Broken Wings (A Romantic Suspense) (122 page)

Kelly is such a kid. All she wants is to eat more mac and cheese. I can’t help but smile as she piles half the pot on her plate. I don’t know where she puts it all. She’s as skinny as a reed.

“Did you see the guy?” Karen asks.

“What guy?”

She chews her hot dog thoughtfully. “Next door.”

Not this again. I sigh.

“Yes, I saw him. He’s obnoxious and rude.”

“And hot!”

“Karen.” I put a hint of warning in my voice.

“You talked to him? What’s he like?”

Sighing, I rub the back of my hand against my temple. “Obnoxious. Rude.”

“Hot.”

“Karen,” I growl.

“Fine, fine. Maybe you should give him a chance?”

Another sigh escapes my throat. Better to let her drop it or hope something distracts her.

“Kelly, not so much salt on the mac and cheese, okay?”

Kelly gives me a sullen look, pushes the salt shaker back to the middle of the table, and starts shoveling yellowish noodle globs into her mouth.

Karen is giving me that look.

Ever since Russel filed for divorce, she’s been pushing me to find a boyfriend. I barely have time to eat and sleep, much less time to date.

I don’t think I even remember how. I was never even in a relationship before Russel. I have kids. I don’t need a man. I’ve written it out of my life. Karen just can’t understand that. She’s got her head full of these silly ideas about romance and love. I’ve been catching her reading cheesy romance novels lately. One time I found her reading a book called
Knocked Up by the Bad Boy
.
She’s a fan of Vanessa Waltz, whoever that is. I really shouldn’t let her read that stuff. She’s not old enough.

I mean, really.

“What did you talk about?”

“What?”

“What did you—”

“I heard you,” I sigh. “I went over to talk to him about his car. He’s going to get it towed if he keeps it in the driveway.”

“That’s a dumb rule.”

“I know, but it’s still a rule.”

“What did he say?”

“He wasn’t happy to hear it. He slammed the door in my face.”

“Jeez, Mom. You need a better opener than, ‘Hey, move your car.’”

“I don’t need an opener, Karen. I’m not interested in this guy. I didn’t know he existed until I got home from work.”

“Okay, okay, fine,” she says, her voice turning sour. “Whatever. I have homework.”

“You’re excused,” I say, as she’s already walking upstairs.

“Can I have the rest of the mac and cheese?” Kelly chirps.

I nod and watch her devour it, chewing on another crusty hot dog before I’ve had enough and my youngest daughter helps me clean up the mess. Once I’ve got her ready for bed I take a shower, dry off, and crawl into my own bed.

My alarm goes off at 4:45.

I sit up and try to walk, rather than crawl, down to the kitchen. I need to have both kids to the bus by 6:30. In his infinite wisdom Russel put us so far from the “good schools” the realtor crowed about that my kids have to ride the bus almost an hour each way, longer if there’s traffic.

Thanks, Russ.

First order of business is preparing food. I want my kids to have a good breakfast, so I cook eggs and sausage myself, and pour breakfast cereal for Kelly, which she devours first.

When they’re both fed I walk with them down to the front gate, where the bus stops, and pace around waiting for them to be picked up. They ride the same bus, thankfully. When it pulls up I feel the same pang I feel every time when they board and wave to me, and choke up a little walking back to the house.

Once I’m back inside I shower again quickly, since it was a sweaty walk down to the bus stop, and dress for work.

I have twenty-five minutes to make the bus, which will be cutting it a little close.

Briskly I storm out of my house, run back up to lock the door, then run back, hoping I’ll make it.

Then some asshole sprays me with a hose.

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Thrall

by Abigail Graham

Chapter One

The dead man in the bathroom is beginning to smell.

I’ve slept in this smelly little apartment as long as I can. I lucked out this time. This isn’t the kind of place where neighbors nose in on each other. A three floor brownstone. I’m on the top floor. I’ve been sleeping in the closet for the last three days, since this guy brought me home.

I knew he was my mark when I tasted the drink he bought and felt the gritty texture of the crushed up pill meant to knock me out. I could feel it in his eyes. Hear a little voice whisper
this one.
I played woozy, let him tuck me in a cab and bring me back to his lair.

I gave him a chance. I controlled myself that long. I played at being drugged, stumbled around, slurred my speech. He could have changed his mind and called me a cab or just put me to sleep on the couch and I’d have been gone by the time he woke up, holed up somewhere else for another day. When I pretended to pass out he started pulling off my clothes. I stopped pretending.
 

I dragged him, kicking and screaming, into the bathroom and pinned him down in the tub. The look of absolute confusion on his face stings my memory like his hot blood stung my tongue.

I ignored his pleas and protests and the confusion and shock as a skinny, five foot two girl overpowered him and bound him with a belt and opened his wrists with a razor from his medicine cabinet. I caught as much of the blood as I could in bowls, drank some then and kept the rest in the fridge until it started to thicken up. After I drank my fill and licked myself clean like a cat I washed off the rest with cold water and washed him, too. It left a red ring around the side of the tub and a rusty streak around the drain.

Last night I went thirsty.

If I don’t kill again in the next day or three, it’ll start to get me. I feel the thirst in my stomach first. It’s not a rumbling or a sensation of
hunger
, it’s more a cold place that wants to be filled up. From there, it spreads. It goes to my lungs next, a constant feeling of suffocation, like I’m just about to draw a breath but can’t. Then it gets in my veins. They harden up. I can feel them crack when I move.

Then it gets in my head like my skull is full of cotton balls and razor blades. Then I have no choice but to feed. If I don’t, I make a straight line for the nearest warm body when I wake up. Man, woman, child, it doesn’t matter. I’ll wake up in a pool of blood holding a corpse with its throat torn open and a hole in my memory between the time the hunger took over and the feeding ended.

I can’t fly. I can’t turn into mist or walk through shadows or become invisible by turning sideways. I’ve never seen a bat in person, and dogs don’t particularly like me, much less wolves. There’s only a few differences between me and you. I’m stronger. I have a theory on that. Human beings have a kind of preservation instinct that keeps them from hurting themselves. The human musculature is much stronger than most people realize. Strong enough to tear itself apart if it’s not held in check. I don’t have that limit. I go all out, all the time. Maybe a little more.

That’s the main difference. The other is the obvious one. I have no pulse. I do not breathe. My flesh will eventually cool to room temperature, even if I warm myself up. I’ve tried everything: electric blankets, space heaters, warm baths. Every night when the sun sets I wake up and I fall asleep when it rises. I do not dream, nor can I wake up on my own. If sunlight touches my flesh it begins to smoke and sizzle and after maybe a minute I will burst into flames and die. The touch of the sun itself is the only thing I know of that can keep me awake during the day.

I have no way of knowing for sure, but I’m fairly certain I could be mistaken for a corpse if someone found me while I was sleeping. I don’t have nightmares because I don’t dream, but sometimes when I’m awake I get a flash, an unwanted imagining. In my mind’s eye I see the bright lights greeting me as my eyes open during my own autopsy, my chest spread open in a standard Y-incision as the doctor weighs my organs.

Nothing scares me more than that, except the thought of what comes after if I actually do die, whether I just cease to exist or go to Hell as punishment for the monster I’ve become. I’m not sure which scares me worse.

I get a taste of that every time I try to remember the person I used to be. My name is Christine, but I don’t know my last name or where I was born or how old I was before…
this
. Looking at myself in the mirror I see the corpse of somebody I’d like to know but will never meet.

Yes, I can see my reflection.

I don’t even have fangs. How’s that for a ripoff? If I want to feed it’s either my teeth or a sharp instrument.

My meager belongings all fit in my pockets. I have a pair of jeans and a t-shirt I wash semi-regularly, usually in the sink. I don’t have much a problem with odors; I don’t sweat, and my hair doesn’t even grow. No other, ah, bodily functions either.

I don’t have any money or identification, but I don’t really need it. I carry a makeup kit I stole a while back and soon I’ll steal another to replace it. After I’ve combed out my hair I go for a goth girl look. I tried to make myself look alive once, put on some foundation and blush and rouge, but I ended up looking like a circus clown. If I go for a dark palette I at least look somewhat alive in the right light. I can’t do anything about the dark veins or the waxy texture of my skin.

The other thing I carry with me is a picture. There’s another girl with me. A tall redhead. I barely come up to her chest. We’re standing together in an airport but I don’t know where it is. I don’t know their names, or why I have a picture of myself with her, how I knew her or where she is now. When I stare at it and try to remember all I get is a numb dull blackness and I have to stop, fold it in half, and carefully put it in the change pocket of my jeans.

At some point, I wore a ring on my left hand. There’s still a slightly paler band around my finger where it used to be. I don’t know if I was married, or if it was just a class ring. I’m pretty sure I went to college. I’m the right age and I get little flashes now and then. I like to read. I only get the chance when a guy’s apartment has books in it. Or they have a Kindle. I love those, if I can figure out the password.

I realize I’m stalling. I double check the garbage bags I used to wrap up the corpse in the bathtub and hope the smell won’t draw any attention for a few days. I hope that the police will call it a suicide when they find him and they won’t start looking for me.

I stop at the door, and rest my hand on the knob. I’m going to go out and find someone to murder. I would cry if I could make tears.

Before, when I was new at this, I used to pray. I figured if by some cosmic joke this could happen to me maybe there was some greater force out there that could turn me back. The more I had to kill to keep myself alive, the more damned I felt, until I realized what a joke this is. I’ve never met another like me. Nor have I met any werewolves, or seen a ghost. I might be the only one in the world.

All I know is this: I don’t pray anymore, but I want there to be a God so I can hate him. He let
this
happen to me.

Out on the street, the air is cold. I can’t really
feel
my body cooling down but I know it is. I’m aware of heat, of cold, of the breeze in my hair, but I don’t
feel
them, not really. It’s the same when I get hurt. I sense injuries but I don’t feel pain. If I try to eat everything tastes like ash and the textures are excruciating. Eating a saltine cracker is like chewing up razor blades and a bowl of soup might as well be acid. It’s even worse when it inevitably comes back up.

What I can feel is the pulse of everyone around me. Walking down the sidewalk means a constant bombardment of sensation. The sound of breathing, the feel of body heat and a constant shivering sensation as I feel the blood pumping through the people as they get close to me.

I slice through the crowd with ease. People move out of my way and look at the ground when they pass and they don’t know why, and I can feel their shivers, see the hairs prick up on the backs of their necks.

I have to go to a different place tonight. If too many guys disappear after visiting the same club people will start looking, and they will notice them all talking to me, or worse, leaving with me. Then the grainy surveillance camera stills come out on the news, and then they find me. I have no illusions about what would happen. I’m not indestructible. I’ll die if someone shoots me. Even if they take me alive, they won’t believe me. They’ll leave me in a place with windows, and come morning find a charred, greasy stain where I used to be.

So after tonight, I will move on. I will not stay the night. I will take a bus to another city. Somewhere north, maybe, where the days aren’t so long. I often wonder if there’s a way I can get into Canada. Just go and go until I hit permafrost. Maybe I can dig in and let it freeze me and this will be over.

There’s a line to get into the club. It’s worse now, the hunger. I can feel it pulsing in my throat as the bass from inside rolls up my legs. I don’t want to stand in line and wait for the velvet rope. I can’t pay the cover.

I don’t know if it’s magic or pheromones or something about my eyes, but the bouncer working the door sees me and I look him in his eyes and it happens. There’s this push, like trying to rub the wrong ends of two magnets together, and his jaw goes a little slack, and he motions me forward. I skip the line, the rope goes up, I walk into the club, and the hunt begins.

Awful, absolutely awful. The lights, the pounding, the constant movement. I cut through to the bar and find a place to sit and motion the bartender over. He doesn’t ask for my ID when I meet his eyes and do the mind trick. He just gives me my favorite drink, a screwdriver. I take a few sips and let it burn down my throat and know I’ll be dealing with it later. I have to keep up appearances. Blend in, and wait.

This is when it sets in.

There might not be another guy tonight, or tomorrow. I might bend my rules, go soft on my standards. I might make an excuse. I want to laugh at myself for thinking I can justify the death of every human being it takes to keep me going. People have to die so this
thing
can keep going for another few days at a time.