Shadow Whispers

by Lexxie Couper

  Grounding her teeth, she shoved the key in the lock, curled her fingers around the doorknob and pushed the door open.

  Cold air folded over her, enveloped her. Air as cold as a crypt. Turned the sweat beading on her flesh to tiny drops of ice and made her nipples pinch into rock-hard tips.

  Tess closed her eyes and let out a wry sigh. Dammit. She’d set the air conditioner’s thermostat too low.

  Walking through the foyer, she crossed the living room to the repaired air conditioner unit built into the far wall and checked the temperature. Sixty degrees? What the hell had she been thinking, setting it so low?

  You didn’t.

  A frown pulled at her forehead at the disturbing thought and she switched the unit off. The chilling air ceased immediately, as did the air con’s mechanical roar. Silence settled over the room, heavy and deafening.

  “Okay,” she muttered, fidgeting on the spot for a moment. She wanted to get to her research, but before she could, she needed to check on something else. Something she’d left on the kitchen table. A pile of torn pieces of something, to be precise.

  Suppressing the urge to hug herself, angry at the sudden lump in her throat, she turned and walked from the living room.

  Sunlight streamed into her small kitchen through the large window above the sink. It turned the room into a warm oven, a sharp contrast to the icy temperature of the living room. Pulling in a short breath, Tess let her gaze move to the table.

  And let out a sharp sigh of relief.

  The photo sat there in the exact condition she’d left it—multi-colored, irregular squares loosely piled on top of each other beside the vase of wildflowers she’d picked before breakfast. Still shredded. Still destroyed.

  Tess snorted, a wry, soft snicker. “Once and for all.”

  A small smirk of satisfaction playing over her lips, she walked back into the chilled living room, dropping into her old paisley sofa under the window. Apart from the air conditioner, pumping out ridiculously cold air—really, who would have thought a run-down old thing could generate such freezing temperatures—everything seemed normal.

  Tess leaned forward and retrieved her laptop from the coffee table. Perhaps it’d all been in her head. It wouldn’t surprise her. The loopy way her mind was behaving since moving to the Creek, who knew what type of bizarre nonsense it might concoct?

  Flipping open her computer, she launched her web browser. The high-pitched screeches and wails of data surging through the phone line emanated from her laptop and she let out a frustrated sigh. She’d never realised just how slow dial-up was until she’d moved to the Creek. She could build a house in the time it took the connection to negotiate. The word “broadband” probably referred to some sort of sheep disease here in the Creek.

  Finally, after what felt like hours of electronic shrieking, she connected to the rest of the world.

  The New York Times’ homepage formed before her but, where she’d normally devour the headlines, keen to discover what idiocy her home nation’s political leaders were up to, today she went straight for her search engine.

  She typed “Robyn Jones” into the subject field.

  Google gave her three hundred and ninety thousand results.

  Gnawing on her bottom lip, Tess did a quick scan of the first few pages. Robyn Jones was a professor of sports medicine in the UK, a beauty salon owner in Utah, a prize-winning cocker spaniel owned by Emily White and Rita Black (now there was a contrary couple, if ever there was one) from Christchurch, New Zealand, and a career consultant specialising in finding jobs for divorced women in Dublin, Ireland. What she wasn’t, according to Google, was a librarian in a small town in Outback, Australia.

  Tess pulled a face. “Okay,” she muttered, wriggling deeper into the sofa and propping her feet up on the coffee table. “Let’s get more specific.”

  She added “Kangaroo Creek” to the search bar.

  Time slowed down. The spinning color ball her cursor had become seemed to mock her: You in a hurry for the answer? You’re in Kangaroo Creek, love. Hurry don’t exist here. She watched the progress bar slowly inch its way to completion, sweat trickling down her temples, between her breasts. Somewhere in the house, a floorboard creaked.

  Tess stared at her laptop.

  Ten thousand results appeared. None of them related to the reticent librarian or the small town Tess now called home. In fact, not one of them had the four words connected at all.

  She changed her search. Robyn Jones. Librarian. Kangaroo Creek.

  Nothing. Nada. Zip.

  Frustration began to niggle at her. For a public servant, Robyn Jones was being particularly private.

  She wiped at the perspiration beading on her forehead and added “Australia” to the search. Again, nothing. Except for a May 2001 entry of a rather strange blog called Have Passport, Will Roam about a “lofty” librarian referred to as R.J in a “blink-and-you’ll-miss-it” outback town who supposedly “creeped” out the blogger’s travelling companion by asking them about his dead cousin.

  A thrill of excitement shot through Tess, the same tight tingle she experienced when researching her next political target…until she realized that one little throwaway comment was the only reference.

  She blew at her fringe. “Dammit.”

  Navigating back to her search engine, she cleared the field. And then sat there, feeling the sweat trickle down the backs of her legs as she chewed again on her bottom lip. A dead end? She didn’t like dead ends. Not when it came to research. It meant there was more to be uncovered.

  But what?

  She typed “Kangaroo Creek, Australia” into the search subject, shifting her legs a little as a soft cold breeze played around her ankles. It tickled its way up to her knees, under her laptop, following the line of her pressed-together legs to the junction of her thighs. Tess scanned the search results, frowning. Not surprisingly, there weren’t that many that related to her new home. The typical information sites noting average outback weather, curiosities, and Aboriginal sacred sites all made reference to the Creek, but that was all—a passing reference to a small town in a big, big country.

  Tess huffed into her fringe again. “Okay, this is getting annoying.” She tapped her fingertips on the keys, thinking. Around her, the house creaked, protesting the scorching heat of the day. A soft sshhh whispered from the bedroom. A cool finger of air drew a soft circle around her left ankle.

  “Let’s see what this gets me,” Tess muttered, distantly wondering when the air conditioner had turned back on as she added “Hill Street” to her search.

  The first result stole her breath and she sat upright, planting her feet firmly on the floor to stare hard at her laptop’s screen. Suspected Hitchhiker Killer’s Home on Hill Street.

  It was a small article published five years ago in The Observer, Kangaroo Creek’s weekly newspaper. According to the article, written by one Y. Vischka, Australia’s most notorious serial killer purchased the small cottage on the outskirts of Kangaroo Creek, Number 42, Hill Street, a month before his first victim went missing. The article went on—in an overly grave tone—to list all the tourists lost, believed murdered, within a two-hundred-mile radius of the Creek, insinuating in barely contained excitement that the sometimes occupant of Number 42 was somehow responsible for their disappearance.

  The local police, led by Sydney City Homicide Detective, Peter Thomas (a man for whom the writer of the article seemed to save his or her most breathy hyperbole) had searched the property thoroughly after his arrest, uncovering nothing more nefarious than a somewhat excessive stockpile of electrical tape. Nothing tied the house to any of his “alleged” victims, but that didn’t seem to faze Y. Vishcka, who continued to allude to its pivotal role in the seven known brutal murders.

  Tess let out a groan. She couldn’t decide whether to laugh or call the real estate agent who’d rented her the house she now lived in.

  Number 42, Hill Street, Kangaroo Creek, was her home.

  A door deep in t
he house slammed shut.

  Tess started. “Fuck!”

  She looked about herself, confused. Afternoon shadows reached across the floor, stretching from the open window to the fireplace and the hungry fire burning within.

  Tess’s mouth fell open. “What the…”

  She blinked.

  And the fireplace stood empty.

  Heart thumping like a sledgehammer, she pressed her hands to her face and shook her head. What the hell was going on? “Maybe you need to call the hospital shrink.”

  She scowled at the thought. No. She didn’t need a shrink. She needed a shower. She was hot, too hot. She’d never admit it to anyone but the extreme weather here in the Creek was knocking her about a bit.

  Who do you have to admit to? Self-imposed isolation, remember? You’re alone. You have no one to share such an admission with.

  A sudden image of the man with honey-blond hair outside the library flashed through Tess’s head—storm-blue eyes creased with laughter, lips curling into a cheeky smile—and, annoying her to no end, her pussy fluttered. This was not what she needed right now. She hadn’t come to the Creek to fall in lust with a stranger on the street, no matter how sexy he was.

  Better tell your body that, Darcy.

  She closed her laptop and ground her teeth. Her body had no idea. Her body had responded to Chad to begin with. She was never trusting her body again.

  Suppressing a wry sigh, she deposited her laptop on the coffee table and stood up. Her sweat-soaked T-shirt clung to her body like a suffocating second skin and her denim shorts seemed to be melding with her butt. Tess wrinkled her nose. She wanted to speak to Robyn Jones again, but before she did she was going to have a shower. She felt like she was in an oven. Even the playful breeze had deserted her.

  Of course it has. What kind of breeze wants to play in a sweltering, serial killer’s house?

  She dragged her fingers through her hair and walked down the hallway. “Goddamn it, Darcy. Could your life get any more surreal?”

  The small bathroom offered no reprieve from the baking heat, despite the ceramic tiles and southerly position. Peeling off her damp clothes, she dumped them into the laundry basket before lighting two jasmine-scented candles sitting on the vanity. No matter how many times she’d cleaned the tub, no matter how many bottles of ammonia she’d emptied, she’d been unable to completely eradicate the faint stench of the dead possum from the room. It lingered in the walls, absorbed by the grout, a very mild undertone of sickly sweet putrescence. The candles didn’t entirely mask the odorous ghost, but at least they made breathing in the bathroom more pleasant.

  Reaching into the shower alcove, she turned on the cold tap. A banging judder echoed through the house’s ancient pipes, followed by a low groan, another bang, this time somehow choked and fluidy, before, in a fit of jerky bursts, water erupted from the showerhead.

  Tess tested the temperature with her fingers. “Damn it.” Even the underground pipes couldn’t escape the heat of the day. Fixing her hair into a loose knot at her nape, she stepped into the shower. Warm water ran over her body, washing away her sweat and instantly bringing calm to her tight muscles.

  Closing her eyes, Tess placed her palms on the tiled wall and drooped her head forward, letting the warm water stream over the back of her neck. It slicked over her shoulder, around her torso to cup her breasts and tickle her nipples. It flowed down her spine, it followed her scar, cooling her flushed flesh with its heated-earth warmth. Fingers of water found their way to the crease of her butt, following its line to the folds of her sex. They played over her pussy’s opening, a soft caress that drew an even softer gasp past her lips. She rolled her head to the side, letting the water run over her cheek, feeling it slide over her parted lips like a kiss.

  A kiss.

  The image of the man with the laughing blue eyes came to her again. She wondered what his lips would be like to kiss. Would they be as soft as the water? As warm?

  Her sex constricted at the thought, pulsed with an elemental response that made her whimper.

  Straightening from the wall, she stood fully under the shower stream, the water coursing over her body, licking her in the most intimate of places. What would it be like to have a tongue bathe her, not warm water? A tongue, belonging to a stranger with laughing blue eyes and a lopsided grin.

  She heard his voice, his unusual, ambiguous accent. Just in case.

  Heartbeat quickening, she placed her hands on her tummy. Skimmed them upward, over her ribcage. Her fingertips brushed the under-swell of her breasts and she paused, breath hitching. Oh, God, was she really going to…

  She hadn’t touched herself this way since the accident. Pleasuring herself, accepting the needs of her body reminded her of Chad’s sexual obsession with her. Only in her dreams, where she had no control of her responses, did she succumb. Touch, physical connection meant pain.

  And yet, here she was, her body aching with the need for release, a man she didn’t know in her head.

  Water poured over her, over her breasts, her nipples. Nipples suddenly longing to be touched by something more than liquid.

  She drew the image of the stranger into her mind. Focused on him. On his tall strength, his hard chest. On his blue eyes, his loose, easy smile.

  Slowly, hesitantly, she slid her fingers over her breasts, lifting their heavy weight and cupping them with her palms. She rasped her thumbs over her nipples, gasping at the electric jolt of pleasure the contact created. Her breasts grew fuller, the pulse between her thighs more insistent. Fingers of water ran over her clit, like an invisible tongue.

  Tess shifted, rubbing her thighs together as she smoothed one hand down from her breast, over her belly to the curve of her mons. Her fingers parted the wet downy curls of her pubic hair, and she paused, sucking in a swift breath. Her blood roared in her ears and she gnawed on her bottom lip. Oh, God, was she ready for this? Was she…

  She slid her fingers past the folds of her sex, over the swollen button of her clitoris.

  Exquisite pleasure shot through her and she cried out. Her breath grew shallow, fear and excitement, both dark and intoxicating, ribboning through her. She dipped her index finger deeper between her thighs, the tight muscles of her vagina gripping its delving length. Letting her head fall back, she stood motionless for a still moment, water coursing down her body, her heart hammering against her breastbone.

  Every fiber of her being seemed to thrum with an energy she’d long denied. She felt like she was stepping out of a shadow, the heat of the water fuelling the heat of her repressed need.

  The image of the man before the library grew clearer. Stronger.

  Just in case.

  She drew the memory of his hard, firm body into her mind. Imagined it pressed to hers now. Imagined his hands sliding up her back, around her ribcage. She cupped her breast, imagining it was his hand not hers caressing her flesh, tweaking her nipple.

  A soft whimper sounded in her throat and she squirmed, squeezing her muscles tighter around the finger penetrating her sex. It was her finger, but at that moment, she wished it was his.

  Just in case. His last words to her as she’d stomped away from him in the street whispered through her head. Just in case she met him again…

  She smiled, thinking about meeting him again.

  She rolled her hips forward, pressing her clit to her knuckle. Another jolt of wet tension shot through her and she bit down on her lip, capturing the cry wanting to escape her throat. The audacity of her actions scared her—was she really ready for this?

  Yes, you are.

  She opened her eyes, watching the steam swirl above her head, rising from her wet limbs like the ghost of her fears. The shadow had held her for so long, had kept her in isolated doubt. With every drop of water licking her body, with every penetration of her finger, with every caress of her palm on her flesh she felt stronger. She was a woman with needs, goddamn it. Why had she suppressed them for so long? What had she to fear?

  Sh
e pushed her finger deeper, feeling a wave of heat consume her. She rocked into her hand, grinding her clit to her knuckle. Her climax grew closer. Her body hotter, hotter. Her flesh felt on fire. The room filled with thick steam, rising from the hot water pouring over her.

  She clenched her teeth, her sex constricting. She focused on the image of her mysterious stranger as her climax swelled. Drew him into her pleasure as her body grew hotter, as her skin felt kissed by molten lips. Lips of wicked heat. Of boiling water. Of scalding, boiling—

  Blistering agony assault Tess and she screamed, leaping from the shower. “Shit!” Skin stinging, she stared aghast at the water surging from the showerhead. It was hot. She watched the steam billow from the torrid jet. Oh God, she’d been standing underneath that. Casting a look at the tap, she frowned. She was absolutely positive she’d turned on the cold water. Reaching past the scalding stream of water, she turned the hot tap to the right.

  Or tried to. It didn’t move.

  A disquieting tension twisted in her stomach. Flinching at the scorching drops splattering onto her arm, shoulder, and ribcage, she tried to turn the hot water tap again.

  It still didn’t move. Not to the right, at least.

  Hesitating for a fraction of a second, knowing what the outcome would be before she even tried, Tess turned the tap to the left.

  A surge of water burst from the showerhead as the hot tap opened.

  Tess swallowed the sudden lump in her throat. Feeling like she was stuck in a b-grade movie, she reached for the cold tap. The tap she knew she’d turned on before stepping into the shower.

  It twisted in her grip. To the right.

  Just like that, the scalding, angry stream of water stopped.

  Tess dropped her hand and straightened. “Okay.” She stood still, beads of hot water still resting on her skin, trickling down her bare legs. “Okay.”