Tim wondered if that might work for Barry. He was a damn good accountant, after all. They had no idea that he was anything other than a loyal employee at the moment. The thought of betraying his friend’s trust sickened Tim, but the thought of getting dragged into a blackmail plot and going to prison sickened him more.
He threw away the rest of his sandwich and headed to the elevator. He stepped inside and pressed the button for the thirteenth floor. The digital readout requested a password. He pressed six, six, six. The floor number display went black and the elevator shot up to the executive floor.
Tim stepped through the open doors and looked around. The floor was black marble and the walls were dark brown mahogany. The tables in the vacant hall were adorned by vases of roses so deeply red that they almost looked black.
Tim glanced down the empty passages. The air was cold and the place was completely silent. It almost felt like a tomb. He immediately regretted his decision to come. He turned around and pressed the elevator button furiously, but nothing happened.
The barely audible sound of a foot tapping against the floor caught his attention. Turning back around, he jumped, finding that he was no longer alone.
The surly blonde executive bodyguard was standing directly in front of him with her arms crossed. He was suddenly aware of just how similar her shimmering eyes looked to Lucy’s.
“Hi,” he said.
Her only response was a slightly raised eyebrow and a deeper frown.
“I’m here to see Lucy. She said I could stop by?” It wasn’t really a question, but Tim’s apprehension made it sound like one.
“Of course she did. This way.”
She walked over to an enormous oak door directly across from the elevator. Tim wondered how he had failed to notice it before.
The door must have weighed at least a hundred pounds, but the woman pushed it open like it was nothing. “You have a visitor,” she said.
Tim stepped into the office and the woman left, closing the door behind her. Lucy sat at a stylish black desk that was empty save for a phone and a small day planner. Behind her, the Los Angeles nighttime skyline poured in through the floor to ceiling window, a sea of glass towers, lights, and life.
“Hello again,” she said. “Have a seat.”
“Hi.” Tim sat in the amazingly comfortable leather chair directly in front of her desk. Immediately an object on the shelf next to the window caught his eye. “Is that a samurai sword?” he asked.
She glanced back at the shelf. “Yes. They tell me it is a very old wakizashi, the shorter sister of a katana. Would you like to see it?”
“Uh…no. I just didn’t know you’d be armed.”
“Should I be?”
They laughed, and Tim realized that his hands were trembling again.
“There is something I need to talk to you about, Lucy.” Sitting in her office and calling her that just felt wrong. “I mean, Miss Romana.”
“Lucy is fine,” she said. “You can talk to me, Tim. What is going on?”
“I have a friend who is in trouble. He made some mistakes and borrowed a lot of money from the wrong people. Now I think his life may be in danger.” He didn’t realize just how weak the story sounded until he said it aloud.
“Your friend is an employee of Romana Industries?”
“Yes.”
“I can do nothing for him unless he requests help of his own free will.”
Tim nodded. The trembling was getting worse. He forced back tears as the weight of the situation hit him. If they didn’t do something Barry might end up dead.
Suddenly, Lucy was sitting in the chair next to his. He hadn’t seen her move, but it must have been the stress. He wasn’t paying attention.
“It is all right, Tim. You did the right thing in coming to me. This company is run like a family and a family takes care of its own. Tell your friend he can come to me and he will have nothing to fear. Loyalty is a quality I value above all others.”
“Thank you.” Tim felt a little better. Lucy had to be close to his age, but her confidence and manner made her seem so much older.
“You are welcome. And now, there is something you can help me with if you have time.”
“Anything,” he said.
She led him to the private elevator in the back of her office, offering no further explanation. They entered the elevator and descended into the lower levels of the forty-story tower.
“Will you give me your completely honest opinion?” she asked.
“What if it isn’t what you want to hear?”
“Then perhaps it is even more important that you tell me.”
The elevator stopped three levels below the lobby. She led him down a dusty hallway that ended at a metal door. There was no lock or security keypad on the door, which was quite unusual.
She stopped with her hand on the doorknob.
“Can I ask you something of a personal nature?”
“Sure,” he replied, a little too enthusiastically.
“What do you value most in a friend?”
It wasn’t the kind of question he was expecting.
“I guess I value loyalty and trustworthiness above most things.” He thought about Barry. “A friend you can trust and who is loyal to you is worth his weight in gold.”
Lucy smiled. “I could not agree more.” Her green eyes seemed to twinkle even more than they usually did.
She opened the door and ushered Tim inside. He squinted in the glare of the single naked light bulb that hung from a wire in the center of the large, bare room. Lucy closed the door behind her and the sound echoed in the emptiness. The walls were unpainted cinderblock and the floor a concrete slab. Five rectangular columns made of red brick stretched from the floor to the ceiling against the left wall. The columns were about four feet wide and four feet deep. It seemed unlikely that they were meant to support the weight of the upper floors.
An extremely tall man in an obscenely expensive business suit was working on a sixth column. He had completed the two side walls and bricked up about three feet of the front portion. He placed the final brick of a row, then set his trowel next to the mortar and pile of unused bricks and faced them.
Tim was finding it very difficult to breathe. The relief he had felt after his conversation with Lucy was being replaced by a growing sense of dread.
“From the quality of his work,” Lucy said into the silence, “one would never guess that Mr. Nash is not a mason by trade.”
The man towered over Tim by nearly a foot. A quick glance at his menacing stare and Tim recognized him as one of the executive security goons.
“What exactly did you want me to do?” Tim asked. He wanted nothing more than to get out of the room as quickly as he could.
“Of course,” she said. “Please examine the contents of the column Nash has been so diligently constructing.”
Tim nodded and walked toward the incomplete column. He took his time, not because he wanted to move slowly, but because it was as fast as he could force himself to go while fighting his mounting terror.
Before he was close enough to look inside, a sound escaped the brick enclosure. Something moved. The ring of metal brushing against metal grew louder as he approached.
A standing figure stirred in the darkness.
“Tim? Is that you?”
It was Barry.
Lucy appeared at Tim’s side. “Your friend Mr. Barrington has been quite insistent that he talk to you before Nash’s job is finished.”
Chains rattled as Barry moved as far forward as he could. His hands and feet were tethered to the cinderblock wall with about two and a half feet of heavy chains. “Tim, you’ve got to help me. Tell them. Tell them the truth.”
“Barry? What is going on?” Tim looked to Lucy for an explanation, but she stood silently, an enigmatic grin her only response.
“Tell them,” Barry pleaded. “It was your idea. I didn’t want to blackmail anybody.” He turned to Lucy. “You have to believe me. Tim said
he’d kill me if I didn’t go along with it.”
Tim was too shocked to reply. He looked at Lucy again.
“It is true,” she said. “All evidence does indicate that you were planning to blackmail me. Nash, show Tim what you discovered in the bottom drawer of his desk.”
The giant reached into his hip pocket and produced the pistol Barry had shown him the night before.
“Our science department checked and the only prints on the gun match what we have on file for you at human resources, Tim,” she said. “A quick check on the gun’s serial number confirms that it was purchased with your credit card and registered in your name.”
Tim recalled Barry asking to borrow his only credit card to purchase a microwave at a local pawn shop a few weeks back. He hadn’t wanted to let the card out of his sight, but his friend had always been very persuasive.
“Lucy.” Tim wanted to explain. He had to.
“No,” she said. “I will ask you a question in a moment, but for now I want you both to listen very carefully.”
Tim silently locked eyes with Barry.
“As I am sure you are coming to realize, I am the type of employer who prefers to settle matters internally rather than involving outside authorities. We are a family. You are both a part of this family. A family handles its own matters, including discipline and punishment.”
Tim glanced at the other five brick columns.
“It is true,” Lucy went on, “that I value loyalty and integrity. I also value strength of character in those I allow into my trust. Someone has shamed this family. One of you must die.”
Tim thought about running.
Lucifera casually placed a hand on his shoulder. Her grip was like a steel vice. He winced in pain and let out a yelp.
She nodded to Nash. “As I was saying, one of you must die. I do not care which of you it is.”
Nash handed the pistol to a very shocked Barry.
Lucy continued. “My only question is—”
Barry cut her off with a primal scream and pointed the gun at Tim’s head. Tim stared directly down the barrel and heard the distinctive click of an empty chamber.
Barry pulled the trigger five more times. The gun clicked harmlessly each time. After the last click, he threw the gun down and buried his face in his hands.
“How rude,” Lucy said finally, releasing Tim from her grasp. She held out her hand, revealing the six bullets that formerly occupied the pistol. “I had planned to allow you to decide between yourselves who lived and who died. The battle between a man of virtue and a cowardly scoundrel is always entertaining.” She placed the bullets in Tim’s hand.
The metal door swung open behind them.
Tim and Barry both looked to the door, hoping for a savior.
The blonde executive bodyguard stepped inside, dragging a young security guard behind her by his throat. The man was struggling, but she held him effortlessly.
“Ah, Sylvan,” Lucifera said. “There you are.”
The woman smiled and nodded. “I figured out how the gun made it inside. Barney has been a bad boy.” She hurled the man like a bowling ball, sending him sliding across the floor on his back.
Lucy halted the man’s progress by stomping on his throat. He grasped her foot and tried to pry it free, but he couldn’t budge her. “I know Mr. Barrington is the culprit,” Lucy said, ignoring the squirming man under the sharp heel of her Salvatore Ferragamo boot. “His bad intentions follow him like a poisonous cloud. There is no place in this building where I cannot hear his convoluted, scheming thoughts.”
“You can read minds?” Tim asked.
“Yes,” she said with a wink. “Now, Tim, would you like to see what the fuss is all about?”
Nash retrieved an old photograph from a package on the floor and presented it to him.
He cautiously took the picture and held it up so he could see it better in the weak lighting. It showed the lobby of what appeared to be an old movie theatre. From the way people were dressed, the photo was probably taken some time in the 1930s. Most of the crowd was walking to the right, but four individuals were walking to the left: an extraordinarily tall man, a blonde woman with spiked hair, a feral-looking, shaggy-haired man, and a beautiful dark-haired woman in an evening gown. They all appeared to have glowing eyes and fangs. Tim wanted to believe the eyes and fangs were the result of some sort of a problem with the development of the image, but it was amazingly crisp and clear otherwise.
He was also painfully aware that three of the individuals in the picture were standing in the room at that very moment.
“Photographs do not lie,” Lucy said. “It is simple to trick the human mind and make it fail to notice our eyes and fangs. To our great annoyance, we have discovered that electronic equipment is not so easily fooled.”
Tim looked up from the photograph to find that Lucy’s eyes were burning with green fire and her smile was now punctuated by two very sharp fangs. He took a trembling step backward.
She pointed to the picture. “That was taken in New York on February 12, 1931, after the premiere of the film Dracula. We were heading to the rear exit to avoid the crowd. Nash and Sylvan went out to feed, and Mickey—he is the dashing though somewhat shaggy one—took me dancing. I have so few pictures of us all together. I would have gladly paid a million dollars for this if Mr. Barrington had chosen to come to me directly.”
“I’m sorry,” Barry said, “I…”
Lucy ignored him and lifted the security guard off the floor. With a hiss, she tore into his throat with her fangs, forcing him back to the edge of the incomplete wall of Barry’s tomb. Blood poured from his ripped neck and she gulped it down.
When she’d had her fill, she hoisted the man up and over the bricks, dropping him at Barry’s chained feet.
“For the love of God,” Barry gasped. “He’s still alive.”
Tim could hear the man wheezing and gurgling as Barry stomped on him and kicked him in the darkness.
Lucy licked the blood from her fingers. “Fear not, Mr. Barrington. He shall likely perish before you do.” She pointed a still-bloody finger toward the pile of bricks on the floor. “Mr. Nash, if you would be so kind,” she said.
Nash picked up the trowel and spread a layer of mortar on the top of the unfinished wall in front of Barry. Working quickly, he stacked the bricks on that level and spread another layer of mortar on top of them.
“Miss Romana, you can’t just leave me here,” Barry screamed.
“Actually, I prefer Lucifera.” She produced a handkerchief and daintily wiped the excess blood from her hands and face. “Five other individuals have attempted to betray me as you have, Mr. Barrington. There are five brick columns in this room identical to yours. I trust someone as gifted with numbers as yourself can figure out what that means.”
Nash was spreading the mortar and stacking the bricks with superhuman speed. In less than a minute, only a small opening remained at the very top of the brick tomb.
Barry cried and begged the woman for mercy. When she did not answer, he called out to his friend. “Please, Tim. Don’t let them do this to me.”
Lucifera frowned. “The true tragedy in this is that he was a very good accountant.”
Nash handed the final brick to Lucifera. She, in turn, held it out for Tim.
“Life is full of choices, Tim. Here is yours. You can take the elevator to the lobby, then walk out of this office and never return…”
Tim’s eyes settled on the brick and did not move.
“Or, you can place this brick and accept your promotion. It seems we need a new senior accountant.”
“I…I can just leave? You won’t kill me?” he asked.
“That is correct,” she said. “But the instant you even think of betraying me, I will ensure that something unpleasant happens to you, your friends, your family, and everyone you have ever known.”
Tim took a step backward.
“Consider this,” Lucifera said. “Mr. Barrington’s death would h
ave occurred either by my hand or by the hand of those to whom he is indebted. Your conscience is and will be clear. Had he the means, it seems Mr. Barrington would have killed you without hesitation. Such treachery hardly seems like the actions of a friend, but, then I am not telling you anything you do not already know, am I?”
Tim stared at the last unfilled hole at the top of the wall.
“And there is still the matter of that picture you are holding.”
He looked down, finding the photograph still in his hand.
Lucifera extended her empty hand, beckoning for the photograph. “I believe that one million dollars is a fair price. Do you not agree, Tim? We can consider it a signing bonus.”
Barry’s muted screams drifted out of the unfinished tomb. Tim tried to ignore them as he stared at the picture. His mother had sacrificed many things for his sake—her pride being one of them. A million dollars would go a long way toward healing the wounds she took for him.
But that didn’t make it feel any less wrong.
He placed the photograph in Lucifera’s hand. Then, he took a deep breath and grabbed the brick. Without stopping, he shoved it into the final opening, locking Barry in the dark with his screams.
He stared at his trembling hands. “Now I’m a monster, too.”
Lucifera appeared in front of him and touched the side of his face. “No, Tim. As I said, your conscience is clear. Now let me remove the burden of this unpleasant memory so you can focus on your new job.”
Before he could protest, she bit into his neck. Her presence invaded his mind, erasing and twisting his memories. Pain and fear were the last things he felt before everything went black.
*****
Tim awoke in his apartment with a throbbing headache. He removed an empty liquor bottle from the night stand and stared at his alarm clock until it came into focus.
Saturday? The last day he could remember was a Monday.
Slowly, things crept back to him. Barry had wanted him to do something.
Here Be Monsters Page 2
