by Amber Morgan
Evernight Publishing ®
www.evernightpublishing.com
Copyright© 2015 Amber Morgan
ISBN: 978-1-77233-351-0
Cover Artist: Jay Aheer
Editor: Melissa Hosack
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
WARNING: The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. No part of this book may be used or reproduced electronically or in print without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in reviews.
This is a work of fiction. All names, characters, and places are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
DEDICATION
To the Evernight Family—a more talented, generous, and creative bunch would be harder to find!
THROUGH HER EYES
Amber Morgan
Copyright © 2015
Chapter One
Cold hands seized her, wrapping round her throat in an iron grip. The scream that spiraled up in her lungs was crushed from her. He shoved her hard against the wall, face first. If there'd been any air left in her that would have knocked it out. The brickwork scraped her cheek and the stinging pain brought tears to her eyes.
She felt him push against her, his body hard and unrelenting. Through the flimsy material of her skirt, she felt his cock strain against her ass cheeks. Horror turned her stomach and she tried to struggle, kick, anything that might free her. It was impossible. He was strong and unyielding. He put his lips to her ear and whispered, "They all try to fight. They all fail."
His words were like an icy lance through her heart. She whimpered, the only sound she could make while his fingers squeezed at her throat. Her vision was blurring, growing steadily darker as her heart fluttered uselessly against her ribs. He was going to hurt her and she couldn't stop it. It would be a mercy to lose consciousness.
And then she felt the blade against her cheek.
His voice was rough with dark pleasure. "Say goodnight, sweetheart."
****
White light blinded Keira, obscuring the blood and lurid graffiti before her. Pain stabbed through her skull as she was pulled away from the nightmare she'd just witnessed, slamming back to reality, back into her body.
She sat up with a scream on her lips, sweat on her shivering body. Cool night air swirled around her through the open window, and her bed sheets were tangled around her legs. She'd been thrashing, kicking out. Just like the girl she'd been watching.
Vomit rose in her throat. She stumbled from the bed into the bathroom, falling to her knees in front of the toilet. She puked noisily, violent images of blood and blades flashing before her eyes. God, was it starting again? She closed her eyes, tears threatening. It had been years. She'd put it all behind her. She'd been trying so hard to have a normal life.
Tonight meant she'd failed. Worse, tonight meant another poor woman was dead.
Footsteps thudded on the stairs. She started, pulling herself up and wiping her mouth. She was reaching for the mouthwash when Dylan poked his head into the bathroom. "Keira? What's wrong?"
She chewed her lip, torn between answering honestly and lying. Her housemate only knew pieces of her past. He'd seen the scars, of course. There was no hiding them. But he didn't know the whole story, didn't know what really happened to her six years ago. And he was such a rational man there was no way he'd believe the whole story.
"Keira," he repeated when she didn't answer. "What's happening? You're sick?"
She sucked in a deep breath, gripping the sink for support. Her knees felt weak, her head pounded. It always did after...After. "I'm fine." She lied. It was easier to lie. "Must have been the takeaway." She tried a smile, big and bright and fake. Dylan came closer, massaging her shoulders. His fingers were warm and gentle, pushing back a little of her lingering nausea and fear.
"I thought that beef tasted funny. Why don't you go and lie down?"
"Are you still working?" she asked. "I could do with some company." It wasn't uncommon for Dylan to sit up all night working on web designs. Once he got absorbed in a project, the rest of the world vanished. But she needed the warmth and comfort of another person right now. Maybe then she could pretend she'd just had a nightmare, a flashback.
Dylan rubbed his eyes, smothering a yawn. "I should stop for the night," he said. "It's almost three in the morning and I'm supposed to be meeting Greg for breakfast." His boyfriend hated lateness and Dylan was perpetually late. "Give me a minute and we'll go huddle on the sofa."
She nodded, relieved. She brushed her teeth, swilled her mouth out with mouthwash, and stared at herself in the mirror. Her olive skin was chalky, her eyes bloodshot. She looked like she felt – haunted. She turned away from her reflection and headed downstairs.
Dylan was already on the sofa, arranging a blanket around himself. He held it up so she could slide under, and he wrapped his arm around her shoulders, pulling her in close against him. The familiar scent of the watermelon bubblegum he always chewed whilst working washed over her. The solid warmth of him was as much a comfort as the blanket, and she let the sense of safety and security fill her.
"Let's see what trash we can find on TV," he said. "Three am is prime time for Bigfoot documentaries and b-movies."
It was an old routine. Dylan didn't know her past, but he did know it haunted her, and he never failed to create the sanctuary she needed.
It didn't have to be real, she told herself as he settled the blankets around them. It could have just been a nightmare.
Please, please let it be a nightmare.
****
Dylan soon nodded off in the middle of a documentary about steroid abuse. Keira couldn't settle, afraid to fall asleep in case it happened again and she was sucked out of her body, dragged back to that scene. Blood and blades in the night, screams and pleas for mercy falling on merciless ears.
At six am she stopped trying to sleep and crept out of the blanket nest, leaving Dylan snoring softly. She went into the large kitchen-diner, which they'd turned into a kitchen-office. He'd left his computer on, as usual, and the bluish glow from the screen lent a sinister air to the room. It highlighted the debris of their lives – wires, discs, speakers, and motherboards from his, piles of unmarked essays and lessons plans from hers. She flopped onto the sofa, studying the essays with a distant sense of guilt. It was only three weeks until the school term started again and she hadn't done a damn thing yet.
She'd been questioning recently if she even wanted to return to teaching. The school she worked at was a residential for children with emotional and social problems – in theory somewhere she'd love to be. She'd gone into teaching wanting to make a difference to children. But the kids were rowdy, impossible to discipline, and the atmosphere at the school was depressing, as if every teacher knew they were fighting a losing battle.
Maybe that was what triggered the nightmare. She had to think of it as a nightmare. Stress and anxiety over her future, maybe that caused the nightmare? It was a better explanation than the other one, that her past was coming back to haunt her.
That someone died tonight and she saw it.
She shuddered, bile rising in her throat again. She swallowed hard and went to the kitchen to fix herself some warm milk, loading it with honey. Her mother swore by it as a remedy for everything.
She sat at the kitchen table, cradling her mug and watching dawn break over her little garden. The neighbor's tabby cat lounged in the grass, watching blackbirds hop along the fence. The sky was streaked with pink and gold. Beautiful. Peaceful. A world away from her nightmare, the woman's agonized face, the blood staining the blade as it flashed down again and again...
Keira rubbed her ribs absently, fe
eling the jagged ridges of old scars through her thin cami top. Phantom flashes of pain rippled through her. Her ribs still ached in the winter. She'd told Dylan she'd been assaulted, a random mugging when she'd been living in London. He'd never asked for more details.
The ring of her mobile phone broke through her reverie, making her jump. She pressed her hand to her forehead, sighing. She couldn't go back to this. It had taken a year for her to get over jumping at every noise, to stop being paranoid at every shadow. She hadn't even been able to watch the TV for months; news of the Shoreditch Slasher had kept the journalists and broadcasters busy for so long. Speculation on who, why, where... She shuddered.
The phone kept ringing. God, who rang this early? She went to retrieve it from the living room, not wanting to wake Dylan. Trepidation filled her, heart fluttering as she saw unknown number flashing on the screen. She hovered between rejecting the call and answering.
You can't let the past control you, she told herself, and answered before she lost her nerve. "Hello?" she whispered, hurrying back to the kitchen.
"Keira? Is this Keira Swanson? It's Detective Abbott – Dom."
The air froze in her lungs, words stuck in her throat. Her heart went into overdrive, slamming adrenaline through her. Oh no, no, no...
"Keira? Are you there?"
She swallowed hard, wet her dry lips, and forced herself to speak. "Dom." Her knees gave out and she sat down hard in Dylan's desk chair. "Dom. I...It's...."
"It's been a while," he finished for her, his raspy smoker's voice soft, careful. "How are you, Keira?"
How to answer? It was too much to think it was coincidence that he would call now after her...nightmare. "I'm...I'm not great, Dom." She'd never been able to lie to him. There was just something about him that pulled the truth from her every time. She could picture him now, probably hunched over a black coffee, cigarette in hand, dark eyes piercing, but kind. "I didn't sleep well."
"I didn't think you had." There was a long pause, and Keira imagined him taking a drag on his cigarette, measuring his words. He needn't have bothered. She knew what he was going to say next. "A girl died last night in Shoreditch."
Her stomach turned. "I know," she whispered. "I saw."
He sighed heavily, as if he'd been hoping she'd say something else. "I think we should meet, Keira. We should talk."
Chapter Two
"So this "old friend" of yours," Dylan said, watching her pack her suitcase. "Anyone I know?"
She glanced over her shoulder at him, dredging up a smile. "No, like I said, I haven't seen him for years."
"And yet, out of the blue, he calls and you're off to London at the drop of a hat." Dylan leaned in the doorway of the bedroom, blue eyes narrowed. "Must have been a really close friend."
His tone bit at her. She dropped the jeans she'd been holding and straightened up to face him. "I don't have to explain myself," she said, sharper than she'd intended. Dom's call had triggered a surge of dark memories, bad feelings. She fought them now, not wanting to pick a fight with Dylan.
"I'm not asking you to!" He held up his hands defensively. "You always say you hate London, but suddenly, for no reason, you're dropping everything to rush there. And after last night, I'm worried about you. Is that okay?"
She sat down on the bed, rubbing her ribs. Where to start? She knew she was acting strangely, but this wasn't how she'd planned to tell him her story. Well, hell, she hadn't planned to ever tell him. He was her friend, not her keeper. But his concern was genuine and he didn't deserve her bad temper.
"You know I told you I was mugged?" she said, staring at the carpet. "In London?"
"Yeah." He sat down on the other side of the suitcase. "You were walking home from a club, right?"
"Right." She nodded. "Yeah, except it wasn't just a mugging." She closed her eyes, hot and sick but determined to tell the whole story now she'd started.
****
“You really should get a taxi home,” Jo told Keira, worry thick in her voice. Keira waved her friend off.
“My place is ten minutes from here. I'm not wasting the money!”
The two girls stood outside their favorite bar, a tiny cocktail bar in Soho, watching other drinkers head to new watering holes. It was past midnight and a light, misty rain was falling. Keira hugged her jacket tighter around herself, shivering. It wasn't really a case of not wanting to waste money. She didn't have any to waste in the first place. Jo had been buying the drinks all night, and all Keira had left was a few quid.
“Keira, you've seen the bloody news,” Jo said. “There's some madman out there—”
“Ten minutes’ walk and I'm home, safe and sound,” Keira said, tucking a stray lock of hair behind her ear and plastering a big, fearless smile on her face. “I've got a rape alarm.” She patted her handbag.
Jo looked like she wanted to argue, but her own taxi pulled up. Jo lived on the other side of London, in the opposite direction to Keira. With a sigh, Jo kissed Keira’s cheek and climbed into the car. “Text me when you're home, okay?”
Keira waved her goodbye and set off for home. It really wasn't far to her flat, and the streets were seething with people. Of course she knew about the Slasher, but surely nobody was going to drag her into an alleyway in full view of a crowd. Nervous, but not unduly afraid, she took off.
She hurried down the familiar streets as fast as her high heels would let her, desperate to get out of the rain. Turning off the main street, she headed past St Patrick's Church, a landmark that meant she was halfway home. She picked up her pace as the rain fell faster and the crowds thinned out. It was still too early for the clubs and pubs to be closing, and the area was quieter than she'd expected. Jo's words suddenly rang loud in her head. Some madman.
He'd already killed three women. Nowhere near Soho, but the police had still warned everyone to be careful and sensible. Maybe everyone else was being careful and staying indoors. Fog curled around her ankles, sending shivers up her spine. The neon lights of the nightclubs glowed seductively in the dark, and for a second she considered ducking into one of them.
“Stop it,” Keira said to herself. A bit of rain and a few drinks and she was seeing Jack the Ripper in every shadow.
Five more minutes and she'd be home. She knew this neighborhood. She'd be fine.
There was a vegan cafe and a tattoo parlor at the end of the street, a narrow passageway separating them. Going down the passage would cut a few minutes off her journey, but it was badly lit and even if she hadn't been alone, Keira wouldn't have gone down there.
As she past the tattoo parlor, someone grabbed her collar.
Keira screamed – or tried to. He caught her so quickly, whirling her into his arms and punching her hard in the face. Once, twice with rapid jabs that sent her head spinning. He dragged her into the passageway, one hand clamped firmly over her mouth.
Terror fired through Keira and she tried to struggle against him, but he was powerful and she was dazed. It was like kicking under water; there was no strength in her limbs. He slammed her against the wall, wrapping one meaty hand round her throat. She choked and clawed uselessly at his arm. He shoved his body against hers and she felt his erection against her leg. She wanted to gag. Disgust clashed with fear inside her. Did he rape his victims? She didn't know. She couldn't think. The world was dimming as he throttled her.
So it was this simple, she thought. You didn't have to be stupid or careless – you just had to be there, and he would take you.
She felt the knife, but the pain was dull and far away, nothing to do with her. She heard him laugh, an ugly sound that grated on her ears, but that, too, seemed nothing to do with her. She was barely connected to her own body, and everything he did, everything he wanted to do... It was blessedly distant. When she died, she'd barely notice...
****
When she finished speaking, Dylan reached out for her, then dropped his hand. "You're serious? The Shoreditch Slasher?”
She nodded. "I was the only victim to es
cape. I was lucky – a gang of kids were passing by the alley from another club and they scared him off before he could...finish." It sounded simple, clean even, when she said it, but the reality had been dirty, violent, and terrifying. The Slasher's hot breath on her face, steaming through the balaclava he wore. The manic gleam in his eye as he pinned her by the throat, knife raised. She'd been more than lucky. Luck didn't begin to cover it.
"My God, Keira. I had no idea...I can't..." He did seize her hand this time, squeezing her fingers almost painfully tight. It was oddly reassuring.
"The police never released my name to the press. They figured I was safer that way. You know, in case he wanted to try again." Her throat tightened. She dug her fingers into her palms, pain stinging through her, pushing back the memories a little. "But after the attack, I was different."
"That's understandable, that kind of trauma leaves all kinds of scars— "
"No, that's not what I mean." She took a deep breath. This was the hardest part of the story. The part nobody ever believed, except Dom. "You know, I suppose, that the Slasher killed eight women in total. I would have been victim number four. The women he killed after me...I...I saw them. Saw him kill them."
He shook his head. "I don't understand. You mean like in visions or something?"
"Dom – Detective Abbott – called it an out-of-body experience. He thought the trauma of the attack forged some link between me and the killer, so I was pulled to him every time he attacked again. It's like a dream. I'm watching, hanging over the scene, invisible, unable to do anything but watch. I saw him kill those women, Dylan. Like I was right there. And I couldn't do a damn thing about it."
"But the police..."
"They didn't believe me. Would you? Dom was the only one who did, and he couldn't do much with my evidence. The killer was masked, I couldn't describe him. And it was raining – a lot of DNA evidence just got washed away."