Mostly Murder

by Linda Ladd

  But he had special plans that day for the boy, the child whose birth had ruined his life. He pulled off the boy’s sweatshirt, laid him on the floor, and carefully tattooed his thin wrist. Now he belonged solely to Malice, and so did his little sister. And they would belong to him for as long as they lived, which might be a very long time or might just be a few more hours. It depended on how much fun they turned out to be. He was all-powerful, like his patron Loa.

  After he was finished inking his tribute to Papa Damballah, he bound the boy’s hands together and tossed the end of the rope over one of the cellar’s ceiling beams. He hoisted him up far enough so that he would be able to stand after he came to. Both of them were still deeply unconscious and had not moved a muscle throughout all his preparations. Good, that’s what he wanted. He took his cigarette lighter and began to light all the white candles around his altar and then took time to go behind the screen and slather his face with black and white paint.

  After he molded his face to look like a smiling skeleton, he poured a good amount of cornmeal on the floor and drew the same Veve in it that he had inked onto the children’s arms. Still, neither of them moved, which was beginning to get on his nerves. Impatient to start his fun and games, he almost woke them, but decided against it. He didn’t want them to be groggy. He wanted them to feel fear and terror and despair, wanted to see them shake and tremble and suffer and beg him to stop.

  Moving behind a screen, he sat down and watched them and ate a package of barbecue potato chips and a can of Vienna sausages. He was starving. He had been so eager to finish his vendetta that he had skipped lunch. He got a Coke out of the crushed ice in his cooler and leaned back and waited some more.

  At long last, the boy came to and struggled desperately to free himself, but that was futile. Malice watched him swing on the ropes and heard all the muffled yells of panic underneath the duct tape covering his mouth. Most of all, he enjoyed the absolute terror in the boy’s eyes, reflected in the mirror he’d set up so the boy could see his own predicament, especially when the kid managed to twist around enough to see his little sister taped to the chair. He started trying to wake her up, his cries muffled and pathetic. The little girl still did not move.

  Malice slipped on his red devil mask and stepped outside, where the kid dangling on the ropes could see him. The boy went rigid, eyes huge and shocked. He approached the twelve-year-old, reached out and grabbed his hair. His young captive tried to jerk free and kicked out hysterically at him. This one was going to be a handful, but he liked that. The boy had guts, just like his daddy; he’d give them both that. He picked up the cat-o’-nine-tails rawhide whip that he had bought in Shanghai and slapped it in his open palm. He came up close and stared into the boy’s bulging eyes. He made his whisper low and gruff and impossible to recognize.

  “Meet your new daddy, kiddo. You and little sis over there are gonna live with me from now on. And we’re gonna have all sorts of fun. Know what else? You’re gonna do every single thing I tell you, or I’ll make your little sister pay for you bein’ obstinate. Got that? I’ll string her up here instead of you, understand me, boy? Understand what I’m a sayin’ to you?”

  The boy struggled impotently and looked frantic, but after a few minutes, he stilled and just hung there.

  “Ever heard anybody say ‘the sins of the father,’ sonny? That’s what we got here. That’s why I’m a gonna whoop on you until you bleed. Got that? Okay, hold still now, it’s time for your very first whoopin’.”

  Smiling in anticipation, Malice pulled back the whip and sent it slicing through the air. He’d been practicing his aim on stray dogs, and the practice had done him good. The leather lash hit the boy’s in the middle of his back and cut a long red streak across it, exactly where Malice had intended. The boy jerked but didn’t scream. So he flicked it against him again, harder this time and with more sting.

  Malice stopped and watched the blood now dripping down the cut on the kid’s back, like water oozing over a wall. The kid moaned some, but he still wasn’t pleading and whimpering the way Malice wanted him to. So he hit him again, and then again, and then again, crisscrossing the blows in a nice neat little tic-tac-toe pattern. Smiling, he stopped for a moment. He felt a great satisfaction well up inside him. Yes, it did feel good to wreak his revenge at long last. Really, really good, in fact. And the boy would eventually beg for mercy. Oh, yes, he would. Malice wouldn’t stop until he did.

  For the next week, he kept them locked in the dark, dank cellar, pretty much drugged up during the daytime while he worked. His double murder of their parents was all over the front pages of the parish newspapers, and the New Orleans television stations were all over it. Everybody in town was upset and afraid, so the police went on high alert and put out a curfew for all young kids. They were searching all over the parish for the perpetrator so he had to play that game along with everybody else and pretend that he felt sad for the family. How ironic was that? They had search teams from all over the state coming in to look for the two kids, but he wasn’t worried.

  There was no way they would ever find them. The assassin’s old house was on private property and was boarded up and isolated and overgrown and very few people knew it was behind the tall brick wall edging the river. Even if someone came around, the kids were in the root cellar secure in a hidden wooden box with air holes, unconscious and silent. He was not worried in the least. He would just have to wait until things cooled down some, and then he would take them upstairs where he had built a mini maze for them to play in, one that was just as terrifying as the real one. But in the worst case scenario, and even if the search parties did manage to locate the children someday, they could never pin him to the murders or to the kidnapping. He made damn sure of that. The kids would never get a look at his face.

  Then at night, when he got off, he would return and force them upstairs where he would chase them around inside the boarded-up first floor and jump out and catch the little girl. Her big brother was very protective and took her whippings for her. That was fine by him. His true love would’ve come back to him if she hadn’t gotten pregnant by the boy’s father. Then the boy had been born, tying his true love to the other man forever.

  Sometimes, he’d take the girl upstairs and pull her hair or shake her violently, just to make her scream and cry, because he knew that tormented her brother even more than the daily beatings, but he rarely ever really hurt the little sister much. She was a pretty sweet little thing, to be sure. Just a slap now and then to shut her up or make her mind him. She would just cower and cry and plead, and that was no fun for him. He liked her brother better. He had so much grit and gumption. Brave as the day was long.

  Although he still hated the boy, he had to respect his courage. No matter how many times he hit him, the boy set his jaw and refused to beg. It was really something to see, all right. He wasn’t even sure that he would be able to do that if his back were being lashed. But he always stopped before the boy passed out. And then he doctored him carefully and gave him painkillers and didn’t touch him for a time, so that he wouldn’t die. He didn’t really want to go that far. In fact, he might even let both of them go, since they’d ended up giving him so much enjoyment.

  One night he forced them into a tunnel he’d made out of barrels positioned end to end, so that he could beat on the metal and listen to the girl scream and cry. He could see them through tiny holes he’d drilled in the barrels but they couldn’t see him. He had other holes on the sides, where he could thrust in sticks to prod them in one direction or the other, depending on what he wanted to do to them. He was having a ball, and they were becoming more docile with each passing day.

  After about a month without detection, he no longer worried about being found out. The investigation was running into dead ends, and nobody suspected him, not a single soul. So elated with the success of his very first double murder and abduction, he went back out to the house by boat in the middle of the night. Eager to see his playthings again, he opene
d the cellar door and went down the steps, wearing his devil’s mask, his heart racing with excitement. He had a new experience for them tonight. A cold water drenching that he’d jerry-rigged up out of odds and ends.

  To his utter shock, the two kids were gone. Oh, God, they had escaped! He finally found where a board had been pulled off a window. The boy must have found something with which to pry it off. Malice leaned out and got a quick glimpse of them running through the moonlight back toward the old graveyard on the edge of the swamp. He ran back upstairs and grabbed his shotgun and headed out after them. He could see their silhouettes in the distance, running for all they were worth. They wouldn’t get far, not with the boy nursing the lashing he’d given him the night before. Malice couldn’t believe he had actually been able to get up and run so soon after his injuries. Then, suddenly, they just disappeared into thin air.

  Frantic, he searched everywhere and heard nothing, no splashing of water, no panting or thud of running footsteps. Then he realized they were probably hiding among the gravestones. He moved into the cemetery and stood very still, listening in the quiet night. He could hear the wind in the trees and the distant rush of the river. But then another sound came to him, a low whimper, and it came from somewhere very close by. They were hiding in one of the crumbling burial crypts. He followed the sound and jerked open the wood door and flashed his light inside. The little girl was in there all right, huddled in the corner and hiding her face, but the boy wasn’t. He had gotten clean away, probably thinking he had hidden his sister well enough while he ran for help.

  Cursing, he grabbed her out and dragged her back to the house. Damn it, now he’d have to get rid of her. The boy probably wouldn’t make it through the swamps alive, not in his condition and with his back dripping blood, and not with so many alligators swarming in the stagnant water back there. He would never make it to town. He’d end up on the bottom in a gator’s nest, or what was left of him. But he couldn’t take that chance. So he put his hands on both sides of the girl’s head and gave it a sharp jerk. Her fragile little neck snapped easily with a crunch of bones but no pain. He walked to the side of the bayou and tossed her out into the still and murky water. It didn’t take the gators long to discover her. He watched a moment until the biggest gator got a good hold on her body and took her down under the water. Damn it, he hadn’t wanted to kill that cute little girl. He liked her. She was a real sweetie pie. It was her brother’s fault that Malice had been forced to do such a terrible thing.

  So Malice went hunting. Big brother would have to die, too, as soon as he tracked him down. That was fine with him. He had grown tired of the boy’s stubborn resistance, anyway. The kid couldn’t have gotten far, not in the shape he was in. Malice headed out into the swamp, following the boy’s trail with a flashlight, shotgun in hand. He needed to find the boy before dawn and finish him off, because he had to be at work in the morning at nine o’clock sharp or risk getting his pay docked.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Still irate that he had to drive all the way down to the bayous in the middle of the night to find Claire, Nick Black pulled his black Range Rover up beside Claire’s white one and shoved the gearshift into park. Not that he was surprised to find Claire holed up on the houseboat. She loved the place, and he figured she was looking for a sanctuary where she could be alone and think things out.

  However, it was also dark and isolated and the scene of a recent grisly murder so he thought he better show up and make sure she didn’t end up as victim number two. One thing for certain, though, he hadn’t expected to find her out there alone with another man. That didn’t particularly sit well with him, either, not at all, but he knew her well enough not to get up in her face about it. She would just bull up and take off with the guy, whoever the hell he was.

  Climbing out of the SUV, he walked to the gangplank, where Claire stood waiting for him. Her unknown companion stayed where he was, slouched in a deck chair on the top deck. Which was probably a good idea, considering Nick’s present infuriated state of mind. The guy was watching them, though, with an amused expression on his face. He didn’t appear to be too shaken up by Nick’s sudden appearance.

  “Hello, sweetheart. Thought I’d come out and make sure you were all right. Seems like you have lots of guys interested in keeping you company tonight, though. Guess you weren’t as lonely as I thought while I was out of town.”

  “How did you know I was out here?”

  “Guess I just know how your mind works.” He glanced up at the guy sitting at the deck table. The other man looked completely ridiculous, as if he were going to a costume party. “So, who’s Johnny Depp up there? I don’t believe we’ve met.”

  “He’s an old friend.”

  “How about introducing us? You know how much I like to get acquainted with your old friends.”

  “Go home, Black. And quit thinking what you’re thinking. We’ll talk later, but right now, you need to just go away. I’ll be home in an hour or two.”

  Like hell. “What is this, Claire? Some kind of payback for Jude being at the party? That’s not like you. Or, are you hiding something out here that I need to know about?”

  Claire looked annoyed and lowered her voice. “Okay, Black, listen to me. He’s an old friend from way back who looked me up tonight. I wasn’t expecting him. He just showed up. We’re talking about old times when we were kids. That’s it. No ex-husband I’m getting cozy with.”

  Nick felt the dig in that barb. He stared down at her and quieted his voice, too. “Jude and I were over a long time ago, and you know it. Just like I said, she was all torn up about her stepson’s drug habit and wanted advice. That’s it.”

  Claire frowned and appeared embarrassed that her mystery guy was listening to their conversation. Nick didn’t care much. Something was going on, and that usually meant Claire was putting herself in danger. So he wanted to know what. He didn’t think she was cheating on him, or even thinking about it. And neither was he. They were in too deep with each other for that, and had been for a long time. But the guy looked downright bizarre and maybe a little dangerous, and Nick didn’t like the way he kept staring at him with that knowing smirk. He brushed past Claire and strode up to the aft deck, then took the stairs up top. When he reached the table, he extended his hand to Claire’s secret pal. “Hi. I’m Nick Black.”

  Up close, the man was big, muscular, confident, and relaxed. But he looked like an idiot in the pirate getup. He stood up, looked at Claire, who was right behind Nick now, and said, “Rocco. Glad to meet you.”

  “Rocco who?”

  “Rocco Ramone.”

  Nick turned around and gave Claire a look that said as plainly as he could make it: A pirate? Really? Rocco Ramone? Really? You expect me to believe this shit?

  Rocco sat back down. “Have a beer, Nick. Claire’s got plenty of Dixie longnecks down in the fridge. Ice cold, too.”

  “Yeah, I know. I bought them. So help yourself. Really. I try to keep this place well-stocked.”

  At that, Rocco shifted his eyes to Claire, a slow, crooked grin overtaking his face. Nick realized that he sounded jealous, and then with some dismay, he realized that he was jealous. The concept was a trifle alien to him; he was not the jealous type. But he felt a lot of things about Claire that he’d never experienced with any other woman. He didn’t really think she was doing anything wrong with this guy, but he didn’t like her being out there alone with him. Claire only sighed and looked resigned.

  “Well, go ahead and sit down, Black. Since you’ve already crashed the party. Want a beer?”

  Nick nodded, and after she headed down to the galley at the front of the boat, he sat down across the table from Rocco. “So I understand that you’re an old friend of Claire’s?”

  “Yep.”

  “How long has it been?”

  “Long time.”

  Nick leaned back against the chair cushion. He glanced around the deck and listened to the slow, rippling bayou current and was fairly certain
that he and Rocco weren’t going to hit it off. He leaned back, nowhere near as relaxed as the other man, and enjoyed dead silence for a moment. The galley windows were open, and he could hear Claire opening the fridge, bottles clinking as she got out their drinks.

  “So, Rocco. Who the hell are you really?”

  “Your girl down there? We were close once, but not anymore. I’m leaving when she gets back. Don’t want any trouble with jealous boyfriends. Just don’t ever hurt her or I’ll come after you.”

  Nick had never in his life been described as a jealous boyfriend, didn’t like it at all, and he sure as hell hadn’t ever been threatened to his face. Rocco’s accent was distinctly Cajun but well-educated, a whole lot like his own. Rocco was trying hard to hide his true persona. He wanted to appear dumb and/or violent and dangerous, but Nick would bet that he wasn’t either. Well, he might be violent and dangerous under the right circumstances. Thus, the pirate beard and fake tough biker mentality.

  On the other hand, Rocco looked like he could hold his own. And he carried a weapon under his jacket on the right side, probably a .38, and probably some kind of dagger in his black leather boot. Nick had seen such men before and he’d pegged Rocco Ramone right off. Most likely he was an undercover cop. What the hell was Claire into now? And why wouldn’t she tell him about it?

  “No trouble. Stick around. I usually like Claire’s friends. As long as they don’t get her shot or put her in a coma. Then I have a tendency to look them up and take care of it. Guess we’re alike in that way.”