The Devil Inside

by D. L. Hicks

  The day she first crossed paths with Jack.

  It had been a deceptively warm morning that gave no impression of the impending change. Charlotte had wandered down to the beach as usual for her return trip along the shoreline to Heroes Bluff. In the glare of the sunlight, she hadn’t noticed him at first, the central figure in a group of four or five women. He was instructing and encouraging, clapping his hands to motivate those who weren’t putting in the requisite effort.

  But once she did notice him, it was difficult to drag her eyes away. He was well built – mature and muscular, but in a defined way; not so he looked like he could lift small buildings and eat an entire cow in one sitting. His sunglasses hid much of his face, but Charlotte could tell he had good bone structure – a strong, sharp jawline with just a hint of stubble.

  As she passed, he backpedalled out of the circle, still yelling advice, and bumped right into her.

  ‘Woah, sorry!’ he said, regaining his balance as they rebounded off each other. He’d paused, as if catching a real glimpse of her for the first time. He seemed taken aback by what he saw.

  ‘You’re good,’ Charlotte replied, a blush rising up her chest and throat.

  He laughed and bowed in appreciation of her unintended compliment. ‘You enjoy your walk … Hope you have a better time than that fella.’

  Charlotte followed his gaze to see a lone gull aggressively squawking at nothing, his neck stretched out uncomfortably. She shook her head and laughed as she continued walking, the smile taking longer to leave her face than she had expected.

  The steady march to the bluff was uneventful, and she spent the last fifteen minutes scrambling over the rocks strewn at the base of the cliff like a dropped bag of marbles. That was her favourite part – the emphasis on form, core strength; the unusual movements and focus on balance stretching her muscles in ways everyday movement didn’t. Her own little parkour circuit provided by mother nature.

  Heading back, Charlotte found her mind wandering once more to the guy she’d bumped into. She failed to notice the large storm clouds creeping in from behind her until she felt the temperature drop, a cool breeze kicking up.

  Still halfway from home, she took up a light jog, feeling sweat dot her lower back as her tempo increased. When her starting point was in sight, the rain hit, large drops that spattered like paint, leaving dark splotches on her clothing. Within seconds, it was coming down hard, the perfect blue sky now cloaked in dark clouds, the surf churning.

  Charlotte was surprised – and pleased – to see him again. Head down, he was furiously packing up stretch mats and medicine balls with no help in sight, raindrops bouncing off his arms. She ran over, the drenched sand sticking to her shoes, and scooped up three multi-coloured mats.

  A smile broke across his face the moment he turned to find her standing there. ‘Well … angels do exist!’ he yelled over the din of the rain, his arms balancing the medicine balls as if they were balloons. ‘The white van over there – run for it!’ They bolted for the car park.

  He flung open the rear of the van and they tossed in the sandy items, which landed among a host of other exercise equipment. Then he ran for the driver’s side door and jumped in, leaving her standing there alone and drenched, like a storm-tossed shipwreck.

  Well … thank you too, Charlotte thought.

  But a split second later, the passenger door flew open, and she heard a voice bellow, ‘Don’t just stand there, get in!’

  She paused, rain teeming off the visor of her cap. Didn’t she preach stranger danger to schoolkids? Wasn’t she about to do exactly what she spent her life telling others not to?

  A loud clap of thunder echoed overhead, rolling across the car park and out to sea.

  Charlotte scampered to the passenger side, jumped in and slammed the door, flopping back against the seat with relief. She was wringing wet, her gear stuck to her body like a second skin. The rain was now pelting the windscreen, water cascading down the glass. Looking across at each other, they both burst out laughing, two drowned rats squeezed into the same drain pipe.

  ‘Came out of nowhere, didn’t it?’ he said, wiping moisture from his forehead. His sunglasses were now nestled in his bedraggled hair. ‘Hi there, I’m Jack.’ As he held out his hand in the tight confines of the van’s interior, there was a sparkle in his eyes that Charlotte was inexplicably drawn to.

  ‘Charlotte,’ she said softly. ‘Nice to meet you.’ She swiped her hand on her clothes in a futile attempt to dry off her palm, before shrugging and clasping his outstretched hand in hers.

  Ten minutes later, he was dropping her at her front door.

  Jack had leant across the front bucket seat as Charlotte thanked him. ‘So, this might seem a bit forward but … What the hell – it’s not every day you find a beautiful woman in the front seat of your car. Any chance we could catch up for a coffee later?’

  Charlotte had smiled, taken aback, but glad she hadn’t imagined the spark she’d sensed flickering between them, warming her skin and drying her clothes from the inside out. Grinning, she’d made him wait a moment longer than necessary for the answer he was after. Having started her treatment only weeks earlier, her chemo-brain was still very real, and she almost didn’t trust that she’d even heard him right. In her condition, combined with the fact she was absolutely drenched, she couldn’t possibly be about to land herself a date.

  ‘Sure,’ she replied, feeling her cheeks redden. ‘I’ll call you.’

  ‘Not if I call you first,’ he said as they exchanged numbers. They had caught up that evening and … had been together ever since.

  As she sat on the beach watching the seagulls, Charlotte reflected on the comfort and security Jack had provided her since that day. Relationships were something she didn’t take lightly. She’d only had what she considered to be three true boyfriends in her time, the last of which – as a younger and more naive woman – she had foolishly married in what was perhaps the worst mistake of her otherwise regulation life. Mark hadn’t been a bad guy – handsome, strong, committed – but, in truth, he was too nice. Like many blossoming couples, when their lives became entwined, things had deteriorated from infatuation to disaster in what felt like the blink of an eye. In the nine months they were husband and wife, her work had become too much for Mark to handle, the stories she brought home too raw, the danger too real. They had eventually parted ways – amicably, she could say, with a strange element of pride – each acknowledging that they had been impulsive, leapt headfirst into the water without checking the depth.

  Charlotte pigeon-holed the whole experience into a life lesson, a speed hump along the road she had no choice but to bounce over before continuing on, watching it disappear in the rear-view. Since then, there’d been nobody significant in her life.

  Anyway, didn’t they say you weren’t a real copper until you were on your second marriage?

  Charlotte wasn’t quite there yet, but with Jack’s arrival that possibility had finally returned, and she had to admit – with burning cheeks – that he had quickly become her rock. Police work was tough and uncompromising, and for a woman in that environment, the pressure increased twofold – especially a woman who wanted her career to progress. Work had always been Charlotte’s main priority, and life in general took a back seat to that.

  Despite that, there were still parts of her job that caused her anxiety: the shift work, the inherent sexism in her office, the horror of the crime she had to deal with, the grief of devastated families. Although these were issues only fellow police officers could truly understand, Jack provided her release in other ways. As an outsider to police work, he came at things from a different perspective, took her mind away from the all-consuming nature of her job with something so simple as a dad joke or a stupid face. Just knowing he would be there when she needed him, with a hug and a glass of wine, while still knowing when to give her space, meant more than he knew.

  In a town the size of Gull Bay, Charlotte wasn’t cautious without cause. Sh
e had already been burnt by what she now referred to as the ‘Tinder Experience’ – one local after another wanting a cheap meal, a cold beer and a meaningless shag. And maybe that appealed to the younger, millennial generation, but for her it had been nothing short of horrendous, and had very nearly destroyed any faith she had in finding a decent bloke.

  But her time with Jack couldn’t have been more dissimilar. For now, though, she was keeping the relationship quiet until she was certain, happy for things to move slowly, especially in her current state. They hadn’t had sex yet, and Jack seemed to understand that she wanted to wait. Somehow that made things even more special.

  That was the one area of her relationship that Charlotte worried about most. Despite everything Jack gave her, she still hadn’t been able to bring herself to reveal her illness or the treatment that was terrorising her body. She had been creative in avoiding the subject, but she knew it wasn’t right, that she wasn’t being fair to him. She also knew the ice she was skating on was getting thinner by the day.

  She dropped to her knees on the silky white sand. She flicked at it, picked up a handful, feeling it slip through her fingers as the sun rose higher in the clear sky. Adjusting her sunglasses, she felt her wig shift slightly, and her heart caught. There were only a few other people scattered on the beach, but it was a small town and you never knew who was watching. One moment of carelessness and her secret would be exposed. The gossip would spread like wildfire.

  The gulls took off, the flock elevating away from the ground, effortlessly avoiding a dog’s futile attempt at a chase. They scattered down the shoreline, soon disappearing into the hazy distance, seafoam sparkling in the light where they’d vanished.

  There were times Charlotte could barely repress the desire to sprout her own wings and join them.

  Rising to continue her journey, she brushed the sand off her legs and headed in the direction of the bluff as the breakers kept time alongside her.

  CHAPTER 9

  Three days had passed, and he was acutely aware that the next step needed to be taken. But this one would be different, this one would be special. After this, he would start the ball rolling in a different direction; one that would make all this worthwhile; one that would finally help extinguish the flames that seared inside him, trapped under skin that bubbled and fizzed.

  But there was plenty to be done before then.

  The papers had played up his first victim’s story, telling the world what a wonderful person she was, how she’d been going to save starving children in third-world countries until he had come along and spoiled the party.

  Oh well, shit happens to us all, he thought. Like a soldier waist-deep in a war zone, there were going to be casualties. Collateral damage.

  A light wind was easing in off the water, cooling the air as the vestiges of another warm day dissipated. Hot days that bled into cooler nights, the constricting heat of mid-summer a fading memory.

  He was in his vehicle, window down, cruising the town’s narrow streets, one of only a few cars out. As he drove past the winding boardwalk at the rear of the beach, there were still plenty of people enjoying the last half hour of daylight, pounding the pavements, riding bikes or just strolling hand in hand with the love of their life. It was a peaceful night, serene and picture-perfect.

  He was about to change all that – not just for tonight, but for the days and weeks to come.

  Further along the beach, he pulled up in a semi-isolated car park and reached across to the passenger seat. Flipping the day’s paper open on his lap, he necked a perspiring bottle of Coke. As he read the headlines, the dark liquid flushed down his throat, the burning sensation comforting him as caffeine fired up his system.

  No Suspects in Sight After Senseless Slaying, the headline read. The article had been put together by local beat reporter Katelyn McBride and was accompanied by a small map of the area where the dead girl had last been seen. A dotted line with an arrowhead marked the killer’s ‘possible route’ to the beach where the body was found. He couldn’t help but laugh at it, and it gave him confidence to know the idiots searching for him didn’t have a clue.

  The article went on in detail about the circumstances surrounding the girl’s death, painting a picture of him as some kind of depraved and uncontrollable monster. It was true this was a premeditated event, and the police would know that by now – he’d made sure there was no DNA, no fingerprints, no hair left at the scene, no physical evidence at all linking him to the crime. He’d given himself the small luxury of feeling the contours of her still-warm body with his bare hands, but only for a moment and he’d been careful. The buzzing sense of power it had given him … She’d been so delicate – almost good enough to eat. But Christ, he wasn’t that much of a freak.

  The newspaper warned the community, especially women, to ‘stay indoors, secure in their own homes’. The warning had clearly gone unheeded – he had seen plenty of women out on their own, going about their business as if nothing had happened. He knew that wouldn’t last long though, and he had to take advantage of the time he had left before fear took control of this community, deadbolting doors and sending people hurrying through the streets in uneasy packs, jumping at shadows.

  As if on cue, a car pulled up alongside him, a young woman driving. As she stepped from the driver’s side door, he noticed she was in great shape: a brunette with her hair tied back, wearing tight leggings and a crop top. She came around to the passenger side and bent over into the vehicle, giving him an unimpeded view of her Lycra-clad bottom.

  ‘No awareness at all.’ He cast a sideways glance at her from behind his dark sunglasses. ‘Doesn’t she know there’s a killer on the loose?’

  The woman emerged from the car accompanied by a fluffy white dog on a lead and looked his way, smiling politely before slipping her earphones in and heading off along the darkening beachfront.

  He eased out of the driver’s seat and went to the boot where he removed a black-and-red retro Puma sports bag, before returning to the anonymity of his car. Placing the bag on the passenger seat, he unzipped it, making sure he had everything he needed.

  Gloves, balaclava, a small coil of rope – just in case – and a twenty-centimetre Darth Vader figurine. He picked up the figurine and pressed down on the dark bulbous head, rotating it anti-clockwise. The entire head came away from the body, bringing with it a fifteen-centimetre serrated blade. He ran his finger along the edge, feeling the blade scrape the surface of his skin, almost but not quite breaking through.

  Reaching back into the bag, his fingers curled around the most important prop of all – a white slip of paper, dark ink staining one corner.

  All the ingredients to make his plan succeed.

  Grabbing the bag, he opened his door and climbed back out into the evening. He stretched, muscles stiff, his neck cracking loudly. She would be back soon – probably twenty minutes or so.

  The daylight was almost gone and their cars were the only two that remained in the car park. Even the passing foot traffic had dwindled to nothing.

  He stared out across the water, the light diminishing and the rippling surface turning black. Night or day, he always felt nostalgic by the ocean, childhood memories flooding his senses. Like scattered scenes from a grainy silent movie, images flickered in his mind – skin peeling in layers from sunburnt shoulders, cricket matches held in the shallows, the coconut aroma of tanning lotion, riding waves until his body ached. Hazy days when his life held promise and potential, the world unfolding before him; the sweetest of rewards.

  Days now long gone.

  He tore his eyes away, swallowing the strange sadness constricting his throat.

  Walking to her car, he slipped on his tight-fitting black gloves, heart pounding at the power they instilled. Glancing left and right, he took a small section of coat hanger from his pocket. U-shaped at one end, the wire was designed to slide between the rubber lining the window of the door and the glass. It only took him a second or two to find the mechanis
m, a few seconds more to yank it upwards, and then the button popped up.

  Easy.

  With one last glance around the car park, he opened the rear passenger door and crawled inside, easing himself into the footwell, the door clicking closed behind him. Manoeuvring his body, he managed to lie from one side of the car’s interior to the other, his body curling over the bump of the transmission tunnel, concealed by the darkness.

  Anticipation and adrenalin thrummed through his body. His whole being tingled, armpits moist. He grabbed the balaclava from the bag which was bunched under his chest and stretched its tight material over his head. There was no time for doubt. Guilt was an emotion for the weak, and it had ruled his life for too long. It was time to take back his life; take revenge against those who had destroyed it.

  Like a trapdoor spider, he lay in wait, ready to pounce.

  Ten minutes later, still coiled up in his dark space, he heard the shuffle of running shoes on the gravel surface of the car park. He flinched, anxiety almost overpowering him.

  STOP NOW! the voice in his head screamed, just like last time. Jump out the door and run – nobody will find you. You don’t have to do this. Run!

  Closing his eyes, he focused on breathing, in and out, in and out. The voice was wrong. There was something bigger at work here, and this was the only way.

  The crunching of gravel came closer and closer until it stopped just outside the car.

  ‘Good boy,’ the girl said, praising her dog for keeping up. ‘You’re a good dog, aren’t you? Yeah, you’re a good boy.’ She opened the driver’s side door, and interior light burst on. He froze, head down, breath held. The dog bounced from the driver’s seat to the passenger’s, still full of energy, then the girl dropped into her seat and slammed the door, her breathing ragged. The vehicle once again became dark. Her body was moist from the exertion, a beautiful, lusty scent of heat and perfume permeating the car.