Body Box: Adult Paranormal Romance (Supernatural Thriller) (Dark Suspense) (The Smoke & Fire Series Book 2)
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Time—and reality—escaped her, as she struggled to remember how she’d ended up plunged into the endless pit of darkness she couldn’t escape.
Yala suffocated, as darkness took her mind and controlled her body with pain. Its dark boney fingers pressed into her skin and sank down to the bone.
Don’t panic!
She repeated the words, in her head. She assumed she was in the Body Box, so the last thing she needed to do was freak out and panic.
She failed in her attempt, however, when she was reminded of what being in the Body Box truly meant. It meant her body was literally in three parts and she remained at the mercy of a warped murderer who would send her parts to Dr. Hughes for reassembly.
The pain!
The fact that pain continued to course through her was a sign she was alive. She shivered without movement. She screamed without sound. She breathed without oxygen. The longer she lingered in the dark, the more she became convinced that she was inside the box.
How long have I been in the Body Box? Will Dr. Hughes receive all of my parts before I become another dead body on his table? Will I be the recipient of Dr. Hughes’s next y-shaped incision, in preparation for an autopsy, only to find that the cause of my death is something impossible?
Doctor Hughes would contact Kevin first, since he’d previously worked on the case.
She prayed the old saying, ‘third times a charm’ was true. If a part of her was with Dr. Hughes right now, this would be the third Body Box to grace his table.
Now, she understood the note that Dr. Hughes called her about. It appeared the killer had used Dr. Hughes to lure her to DC, so she would become the next victim. The note was a trick, a compass that pointed her right back to the Oakwood Apartments. Then, then—dammit! Her thoughts fractured as soon as she'd linked a few together.
How could she think her way out of this, when she couldn’t break free of the darkness—and pain?
Wait.
The pain had lessened, considerably.
Was she dying or was her body being rebuilt as the doctors reconnected her parts?
Her mind started to clear enough for her to string together more logical patterns of thought.
Does this mean my head has been reconnected with my body?
Did Kevin know she’d been snatched into this deadly game? Had anyone been able to identify her in the box?
If they received her head first, they knew. Only Kevin would know her by the tattoos on her side. There were so many questions and no answers.
Tiredness made her drift, but she wouldn’t release the little bit of knowledge her mind desperately clung to.
A sudden jolt shook her, yanked her away from what was assuredly trying to tug her under—Death!
He’d finally emerged to take her, but her determination to fight him grew strong, so much stronger now that she had the ability to think. She’d embraced him the first time because she was fourteen and naïve. Now, she had someone to fight for. Kevin was her profoundly wonderful someone, and she couldn’t bear to let go.
Dammit.
She forgot what she’d been concentrating on, as another surge of energy pulsed through her body. Like a car that struggled to start, she kept sputtering.
Was it life? Was it her body fighting to function?
She couldn’t tell. A sense of knowing the reality around her found her mind and put her in the right headspace and time.
Yes. That was it.
She'd located her scattered thoughts. She was inside that horrendous box, fighting Death, to find her way back to Kevin.
Blood danced through her veins, pulsing against the warmth of her skin. The sensation caused her to quiet her mental rant and enjoy the moment as life coursed through her and eased the pain.
A sound called, urging her to move.
Beep. Beep. Beep.
A repetitive beep drew her attention. It resounded low, off in the distance; but it was easy to distinguish. If her mouth worked, she would say something; but she didn’t have complete control.
My eyes.
They fluttered, anxious to see more than darkness. She poured all of her strength into opening her eyes. They were the safest things to move to not risk opening the box.
Finally, after what seemed like an hour, her eyes flickered open. A blinding light filled her view, but she fought it, searching for anything familiar. Something covered her mouth and the wind from the breaths she released made it billow and slink across her cheek. She turned her head with slow ease, until the cloth fell from her mouth.
Where am I?
She knew these dingy walls—Dr. Hughes’s exam room. A rush of panic hit her chest at the realization and she wheezed to get air into her lungs. The sudden intake of air caused her to cough. The cough caused her body to ache as pain erupted everywhere. The view from where she lay put her in the last place she wanted to be, on the exam room table. The cloth that had covered her mouth was a sheet. She felt it now, covering the rest of her body.
Wait. Is there a rest of my body?
A slow panic filled her. Her trembling fingers itched to search and confirm whether or not she was in parts. Not yet ready to glance at herself, she feared she might be a head missing her middle or lower parts. It didn’t much matter what part was missing. The sight would be traumatic.
After a deep intake of breath, her glare crept down. She raised her head inch by inch until the view of the rise and fall of her chest registered. The view of the points of her toes under the sheet peaked. She sighed and exhaled her release. Knowing her body was in one piece gave her the spark of strength she needed to move other parts.
She wiggled her toes first. Another sigh of relief escaped after her fingers flexed and her shaky hands lifted on command. Finally, she turned her aching body. As her gaze scanned the room, she heaved a shocked breath and jumped at the sight of that hideous box she’d somehow escaped. The horrible thing stood in the corner of the room, like a goon straight from hell. As soon as she found some matches, she’d burn it.
How had she survived that thing? Why was she alone?
“Am I dreaming? Dead?”
The tone of her cracked voice registered and confirmed that she was, in fact, alive. Muffled voices seeped through the cracked exam room door. The distant sounds drew her attention and urged her to keep moving.
She rolled, agonizingly slow, over the edge of the table. Pain made her pause half way into the turn and her gaze landed on the cracked tile of the floor that she aimed to get her feet on. Grunts and groans accompanied her slow movement as she inched over the side. Squealing help her get past the pain in the process. She needed to let someone know she was alive.
Chapter 29
The Walking Dead
Sori glanced at Kevin, who was still out cold. A few more hours and the sedative would wear off. She had no idea what she would tell him when he woke up.
Death still hadn’t come to collect Yala’s soul, but there was another issue to think about.
Would Yala’s body recover from the shock and trauma it had gone through?
Although she didn’t understand a lot about this case, Sori hadn’t bombarded the doctors with a bunch of questions. She’d been around the bizarre, the strange, and the unexplained for years; herself included on the list. As much as she knew she shouldn’t admit it, compared to the doctors, she wasn’t that interested in finding out what made the Body Box work.
What plagued her most was the person responsible for it. Taking a person apart was personal and intimate in a way that required a tremendous amount of time and devotion. It took a dedicated mind to perform that level painstakingly complex work.
Why would someone do it?
Sori’s job was to think like—and sometimes be like—the monsters, in order to catch them.
Was the killer testing his victims to see who would survive being taken apart and put back together? Was he doing it simply because he could? Was he fulfilling a sick fantasy? Was this his test run to do more evil?
Handling situations where emotions were concerned proved difficult for Sori. A situation she could handle, however, was placing her hands around the murderer’s neck and choking him until he French-kissed Death.
***
Sori and the doctors jumped to their feet at the loud groan and hobbling steps that broke their silence. The sound reminded Sori one of the walkers from the television show, The Walking Dead—a zombie, shuffling across the doorway, releasing a creepy death moan.
When Yala stumbled into the room, Sori was at her side in seconds. She supported Yala’s twitchy body and led her to the nearest chair.
Sharp breaths blew past Yala’s lips as Sori assisted her into the chair. She swiped sweat from her brow and strained to keep her eyes open. Her lazy gaze strayed towards Kevin as she attempted to raise her trembling hand.
Sori’s quick words captured her attention.
“Don’t worry. He’s fine. I had to give him a sedative.”
Yala didn’t seem to understand, but she appeared too exhausted to ask for an explanation.
Both doctors approached Yala’s side. They asked her questions that she was slow to answer.
“How do you feel? Does your head hurt? Your back? Your neck? Does your stomach hurt? Can you feel this? What’s your name?”
She didn’t answer. At the moment, her body swayed from fatigue. She may as well have been a piece of clay, molded to the chair she sat in. Her skin glistened with sweat from the exertion of dragging her tortured body from the exam room.
“I’ll get you a wheelchair. We need to get you back to recovery.” Dr. Pendergast announced.
While being wheeled to the room, Yala passed out.
The doctors assured, “She will be okay,” but Sori wanted confirmation.
She didn’t leave Yala’s side, until the doctors stabilized her. They hooked up to multiple intravenous drips. Sori sat and watched Yala sleep contentedly, like a fat baby in a dry diaper. The silly thought made her smile, her first sincere smile since she’d arrived.
When she returned to the break room, Sori waited until Kevin came out of his stupor. She'd just confirmed the status of the apartment and hotel watch when Kevin jumped up with a start.
“Yala! Yala!”
Sori placed her hands on his shoulders to keep him seated. The lingering effects of the sedative would be with him for a while.
“Kay. Yala is okay. Sleeping. Recovering. Please, don’t stand.”
She explained his stupor and all that had occurred during his time out. She escorted him to Yala’s room, where the doctors monitored her closely.
Sori sat Kevin in a chair near Yala’s bed. She stood in the corner, observing Kevin with Yala.
When she could take no more, Sori announced, “I'll go and find Dr. Nolan and, hopefully, a way to keep myself from killing the monster.”
***
A wave of relief swept through Kevin upon learning that Yala would be okay. He leaned closer to her and let her warmth comfort him.
Sori’s parting words resonated, finally soaking into his brain.
They made eye contact before she stepped out of the door. Kevin had worked with Sori on many occasions and knew the look well. She got this chilling look when she was about to kill someone. Death danced behind her eyes and her glare left no sense that there was a human operating her body.
If Dr. Nolan was the Body Box killer, Sori was going to kill him and nothing was going to stop her. The doctor was about to suffer. His death wasn’t going to be quick, and it definitely wasn’t going to be painless.
“Sori, wait up,” Kevin called after her.
Although Kevin wanted the man dead, he had questions he wanted answers to before he agreed to let Sori kill him. In the back of his mind, he couldn't help thinking; What if it's not Dr. Nolan?
Kevin didn’t leave Yala’s side until he was reassured she would survive the ordeal. Once confirmed, he and Sori drove to Dr. Nolan’s secret hideaway, speeding like they were on the last lap and Dale Earnhardt Jr. was on their tail.
Although he knew she was perfectly capable, Kevin couldn’t stomach the idea of letting Sori go at it alone with a monster that butchered people and put them on display in glass boxes. And, he’d be lying to himself if he said he didn’t want revenge for what Yala had gone through.
The agent they left watching the apartment reported no activity. The one watching the hotel reported the same.
Kevin and Sori approached the apartment, ready to start a war. They used their professionally acquired burglary skills to enter the apartment. Upon entry, the stench of death burned through the air like a wicked curse and immediately overwhelmed Kevin. Sori swallowed the stench, wrinkled her nose and aimed her weapon higher.
As the two traversed the distance from the foyer to who they assumed was Dr. Nolan, the scene started to match the file odor. The doctor was seated on the couch, facing the television. A gun rested on the floor near his feet. A large chunk of his skull had fallen over the back of the couch and had splattered onto the carpet. Clumps of brain matter and blood had been blown about the area and clung to the carpet, couch, and nearest wall.
The couch, the television and stand the television sat atop were the only pieces of furniture in the living room. The air conditioning had, undoubtedly, been turned to its coldest setting to keep his body from being discovered right away.
Sori shook her head. “Damn!” She wasn't going to get to question or kill the doctor like she'd planned.
The team spent time processing Dr. Nolan’s suicide. A crease lined Sori’s forehead, and Kevin gave her a sidelong gaze. There wasn't a suicide note and something seemed, off.
“Why would the doctor commit suicide?” Kevin asked. “It doesn't make sense. If we were closing in on him, why not just run?”
Sori shrugged before calling and instructing the agent to enter the hotel suite. If the doctor was here, dead, why was his phone pinging from that hotel? It didn't take but a minute for the agent to report that all they found in the room was the doctor's phone sitting on the bedside table, likely forgotten there or left there on purpose.
For someone that was so dedicated to his murderous project, taking his life didn’t seem like the next logical step. Nothing about the doctor’s suicide made sense.
Kevin and Sori poured over Dr. Nolan’s decaying body, before stepping away to check out the rest of the apartment.
When Kevin entered the master bedroom, he inhaled a familiar sweet and spicy scent that matched the scent of the Body Boxes. The faint smell of decomposition had drifted into this area from the living room. There was a glass coffin lying atop the bed’s wooden frame. The mattress from the bed stood at and blocked the window, obstructing the view into and out of the room. An arsenal of cutting tools and surgical tools sat displayed atop a slender metal table next to the coffin. A tall standing light stood over the bed waiting to illuminate the path of madness.
A check of the smaller bedroom didn’t reveal anything but cleaning and medical supplies. Other than the bed, metal table, and tall lamp, there was no other furniture in either of the bedrooms.
When Sori entered the master bedroom, her gaze shot to the coffin first, then locked with Kevin’s. He stood in the middle of the room, wiping his nose.
“What is it?” she asked.
“The scent. I didn’t smell it on the doctor, but this room is filled with it.”
The team had definitely found ground zero. They discovered that the bathroom attached to the master bedroom had been converted into a washroom. Tools and other equipment lay soaking in the
tub and in the sink.
Based on the amount of medical equipment in the apartment, they surmised the doctor had likely been experimenting on people for years, and his operation was sanitary enough that no one suspected a thing.
Disgusted, Sori shook her head. “Our doctor is one sick individual. He probably thinks this chop shop he’s been running is somehow for the greater good of humanity. People that sick in the head always dream up justifiable reasoning.”
Kevin creaked open the wooden door to the walk-in closet. Behind the wooden door sat a sturdy half-metal door supported by the bricked-in wall of the closet. The bricks turned into the small space which meant the closet was bricked from the inside.
A thick metal lock adorned the half door, and three thumb-size air holes had been drilled into the smaller door. A sinister vibe crawled over Kevin’s skin and clung to his senses.
He glanced at Sori.
“He’s keeping somebody in there.”
If this was where the doctor kept victims before he took them apart, Kevin couldn’t help wondering, if that was where he'd kept Yala.
“My senses are tingling,” Kevin stated, as he shook off a chill.
“Mine too,” Sori announced, her glare probing the area.
They drew their weapons and prepared to meet what lingered behind that half door. The door had been borrowed from a horror film—the kind of door that creaks open right before the monsters attacked.
Kevin slid the lock from it housing. The screech of iron scraping iron cast a sound like a woman screaming a tortured cry of pain. There was pain behind those bricked-in walls, a deep hurtful hair-raising pain.
Kevin and Sori waited for a disfigured soul-snatcher to spring from the dark after the door was half opened. The door opened in the direction of tall wooden door that kept it hidden. If the dark soul-snatcher got out of hand, the larger door could be used to slam the smaller door shut.
A gust of wind flew from the darkness, enveloping both Kevin and Sori.
Kevin dropped to his knees and hunkered down. He followed his gun into the tight dark opening inching forward on his knees. The only light that illuminated the dark came from a ghost-white figure, huddled in the corner of the bricked-in tomb.