House of V

by Raen Smith

  “Ryan said something about him getting arrested after trying to sexually assault someone,” Delaney added. “He just said he thought you should know.”

  “Thanks.”

  Suddenly I was torn with the impossibility of calling Sanchez and his crew to go to scope out the orphanage instead. I could walk away from this and trust Sanchez to finish the job. I could go back to Ryan and Norway, eventually. Move on, like everyone was telling me to do. But I had done so well on my own for so long.

  I closed my eyes to see the face of Sister Josephine staring back at me with her silver-streaked hair and amber glowing eyes. She smiled at me before I opened my eyes, her face disappearing into the night.

  I had to do this.

  “So glad to hear that everything is going well,” Delaney said in her fake voice again.

  “What’s the address?” I asked.

  “It’s Cooper Orphanage. It closed in 1968. The building was then converted into a small warehousing facility and looking at these pictures, it hasn’t been used in a while. The owners are both deceased, so I couldn’t find out any more information. W4253 Palmer Road. About twenty minutes south of where you are,” Delaney whispered. “Just take the highway for about ten miles and then take a left on Palmer. It should be about a mile or so down the road on your right.”

  “Did you find an aerial view of the address?”

  “Yes.”

  “Is it surrounded by trees?”

  “Yes.”

  My heart fluttered. This was it.

  “Give me a twenty minute lead and then call Sanchez with the address,” I said as I pulled open the door and crawled into the driver’s seat. I held the key in the ignition and paused before turning it over. “If he doesn’t already know by then.”

  “There’s a knife in the glove compartment,” she whispered. “From Mark’s kitchen, but it still should do the trick.”

  “How did you?” I stopped in awe, thinking how Delaney had saved me more than once. I was beginning to think we weren’t so different after all. We were sisters.

  “It was so great to hear from you. Keep me posted and be safe,” Delaney said in her put-on voice. I rolled my eyes and hit the end button before I turned the key to let the engine split the silence of the night.

  ***

  I rolled the SUV to a stop along the road fifty feet outside the building and shut the lights off well before the quarter mile mark. I was in the middle of nowhere on an old country road with little sign of life or human footprints. It was the perfect place. A patch of dense trees was far off to the right of the building. The video of Sister Josephine. He had to have taken her outside to shoot the video.

  The dilapidated orphanage turned warehouse stood quiet in the pale moonlight. A single lamp post flooded a small area in the front of the building. I scanned the surroundings, but I didn’t see any light or cars in the driveway. There was no sign of anyone. I leaned across the seat and opened the glove compartment. My hand fumbled around until I gripped the handle of the knife. I pulled it out and felt the length and width of the blade. A butcher knife. Delaney had wanted me to go for the kill instead of my quick jabs with my usual short blade. I felt my lips turn up into a smile.

  I slid the key out of the ignition and turned off the interior lights before exiting the SUV in silence. I crept through the ditch until I moved to the edge of the trees on the right side. There was nothing standing between Sister Josephine and me except a building and a man that wanted me. I was ready to give him what he wanted.

  One, two, three, four, five.

  I sprinted across the dusty and overgrown driveway of the warehouse. I stood against the wall, feeling the small pants of my lungs press against the hard surface of the brick. With the knife gripped tight in my hand, I crept forward to the nearest window. I huddled next to it and listened, waiting for any sound from inside. Instead, I heard the rustling of trees and an owl hooting somewhere deep in the woods. I poked my head above the window and peered into the dark warehouse.

  I could barely see anything except for the faint outlines of large machines that sprung up throughout the wide open space. The smell of mold and must assaulted my senses as I held my head there for a few more breaths. I finally pulled my head down below the window and turned so my back was against the wall once more. I sunk down to the ground and let my knife rest in between my legs.

  Maybe this wasn’t it. Maybe this wasn’t where he was keeping Sister Josephine. Maybe I was completely wrong. I had been wrong about Kevin Carpenter and now this urge to come here was swirling in my head like a fog I couldn’t get rid of. Why this place? Why would he want me to come here? I closed my eyes, envisioning the man in the video. I didn’t know who he was. I was getting this all wrong.

  I sat in the dust a moment longer and listened to the silence of the warehouse and the faint sounds of nature. Sanchez would be here soon with a fleet, just fifteen more minutes. I could wait it out here until they came just to be safe. We wouldn’t find anything here, and then we would be back to the drawing board in the morning with only hours to find Sister Josephine. She deserved better than this. She deserved better than the butcher knife from Mark’s kitchen. I twisted the point of the blade in the dust, spinning the knife until it was buried almost an inch. And that’s when I heard it. The sound of the calling from a guardian angel.

  Clank.

  The soft pull of chains clanked from inside the warehouse. I closed my eyes to see her in the video, her arms and legs bound with heavy, rusted out chains. The sound of the chains triggered a shot that coursed through my body with adrenaline. Sister Josephine was inside.

  I whipped up my knife, tucked it close to my body, and crept along the wall to where I heard the sound. I poked my head in the next window. The opening had just a few glass shards left on it, thrusting from the bottom of the sill. I looked through the shards and searched for any signs of movement. Nothing. I listened and waited for another clank from the chains. Nothing.

  I moved further down the wall and spotted an industrial metal door just twenty feet ahead. If he was here, he would hear me go through that door. That meant that the there was only one way in; the last remaining window before the door. I shuffled against the wall until I was next to the window, which thankfully had only a few small shards left protruding from its frame. I lifted my head until my eyes were right above the sill and looked down to see the outline of a lump covered in wool blankets against the wall. I squinted to see if the lump was moving, but I couldn’t make any movement out. I had to go in.

  My heart thrashed as I leaned up against the sill and kicked my legs over. The glass shards sunk into my rubber boots as I huddled on the sill for a second before I dropped one leg down. My boot hit the concrete in silence and my other leg quickly followed. I held the knife in front of me, trying to adjust to the darkness in vain, and crept toward the lump of blankets. I reached out my shaking hand, about to touch the blanket when a clash of chains crashed to the floor behind me.

  I whipped my head around to the noise, but didn’t see anything. I turned back to the lump and pulled the blanket away from the wall. I touched the lump, expecting to feel Sister Josephine’s body, but instead my hand sunk into the pile as coarse fabric scratched against my skin.

  Shit.

  I heard a clap echo in the warehouse. I spun around and squinted to make out the outlines of the machines. I crept toward them, running along the edge of the machine and the outside wall until I got to the end of the metal. I squatted and listened, waiting for any sound, but all I heard were the quick pants of my breath.

  As I attempted to calm my breathing, a soft sound of movement seemed to be just a few feet nearby. I narrowed my eyes again, desperate to make out the layout of the machines, but the warehouse was too dark and the moonlight not bright enough.

  The drag of chains against the concrete sounded ahead of me, so I crept back the way I came and moved along the machines when I felt my foot suddenly slip. I kept moving though, feeling the
footsteps behind me close in.

  I looked back at the window where I had come in. It was the opening away from the monster in the shadows that had Sister Josephine. I moved one step closer to it when I heard another clap. This one was louder, close behind me. I spun and jabbed the knife, but I connected with nothing except the air. I cursed myself and pulled the knife tighter, knowing that he was watching me.

  The sound of chains echoed again, but this time it moved away from me.

  I was trapped like a rat. He clearly saw me, but I had nothing on him. He was choosing to walk away from me. The burn coursed through my body. I was merely a pawn in his little game.

  Silence.

  A loud clap echoed again.

  Silence

  Clap.

  I gripped my knife tighter, huddled now against the outer wall just beneath the window. Finally, a light shone about forty feet from me in the middle of the warehouse. I shielded my eyes with my hand as the beam moved to my face. Another clap sounded. And then another. And then one last one before he spoke.

  “Well, if it isn’t the devil herself, Ms. Evie Parker,” a man’s voice called from the shadows. “You’ve found me.”

  “Where is she?” I asked, now standing. This was it. I came here to find Sister Josephine, and I wasn’t backing down now. I edged toward the light. “I’m here now. Isn’t this what you wanted?”

  “Yes, it is what I wanted. You’re alone, just as I anticipated. You know, once your father began to trust other people, that’s when it went all downhill for him. There were too many people involved. He was in too deep. Lie after lie after lie. You can’t trust anyone but yourself,” he said as he walked into the light. He stood next to a small pile of chains. I narrowed my eyes at the man in blue jeans and a white t-shirt, only twenty feet away from me. Sister Josephine’s rosary hung from his neck, swaying with each movement as he stepped closer to me.

  He was definitely the man in the video. Judging by the way he moved and the wrinkles on his face, he was in his early sixties and wholly not what I’d anticipated. I searched his face, expecting to recognize the man that wanted me, but I had never seen him before except for a younger version. His skin was pale and his hair dark, just like the little boy from the picture.

  “I see the disappointment in your eyes,” he said as he walked toward me. I hunched my body in a defensive position and held the knife high so he could see it.

  “Don’t you dare come closer. I won’t do anything you ask until I see Sister Josephine,” I warned, looking down at the chains.

  “You don’t remember me, do you?” he asked. “I know it’s been awhile, but I thought you might remember me.”

  I shook my head as I studied him. I tried to focus my attention on him, but all I could think about were those chains and how I wanted nothing else than to see Sister Josephine in them. At least I would know where she was.

  “It’s a shame really that no one remembers me. I’m so forgettable to most people, but I won’t be after tonight,” he said with a sordid smile. He stopped and clapped his hands together.

  “What’s tonight?” I asked.

  “Tonight is the night that you repay me for all that I’ve lost. For all that Holston Parker has done to my family and me. What you did to my son.”

  “I don’t know what business you had with Holston, but I had nothing to do with it. I wasn’t even his daughter. I killed him. As for your son, I have no idea who you are talking about,” I explained, feeling the flush of heat rise in my chest. I wasn’t going to go down for Holston’s mistakes. I had already dealt with his demons for too many years, and he was gone now. Nothing should be left.

  “Ethan.”

  The name shot through my body like a spear, tearing at every corner of me.

  “So you recognize that name, huh?” he said. “Ethan’s dead father has been resurrected.” He held his arms out in the air as if he was Jesus Christ himself.

  “But you were supposed to be dead,” I whispered. I remembered Ethan moving in with us for a few months when I was young before he left, allegedly adopted by a woman across town.

  “Resurrected,” he said again. “Except I’m not a religious zealot like Sister Josephine and Holston. They both found God to deal with their demons except Holston’s path was a little- ” He stopped short.

  Silence.

  “Psychotic.”

  Damn, I wholly agreed with this bastard on that point.

  “You see this scar on my neck?” His thin finger pointed to his neck, but all I saw were shadows. “I have Holston to thank for that. He thought he got rid of me that night, but hell, I just kept on ticking. I’m like the Energizer Bunny.”

  Silence.

  “You don’t talk much, do you?” he asked. “Some things never change. You didn’t say a word that night either when you watched your father slice through my neck.”

  I scanned my memories, trying hard to remember anything with Holston and this man. Nothing.

  “Did you have to throw your teddy bear away, Ms. Parker?”

  My teddy bear.

  Suddenly, the memory of my red-soaked hands came back to me. It was the night Sister Josephine had taken me in. She had thrown the crimson-stained teddy bear in the garbage despite my tearful pleas. She had washed my hands over and over, explaining that it was just a bit of food coloring. The teddy bear was ruined and couldn’t be washed, she had said. The stains were set too deep. It hadn’t been food coloring, though. It had been this man’s blood on my hands.

  “You were small then when I saw you last. You were playing with a little white teddy bear, dancing it across your legs. You looked up at me and waved before Holston sliced through my neck. He didn’t know you had gotten out of the car.”

  I shook my head slowly, trying to shake the memory from my head, but it came flooding back to me.

  “Ta da,” he said as he threw out his hands. “Not dead. I got away, but not before Holston took Ethan. And I almost got Ethan back. I was so close.” He said those last words with fierce longing in his voice. “But then, somehow, Ethan had disappeared, and I lost him for good.

  “I left Appleton then. Moved to Texas to start over. Life went by, and I hopped from one town to the next until I decided to head back to Wisconsin to try to find Ethan ten years ago. That’s when I met Erica,” he said. “Got married and got a real job. I was a sucker back then. That’s what a woman will do to you. She’ll make you do things that you’ll regret, like not fight to find your son.” His eyes narrowed on me.

  I swallowed hard, trying to avoid his words. “Where is Sister Josephine?”

  He waved his hand in the air, dismissing me. “Josephine’s fine.”

  “I want to see her.”

  “Not until we’re done having our little conversation here,” he said. “By the way, my name’s Derek Schuh. I think it’s only proper to get acquainted to the individual that is going to take your life.”

  “Well, good thing you already know my name,” I replied.

  He raised his eyebrows and let out a small whistle. “We got a pistol, just like her father, ladies and gentlemen.”

  “Not my father,” I muttered as I gripped the knife tighter.

  “Not your biological father, but your father in every other right. You see, I missed that opportunity with my own son. Your father took him from me,” he said.

  “Holston took his life. I didn’t.”

  “And now it’s my turn to take yours. Tit for tat. He took my son. I’ll take his daughter.”

  “What about Sister Josephine?” I cocked my head, holding the knife steady. The twenty minutes had to be close. If I could simply keep the conversation going, Sanchez and his crew would show up any minute.

  “Sister Josephine this. Sister Josephine that. She’s the one that started this all in the first place,” he said. “It was actually over there, on the outside of that wall.” He pointed to the far side of the building.

  “Sister Josephine is quite the contradiction,” he continu
ed. “But you didn’t know her when she was a little girl like I did.”

  The black and white photo back at the cottage flashed through my head.

  “She was a spiteful little thing. Quite the devil, if you ask me. I think it’s rather humorous that she ended up being a nun,” he added as he put his hand behind his back and retrieved a handgun. “No men would probably take that wicked thing, so she had to turn to the only thing that would; the Church.”

  He waved the gun in my direction, swirling it around in the air until he aimed it at my head. My heart stopped. He pulled his hand down and rested the gun on his thigh.

  “Did you honestly think I’d let you off that easy?” he asked with a small laugh. “Now back to Sister Josephine. Do you want the long version or short version?”

  “I want to see her, otherwise, I will cut your throat, but this time, I’ll finish what Holston couldn’t,” I warned, rotating the knife in my hand. I couldn’t stand here any longer, listening to his sob story, without seeing Sister Josephine.

  “So violent,” he said with a drop of his head. “Are you sure you aren’t Holston’s biological daughter? The resemblance is astounding.”

  I was silent, but I felt the cut sear my skin. I was not his daughter.

  “Okay,” he said as he put his hands up. “I’ll concede. Now that I have you, I’ll keep my end of the bargain. As you can see, I’m a fair man, unlike Holston.”

  He picked up the spotlight from the ground and pointed the beam to my left. I followed the light to see Sister Josephine with a rope around her waist, sitting on the ground next to a machine. She looked up in a haze, her head barely reacting to the light. Her hair hung over her eyes and a large piece of duct tape covered her mouth.

  She was alive.

  I lunged toward her and slid on the ground to meet her body. Derek’s laughter filled the warehouse as I scrambled to pull Sister Josephine’s tape off her mouth. Her skin was a ghastly white hue and felt clammy, void of life. I fumbled to take hold of the rope and hacked through it, making quick movements until I saw it. A fresh, eight inch gash along her arm that trickled blood.