A Life Without Fear

by Leo King

  Dallas winced. “Oh, shit, that’s right! You didn’t know. Sorry, I didn’t mean to break it to you so conversationally. Yeah, your father was actually Vincent and my father was actually Edward. Which made Edward your half-brother, not your father. Which technically makes you the sister of my father, which means… hello, Auntie!”

  Turning off the water and patting his hands dry with a towel, he heard a strange sound coming from her. It was a rhythmic whining sound, like a puppy whimpering. Finally, it occurred to him that she was crying.

  With a nod, he said, “Yeah, I know how you feel, Sam. I was grossed out, watching from the back seat while Richie did all those things with you.”

  He held out his hands.

  “And believe me, I had no idea what freaks the two of you would be. Seriously, that’s the most mentally deranged thing I have ever come across—an aunt and a nephew screwing like little rabbits.”

  He then shrugged and walked back over to her side. “But, hey, it got your trust, right?”

  Ruffling her hair, he added, “And that’s all that was important. Gaining your trust so that I could get you here. Which, by the way, is the point of everything I’ve done these past twenty years. To kill everyone around you and then kill you. Revenge. Oldest plot in the book.”

  Finally ready, he looked at the setup appraisingly. “Yes, this will do nicely.”

  Sam’s heart rate sped up again as Dallas took off his jacket and started to undress. With his shirt off, the crescent-shaped scar was visible—the scar caused by Vincent as he buried Dallas alive with Maple.

  “The hardest part was keeping Richie engaged in what was happening here, so we could stay in town and near all the right people, but without letting him realize he was a part of me. So I had to keep sending him these delusions of the Nite Priory, hooded figures, and a Lady in Red to keep him under control. When he found out that ‘Nite Priory’ was an anagram for ‘iron pyrite,’ I changed his delusions to have the Knight Priory spelled properly.

  “Heck, I even sent a special delusion, a hooded figure Richie thought was Julius, at the very end. It was the kind of convoluted crap you’d write in your stories, Auntie, but it worked. Any time the hooded members of the Priory or the Lady in Red or any of that crazy crap appeared to Richie, it was in his head. It was me manipulating Richie. And by God, it worked like a charm. Fooled him completely.”

  He stretched a few times. I need to start working out again. I’m getting too tight.

  “Good thing that when I murdered all of Marcello’s men and when I killed off Nick’s gang there were no witnesses around to see my particular brand of psycho. It would have looked very unusual to see Richie Fastellos going between arguing with himself to pissing himself to going batshit insane and murdering everyone around him.”

  With a snort, Dallas said, “It’s a shame what I did to those dogs.”

  With a sigh, he recalled the mental effort needed to create that much delusion for his subordinate personality. “One thing I can’t figure out. When I first started fighting Marcello’s men, I thought I was going to die. Then time slowed down, I got stronger and faster, and… oh, you know the drill. You did it, too. All I know is that Grandpa injected me with that tkeeus before burying me with Mom. But the tkeeus only seems to work when my adrenaline starts pumping. So what is it?”

  He looked over at Sam and arched both eyebrows. “Think maybe there might be some truth to that whole voodoo thing? I’m starting to wonder about that, too.”

  She stared back at him, gurgling out a whine.

  He tapped the scar on his chest and slipped on a green scrubs top. “Just so you know, Sam, I hate Grandpa, too. We are totally simpatico there. He refused to acknowledge me, even though I am his grandchild, just because he didn’t approve of my mother. Hell, he had my dad take your mother out to the Comus Ball, not mine, because he couldn’t stand mine.”

  Dallas dropped the tuxedo pants and then, holding out his arms, exclaimed, “But Dad loved Mom. Maple was spicy and passionate. She had a temper, but she had such a love of life. She was the perfect match for Dad. Mary was just, I don’t know… sweet. Nice. Bland. Kinda like Gramps.”

  Rubbing his head, he muttered, “Mom told me, the night before we were kidnapped by Grandpa, what she and Dad did to Mary. Of course, you realize it was an accident, right? You see, Grandpa was so controlling that even after Mom and Dad got married, they couldn’t live together or even acknowledge each other. Edward had to raise you as his own child so you would appear to be part of the normal lineage.”

  Shaking his head, he looked at Sam with a frustrated frown. “Seriously, who doesn’t let a husband and wife live together? Vincent Castille, that’s who! The bastard wouldn’t even live with his own wife—your mom. All to keep the Castille family image. Seriously? Break up a family for that? What a crock of shit!”

  Sensing her staring wildly at him, he took a few deep breaths. “Sorry. I was out of line there, Auntie.”

  Once he was calmed down, he said, “So, Mom and Dad came up with a plan to distract Grandpa with your mother. They wanted her to be hospitalized. That way, Grandpa would be solely focused on her, and Mom and Dad could take me and move far away. But Mary’s heart was really weak, and she died in the hospital. That’s what drove Grandpa over the edge. That’s why he made me watch as he killed Mama.”

  Pulling on the rest of the scrubs, Dallas shrugged. This was, after all, ancient history to him. He had only gotten upset because he couldn’t understand Vincent’s elitist logic. He didn’t want to appear unhinged in front of his magnum opus.

  “So, anyway, that’s what drove me here. I spent years researching the Bourbon Street Ripper murders, learning about the accomplices and police who messed up, and everything. I started by getting that douche Kent and his greedy son to facilitate everything, then I got Blind Moses to think I was the Knight Priory of Saint Madonna. Lastly, I got my stuff set up, gave that escort Virginia a call—the daughter of the first original victim—and murdered the shit out of her. Pure poetry! And that’s how I started setting up the bullshit murders to hide the first real one—Detective Aucoin’s daughter.”

  Popping on some surgical gloves, he continued, “It was easy to pick my other victims. Miss Clemens seemed a good target, nice and drunk and a real ‘Cock Teaser.’ And Emilie Guidry made it so easy by being Nick’s girlfriend… she was asking for it. The only sticky part was that Richie actually met every single victim after Virginia. He met Rebecca, Cheryl, and Emilie. I am so lucky no one ever picked up on that.”

  Gloves on, he headed over to the tray of surgical tools. “So you see, Auntie, the only one I was really worried about was Detective LeBlanc. His death was a remarkable bit of good luck, although it seemed almost like, once again, some dark voodoo power was forcing the hand of fate that day.”

  Turning around, he perused the instruments.

  Finally, he chose a scalpel.

  “Really, hindsight being twenty-twenty and all, I should have just settled on killing you, Sam. I do tend to overcomplicate things. Kind of like your stories, you know? You see, all of this happened because Vincent, your father, loved you the most. My mother and father were murdered, and I, after being forced to watch my mother suffer for over five hours, was buried alive inside her guts. All because that evil bastard loved you the most.”

  He approached her. She was staring at him, the fear in her eyes like an aphrodisiac. He felt himself choking on the desire to cut into that beautiful flesh. The sight, the sound, the smell. It would be intoxicating.

  “The only way I will ever lay my mother’s soul to rest is to murder that one thing Grandpa loved the most, in the same way that he murdered my mother.”

  Winking, he lowered the scalpel to her left elbow joint, the tip piercing the skin just enough to make a droplet of blood appear. Sounds of terror gurgled in her throat. Her heart rate shot through the roof.

  “Ya know,” he said, pulling back and looking up at the ceiling, “the one thing I never fi
gured out is how Fat Willie’s death happened so conveniently. I mean, I suspected that Violet would attack you. But Fat Willie? An accident right after you visited him?”

  Dallas waggled his eyebrows at Sam. “Again, it’s like there’s some truth to this ‘Voodoo Hoodoo’ thing after all, isn’t it?”

  He patted her left breast, lifting the mammary up and looking at where it connected to her chest. Nodding to himself, he placed the scalpel there. The heart rate monitor started beeping like crazy, her breath increased, and her whimpering got more labored.

  “Honestly, though,” he said, pulling back again and drumming his fingers on her stomach, “I’m really on the fence about that voodoo stuff. I mean, I’ve seen the tkeeus in action. Heck, one whiff of it back at your place and I was able to put Richie down for good. Usually, I had to make Richie think that something like Rosemary Boucher hitting him with her heel was the Lady in Red kicking him, or Officer Guidry’s head-butt into his face was an accident instead of self-defense. You know, more delusions to explain away real-life injuries. But man, the tkeeus… wow… that stuff was potent. And what it did with you and Violet. That was beautiful!

  “But the rest of the coincidences, the little things here and there that have happened… I really don’t know. Were they flukes? Are we just crazy? Or is there something darker and more sinister at play? Sam, let me know when you’re dying if there’s any truth to this stuff, like hearing Baron Samedi dig your grave. I really want to know.”

  Shrugging, he looked down and saw her eyes wide and wild, her chest heaving rapidly, her cheeks wet with tears. The heart-rate monitor beeped uncontrollably.

  “I guess you’re pretty anxious. All these false starts aren’t very fair. All right, let’s get started. I promise not to make you wait anymore.”

  Dallas lowered his lips to Sam’s ear and whispered, “I’m going to go as slowly as I can. I won’t let you bleed to death, I won’t let you choke on your own vomit, and I won’t let you have a heart attack. I won’t let you die until I’m satisfied.”

  He kissed her ear tenderly. “I won’t lie, this is going to be a very hard night for you, Samantha Castille. Very hard indeed.” He nipped her ear almost playfully. “Suffer for me.”

  Standing up, he moved down to her hips and placed his hand on her pubic bone. He then rested the scalpel to the side of her groin. Looking up into her eyes, which looked back with exquisite fear, he grinned and then pushed the scalpel into her flesh.

  Her throat opened and a shriek gurgled out, her body immobile but her eyes as wide as could be. Blood welled up in copious amounts from the wound as he drew the blade down, stopping just to the side of her genitals. The blood pooled on the operating table.

  “Whew,” Dallas said with a nervous chuckle. “I came inches from the femoral artery. I could have killed you right then! Isn’t that exciting?”

  Sidling up along the side of Sam’s body, he noticed that she had managed to turn her head away and shut her eyes. “Got a little motion back, eh? That’s good. Maybe you can scream for me near the end. That would really be thrilling.”

  Pressing the scalpel into her left shoulder joint, he cut a sizable slit. Again, her cries only gurgled in her throat, but her head whipped to the side violently. “See? You have some fight in you, Sam. That’s wonderful. Please, let me know how much you’re suffering. I’ve waited my whole life for this.”

  He dropped the scalpel into the pan and took out a retractor, then pressed it into the shoulder wound and opened it up. Her chest heaved as her throat rattled with another scream that couldn’t completely come out.

  “Interesting bit of trivia,” he said as he picked up the dentist drill. “Do you know what Vincent Castille’s last words were before being executed?” Starting up the drill, he moved it toward the bundle of nerves in Sam’s open wound. The sounds she would make as he ripped into them would be exhilarating.

  From the entrance to the torture chamber, a voice said, “Yes. He said ‘Pull the switch. I have no regrets. She was worth it.’”

  Quickly, Dallas turned to see Rodger Bergeron standing at the doorway and pointing Edward’s revolver at him.

  “Checkmate,” said Rodger, a look of focused resolution in his eyes.

  Chapter 31

  Just the Mask

  Date: Monday, August 17th, 1992

  Time: 11:59 p.m.

  Location: Castille Family Mansion, Lake Pontchartrain

  For several long seconds, Dallas stared at Rodger in disbelief. The old shit had actually figured it out in time.

  Dallas blinked a few times before lifting up his hands. “OK, I’ll admit it. I thought you’d never figure it out. Good game, Rodger. Good game, indeed.”

  “Yeah, tough luck for you, asshole,” said Rodger as he slowly circled around the rack, heading toward Dallas. He only stopped when he saw the tuxedo on the floor. “You realize that even if I hadn’t figured it out it was Mason you murdered in Sam’s bed, the moment the body was taken before the medical examiner, they would have known?”

  Dallas rubbed his nose. “Meh. I was in a hurry, I had to improvise with Richie, or else I would’ve been late for dinner with Aunt Gladys.”

  “You think this is funny?” asked Rodger, anger in his voice.

  “No,” replied Dallas with a slight shrug. “I think it’s hilarious.”

  By now, Rodger was in front of him, the revolver level with his chest. “Turn around, Dallas. Put your hands behind your back.”

  “Really?” asked Dallas, his voice bored. He turned around, lowering his hands and putting them behind his back. “You’re going to arrest me? Wouldn’t it be easier to put a bullet in my head and call it justice?”

  Dallas could hear the sound of jangling handcuffs, along with Rodger saying, “Don’t tempt me. I am seriously considering it.”

  As Dallas felt the cold metal of a handcuff lock into place on his right wrist, he heard Rodger say, “What the hell is that thing in your hand?”

  Dallas’s grin widened, his adrenaline starting to pump. He could feel the tkeeus slowing down the world around him. “It’s a dentist drill. It’s great for drilling teeth, torturing wounds, and—” Quicker than the blink of an eye, he spun around, slapping Rodger’s gun out of his hand, turning on the drill, and slamming it into the side of Rodger’s neck, drawing blood. “—it’s great for getting fat, old cops off your ass.”

  Spinning around again, this time in a full circle, he kicked Rodger in the gut, sending him sprawling back against the rack. Dallas looked at the handcuff around his wrist and said, “Not my kind of kink, you old fart.” Reaching into the tray of surgical tools, he grabbed a pair of scalpels.

  “Seriously, Rodger, you need to retire,” he said, jamming one scalpel into Rodger’s shoulder. “You’re too old to be doing this shit.” The second scalpel went for Rodger’s chest, but the detective was able to block it, the blade sinking into his forearm.

  Rodger cried out from being stabbed and, with a grunt, head-butted Dallas in the face. “You resisting arrest is all the excuse I need.” He quickly removed the two scalpels from his body, making the smell of blood thicker.

  Seeing stars explode from the head-butt, Dallas stumbled back, holding his bleeding nose. All desire to be charming and witty was swept away with a tidal wave of rage. “You’re so fucking dead, old man!”

  He grabbed a pair of switchblades and dashed at Rodger. The rush of adrenaline was complete, in full force as it had been at the Riverwalk. Time slowed down once more. He felt a tingle down his spine and a rush of cold air. Whenever he got this sensation, he became a whirling dervish of death. He took numerous swipes at Rodger, who jumped back and rolled behind the rack to avoid getting hit. Planting his foot on the rack’s frame, Dallas jumped over it with a forward flip. Landing behind Rodger, Dallas stabbed at him several times, the blades lacerating his face and hands.

  Fresh blood began to pour out as Rodger stumbled back, taking a wild shot at Dallas.

  The killer ducked, hi
s body moving with tkeeus-induced speed. The bullet flew overhead. “Ha!” He rushed forward. With two swift moves, he plunged his switchblades into Rodger, getting him in the shoulder and the side. When he pulled back, he saw that one of the knives had stayed in Rodger’s torso.

  Rodger spat up blood on him, his eyes wide with shock as he pulled out the blade. It clanked to the floor.

  “Surprised?” asked Dallas with a cruel smirk, twirling the remaining knife. “You can thank Vincent for this. Looks like he’s still haunting you, eh, Rodger?” Doing a back flip, he kicked Rodger in the face, knocking him against the spiked chair.

  As Rodger fell on the chair, he let out a cry, the spikes piercing his flesh and the latches falling down to secure his arms in place.

  As Dallas landed, he took his remaining switchblade and slammed it into the table near Sam’s head. “Hold that for me, will you, Auntie?” He winked at Sam. She stared at him in both fear and rage as he grabbed the chainsaw. Revving it up, he turned to Rodger, who was struggling to get free of the spiked chair.

  Rodger looked up as the chainsaw roared, his face horror-stricken, before struggling even more with the metal latches.

  “You know, Rodger,” said Dallas as he approached, waving the chainsaw side-to-side, “I am sorely tempted to make you sit there while I kill Sam. I think it would be a brutally ironic ending to all of this.”

  The chainsaw was close enough that he could easily start carving off Rodger’s fingers like the old man was a Thanksgiving Day turkey.

  Rodger’s eyes were fixed on the rotating blade.

  Dallas revved the machine a few more times. “But I want Sam to be the last one who dies. It’s how it needs to be. And then, once she’s dead, I’ll burn this place to the ground and just disappear. Maybe I’ll continue writing. Maybe I’ll get married and have a family. Maybe I’ll go kill elsewhere. Who cares, so long as I never have to see New Orleans again. I hate this fucking city. This city is hell!” With a sneer, Dallas raised the chainsaw and brought the whirring blade down—