by Regina Cole
The outer layer was thick, filmy, almost like frosted glass. I narrowed my eyes and stared harder, doing my damnedest to focus. There. Deep in the orb’s center, swirling reddish smoke. Without thinking, I rubbed at the glass surface, trying to clear up the film and see the center of the globe more clearly. Images leaped into view so quickly I staggered away with a gasp.
Verum stood with his back toward me, his hands clasped tightly behind him as he watched a group of men drag a woman from the front porch of her ramshackle home. He didn’t move as they threw her down, one of the men sitting on her legs to keep them still, another holding her arms to keep her from fighting, another lifting a knife before driving it deep into her chest with a wicked twist. Verum didn’t react as I screamed and beat the orb, begging him to stop them as they split open her belly like a fish’s.
My screams faded as the men fell on her like a pack of wild dogs, their teeth tearing into the bleeding flesh of her abdomen. Verum didn’t so much as twitch at what was happening only a feet away from him.
I whirled away from the sight, my gasping, terrified sobs echoing in the empty room. Verum had done nothing to stop those monsters. What kind of sick, sadistic person could watch that happen and not help? He’d been standing right there! He could have whisked her away, brought her here as he had for me.
But he hadn’t. He’d let her die.
Steeling my heart, I dashed the tears from my cheeks. I’d had enough. My heart had been misled by another man who didn’t give a shit about women.
Tearing the covers from the bed, I seized a silken sheet. Wrapping it around myself like a tunic, I searched the room for two things. First and most important, a weapon to protect myself. And second, the door. My freedom was now vital. Verum couldn’t be trusted and I wasn’t going to leave my safety up to him anymore. My chest ached at the thought but I ignored the pain.
Half an hour later, my knuckles ached from rapping on every square inch of the walls surrounding me. My ragged nail beds throbbed, broken from the way I’d pulled at the bricks in the hearth, looking for some unknown trigger to swing a portal wide. The skulls on the shelves sat in drunken disarray, as I’d left them after examining each for a hidden switch. The room stood in shambles. I’d shoved furniture out of the way to search for an exit. Nothing. Verum’s home was apparently an impenetrable fortress and the only way out was with the Truth Keeper himself.
I slumped against the base of the orb, which wouldn’t move no matter how I pushed at it. I was well and truly trapped in Verum’s world until he chose to set me free. Fortunately, the cruelly sharp, oddly shaped sword I’d found meant I had some protection from both Verum and the madmen who’d chased me.
It’s not such a bad thing to be stuck here with Verum, whispered my subconscious. After all, the sex was incredible.
I shook off the traitorous thought and scrambled to my feet, palming the scythe-like sword. The sex didn’t matter. Another woman had died. That made three I knew of and Verum hadn’t bothered to save anyone. Except me. Why were they targeting women? What reason could they have for such senseless, heinous crimes?
Why me, Verum? I paced around the orb, trying like mad to make heads or tails of the situation.
“I did not mean for you to witness that.”
I whirled around, bringing the heavy sword up with both hands and pointing it at Verum. “Stay away.”
He shoved his hood back with a quick, practiced movement. His eyes glowed brighter as he frowned, his tall, dark form even more intimidating with that displeased expression. “Bryerly, put my khopesh down. I shall not harm you.”
“But if somebody else comes in here and wants to chew on my internal organs, you’ll stand and watch, right? No thanks.” The point of the weapon trembled with my nervousness. “I can’t trust you. You need to let me go.”
The tip of the khopesh pierced the exposed skin on his chest as he leaned toward me. A single drop of bright-red blood dripped down the vee, disappearing beneath his robe. “I do not keep you here.” His voice was a hiss. “I’ve not harmed you, Bryerly. I saved your life.”
I flicked my gaze up to his face. “But not hers. And how long will you keep me alive? As long as you can fuck me?”
He jerked backward so quickly the wickedly sharp tip of the khopesh cut a slit in the neck of his robe. “You do not believe that.”
I nodded, keeping the sword pointed at him. “I do.”
He laughed, a cold, mirthless sound that echoed off the wicked grins of the skulls lining the shelves behind him. “Bryerly, you forget. The truth is my burden. I know what you think.”
Shame, hot and liquid, filled my veins. I hated myself for my weakness. I hated Verum for pointing it out. Without thinking, I swung the khopesh. He ducked my clumsy swing, coming up and close to me as he grabbed my wrist, squeezing just hard enough to make me release my grip. The khopesh clattered to the floor beside us. Tears tracked down my cheeks as I glared at him, his odd white eyes only inches from mine as his large body pressed full into me.
“Go ahead. Use me. You know everything so you know I still want you. But if you know what I’m thinking then you already know I hate you for watching that girl die.”
His lids slid closed. I didn’t dare to breathe as he slowly released me, stepping aside until we no longer touched.
“I would explain but your opinions are set. It would do no good.”
“Try me.”
He looked at me then and I nearly took a step toward him at the naked pain in his ghostly eyes. “The burdens you chose to bear are still yours but I will not interfere again. I must touch you one last time to return you to your plane.”
“Wait, Verum,” My voice sounded thin as he closed the gap between us. He reached out. “I’m…”
His skin touched mine and light covered my vision before I could utter the word. “Sorry.”
When the whiteness faded from my vision and my lonely bedroom surrounded me once more, I didn’t waste a second. Verum’s sheet fell to the floor as I sprinted for my closet. Underwear, jeans, T-shirt, sweater, thick socks and hiking boots went on faster than I’d ever dressed before. My dad’s pistol, fresh from its resting place in my nightstand drawer, felt cold and alien. Flicking open the chamber as he’d taught me before he died, I made sure the bullets were all in place. I shoved a spare box of ammo into a backpack and after yanking my hair into a ponytail and tucking it under a cap, I headed swiftly and silently into the kitchen.
The door still hung open from my earlier desperate flight. Ducking behind the island counter, I stilled my breath to listen. Nothing. I was alone, at least for the moment.
Peanut butter, bread, fruit, granola bars and bottles of water joined the box of bullets in my bag. After I shoved a book of red-tipped matches and a flashlight into the bag, the zipper hummed shut. The straps dug into my shoulders but I ignored the slight discomfort. Women were dying and no one but I seemed to care. Not even Verum. I had to do something to stop these brutal psychopaths, find my way out of town and do it all without dying myself.
With a last, longing glance around my house, and the ominous weight of the gun in my pocket, I headed out the open door into the rapidly darkening woods.
As I trudged through the dusky forest, plans whirled through my brain. Rafe. He’d started this, he and Davis. If I could find him, maybe I could get some answers, see what his plans were, what I was up against. My mind made up, I headed in the direction of Rafe’s dumpy trailer. His grandfather had left it to him when he died. Before, when things were different, Rafe and I used to joke about selling the run-down mobile home to a family of possums. He’d been living in it for six months now, since getting evicted from his apartment.
It was getting too dark to see clearly. The faint moonlight glinted off the damp carpet of leaves beneath my feet. The evening’s chill wind whipped stray hairs across my cheek before I tucked them beneath my cap again. The sharp scent of pinesap and wet earth filled my nostrils, a perfume that would normally soothe me.
Tonight it put me more on edge, with memories of my last flight through the woods. That one had ended with seeing Donna dead and getting myself nearly caught in the process.
Verum had saved me though.
I shook the painful thought away and reached into my backpack for the flashlight. Bryerly, you have to forget Verum. He’s not what you think. He watched that woman die. He’d watch you die too, if you weren’t fucking him.
Even though I was certain it was the truth, it still stung and I sniffed as I clicked the flashlight on. I was alone. Verum had made it clear I couldn’t depend on him. And that, I thought with a determined set to my chin, is completely fine with me.
Even though Rafe only lived about ten minutes away by car, it took much longer than that on foot, especially through the rougher terrain of the woods. The moon was high by the time I neared the clearing where the trailer sat.
A large oak stood about thirty yards from the edge of the tree line and I set my pack there, nestled at the curve of two roots. Digging in the pack, I pulled the box of bullets out and shoved a fistful into my front pocket. I triple-checked the chamber, clicked off the safety and, with both hands trembling on the gun, I crept toward the trailer to face down the creature that had once been my boyfriend.
Chapter Seven
Huddled behind a skinny bush, I waited for any signs of life in the rust-spotted, grimy yellow mobile home. Watery light bled through the aged curtains of the kitchen, illuminating the patch of bare dirt over the septic tank where grass refused to grow. I listened hard. No radio or TV. No voices. No whirring tools in the simple lean-to shed behind the trailer. Rafe’s car was there but his junker of a motorcycle was nowhere to be seen.
Think, Bry. You know where the spare key is. Go in, see if you can dig out some information about what the hell is going on in this town. Rafe is mean but he’s not sneaky. If he’s up to something, there’s a pretty good chance he’s not hiding it well.
With the little pep talk from the brave section of my brain over, I wiped my sweaty palms on my jeans, got a better grip on the gun and sprinted toward the rickety wooden steps. Once there, I flattened my back to the outer wall beside them, listening hard. Nothing.
Not daring to feel relieved, I reached beneath the upper step, trying to ignore the sticky threads of a spider web. The bent tenpenny nail was still there, its burden of a single key undisturbed. My fingers closed around it gratefully.
The grayed-out wood of the steps creaked beneath my boots. After jabbing the key in the lock, I turned it and pushed in at the same time. Slipping through the crack, I held my breath then shut and locked the door behind me.
I made it.
My eyes slid closed for a moment, my pulse beating a wild tattoo in my throat. I was in the home of a murderer. Last time I’d been here, only a couple of months ago, I’d been trying to tell myself that nothing was different, that Rafe was tired from his swing-shift job at the plant. He’d get back to normal soon. But it hadn’t happened. And now women were dying because of him.
After a deep breath, which did little to slow my thrumming pulse, I began a slow, careful examination of Rafe’s home.
I made my way from the dirty kitchen into the messy living area. It smelled awful. It had been none-too-clean when I’d visited before but now the whole home had an odor of sweaty socks and rotting meat. It turned my stomach and whitened my knuckles on the pistol’s grip.
Piles of clothing and trash littered the living area. Only one space was open on the couch, directly in front of the TV. Gingerly, I shifted some things in the nearest pile of garbage. Food wrappers, discarded beer cans, crumpled papers. Tucking the gun beneath my arm, I smoothed out one of the sheets. It was a full-page receipt from an internet medical supply company. Rafe had ordered a large number of syringes and vials of…female hormones?
Incredulous, I folded the paper and shoved it into my pocket. What the hell did he need that for? Notions whirled in my head as I finished looking through the pile, each one crazier than the last. Without coming up with any logical ideas, I mounded the pile again before heading to the only bedroom in the tiny trailer.
Alarm bells went off in my head as I stopped in front of the closed door. The smell was much stronger here. Like death—dark, musty and foul. I shuddered as bile welled in my mouth. There was something awful in that room. And I’d have to check it out before leaving if I had any hope of discovering how to stop Rafe from hurting anyone else.
Come on, Bry. Let’s get it over with.
The thin brass knob felt unnaturally cold as my nerveless fingers gripped it and turned.
I would have thought that, at some point, the sight of blood, shattered bone and gutted corpses would be easier to take. And it might have been, if not for the smell. Heavy, cloying, the scent of decay invaded my lungs like a harbinger of my own death. The stench clung to me as if glued there. I clapped my palm over my mouth and nose. Stinging tears welled in my eyes at the sight and stench of the thing in front of me.
It was impossible to identify the woman whose remains hung from the ceiling of Rafe’s bedroom. She’d been there far too long. Her body had been ripped open like all the others’ but it had been at least weeks ago. The bloodstains were dry, her skin was shriveling and the organs that remained looked and smelled foul.
She’d begged Rafe to stop. Harold had watched and smiled as Rafe made his first kill.
I slammed the bedroom door and ran for the exit. Sick, sick, sick. They were so fucking twisted. There was no sense to be made here, no clues that would justify remaining in the home of this murderer. I had to get out, leave town. I’d been crazy to think I could stop these psychos with only an inherited pistol and a single box of bullets. I’d need a SWAT team to tackle the dark minds I was faced with.
I skidded to a stop at the door but the menacing, rough sputters of approaching engines stopped me cold.
“Oh no,” I whispered. My heart faltered as two engines silenced. “Oh shit!”
Footsteps approached and voices sounded. It was Rafe and he wasn’t alone. Suddenly the deadly weapon I held looked as useless as a water gun.
I staggered into the living room, looking around frantically for a place to hide. There was no time. A narrow closet was my only chance. I threw myself into it, shutting the door just as keys jingled in the lock.
Muffled voices greeted my ears as I huddled behind an ancient letterman jacket and assorted other clothing. I curled into a tiny ball in the corner and hardly dared to breathe.
“Man, Rafe, this place smells like ass.” Davis’ laugh sent shivers through me.
“Shut up. We have work to do.”
A thump and dragging sound on the floor sent shock waves up my spine. They were close, so close. They had to be in the middle of the living room.
“Did you have to knock her out?” Davis whined. “It’s more fun when they fight back.”
I stared into the darkness, panicked.
“It’s cleaner this way. When she fights, it’s hard to get them all. Now come on. It’s your turn.”
Two more thumps and a soft, feminine moan. Terror rose in my throat. I had to get out, to stop them. They were going to kill another woman right there.
I palmed the gun with shaking hands and rose to my feet. I reached for the closet’s knob as two gunshots sounded from outside the door.
Too late.
My fingers fell and I stared into the darkness, numb. I’d been no better than Verum. I’d blamed him for standing by while another innocent was murdered and what had I done?
The ripping, wet sounds filled me with panic. They were doing it again. A desperate moan clawed its way up from my belly and I shook my head furiously, trying to deny it. I had to keep silent or they’d do the same to me. I shook wildly, terrified sobs building in my chest. A ragged gasp escaped me and the sounds beyond the door stopped.
“What was that?” Rafe’s voice was dark, menacing.
I froze.
Bryerly. Verum’s voice brushed by my e
ars. Bryerly, relax.
My breath evened slightly and I barely registered the sounds as they resumed. It was my imagination. Verum had promised he wouldn’t come to me again and he’d been truthful. I knew that. I’d told him I hated him, after all. But despite what had happened between us, the memory of him steadied me, held me through the nightmare happening only inches away.
Bryerly, stay with me. Let me hold you.
Invisible, intangible arms circled me, held me close. The musty, dank smell of the closet faded away, replaced by the clean scent of my dark lover. I hesitated at first. The terrifying sounds from outside my makeshift haven intruded again. I made my choice and turned my face into Verum as the room shifted, the black edges catching glints of white light as they shimmered into nothingness.
I tilted my head up and looked into his warm white eyes. He kept them open as he kissed me, his hot tongue dipping between my lips. My arms twined around his neck as my knees went weak. He held me to his nakedness, his erection pressed to my belly. An answering heat began between my legs, warm wetness pooling there. My breasts pressing fully onto him, I opened my mouth farther, denying him nothing.
He lifted me tenderly, gently, and laid me on the bed. My body and heart warmed as he pulled the cap from my head, freeing my blonde hair into rippling waves across the pillow. He removed my sweater and shirt, unhooked the front clasp of my bra and took off my jeans, boots and shoes without saying a word. I bit my lip as I watched him, lust building deep within me.
Somewhere in my conscious mind, I knew none of this was really happening but I didn’t care. It felt real so it was real. Much more real than anything going on outside that closet. Verum would protect me, even if it was only his memory.
I almost lost the vision then, threads of darkness winding through our hidden retreat, but I quickly rose on my knees and pulled Verum atop my now-naked body.
“Please,” I whispered between desperate kisses. “Please fuck me, Verum.”
He rubbed along the skin of my bare back, down to cup my ass. I moaned against his mouth as he lifted me, wrapping my legs around his hips. Our position brought his stiff cock into full contact with my throbbing heat and I rubbed him hungrily. The anger and confusion that had plagued me before burned up in the heat of our passion. All I could think of was Verum, what he was doing to me, what he would do. He was the best distraction I could have asked for.
