by Bryan Smith
“No.”
She reached the other side of the street and turned left up the sidewalk. “Then we don’t have shit to talk about.”
“You’re wrong about that.”
He stepped in front of her, flipping open the paper he was carrying in the same instant that he blocked her path. He held it up for her to see and some of the fire went out of her at the sight of the huge headline below the paper’s banner:
RIPPER STRIKES AGAIN.
She shook her head and stared off into the distance.
“Fuck.”
Daniel folded the paper and tucked it under his arm. “Let’s go sit down somewhere, Kayla. We need to talk about the last path available to you for some kind of spiritual redemption.”
“Redemption? Really?”
He winced. “Maybe not the right word. You are beyond redemption.”
Kayla’s face sagged. “Great. Well, once again, fuck you, angel boy.”
He put a hand on her shoulder, stopping her as she tried again to walk past him. “My apologies, Kayla. I did not mean to give you false hope. What I’m saying is, if I can convince you not to do what the devil wants, you can leave this world with a clean soul, albeit one that belongs to Lucifer. You’ve never directly or intentionally caused any innocent person harm. All that goes away if you do this thing.”
“Either way, I’m going to hell, right?”
There was genuine sadness in the angel’s eyes as he sighed. “Yes. But you already knew that.”
“Then you’re just wasting my time. Get out of my way, please.”
He didn’t move. “A clean soul has to count for something, Kayla. At least you can depart this world knowing you did the right thing.”
Kayla narrowed her eyes and pursed her lips, regarding him silently for several moments.
Then she stepped close to him and dropped her voice to a whisper. “I’ve made up my mind, Daniel. I’ve been thinking about it and thinking about it, and I’m just so tired of all this. There’s only one way I can get my old life back and I’m taking it.” She leaned in even closer, so close their lips were nearly touching. “Sometime in the next forty-eight hours, I will take an innocent human life. And then I’ll cut off a piece of that innocent dead fuck’s body and take it to my new master. I’ve chosen my path and you’re the enemy now.”
She stepped back and smiled sweetly. “Now get out of my way or I’ll kick you in your heavenly balls.”
He gaped at her in apparent shock for a moment.
Then he shrugged and stepped out of her path.
The look on his face was priceless. It was enough to cause her to walk with an extra spring in her step the rest of the way back to campus.
And she hadn’t lied. It was just as she’d said. The decision was made. She couldn’t take the relentless pressure of the looming deadline any longer. Couldn’t take the prospect of a lonely life on the fringes of society. So what remained was figuring out how to do it. But first things first. She got back to her dorm as fast as she could, stripped off her grimy clothes, and hopped in the shower. She then hurriedly dressed and headed off to the second class on her Monday schedule. It was the first class she’d actually attended in days. She went to her next scheduled class shortly after that one ended. She scribbled in her notebook as the professors lectured, but nothing she was writing down had anything to do with the lessons being taught (though she was able to absorb some of the high points of what was being said).
There were practical matters to consider and she found that writing it all out helped her get a better handle on them. The final note she scribbled was a reminder to herself to tear the pages from her notebook later and destroy them.
After the last class ended, she bolted from her seat and made it out the door before anyone else. She jogged across campus to the lot where her Mini was parked. She hadn’t driven it in almost a week. A folded note was trapped beneath the windshield wiper on the driver’s side. It was from Lee, a neatly printed apology for his failure to return any of her many messages from Sunday. He’d tried calling her on her cell this morning and then at her dorm when she didn’t answer. He was worried about her and wanted her to call him as soon as possible.
She crumpled the note and dropped it to the ground.
She then got in her car and drove out to a sporting goods store in Green Hills, where a helpful clerk showed her a selection of very large and very sharp hunting knives. After looking at more than a dozen knives of various sizes and shapes, she purchased one with a curved six-inch blade and a molded rubber handle. In addition to being exquisitely sharp, the blade was very thick. She was confident it would accomplish the job required of it. It was very expensive but worth every penny. It even came with a cool leather sheath.
The next item on her shopping list took her to the Hustler Hollywood store on Church Street. Which made her laugh. A sex shop on Church Street. The world could be a pretty funny place sometimes, when it wasn’t busy fucking her in the ass. She wasted a bit more time than necessary browsing in the store, snickering over the vast array of sex toys, including many things she couldn’t imagine anyone not producing their own pornographic movies ever using. It also made her sort of horny and made her think again of how long it had been since she’d been properly tended to in bed. The interlude with Lee had been fine for what it was, but not nearly satisfying enough. She left after purchasing a pair of handcuffs and a beginner’s bondage kit, which contained a blindfold and four wrist and ankle restraints with straps. Buying the handcuffs and the bondage kit was maybe a bit of overkill, but she wanted to be sure she had everything she needed.
The remaining items on her list were acquired from a costumes shop, also on Church Street. They had everything she wanted and she was able to get out of there in less than half an hour. A flash of inspiration caused her to stop at a Walgreen’s on West End, where she bought a package of temporary tribal tattoos.
Now she had everything she needed.
By then it was mid-afternoon and she needed to get back to campus. Time was running out and she wanted to go prowling tonight. Maybe even end this thing before the night was over. Her comfy bopping around town clothes were cute enough, but it wasn’t the right outfit for what she had in mind. She was nearing campus when the glaring flaw in her plan dawned on her. She wouldn’t want anyone who lived in her dorm seeing her in her hunting outfit. So she bypassed her usual parking lot and drove to her dorm, where she parked at the curb and hurried up to her room just long enough to drop off her book bag and exchange her flip-flops for a pair of black boots. Sheila wanted to know why she was in such a rush, but Kayla blew her off with an excuse about an impromptu date with an old flame, who was waiting for her outside in her car.
The only thing waiting for her when she got back to her car was a citation issued by campus police for illegal parking. She snatched the ticket from the windshield wiper, hopped in her car, and went off in search of a place to stay for the night. Her dorm room was out for a host of obvious reasons. She immediately ruled out using any of the plentiful cheaper motels available in the more ghetto parts of town and soon settled on a Days Inn on the other side of the Cumberland River just beyond the downtown area. It wasn’t the classiest joint in the world, but it wasn’t a fleabag either.
After getting a room (paying with cash and using her fake ID, which did not show her real name), she retrieved all her shopping loot from her car and reentered the hotel. She experienced a moment of panic after she entered an elevator and the doors slid shut. In that moment, the emotional shield she’d erected slipped and there was no longer a disconnect between the plans she was making and the ultimate hard reality of what she was working to accomplish. She pressed her back against the rear elevator wall and tried to remember how to breathe for a moment that seemed to go on forever, even though it was actually only a handful of seconds. Then she smacked the back of her head against the wall and sucked in a big breath. The world came into focus again and she saw that the other people on the e
levator were looking at her strangely. She smiled and made a comment about jet lag, which seemed to relax them. It was a lame explanation, but she understood why they accepted it so readily. She was a stranger. They were strangers to her. Their lives were all intersecting for a very brief moment in time that was about to end. Who wanted to linger on a stranger’s display of stress when said stranger had given them a believable out?
The elevator let her out at the fifth floor and she hurried to her room. The less anyone here saw her looking like her normal self, the better. The room was nice enough in the standard economy hotel way. It had two twin beds, a small table with chairs, a closet, a bathroom, and a television that sat atop a long dresser. She dumped the contents of her shopping bags on the nearest bed and set to work transforming herself.
She applied a darker shade of lipstick than she would normally use and more eye shadow. She also powdered her face with white foundation for a more pale look. The next piece of the puzzle was her hair. She pulled back her long, naturally blonde locks, pinned them up, and covered the mane with a wig cap. The wig she’d selected at the costume shop went on next. It was styled as a short black bob with long bangs. The wardrobe followed in the same theme. A little black dress with spaghetti straps and a hem that hung to mid-thigh. Then black stockings and her black high-heeled boots. The jewelry she used was silver. Thin bracelets and a delicate necklace. Skull earrings. A variety of goth rings for her fingers. The final touch was one of the temporary tribal tattoos, which she applied with extreme care around her right bicep. It went on smoothly and would look real enough in the dark lighting of a bar.
By the time she was done, she bore little resemblance to the Kayla Monroe anyone knew. What she saw when she looked in the mirror was nothing less than breathtaking. She looked so sinfully sexy.
Irresistible, actually.
What she really looked like was Summer Henderson. Which was no coincidence. Summer’s look was her inspiration.
At least the lying bitch was good for something.
At seven o’clock that night she slipped the hunting knife inside her purse. She shouldn’t need it until after she returned with her intended victim, but it made her feel better to have it with her.
Then she left the hotel to go out hunting.
For real, this time.
34.
She had a cab take her back over the Cumberland River to 2nd Avenue downtown. Huge crowds of people wandered around down here most nights and this night was no exception. Lots of out of town guys in ridiculous cowboy hats, pegged jeans, and boots. Their girlfriends wore too much denim and had big hair like something out of an 80’s music video. Fucking tourists. But there were also a lot of normal-looking young people out for a good time on the town. Hot guys and fashionably dressed girls, some of whom looked almost as good as she did. One thing was certain, there would be no lack of potential sacrifice candidates.
The self-doubt that had briefly assailed her at the hotel seemed under control as she strolled the street. One of the ways she was holding it back was by rejecting the notion of herself as an essentially good person. Her words had sent Rebecca Galbreath to her death. Probably. Maybe. Whatever. At the very least her verbal assaults on the girl had been a large underlining factor in what happened. So what she had to do was embrace her obvious evil nature.
I’m bad, she thought.
I’mEvil.
A predator.
A shark in disguise swimming amongst unsuspecting prey.
So many of the people around her were laughing, the sounds of their merriment mixing with the country, rock, and dance music emanating from open club doors. They were having the time of their lives, the young people and the tourists alike. Many of them were holding hands or had their arms around each other. They seemed so carefree, even with the news of a deranged killer stalking the city. Probably they felt safe out here in the crowds. The fools. Danger lurked everywhere. And evil had more than one kind of face. She thought of the big knife in her purse and imagined using it to open the throats of some of the people who smiled at her as she walked by them.
Visualization seemed important. If she could picture herself committing violent acts often enough, it might prepare her for the real thing. She didn’t actually know whether this was true. They didn’t teach murder classes at Vanderbilt. Well, maybe they did, in a way. The school did have a criminal justice program. Still, she doubted any of those classes were designed with an eye toward helping potential killers better hone their bloody craft. And she didn’t need an expert’s advice to know that the visualization technique was likely a good one.
The first place she stopped in was an Irish pub called Mulligan’s. It was kind of small and dark inside. Jaunty Irish music played on the sound system. She took a seat at the bar and ordered a pint of Guinness to fit in. The bartender never met her gaze, acknowledging her only with a grunt as he reached for a glass and began to fill it from a tap. The lack of attention was the fault of the devil’s spell, but it remained disconcerting. She was easily the most drop dead sexy chick in the joint and hardly anyone was looking her way.
Well, there was one person, a grizzled old guy with a slight build sitting at the opposite end of the bar. He wore a sweater over a buttoned up linen shirt. A Kangol cap sat askew atop his obviously bald head. He smiled and winked when he saw her looking his way. She quickly looked elsewhere. Murdering someone’s grandpa wasn’t what she had in mind. An argument could be made that doing just that would be the right thing, relatively speaking. The guy had lived a longish life. She wouldn’t be robbing him of too many years if she killed him. He even met the devil’s sacrifice criteria. He’d told her she couldn’t take anyone on the verge of death, but had said nothing about age. This guy looked alert and fit for a man of his advanced years. The problem was the devil might still cry shenanigans and attempt to invalidate the sacrifice on some kind of technicality.
Basically, it just wouldn’t do to show up with some wrinkly body part as her ‘trophy’.
She had to take someone in the prime of life.
That was the sad, inescapable truth of the situation.
No.
Fuck that. That was the kind of thinking she was trying to leave behind. Embracing her badness meant finding nothing sad in this. Being truly bad meant finding pleasure in every aspect of the process. There should be delight in the hunt. Joy in the seduction and manipulation of her eventual target. And then a kind of ecstatic release in the moment of truth itself, when the fine edge of her blade slipped through soft flesh and opened veins.
This was similar to the visualization technique.
If she told herself these things enough times, sooner or later she would have to start believing them. She felt like she was getting close to that point. She sure the hell hoped so, anyway, because otherwise she was fucked.
The bartender set the pint of Guinness on a napkin in front of her and immediately turned his back on her. Kayla lifted the glass and took a long swallow of stout. The stuff was creamier-tasting than she’d expected. Smoother. Almost with a hint of coffee flavor. She frowned and stared at the rim of the now much-depleted glass, thinking she could get used to this stuff. Then again, she’d done a lot of drinking lately and had encountered few types of booze she actively disliked. So maybe she was an alcoholic or something. Not that she cared. Not that it mattered. Nothing much at all mattered anymore, with the sole exception of getting this thing done.
“You like the Pogues?”
The verbal intrusion was so sudden the pint glass nearly slipped from her fingers. She tightened her grip on it, glanced right, and saw a pretty okay-looking guy in early middle age. Late thirties, maybe. He was grinning. She liked his teeth. They were all very white and even, like in a toothpaste commercial.
She set the glass down and smiled. “The what?”
“The Pogues. This music?”
Kayla focused on the music for a moment. As far as she could tell, it was just more of exactly the same kind of thing she�
�d heard upon entering the bar. Bouncy, rollicking stuff. “Yes. Love them.”
The guy laughed and sat on the stool next to her. “Let me guess. You’ve never heard of them until now.”
Kayla shrugged. “I’m more a Lady Gaga girl.”
More laughter. “Funny. You look more like a Bauhaus girl.”
“A what?”
“Sorry. The old guy in me showing again. Goth is what I mean.”
“Right. Right. That’s me.”
Kayla picked up her glass again and took another very long swallow. The guy took a look around the bar while she was inhaling her drink, the lines at the corners of his eyes creasing in a way that made him look even older as he checked the place out. He smiled when his eyes settled on her again. “You know, a dress like that is really kind of wasted in a place like this. How about I take you out dancing?”
Kayla patted the corners of her mouth with a folded napkin. “Where?”
“There’s a club a couple blocks from here. The Hex Lounge. Heard of it?”
Kayla had been there several times with friends the previous semester. A wild time was had by all. It was a fun place. Three stories with two dance floors. Lots of hot music and hot guys. The problem was the increased likelihood of being recognized there, even with the shunning spell in effect. Her disguise was good. Anyone who knew her really well might not recognize her at first glance, especially with the music banging and the lights strobing, but prolonged exposure might well give the game away.
She studied the guy a little more closely. Okay, he was twice her age, but he was fit. He obviously worked out. He had a tan. A professional cut his hair and he styled it with product. He was well-dressed in business attire. Her gaze flitted to his left hand for a millisecond. She saw no rings, but there was a telltale band of white skin around his ring finger. So either he was recently divorced or he was a married guy hiding his status for the night.
She touched his hand, rubbing the band of pale skin with her thumb and forefinger. “Where’s the ring?”