"Tell me I'm the one you want. Only me and no one else," he demanded.
Liliana started to say the name 'Stuart,' but Sade stopped her.
"There is no other man, only moi, ma... Liliana. And I will see to it that the child in you is at last gone." He moved his wrist, watching her gaze shift with each of his moves. Sade reached behind him and drew his thick studded belt from the loops on his jeans. "I have never truly shown you the extent of my love for you as a woman. I have not bled you in the fashion that most pleases me. Liliana, I have spoiled you."
His hand carrying the belt flashed upward, and Liliana's breath halted just before the pain echoed through her body.
Chapter 50
"Uncle is turning Cecelia."
Marie turned from the rose bush and stared at her granddaughter.
"I can't stop him."
Her granddaughter looked tired but healthy. A bloom swelled her cheeks with a dusty pink. Faint, but she could see that Liliana had finally fed from a mobile human, not one who lay on a metal table awaiting her granddaughter's ministrations.
"He's stealing her youth."
"As he did to you." Marie kept her voice soft and filled with empathy.
"He did it to both of us."
"My youth had passed many years before he turned me." A sad fact that always irked her days, she thought. "Is there any suspicion on the part of the parents?"
"They think their daughter is going through a stage. Matilda has spoken of taking Cecelia to a doctor, but the child refuses to go. And since Cecelia does not really look ill, her parents haven't forced her to seek medical attention."
Marie turned back to her rose bush and snipped a pinkish flower in full bloom. She carried the rose to her granddaughter and offered it to her.
"A doctor will never be able to diagnose what is wrong with the child." Marie still held the flower, waiting for Liliana to come out of her lethargic fog.
Gradually Liliana spied the proffered rose and took it.
"Grandmother, I feel so helpless. I know what her life will be like, but I can't explain it to her."
"He must be stopped from ever turning anyone again."
"He'll never stop."
Maria rubbed Liliana's knee with her ungloved hand.
"You remember all those children who went missing in Paris around the time we thought you had died?"
Liliana's hands began to tremble, and Marie placed her own hands around her granddaughter's.
"This is something we must talk about. We cannot continue to ignore his savage behavior." Receiving no response from Liliana, Marie persisted. "The general consensus of the people at the time and in history books, as far as I can tell, was that the children were kidnapped by the government in order to populate the new world.
"None of those children made it to the colonies. They were all killed, and Sade paid to have it covered up. I know because several people came to me and asked what to do. Of course, I was terrified of Sade and advised the people to accept the money. I've been so ashamed. Obviously Sade bled those children and buried, burned, or in some way disposed of the bodies. I wouldn't be surprised to learn that many of the children are living wild as vampires."
"No," Liliana softly said.
"Why else would he pay to have the rumor spread about the government? He tortured those children and then drained their blood."
Liliana kept shaking her head.
"You can't continue to ignore the truth about your uncle. He's a fiend, and we are the only ones who can stop him."
"Grandmother, you don't understand."
"Evil." She squeezed her granddaughter's hands tightly. "Insane evil. Children as young as four and five being raped and murdered by that fiend."
"He didn't do it."
"Liliana, give up the denial. I've enlisted Wil's help in destroying Sade. He'll pound the stake in and cut off Sade's head, but we need to know when he is vulnerable. You live with Sade. He trusts you.
"Damn, stop shaking your head and pay attention to what I'm saying."
"He didn't kill those children," Liliana screamed.
"You believe that the government would send children just out of babyhood to colonize land?"
"No," Liliana whispered.
"Then help us, Liliana. Tell us when he is most vulnerable, for Will means to destroy the fiend."
Liliana jumped up from the step on which she had been sitting and ran to her car, pulling the door open and throwing herself into the seat behind the steering wheel.
The car choked but finally started, and she drove away at high speed.
"Oh dear, Liliana, I tell you a little lie and you run away." Marie had always accepted the idea that the children were kidnapped by government agents; after all, it had happened several other times. She even knew people who had made a considerable amount of money delivering children. However, Marie had decided to use the incidents to enrage her granddaughter.
What if Liliana reported their conversation to Sade? Shit! She hadn't wanted to inform him of her plans. Perhaps the girl would be smart enough to keep the conversation to herself. If not, Marie was in big trouble.
* * *
Liliana undid the few buttons on the back of her dress and let the blue linen slide down her naked body. She slipped out of her sandals easily.
Before her stood the off-white coffin that her parents had selected for her. She opened the lid, and the smell of earth hit her nostrils. The yellowed satin had begun to gray and fray. The threadbare pillow lay crooked. The pretty lace dress her mother had selected for her lay to the side of the coffin. Bits and pieces of the convoluted lace spiked out from the dress. The light layer of dirt scattered across the bottom of the coffin clumped where her fingers had dug into the soil.
"Mamma," she said, clutching the tattered lace in one hand. "Mamma, I never meant to do any of it."
The feeding frenzy had gripped her tightly in its spell. Her uncle had allowed her body to be underground too long. She had awakened famished, clawing at the satin surrounding her. At first she had thought that she still lived, that she had to reach the surface or die. After two days lying conscious in the coffin, she realized she couldn't be alive. No gasping for air. Sleep did not come to reprieve her from the insanity of being enclosed in a small space. She had to be dead, and this possibly was her eternity.
When Sade finally pulled her up from the grave, a ravenous hunger seized her body. He offered her a young child. The other children she had hunted and slaughtered on her own, until Sade instructed her in how to be satisfied with a taste and not gorge on blood.
Yes, there were times, many, she knew, when he killed while drinking, but he loved the hunt and always felt the prey belonged to him to dispose of as he wished.
He taught her caution and managed to rid Paris of the small empty hulks she left behind. He paid people to spread false rumors about the children being kidnapped.
"No, Grandmother, you are blaming the wrong fiend."
Liliana reached up to feel her fangs. Sharp, pointy, only slightly larger than her other teeth. Large enough to pierce flesh down to crimson blood. She pulled at the fangs until her mouth ached, but they stayed in place, waiting for the next meal.
All those children coming to her, trusting her, giving themselves over to her spells. Early on one or two had fought before she understood the mesmerizing control she could exercise over the tiny minds. They had played games with her, shared their sweets, and smelled of the dreadful hovels from which they had come, hovels no worse than the final resting places Sade had found for them.
One girl had felt so warm that Liliana had stripped the child's body in order to touch the warm flesh while savoring the freshness of the child's blood. The little girl's eyelids had closed over the dreamily shiny blue eyes while Liliana sang a soft lullaby. Eventually the gentle sleepy breaths slowed, then suddenly stopped.
Liliana pulled the lace dress from the coffin and rent the material, scattering the tatters onto the wood floor.
&nbs
p; "Mamma," she said, kneeling down to gather the threads into her hands. "Mamma."
Lifting the remains of the dress, she stood.
"Mamma," she again said and spread the ruined lace across the bottom of the coffin, mingling her mother's gift with her homeland's soil.
Her long legs stepped into the coffin. Immediately she felt the decay begin. Her skin would shrivel inside the coffin. The body would finally rest, at least for a few hours, never for eternity.
Cautiously she lay her body down. Shame, repulsion, and fear swept through her as the overworked skeleton eased into the centuries of abuse and pain.
Her uncle had raped her, but she had found a perverted joy in his taste, smell, and touch.
She yanked on the lid and let the coffin slam shut.
"Mamma, come and save your little girl."
"And indeed what creature is more precious, more appealing in the eyes of men than the person who has cherished, respected, and cultivated the virtues of the earth and, at each step of the way, has found naught but misfortune and grief?"
Eugénie de Franval
by the
Marquis de Sade
Chapter 51
Bubbles wet the flakes of skin on Keith's lips. The stale breath blew an occasional bubble away. He projected a hiss and a gurgle into the room. His stubby beard hid the slackness of his skin underneath. Hairs grew from his nostrils and snot clogged the air passages. The open eyes stared at the ceiling. Occasionally Wil thought he caught his father glancing at him. The furrows hemmed in between Keith's eyebrows seemed to have deepened since the accident. A pulsing vein caused the lines on his forehead to quiver. Keith's hair, swept back off his face, shined with an oily sheen.
Wil had been sponge-bathing his father, noticing the shrunken chest, the stretch marks covering the lean abdomen, and the wilted hood of his father's penis.
"Old man, how did this happen to you?"
Keith's legs shook in a trembling spasm, the right foot kicking upwards from the ankle twice. The son rested his hands on Keith's legs and waited for the spasm to quit.
"You know, Dad, I miss that wizened voice of yours. The throaty bark of your cough in the morning is something else that I miss. I never thought I'd ever miss those sounds, but yeah, I do." The spasm had ended, and Wil returned to sponging down his father. "Sometimes I imagine I hear you spitting up a gob of sputum. God, you were so disgusting. I wish you could do it again so's I don't have to worry about pneumonia setting into your chest.
"One thing you got me to do, though, and that's stay here in this house. Can't put you away in a home, Dad. Can't go back to the city, either. May as well stay here with you. This is our one last chance to become buddies, and there you are, stricken dumb." Will shook his head and dropped the sponge back into the tepid water. "You're as clean as you'll ever be. Your skin, that is. Your soul is another matter."
Keith's fingertips pattered against the towel covering the sheeted mattress. He emitted a hoarse breath from his mouth. His lips trembled.
"I wonder whether anything is going on inside your head. Major thoughts of how to save the world? Or curses damning me? Maybe a whole lot of nothing."
Wil easily lifted his father and brought him into the living room.
"Have to leave you on the sofa for a few minutes while I change the bed. Here, let me wrap you up in this throw." Wil grabbed the hand-knitted blanket his mother had knitted while pregnant with him. "Has a few moth holes, but it will keep you warm until I get back." Wil looked around the room. "Want some television?" Wil shrugged his shoulders and used the remote to turn on the screen. He clicked between several stations before settling on a televised stock-car race.
When Wil returned to the bedroom, the stink suddenly hit him. Stay in a room long enough and you start getting used to piss and shit. He dumped the wash basin out in the sink in the bathroom. Another room he needed to clean, he thought, wiping shaving cream off the medicine chest.
In the bedroom, the distant roar of the televised car race seemed like white noise. He went through the mechanics of tossing the towels and used sheets on the floor. Down to one more clean set of sheets--then he'd have to do the dreaded laundry. He picked up the soiled bedclothes and carried them into the bathroom to fling on top of the rest of the laundry stacking up in the tub. Thank God dad had thought of putting in a shower stall.
The dark wooden sleigh bed, a wedding gift to his parents, looked pristine covered in clean sheets, but he knew the sheets would soon be soiled again. He plumped up the pillows and took a deep breath, preparing himself for the return to the living room.
A red race car was spinning off the track when he entered the living room. His father's blanket-wrapped body lay on the couch, shaking.
"Hey, hey, old man. The excitement too much for you?" Wil shut the television off and hurried over to hold his father. "It's okay. How the hell did you get into this shape? How could anyone do this to you? I confronted Marie, and she denied having anything to do with this. Hell, she's strong, but not strong enough to break a man like this.
"You'd really be pissed now if you knew what she wants me to do. Kill her son-in-law. Says he's already dead. I'd just be disposing of the body." Keith laughed. "The worst part is that I agreed. Shit, I don't know how I got myself into this. Wants me to flee to Paris with her, but I can't leave you." Keith kissed his father's forehead.
Keith's hands began to claw at his son's shirtsleeve. Saliva dribbled down his chin.
"Hey, don't worry, I'm not going to kill anyone for that bitch. Look at me. I'm talking to you as if you understood." Wil looked closely at his father's face. Tears welled in his father's eyes. Wil couldn't tell whether the eyes looked at him or through him. A knock on the front door distracted Wil. "Listen, Dad, I'm going to put you back in bed and see who that is." His father's seizure seemed to be almost over, but Wil lifted his still-trembling father with difficulty. Another knock. Wil cursed. Carefully he carried his father back to bed. Wil had lain out his father's pajamas at the foot of the bed, thinking that he would dress the old man before tucking him in.
Another knock.
"I'll be back in a few minutes, Dad." He left his father on the bed, bundled in the blanket.
"I hate waiting. You know that."
"Keep your voice down, Marie. Dad's recovering from a seizure."
"He piss himself again?" Marie walked into the house and directly toward the father's bedroom.
"No, no. You can't go in there," Will said, grabbing Marie's right elbow.
"I've only seen him once since the accident. Mind if I go in and give my regrets? Tell him how we're all praying for him?"
"Stop it, Marie."
"You are still talking to him, aren't you, as hopeless as it is?"
"The doctor said I should act as I did before the accident."
"Oh my God, you're not picking on him again."
"Marie, what do you want?"
"To take you for a drive."
"I can't go right now. There's no one to watch Dad."
"Call someone. What about that visiting nurse? Is this a visiting day?"
"She'll be coming over tomorrow."
"How about I get Liliana to come over and sit? You trust her, right?"
"I don't need to take a damn car ride right now."
Marie walked over to the side table where the phone sat, lifted the receiver, and started dialing a number.
"Shit, didn't you hear what I just said?" Wil moved forward to set his hand down on the cradle. Marie grabbed his wrist and held it, making it impossible for him to reach the phone.
"Liliana, hi. I have a favor to ask."
Wil felt Marie's fingers digging into his skin. Where her fingernails met flesh, blood seeped. Could she have savagely attacked his father? he wondered.
* * *
Marie had opened all the windows of the car. Her short hair barely moved. From the corner of her eye she could see that Will fought a losing battle to keep his hair off his face.
; "Where the hell are we going?"
"A special surprise." She turned her head slightly to wink at Wil.
"I've had plenty of surprises."
"But this one is a treat."
Marie pulled into Sade's driveway. Liliana had said that he would be at home. Out of his coffin, but still at home.
She turned off the ignition and invited Wil to follow her.
"Who lives here?" Wil asked.
"You'll see." Marie smiled and reached for the elaborate door knocker. The door opened before she had a chance to knock.
"Marie!"
"Hello, Louis."
"Liliana is not at home."
"That's okay. We're here to visit with you."
"I thought we were not even on speaking terms."
"By now you should know that I never stay angry with you." She brushed past Sade and crooked a finger in invitation to Wil.
"Monsieur?"
"I'm..." Wil looked at Marie as if he didn't know who the hell he was.
"Come in. Come in."
Sade stepped back and invited Wil into the house.
Marie walked into the living room and settled herself on the striped sofa.
"Wil is my... new friend."
Sade walked a circle around Wil. Marie instantly recognized the predatory movements Sade made. He's interested. She had made Wil slip on a clean shirt. The poor boy had become as uncivilized as his father, hanging around in dirty T-shirts and worn-out shorts. The white cotton shirt emphasized Wil's tan.
"Isn't he beautiful?" She noted how Wil flinched when she had spoken. "You are beautiful, you know."
Sade began to laugh. He turned his back on the guests and settled in a distant chair and spread his legs.
"A charming pose, Louis. I believe I can see the outline of your privates very clearly under those tight silk pants."
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