeing her plight would surely inspire the rest of his minions to greater understanding.
She tasted even better than Georgie had, but Fabian no longer fed from hunger. No, Georgie had taken care of that.
He fed now to show his superiority.
He fed from sheer pleasure.
He fed as a show of dominance.
And then, like any good master, he stepped aside and let the others take a turn.
He didn’t mind sharing. And besides, he had to leave for work soon. Today, he would arrive at the shop more fulfilled than he’d been in ages.
Maybe, with the added drug of fresh blood, he’d be able to surmise how he knew the skinny woman he’d seen with the cops. He’d been too far away to see her clearly. All he’d noted with certainty was her weakness, her vulnerability. Yet when he’d looked at her, despite her pathetic flaws, he’d felt a strong familiarity.
Somehow they were acquainted. But how?
He would figure it out, Fabian decided as he stood back and watched the others descend on the woman.
She made a most delectable meal.
But somehow he knew, if he captured that skinny woman and tasted her, she would be the most sublime.
Anticipation gnawed on his serenity; he could hardly wait.
Chapter 4
Gaby dressed without hurry, distracted by the mayhem of her thoughts. She wasn’t sure where to look for the girl, but staying in Luther’s home wouldn’t elucidate things. She needed to be doing . . . something. Anything.
Hanging around, waiting for Luther to return, made her feel doubly dependent and pathetic.
She couldn’t abide either.
She locked away her manuscript for safekeeping, hoping that by the time she needed to finish it, the child would have an ending that ensured safety and security.
Because she wasn’t certain where the bus route might be in Luther’s neighborhood, she bundled up in a dark hooded sweatshirt. She might be walking for a while, not that she minded. Strolling around the area would help her familiarize herself with the new surroundings. She needed to find a good place nearby to stow her beat-up car. She needed to learn the various routes and where they led.
After clipping a digital audio player to her waistband and putting headphones in her ears, Gaby ventured out. Luther had bought her the music player, and she enjoyed it more than she’d thought possible. Even the music he’d initially chosen for her, edgy and loud with a hard thumping beat that she felt inside herself, was perfect for her.
In some ways, he knew her well.
In other ways, he didn’t know her at all.
The gray sky and brisk wind added a nasty chill to the air, but Gaby paid no heed as she concentrated on the side streets and main intersections, learning the area and committing it to memory.
After several miles of walking, she found a bus stop and joined others huddling under a lighted metal enclosure that would protect them from the rain.
Recognizing the difference between the squalor of the areas she usually frequented and Luther’s middle-class comfort, Gaby stuffed her knotted hands into her sweatshirt pockets.
Truth be told, she felt more comfortable near the dregs of society, in the projects and government housing units. There, surrounded by crime and immorality, around people driven by indifference and desperation, she felt at home.
Mort, her old landlord and now a friend, had kept his building clean and semi-secure, especially since the comic book store he owned was attached to the living quarters. But at night, she could hear the drunken arguments, the domestic abuse, the drive-by shootings and gang disruptions.
And it . . . comforted her.
There had been a bus stop not two blocks from Mort’s front door, but not even a bench remained at the designated location. Miscreants of the serious and not-so-serious kind had repeatedly demolished it, as much out of boredom as a display of street cred. No one had bothered to replace the seat or the shelter.
Though she hated to be fanciful, Gaby missed the old plac
e. At least while staying there, she’d understood her life and her purpose.
Then she’d met Luther, and he’d turned her whole existence upside down. Running from him had seemed the safest bet. For a time, she’d stayed with hookers and put up with Jimbo, their pimp.
She’d changed her look, changed her location, changed almost everything about herself except her duty—and still Luther had found her.
Bliss claimed they were destined to be together.
So dumb. How could that possibly be?
Gaby hunched her shoulders, driven inward by her thoughts.
She did believe in Bliss’s intuition, but Bliss was little more than a child, as much an outcast as Gaby herself. Until Gaby stepped in, she’d been a hooker.
Now she was a friend.
Damn, how many freakin’ friends did she need, anyway? She was starting to collect them the same way a mangy dog collected fleas. She’d gotten by for a long time all on her own. Other than Father Mullond, the priest who’d helped her understand her calling, she’d had no one.
And she’d been fine and dandy all alone. It was better. For her, for everyone else.
But things had changed irrevocably.
An older woman gave Gaby a sympathetic smile, and she realized how darkly she scowled.
Shit. She turned away from the granny and turned up her music until it made her eardrums vibrate.
Disgruntled by the rapid changes taking place in her life, Gaby kept her distance from the warmly clothed men and stylishly dressed women at the stop. Leaning on a brick structure, she surveyed the traffic, both human and automotive.
People laughed or talked, some with umbrellas open, some with collars up. A few had devices in their ears and appeared to be in deep conversation with . . . no one.
Even those waiting for the bus were in a hurry to get somewhere, likely nowhere important. That mind-set, the on-the-go lifestyle, made no sense to Gaby.
These people acted safe, as if anyone ever truly could be. They had no awareness of the ugly societal deformities that loomed around them. Homicidal psychopaths lurked everywhere, disguised as neighbors, family, friends, or lovers. Fiends of every disorder existed hand in hand with innocents.
Yet none of these people had a clue.
And Gaby could never forget. Not for a second. God, she was out of place here, and sooner or later Luther would realize it.
The bus finally came and Gaby waited until everyone else had boarded before taking a seat toward the back. No one sat by her, but several people stared.
Was she that transparent? Did even strangers recognize her deviant presence among them?
Their auras filled the bus with a churning hue of expectation, urgency, boredom, and complacency. Not one of them understood the day-to-day peril they faced.
Choosing to ignore them, she turned to stare out the foggy window. Like veins on emaciated flesh, raindrops traveled haphazardly over the dirty glass, occasionally crisscrossing and blending, only to branch out again.
Gaby contented herself by watching as tidy buildings gave way to shops with crumbling bricks and peeling paint. One by one, the social scale of the bus’s occupants changed. The “nice” people got off, and a new element boarded.
The hypnotic hiss of bus tires on wet pavement, the gray day and drizzling rain, softened the reality of bars and tattoo parlors that replaced groceries and salons.
Falling into a lull, Gaby lost herself in her raucous music—until her unfocused gaze snagged on one particular tattoo parlor. Beautiful swirling colors and font shapes drew her attention to an ornate sign indicating the artwork available inside.
But around that sign, encompassing the façade of the tidy, well-kept building, a thick, dark impression of reality swirled. This aura wasn’t so much a glow as a smoky film in dirty colors of sulfur and mustard, rich with pain and anger.
Gaby pressed a hand to the window and stared. Black boreholes pierced the shades, and through those holes, small white explosions, spurred by artificial stimulation, told Gaby that the tattoo parlor partook of some serious drug use. Shades of grave imbalance indicated a lack of sanity. A crazed sociopath lurked inside.
Gaby’s senses kicked.
This wasn’t a true alarm, but more like sensory awareness of things being out of place. It thrilled her to have found a firm purpose.
Adrenaline rushed through her lax limbs as Gaby stood to make her way to the front of the bus. The second the driver stopped, she got off, removed her earphones, and surveyed her surroundings.
Even the air smelled different here, not as green, crisp, or clean as it did near Luther’s home. Here, she smelled the smoke of factories, the odor of rotting garbage, and the sticky stench of unwashed bodies.
This was her world.
She knew what to do here.
Renewed by familiarity, Gaby started back up the street toward the tattoo parlor, but before she’d gone more than a few steps, the vicious snarling of dogs drew her gaze.
Across the street, three young men with two pit bulls on leashes approached the gated area of an old elementary school. The school’s windows were all shattered or boarded up, but in the yard a ramshackle playground inhabited by an old moldy sofa and a few treadless tires remained.
The men were muscular guys, tall and cocky, and their dogs begged to be unleashed.
A young, dark-skinned woman quickly gathered up three children and left the area. A husky woman yelled something at the men and shook a fist, but quieted when the dogs lunged, trying to get free of their restraints. The men laughed, and the angered woman snatched up a child off the old couch and fled.
More children remained, climbing in and over the old tires, bouncing on the broken springs of the couch, risking hazard on the rusty, ruined playground equipment. Most of them were unattended by adults.
So, Gaby thought. She had children aplenty, and obvious drug dealers claiming real estate. This was a perfect opportunity for her to shake off her introspection.
Alive with anticipation, Gaby started across the street. The tattoo parlor could wait.
She needed this. Oh yes, she did.
Before she could reach the men, someone caught her arm, startling Gaby so that she swung around in a defensive stance.
The petite girl, who looked to be twelve or thirteen, wore a comprehensive expression of worry far beyond her immature years.
“Lady,” she said in a frantic whisper, “what are you going to do?”
Strangers seldom got explanations from her, but the girl’s lyrical accent, long dark hair, and dark eyes softened Gaby. “What I do best—get rid of trouble.”
Putting a delicate hand to her forehead, the girl mumbled in frustration before saying to Gaby, “You should not do that.”
Intrigued by her daring, Gaby crossed her arms and gave the child her full attention. “Why not? You going to tell me those punks aren’t trouble?”
The girl’s eyes darted to the men; fear clouded her expression. “You should not mess with the likes of them. They are very dangerous.”
Gaby leaned down close. “Here’s a secret for you, kiddo. So am I.”
A small, thin hand clamped on to Gaby’s arm. “You do not understand. They do not like interference. They will . . . retaliate.”
Gaby scoffed. “They’ll try.”
The girl rolled her eyes and her whisper went harsh. “Do not be foolish. Please. They will . . . burn you.”
That took her aback, not in fear but in curiosity as to what this child had been through. “Burn me, huh?”
Nodding, the girl again glanced at the men. They were currently harassing a boy close to the girl’s age. The boy strained away, anxious to escape, but they kept him in place with a painful grip on his shoulder and a lot of mean-mugging intimidation.
That in itself, the physical detainment of a young boy who wanted to be free, was reason enough for Gaby to intervene, to execute her own form of devastation. But she wanted details on what the girl meant, and at present, the boy didn
’t look to be in immediate danger. Scared, yes, but they wanted something from him, so they wouldn’t hurt him. Yet.
If things changed, well then, Gaby would be on the men in a heartbeat.
“How about you explain to me—real fast—exactly what you’re so afraid of.”
“And then you will go?”
“Then I’ll understand.” No way was Gaby leaving.
The girl nodded. “There are few places for children to play, and they often gather here. Then the men showed up and began selling their drugs. Things were not the same. There were gunshots and loud arguments about who could sell here and who could not. A man was beaten, and another was cut with broken bottles. When they started to bother the children, my aunt asked them to sell their drugs at another block, to leave the children here alone.”
“Other than the obvious danger, how were they bothering the kids?” Gaby already had an idea, but she wouldn’t mind having it spelled out.
The girl looked down at her clasped hands. “They get the children to be lookouts when they sell their drugs. My aunt did not like that.”
Had they tried to force the girl? Oh yeah, she’d bet on it. And now Gaby would make them pay. “Your aunt sounds like a gutsy lady.”
Remembered heartache added pain to her tone. “After my aunt complained, they attacked her. Her house was burned to the ground.” Her stark gaze came back to Gaby’s. “She and my uncle both died.”
Pain as sharp as her blade sliced deep into Gaby’s conscience. Why hadn’t she been called on to help the aunt? God knew she couldn’t be everywhere at once, but for this child to have suffered such a loss . . .
“Damn it.” Gaby looked up at the sky. “You know, You could have let me know.”
The girl backed up a step, and Gaby realized she’d scared her. Around here, few probably talked directly to Him.
Around the tightness in her throat, Gaby asked, “When was this?”
“A few months ago.”
Had the girl been living with her aunt when the fire happened? If so, where did she live now?
Gaby didn’t like the probability of her on the street. “The police did nothing?”
“There is nothing that they can do. They try, but they never catch the men doing things they should not. There is no way to prove that they set the fire.”
