Destiny Strikes

by Flowers-Lee, Theresa

  “The only thing you’ve done tonight,” the mysterious voice bellowed, “is delay the inevitable. My children will judge Earth. She weakens more each time I awaken, and soon, I will rise.” Her words reverberated in the air and faded into silence.

  Thin whipcords of light crept from her shoulders and moved down and around her body sensuously before striking the ground with the intensity of a percussion grenade. Hands over his ears in avoidance of busted eardrums, Travis waited several long minutes for her to awaken and acknowledge his presence.

  Travis knew from the way she rode into town that she was irresponsible and trouble, but what he had seen tonight was downright madness.

  He understood when her lids lowered that she would not be coming around anytime soon. When she collapsed, he caught her up into his arms before she hit the singed ground. Further complicating the slippery slope of lunacy, a painful jolt shot through his body again, and this time it brought him to one knee. The unexpected discharge from the cargo in his arms was immediate. Her back bowed at an inconceivable angle, and she emitted the most lustful moan Travis ever heard.

  In his current position, her generous breasts, nipples pink as petal points, lay cradled near eye-level. He gazed transfixed by them. They were magnificent.

  The second moan that escaped her lips broke the spell her body put him under. He had to release her before he became one of the perverts he put in jail. Other than her moans, she still hadn’t showed actual signs of consciousness. He needed to get her into her house and himself the hell away from here.

  Her head drooped over his arm, baring her slender throat. He adjusted her properly for the trip inside and her head came to rest against his chest.

  And I thought I had issues, he thought as he maneuvered her through the door.

  CHAPTER 10

  Travis stopped by the Erect Gas Station before heading into work the next morning.

  Sleep-deprived and baffled by how his world had slipped through the reins of reality in such a short time, he couldn’t muster the energy to get out of his vehicle to go inside. In a way, with everything around him changing, he wondered if anything could match the alternate universe he’d been sucked into. Was it so farfetched he’d think of Fallon as Linda Blair in The Exorcist? Then Barbara had been murdered. It all seemed like a bad acid trip if he were so inclined to taking drugs. He pulled down the review mirror and took a good look. Obviously not.

  He stepped from his car and performed a habitual quick sweep of his surroundings. Nothing here was out of the ordinary. After filling the tank, he stepped into the store for a few general items.

  “How you doing, Travis?” Henry raised his hand, motioning him over. “You haven’t been in the last couple of days, and we started to worry, son.”

  The sectioned-off opening behind the checkout counter provided an unobstructed view of the three men sitting at a large round oak table. Every morning it was the same thing: a pot of coffee and gossip. Late evenings filled with listening to the men playing banjos and guitars. Sometimes he stopped in just to hear them swap stories and joke with each other. Almost a year after he arrived in town, each man had offered him their friendship, before grilling him about kin and finding the right woman. Over time, they had begun to treat him like family. He cherished them as well.

  Travis took a seat beside Joe. As he eased into a straight-back wooden chair, he tipped his head, acknowledging them all in greeting.

  In unison, varying “Good mornings” and mischievous smiles adorned their faces.

  Travis frowned.

  He knew they anxiously waited to discuss a curvaceous troublemaker. However, he needed whatever information they had on Barbara, as well as whatever passed through the grapevine about Fallon, and if anyone had noticed anything unusual about the two women.

  Nothing went on in this town without going through these men first.

  They fidgeted in their seats, seemingly anxious to hit him with questions about Seagrove’s newest resident. It did not take long after Donna served his mug of coffee. Travis took his first sip and the questions commenced.

  “Heard you pulled over the little lady on the Harley? Was she as purty as old Joe over here claims?” Jacob asked, his wide toothless grin prominent in his mirth. He elbowed Joe in the side, and Joe took the gentle ribbing in stride.

  “She’s taken over the old Matthews farm over there on Brower Mill Road,” Henry said. “That place has been empty for years.”

  Travis noted how Henry eyed Jacob with a conspiratorial wink before emphasizing, “She’s going to be a might lonely over there, all by herself. From what I’ve heard from Daniel over at the new ABC store, she’s nearly cleaned out one whole shelf of alcohol, all by her lonesome. I don’t know how a tiny thing like her can consume that much.”

  “Have you guy’s noticed the crazy weather we’ve had lately?” Henry commented, turning the conversation. “I’ve never seen so much lightning in my life. They sent someone from the United States Air Force Atmospheric Research Center, a Dr. Elizabeth Laconia. She came all the way from Colorado Springs to study the oddity.”

  “I hadn’t heard that,” Travis replied with real surprise.

  Joe chimed in, wanting to get back to Fallon. “But you did pull that beauty over though, right? I don’t know how she’s coping with that motorcycle of hers though. Those gravel roads are going to be hell on her tires and paint job.”

  “Did she say why she moved here, and will she be hanging about long?” Jacob asked.

  Travis knew the request for information had nothing to do with him and everything to do with genuine interest.

  “No, she didn’t mention that,” he answered honestly.

  “Did you get her name?” Cletus asked. “Maybe she has kin around here.”

  Rumor had it Cletus’s bossy wife would not let him complete a sentence.

  Travis knew if he did not leave now the questions would just keep coming. Fallon was the topic they wanted to discuss, but knew he’d have to give up some information so they could concentrate on something else. “Her name is Fallon Strikes, and that’s all I know for sure about her.” Then, looking each man in the eye, he asked, “Did any of you know about Barbara’s plans for me?”

  Each man ducked his head in shame.

  Henry spoke for them all as he stated, “We’re sorry, Travis. Yeah. The poor things had designs on you well before this Fallon woman showed up. It’s sad how she ended up. No one in town can understand this happening to her.”

  “Don’t worry, fellows, I’ll find out who did this and see them brought to justice. Now, if you gentlemen will excuse me, I have to get to work.”

  Properly forgiven, Cletus said, “I heard from the mechanic down at PO Boys’ towing yesterday. He’d picked up your squad car. That car of yours wasn’t more than two years old.”

  “It was the strangest thing,” Travis said, pushing his chair under the table. “The entire electrical system was fried. So, you’ll be seeing a lot of the old squad car until mine is fixed.”

  Travis headed to his car, but Donna's voice stopped him.

  “Hey, Travis, could you hold up a minute?” she asked as she walked swiftly across the tiny parking lot.

  Donna was in her late-sixties. The silver lining her hair accentuated her wizened face. Her beauty, despite time, revealed the heartbreaker she must have been in her hey-day.

  “What can I do for you, Donna?” he asked. She was a mother hen to everyone, and her concern for him was equally endearing. Because of her kindness, Travis had never missed a meal.

  “Did the guys happen to mention that fellow who moved here a few months back?” she asked. “When he first showed up in town, I believed he was a social worker.” Shaking her head, she continued. “Asking all those questions about Dennis, and had we ever met his dad. Then he up and left, in the
middle of the night, right before this new woman came to town.”

  Travis tilted his head in thought. “No, I never got to meet him.”

  “If you don’t know him, you ought to know the place. They put that new mobile home over on Union Road, right where the bridge got redone last month, and a little way up from the Crisco’s land.”

  He wondered why she thought this information would be significant to him. “Is there anything important you want me to know about him? Does this have anything to do with Barbara? Or, do you want me to check into his skipping town?”

  “No, Travis, it’s nothing like that, I hope. Anyway, he’s already left. He couldn’t have anything to do with Barbara’s murder. What troubles me is the relationship between the McBride boy and that stranger. You know the young man I’m talking about, don’t you? Dennis. Lord knows you’ve been called to their house enough times.”

  Travis knew exactly who Dennis was. “What happened to Dennis?”

  “Nothing I’m aware of. When his momma came into the store yesterday, she told me she was worried about him. She’s noticing strange behavior and eating patterns that she sees as not quite right about her Dennis these past couple weeks. A mother knows her children, and that’s one thing I know about Lisa. She loves that boy. Especially since he’s the last child living at home now.”

  Helpless, and wanting to offer Donna something, he said, “I promise the next time I run into Dennis I’ll have a talk with him. Will that help?”

  She gave him a big hug. “You’re a good man, Travis.”

  She held on to both of his arms and leaned back to look up at him. “When are you ever without those damn shades?” She had asked the same question for the last six years. “I want to see those eyes that God gave you. The way you wear them shades, you’d lead me to believe you are hiding behind there.”

  Definitely true on some level, Travis reluctantly conceded. After another round of goodbyes, he promised to pick up the plate of food Donna made for him twice a week.

  Although he loved her like a mother, he’d never revealed his eyes to her. Reactions in his past had taught him valuable lessons of how long a person could love someone they considered deformed. If the love was not unconditional, then the love wasn’t real.

  CHAPTER 11

  Sweating heavily, Rafael woke from a tormenting nightmare.

  Heat racked his body and nothing could assuage the internal blaze, not even the central air circulating in the hotel room. He kicked himself free of the tangled sheets clinging to his lower body. Freedom from the dream and the sheets cooled his skin. Reclining on weakened forearms, it didn’t take much to recall every vivid detail. What was he to do now? The one certainty he had was how he’d die. Leaving the bed and possible sleep behind, his dream-atrophied muscles worked enough to move.

  “Wha-What’s wrong?” a soft voice whispered as he staggered to the balcony doors and threw them wide.

  Taking several deep breaths of fresh, crisp air, Rafael feared his latest vision more than all others he’d ever had. A smooth hand came to rest on his shoulder and a silky body pressed against his side as the woman tucked her head into his shoulder.

  “Have you figured out why you keep having the dream?” his companion asked on the heels of an extended yawn. “You know it’s a part of my orders to ask.” Her hand slid around his hip.

  “I’m here to help,” she continued. “Sooner or later, you’ll tell somebody what our future holds.”

  “If I knew, do you think I’d still be having the nightmare?” He pushed Delilah away.

  Moving about the elegant but sparsely decorated hotel room, Rafael’s palms moistened as he swept the stringy wet mass of black hair off his face. His pectoral muscles and arm tendons protested as he stretched and locked his fingers together behind his head. After his circuit around the room, he returned to the balcony glass doors, fully exposed to the outside world.

  Predawn light filtered throughout the room. A longing for quiet and peace tortured his soul.

  Peace wasn’t, by any account, what Delilah had in mind. Adequately named, she was every bit as good a lay as his “partners” wanted her to be. Beauty and viciousness rolled into one.

  “Would you care for me to relay the message of exactly how you left the newbie behind?” Delilah asked, dressed now, “or would you like to explain it yourself later?” Her proper parliamentarian accent belonged in England, not here reprimanding him for things he could not change. She checked her phone before meeting his eyes again.

  Fate apparently had other plans for her associates if he’d read Fallon’s unexpected arrival correctly. When he remained silent, he heard the room door open and her parting words. “As you know, they’ll be in touch. Oh, by the way, they’ve already sent someone else to finish what you started.”

  Rafael neither turned nor acknowledged the warning as his cell phone on the nightstand beeped twice. Who sent the message, he already knew. Wallace, the best computer geek in the world had given Michael the information.

  Ignoring the call, Rafael crossed his arms and widened his stance. Lovers entwined in a passionate display captured his attention from another high-rise across the street. He suspected the couple’s X-rated meeting of flesh came from a desire to be free. The couple probably expected they’d be safe from prying eyes, unabashedly satisfying their sexual desires on the balcony. Rings glinted against the sweat coating their bodies. Not immune to the sensual performance, Rafael registered no shame as the cool air caressed his sack and his hardened dick. Unlike the lustful sex he’d had with Delilah, witnessing true love and desire proved a powerful combination. Colorful rays caressed the woman's perfectly arched spine.

  Rafael knew what would come next, and it wasn’t in the throes of their mutual orgasm. As the sun beat the darkness back, more shadows would appear.

  He had lived for ages in shadows with just enough light to stave off total darkness. His family’s actions marred and stained the future, but had to occur without his interference.

  Under the weight and pressure of his gift, he left the couple to their exhausted embrace.

  His mind returned to the endless walls of fire portrayed in the prophecy he’d envisioned. Bodies burned, as the sickeningly sweet smell of flesh permeated the air. Endless cries and pleas for help left unheeded as Rafael gazed upon chaos with an unholy smile gracing his face. As a king on high, Rafael knew there was nothing anyone could do to stop it or him. It took someone evil could look upon destruction with glee in his heart.

  Earth’s impending future was written in the stars, each speck a roadmap showing long-ago, and imminent, events. Their messages, his cross to bear. At five a.m., his tears mixed with water from the shower overhead. He shattered the cream color, checkered tiles, just above his head with his fist, as red rivulets of blood swirled down the drain. His forehead rested against the slick fissured tiles as he raged over being so alone with no one with whom to share this knowledge.

  Leaving the confines of the bathing cubicle, he dropped the towel he used to dry his body, and his tears. With a heavy heart, he picked up his cell phone.

  This number would change, as all the others had, for the same reason Michael had long ago given up trying to track Rafael’s location. Rafael would always be one step ahead of them, even when he did not want to be.

  Rafael deleted his messages without listening. He keyed a text into the phone, but the beginning phase of Orion’s return was already taking place as he typed. He knew Michael was asleep and would not get the message until later in the day. There was a price to pay for love, and some were destined to pay more than others. Fallon was soon to learn that lesson the hard way.

  With a self-depreciating smile, Rafael hit ‘send.’

  CHAPTER 12

  With so many unanswered questions screwing with him, Travis hadn’t gotten any sleep after h
e’d left Fallon asleep on her couch. In such a short time, she’d become a menace to his insides.

  His hand rose to his chest, the tattoo over his chest bothering him again.

  Questions.

  Her move to Seagrove. Her effect on him? Surviving bolt after bolt striking her luscious body. Who the hell was she?

  He’d left Palmerstone’s and hurried to the station to utilize every database he could, but his efforts disclosed nothing useful. The identification she gave him two nights ago was the key point of clues as to her existence.

  Minutes later, and still staring at his computer, the phone’s insistent ring disrupted his thoughts.

  “Seagrove Police Office, Officer Travis Orion speaking.”

  “Travis, I might’ve found something that may clear your name. Also, because I know certain things about you, maybe you can help me figure out what the Hell-o-Pete is going on. As I see it now, no one else will believe this shit.

  Not once in his seven years had Travis received so many calls from the captain. For good reason, he did not want to dwell on the last call he’d received.

  “Sir—”

  “Now isn’t the time for questions. Just get your ass over here to the morgue.”

  For someone who attended church every Sunday and didn’t use colorful language, the captain’s use of curse words indicated his stress in dealing with Barbara’s murder. Grabbing his badge and gun from the desk, Travis headed out the office.

  On the way over, he recalled the first months with Captain Harris after completing a four-year stint in the Navy. Captain Harris had always kept his cool under pressure, and wasn’t a man to raise his voice over minor issues. His patience, understanding, and dedication to the job were admirable traits. He also never saw Travis’s preference for wearing shades everywhere or the obvious pain he suffered due to migraines as a hindrance from doing any task assigned to him. It was a rarity to find someone willing to take a chance on someone with his unusual handicaps. Thirty minutes later, Travis found himself hesitating before pushing through the large stainless steel doors with MORGUE embossed on them.