demanded to know what she wanted, why was doing this, and what the hell she wanted him to do. Apparently having anticipated this, she simply held up the dry-erase board that she had taken off the kitchen refrigerator. She pointed to the message that she had written upon it:
YOU HAVE FIVE MINUTES. CONFESS OR BURN.
The red LED light of the camera glared at him, almost as though the camera, itself, was demanding a confession from him. This was insane. This wasn’t right. It wasn’t fair! This was torture, plain and simple! He’d never tortured anyone. That wasn’t his style. He killed, but he didn’t rape, and he didn’t torture. He had rules. He wasn’t an animal. He was just curious. And curiosity, of course, had killed the cat … and maybe him, too.
He considered it for a few moments, weighing his options. Well, really, there were only two options: confess or burn. Sure seemed simple enough. One option was to play it tough, give her nothing, and hope she didn’t have the gall to actually torch him … only to find out that he was wrong. That was a stupid option.
Bella wasn’t weak. She was cold, every bit as cold as he was. Hell, she had been the one to drug him. She was the one that had gotten a leg up on him in this situation. He respected her now … and realized he should have respected her before as well. He dared not underestimate her again by calling her bluff.
The other choice was to spill his guts. Of course, it was obvious what she wanted. She knew. She had to know what he was all about, that this was nothing new to him. The way he had attacked her, so suddenly and without provocation, she had to have known that he had been planning all along to kill her. And she had to know that he was the type that would likely do this again, if he hadn’t already done it before (which he had). So, what Bella wanted was a confession to hand over to the police. She would let them mete out justice as the courts saw fit.
Well, for sure, that would mean prison time. He could afford the best lawyers there were, but nobody could get him off the hook for everything, not if they had a videotaped confession. And his confession would have to be real, of course. He couldn’t assume that he would be able to rattle off some irrelevant details to Bella and hope that she’d just accept them as the truth. Again, he dared not underestimate her twice. Besides, the idea of finally telling someone else everything that he had done was kind of exciting in a way. All these years, he’d been keeping it all to himself, never able to see just how someone else would react to hearing everything that he had done.
So, yeah, he could confess. Go ahead, let her use it against him in court. He would do prison, but he could live through it. It had been worth it. He had already experienced more in life than most people would ever experience in several lifetimes. They wouldn’t give him the death penalty, not with his lawyers. Even if they did, it would take decades for them to actually carry it out, at which point he’d be so old that an execution would be more like a mercy killing. It was an unpleasant future, but perhaps inevitable. He’d considered the possibility of it many times in the past, even before he carried out his first hunt. He had always known the risks involved. He’d expected to be caught eventually; however, he hadn’t expected to face being burned alive by one of his victims.
So then, after a brief hesitation, he confessed. He spilled it all, speaking quickly, trying to cram as much detail into the time allotted as he figured he could afford. He told her (and the camera) about all six of the women he’d murdered, about how he had lured them in, how he had killed them, and how he had disposed of their bodies. He even went so far as to explain why he’d done it. He hoped to make her understand that he wasn’t some sick pervert that got his jollies from sexually violating dead bodies. He wasn’t some lowly scumbag that picked up hookers and dumped their mutilated remains in a river because he had childhood abuse issues with his mother. He threw it all out there, laid all his cards down on the table. He gave it all until he had nothing left to give.
At last, he shrugged after sitting in silence for a few moments in conclusion. “So, there you have it. Now … what happens next?”
She had been standing with her arms folded as she’d watched him. Now, she turned the camera away from him for a moment, walked over to him, and put the sock gag back into position. She hadn’t actually stopped the recording, so obviously she wanted to keep her identity secret for some reason. With the gag back in place, she then aimed the camera at him again, picked up the dry-erase board, and wiped off its prior message … or at least the majority of it. She held it up for him to read again. He read it. His heart sank. She had left only one word:
BURN
He screamed.
Bella took the camera with her, still recording, and walked over to the door leading into the attached garage. She reached in through the open window of his luxury SUV, unclipped the remote from its visor, and used it to open the garage door. He was still screaming, wailing even louder now with the hopes that the open door would allow his cries to be heard. It was a stupid assumption, thinking anyone would be awake and outside to hear his muffled cries at three o’clock in the morning – he probably couldn’t even be heard one room over within the same house.
Bella set the camera’s tripod down so that she could aim the camera into the house, still clearly able to view him. For obvious reasons, she made sure that she remained behind the camera at all times, completely out of view. She went around, started her car, and let it idle as she came back around to the doorway one last time. She stared at him for a moment, watching as he pleaded through his gag for her to let him go, to not do what he knew she was going to do. She just shook her head, the faintest hint of a smirk curving her pretty dark burgundy lips.
Bella produced a small book of disposable matches that she’d taken out of her car. She struck one, used it to set the others alight, and gave him a small wave goodbye before tossing the flaming matchbook over the camera and into the house. A splash of gasoline was visible upon the hardwood floor. The vapors ignited with a pretty blue wash of flame that swiftly spread into the house, crawling along the floor with a beautiful fluid motion. The flames reached the nearly empty gasoline can sitting a few feet in front of him. He screamed his last.
She backed out of the driveway, used the stolen remote to close the garage door, and watched it go down slowly as the orange glow of the flames glared visibly through the front windows of the house. She drove away calmly, quietly, and sedately. Spinning the tires and gunning the engine would only attract the neighbors’ attention, drawing their attention to the house that would soon be completely engulfed in flames. The sooner the fire department was called, the less time he would have to burn.
During the drive home, she removed the gloves and pulled off the wig, fluffing her natural red hair. The wig had been terribly itchy, and she was glad to be done with it. She used a tissue from her purse to wipe away the makeup she’d used to fake her bruises. The punches she had sustained would leave real ones, and for those she would need different makeup to hide them. She didn’t want her roommate to ask any more questions than she already was going to, what with her being out so late and all.
She crept into her apartment, took a shower, and rejoiced in finding that her roommate was still soundly asleep when she got out. She drank a few cups of coffee as she waited for sunrise. At exactly seven o’clock in the morning, she left. The drive was short and the trek was familiar, but this would be the last time she would ever make this visit. She didn’t know if she would be investigated or charged for what she had done, but she didn’t care. The end justified the means. The consequences were irrelevant.
She entered the memorial garden just as the caretakers were opening the gates for their normal daytime hours. She drove to that same spot, the one she’d visited every Saturday for the past five years, and she parked. She weaved her way between the headstones and grave markers until she reached that one lonely, humble, simple granite marker. She had brought along the same two tumblers she had saved from the house before she’d left, along with the bottle of rum. She poured a do
uble into each glass. She set one glass upon the grave and clinked the other glass against it, raising it in a toast.
“Cheers, sis,” she declared before she drank. “I finally found him.”
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About the author:
Born in the Midwest and an avid writer since the age of 13, David M. Bachman's works of fiction span over 25 years. His first published work, "When Raindrops Come Crashing," marked the start of his foray into publishing in December 2000. Since then, he has written a number of other fiction novels and short stories, including a carefully-crafted, nine-volume vampire series and many short stories and other novels. He currently resides in the East Valley area of Phoenix, AZ, where many of his recent stories are based.
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“Little Miss Mute”
“Belladonna”
“The Darkest Colors”
“The Darkest Colors: Exsanguinations”
“The Darkest Colors: Children of Asmodeus”
“Kat & Katarina”
“Grace of Smoke”
“Beautiful Reaper”
“Consecration”
“Swatted”
“The Rider of Los Muertos”
“For the Wicked”
“Mortal Consumption”
“Immortal Debts”
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Belladonna Page 4