Ben woke to find his hands and feet bound by electrical tape. Marla was inching him closer to the grave, pulling his feet and torso in line with the hole to make it easier for her to roll him in. The reality hit him—she was going to bury him alive in his own backyard.
Ben began to scream. Marla put her hand over his mouth and he bit her. She pulled her hand away and then slapped him hard across the face, causing his already aching head to throb in earnest. She pulled off another piece of electrical tape and placed it over his mouth.
“You think I’m a monster.” She bent down, studying her handiwork. “Well, you have no idea of monsters, Ben. I could show you monsters.” She stood up, and he could hear her knees crack. “You asked if killing them was worth it? The answer is yes. I’ve lived for a hundred years. Killing is what keeps me alive. Every thirty years like clockwork, I find a willing sacrifice.” She smiled. “Well, willing is probably not the right term. Still, I get to keep living and looking like this.”
She wiped her face and then pulled Ben’s legs toward the hole. He kicked at her and screamed through the tape, but the sound was so muffled with the buzzing sound that continued a few houses down, drowning out his stifled pleas.
“Esmé.” The name sounded odd through the tape, but it caught her attention.
“Yes, Ben.” Marla knelt beside him. She kept aligning Ben’s body with the pit to dump him alongside Todd Sutton. She motioned toward the body. “It was easy to get Todd here that day. I’d been helping him find photos of a vintage truck that he was giving Lara as a wedding gift. Touching, isn’t it?” She rolled her eyes. “As he was leaving, I hit him with the lion doorstop we bought at Vic’s garage sale last year. You remember the one?”
What was he supposed to do? Nod that he recalled the garage sale?
“I don’t have to choose one of their loves, it could be any man, but it makes it more poetic for me somehow. I keep seeing Cecile’s face when I kill them. Her naive, stupid face. Then I place their cars at Wickelow Bend because it reminds me of the White Forest. A little offering for him so he knows that I haven’t forgotten, either.
“The thing is that they—what I like to refer to as Father’s victims—have to bleed. That’s the requirement.” She was on her hands and knees, getting him positioned, and she blew her hair out of her eyes. “You won’t count, though; the spell doesn’t work that way. I’ll be on the hook for another man in another thirty years.” She thought about something. “Sorry.”
How had he missed this? Had he been so stubborn that he failed to see the signs? This woman he’d lived with for ten years was going to dump him in a shallow grave and then pretend to mourn his disappearance.
Marla swayed a little and she got up then sank onto the nearby iron bench, finally looking down into the hole. “You were right. I need to sell this house and get out of here, go back to Rome or Los Angeles and live again. I thought I’d try domesticity with you, but it just didn’t fit.” She smiled sadly, gazing at her nails as though worried she’d gotten dirt under them. She looked down at Todd’s body. “I’m glad we can’t see his head. I hit him on the side of his head above his ear. The doorstop kind of stuck in his head.” She touched her hair lightly to demonstrate her aim.
“Peter was different, though. Oh, Peter Beaumont.” She closed her eyes like she was savoring a memory. “He could have made me forget all about Émile if I’d stayed with him long enough. I was a friend of his mother’s. He got all sentimental when Audrey told him she was pregnant and said he couldn’t see me anymore. It was like Paris all over again. But I regretted killing him the most. He always took the Wickelow Bend shortcut on his way from Cabot Farms to his house, so I parked my car there by the side of the road. He never knew what hit him. And Desmond, well, he was a bit of an asshole. I fucked him right over there”—she pointed to the lattice now facing Victor Benson’s home—“before gouging his eyes out. You were so funny, going on about fingerprints being wiped. They weren’t wiped, Ben, I just enchanted them all. The whole thing was right under your nose, but you refused to see the magic.”
She stood up and took a deep breath like she was refreshed after unburdening herself of these crimes. Then she kicked him hard in the stomach with the heel of her espadrille, which caused his body to roll. Ben fell the entire three feet into the grave, landing hard on top of what was left of Todd Sutton’s uncovered body. Upon impact, the body gave, releasing putrid smells that engulfed the hole. Ben’s head landed inches from Sutton’s, and his nose took in the pungent decay. His eyes began to water. He squirmed and tried to sit up to get away from the smell. Marla returned to find Ben trying to stand upright in the grave. The uneven dirt made it impossible for him to gain his balance and he fell, this time directly on top of Sutton. Marla furiously shoveled dirt into the hole. “Do you want me to knock you out?” She stopped and watched him squirm. “It might be easier that way… for your sake. I don’t need the blood. I don’t really enjoy it, especially not with you. You’re a good guy. I owe you that, at least.”
“Fuck you,” Ben mumbled through the tape.
“Okay then.” Marla shrugged. “You can’t say I wasn’t merciful.” She resumed tossing dirt over Ben’s feet. He sat up again and shook the dirt off. He quickly decided against getting back to his knees, which would give her another shot at the back of his head.
She walked around the hole, holding the shovel out. She positioned herself to hit him again. This time, he could tell she was going to bring the metal part down on top of his head. He moved around and lowered his head beneath the hole so she couldn’t get a good angle. After a few minutes of him struggling like a worm, she hit him in the back with the shovel, hard, and he fell facedown onto Todd Sutton’s faded jeans that were white from lime and felt his skin and eyes burning. He closed his eyes and prepared for the blow he knew was about to come from behind. She had a perfect shot at the back of his skull. Only then did Ben begin to laugh at the absurdity of his situation. After all these months of looking for Todd Sutton, he was about to die—in a hole—next to the poor missing bastard: the two of them, entwined forever in a shallow grave in his own fucking backyard.
This thought gave him one last burst of energy. He probably was going to die today, but damned if he was going to go down like this. Through the tape, he screamed, more of a rallying cry for himself. Then he rolled forward and put his legs up; they absorbed the blow of the shovel as she brought it down, sending it sailing across the stones. She scurried to retrieve it. With the shovel in her grasp, she turned back… and Ben nearly cried with a mixture of joy and dread when he spotted Lara Barnes walking through the garden gate directly behind Marla.
Lara stood behind Marla, unsure of what to do next. The entire scene was a mess. Ben appeared to have his mouth covered with electrical tape and had been pushed into a deep hole. Lara had a sinking feeling about what else was in that hole with him.
“Ben,” she called. “Are you okay?” She could see from his expression that he was worried about her.
“Have you come to rescue him?” Marla turned, smiling. “If so, you’re just in time.” She held on to the shovel and cocked her head as she took in Lara. “Something has changed in you, hasn’t it?” It was clear that Marla knew Cecile’s essence had joined with Lara’s. “What has Father gone and done now. Hello, Cecile.”
“You haven’t changed a bit, Esmé.” Lara’s tone was sharp, but the words weren’t hers. Cecile had taken over. After a long sleep, Cecile had come awake. Lara could feel herself growing in strength with each passing minute, like they were fusing in strength and magic.
“Let’s just say that every few years I get a little rejuvenation. How is the old bastard?”
“I’m not having a family reunion right now.”
Marla shrugged. “Would you prefer I just kill him quickly?”
“No,” Ben and Lara said in unison, Ben’s statement coming out more of a mumble.
“How is the place? Still a prison?”
“You sh
ould see for yourself.”
“Oh, I don’t think so. Look, Lara, I’ll make you a deal. I’m getting tired of Kerrigan Falls. It’s like our circus: You don’t want to stay in one place too long, people begin to notice things. I made the mistake of letting revenge go to my head; I know that now. Just turn around and go back out through that gate where you came from. I promise you won’t see me again. It’s a onetime deal and it’s a good one. You two are kidding yourselves if you think this body-snatching routine is going to work. The two of you—even entwined—are not as powerful as I am, especially not so soon after killing.” She paused, thinking about what she’d said. “Sorry, Lara.”
That comment stung. Lara flinched. “Seems like you have a history of killing men who don’t love you.”
Marla smiled. “I’ll admit, I was confounded at first that Father had chosen you. Then I got wind that he was getting a lot of pressure from the other daemons to get me back in the fold, so he needed the perfect little soldier to wrangle me like a wild horse. I’ve caused a bit of a scandal. The other daemons think we cambions need to stay hidden in the shadows, but that was never my way—nor Father’s really, given that he created a giant, otherworldly hippodrome to put us in,” said Marla. “So what’s it going to be, Lara?”
“You killed Todd,” said Lara. “I don’t give a shit about your daddy issues. Todd, Peter, Dez, and Émile—none of those men deserved to die.”
“Don’t talk about Émile Giroux,” said Marla. “You know nothing about him. He was my love. Mine. You had everything, Cecile. Do you remember us before Father split us? Have you gotten your memories back now that you’re dead?”
Cecile was silent.
“Let me fill in some gaps, sister. Cambions like us didn’t live. Madame Plutard was such a kind woman and she loved our mother so much. After Mother died, she agreed to give up her life and care for us as our nanny. She had a wheelchair fashioned for the both of us. Each day, she’d take us around the circus in that chair until we were ten years old. Do you remember that?”
Cecile—as Lara—shook her head.
“We’d try to take steps, but we had three legs and neither of us controlled the middle one. I figured out how to put weight on it so we could move with one of us stepping at a time with our good leg and then leveraging our middle leg like a crutch. After we’d practiced it for weeks, I made the mistake of thinking that was something great—that we could finally walk. Madame Plutard was so proud of us.
“Well, Father arrived at the circus. In those days, we were cared for by Doro and Hugo and all of them. Le Cirque Secret was a fun place for us, where people loved us. It was always tense when Father came back and we were paraded out to see him. We started toward him. It was supposed to be a surprise for him that we could walk. Madame Plutard had made us a satin dress—pink with a lace collar—just for the occasion. She’d taken the iron to our long ringlets and placed matching bows on our heads. Everyone was there—all the performers, Madame Plutard, Sylvie. I still recall how much joy we felt to be able to do that on our own—that one little fucking thing on our own.
“Well…” Marla laughed sadly, looking down at the courtyard. “In gazing up at him for approval, I forgot my step and we fell in front of everyone. You have to understand that it was difficult when we fell—we didn’t exactly move together as one unit, so we struggled on the ground for what seemed like a long, long time. At first, no one moved a muscle. Then the Doros and Hugo came to help us, lifting us back on our feet while Madame Plutard ran to get our chair. I’ll never forget the look on his face, Cecile. It is bored into my memory forever, and it fuels me. I’m so sorry you can’t recall it, because if you did, you’d despise him as I do. He was repulsed by his own children,” said Marla. Small sobs erupted from her, and she stopped speaking until she could regain her composure. “He told Madame Plutard that from then on we were to be wheeled to him in a chair, covered with a blanket, like dolls in a carriage.”
Everyone was silent. Lara found the story so horrible, so shocking that she couldn’t breathe. “I’m so sorry, Esmé.” Lara spoke, her voice breaking. “What he did to you was simply unspeakable. I’m so terribly, terribly sorry.”
“Thank you, Lara. I appreciate that,” said Marla. “Soon after the incident, he decided, against the advice of everyone, to cut us in two. It was a terrible thing to endure, Cecile. The pain was unbearable.” Marla closed her eyes as her body tremored. “Even with magic, we barely survived. You were the worst. Your screams were so loud that Madame Plutard begged Father to take your pain away. So he did. The problem was that the enchantment required fealty, so one of us had to remember to keep the spell up. From then on, I had to keep the illusion of us inside Le Cirque Secret going. But even I made the grave mistake of forgetting that it was all an enchantment.” Her voice trailed. “Remember when he sent me to the White Forest, Cecile? Oh, of course you do, you tattled on me like some spoiled brat. Do you know what they do to you in the White Forest? There are no illusions there. Dumped off there and separated from you, I crawled on my belly for three days across the forest floor. Defenseless, I had to fend for myself against all kinds of creatures. I ate twigs and sucked on leaves. I recall wondering what I had done to have our Father hate me so much.
“Finally, I got to the gate at Le Palace Noir, thinking I would be safe. I didn’t know then that the other daemons look down on cambions like us, so I was tortured. I endured unspeakable things, until Lucifer found out and put a stop to it. No matter what anyone says about him, I’ll always be grateful to Lucifer. He sent me back to the circus and rebuked Father horribly. Until I’d heard the gossip in the palace, I didn’t know that the other daemons loathe our father.”
“I never forgave myself for what happened to you.” Lara could feel Cecile’s sobs, causing her own heart to race.
“Well, we’re even. I never forgave you, either.” Marla’s voice was hollow. The story had taken its toll on everyone, yet it hadn’t made Cecile more empathetic to her sister.
Lara could feel Cecile’s anger, mixed with shame, heating up inside her. “It wasn’t my fault, Esmé,” spat Cecile. “I didn’t know. It wasn’t my fault that Father placed that unfair burden on you. You cannot blame me for something I didn’t know. And you’re wrong about Émile. Father enchanted the painting so you’d love him. I gave him up for you.”
“You’re wrong,” said Marla. “He would have chosen me, if not for you being pregnant with Margot.”
Marla had walked around behind Ben, and Lara instinctively knew what she was maneuvering to do. She was about to hit him over the head with the shovel. Ben knew it, too, and squirmed and twisted, but inside that hole he was a sitting duck.
“We didn’t want to be separated from each other. We begged him not to do it. Madame Plutard went to the White Forest for throwing herself on us to try to stop him. Each fortnight the circus ran, I had to kill a man to keep up the illusion he wanted. I had to do whatever was required to get them near. When I first started killing, we were ten and I’d feign being hurt. I felt bad because it was always the kind ones who came over. Then as I got older it wasn’t the kind ones. Yet our father didn’t care about me. He didn’t care about us. Once, I asked if we could send you instead. Just for one night. Do you know what he said? ‘Cecile couldn’t bear it.’ All because you looked like our mother.” Marla laughed.
Something occurred to Cecile. “It was you who sent the mirror to me, wasn’t it? I thought it was a trick—some poor creature was trapped in there.”
“That poor creature in the mirror of truth was you, my dear. That’s why we couldn’t be drawn. We weren’t real. Like the way you made fun of me with my cats. That was us, as well. You were the one who couldn’t see it. And although they thought they painted us in our illusive forms, the painters and photographers captured us as we really were. Father couldn’t have them seeing those, so he’d erase the paintings and expose the film before morning. You claimed you wanted all the answers, but in the end you couldn’
t even gaze upon yourself. You covered the mirror.” Marla searched Lara’s face for a glimmer of Cecile.
“And are you happy now?” Lara had tears in her eyes. The emotion was all Cecile. “You killed Émile Giroux, Desmond Bennett, Peter Beaumont, and Todd Sutton—tormenting my family for decades. I certainly have blamed myself for being sheltered. But I am not the one to blame here. You are angry at Father, not me. You’re a hundred years old and yet you continue on like some living waxwork seeking revenge. Or are you so warped by your hatred that you don’t see that it is Father you should be angry at? Tell me, when will it be enough? Does this really make you feel better? Or do you just hate yourself so badly that you hate me, too? We may be divided, but we are still one creature. Is it yourself you truly hate?”
Marla put her hand to her face. “I’m broken, Cecile. Nothing will ever make me feel better. And I was a child. What could I have done with my anger toward our father? We were children. But I’ve had a fabulous life—Rome, London, Los Angeles, Buenos Aires, Sydney. I’ve done the best that I could. After I killed Émile, a strange thing happened to me. I got stronger, but it was like a thirst for blood that I couldn’t quench. In Rome during the 1960s, I killed a man a night for thirty days. Now it’s only one every thirty years.”
As she listened to Marla’s story—Esmé’s story—Lara couldn’t help but pity the poor, motherless child she recalled from the photo. Esmé had been dealt a cruel hand, all Althacazur’s doing. Lara considered this to be one of the saddest stories she’d ever heard and her heart broke for that little girl.
Yet it was hard to reconcile that story with the woman standing before her. Like the many killers who were once victims themselves, at some point Esmé became the torturer. This woman had killed Lara’s fiancé and her father, and despite the pity she felt for her now, Lara knew she would kill everyone here today unless she stopped her.
The Ladies of the Secret Circus Page 40