Ravenous Ghosts (16 page)

I suppose there is a kind of justice to be found in the fact that those children I murdered have come back to escort me home. My brother piper
's touch.

Consider this my farewell.

Until this ends I am going to relax in my chair, pop the tab on another beer and maybe watch a little television.

Just like one of you.

COL
D SKIN

"Cold Skin" is a curious beast, a story composed of fragments as an experiment, a test of my own ability to thread together apparently disparate elements.

Whether or not it works is up to you to decide, but strangely enough, this bizarre little exercise was my first professional sale…

Janice felt the world begin to blur, her eyelids growing heavy. Just as she was about to give herself freely to the cotton hands of sleep, she was shoved roughly from behind.

"Jan, wake up!"

Startled, she looked around with red-rimmed eyes until she registered the look of concern on her husband
's face.

With a sigh, she propped her head up with a hand on her chin and stared into her cup of coffee, the tendrils of steam growing thin as the liquid lost its heat.

"What's wrong with you?" Jeff asked, pulling back a chair and sitting heavily down across from her. Her eyes drifted lazily to his face.

"
Tired."

"
Yeah, I can see that. Didn't you sleep at all last night?"

She shook her head.
"N'much."

"
Bad dreams?"

"
Dunno. Cold."

"
You were cold?"

She shrugged.
"
You
were cold."

She looked back into her coffee and struggled to blink the sand from her vision. She sensed her husband
's confusion but at that moment had no energy to deal with it. Besides, he would soon be gone to work and it would no longer be her concern.

"
That's odd. I don't remember being cold."

"
You were asleep."

He snorted.
"Why didn't you just move away from me?"

Another shrug.
"Couldn't."

"
Why couldn't you?"

"
On my side."

"
I was over on your side? You should have pushed me off!"

She was too exhausted to reply. Instead, she picked up the teaspoon and began to stir the coffee. His chair screeched against the tiles and her nerves as he got to his feet.

"I'm sorry Jan. I didn't mean to keep you awake. Maybe you should get some sleep instead of going to work. You look shattered."

She had already decided to take the day off to catch up on lost sleep and might have appreciated his suggesting it had she had the patience. But all she could manage was a brief emotionless smile as he kissed the top of her head and left.

She sat in the kitchen, alone with her thoughts and a cold cup of coffee until sleep reclaimed her and she slumped forward onto the tablecloth and into unconsciousness.

* * *

Lydia grimaced as she pulled the body into the bedroom.

She had thought the plastic wrapping would prevent him from bleeding all over the parquet floor but apparently she hadn't sealed it tight enough and now she had the added inconvenience of having to scrub the bastard's blood off the wood when she was done.

Cursing, she let go of the folds in the wrapping and allowed herself a satisfied grin at the sound of his head hitting the floor.

"Didn't see this coming, did you?"

She stared at him for a moment, his face an opaque blur through the material, but he wasn
't talking.

That suited her just fine.

Taking a deep breath, she bent down and grabbed the plastic where she had bunched it up at the top of the wrapping.  Absently hoping that she had managed to avoid getting blood on the new carpet in the hall, she dragged the gruesome package over to the side of the bed where again, she let go, relishing the sight and sound of his head cracking against the floorboards.

She leapt onto the unmade bed and let herself bounce up and down for a moment, immersed in the scent of recent sex, the protestations of the bedsprings bringing pleasurable memories back to the forefront of her mind. She giggled like a child who has seen a boy naked for the first time and peered over the edge of the bed at the body on the floor.

Beneath his plastic shroud, he was naked.

Chewing on a nail, she decided that maybe the fun wasn
't over after all.

* * *

Janice woke with a start, the side of her face wet.

Disorientation gave way to discomfort as she groaned and raised her head from the table.

A brief glance at the clock told her that she had been asleep for little more than forty minutes. Yawning and flicking coffee from her hand, she pushed back her chair and stretched.

The table was a mess. At some point she had knocked over her cup and the linen tablecloth was now a dirty brown color. She decided it was something that could be dealt with later. Her immediate concern was simple. Bed. Sleep.

Stiff-legged and sore, she made her way upstairs where the promise of a comfortable slumber awaited her.

* * *

"Mr. Carroll? Ms. Bernhardt would like to see you in her office immediately."

Jeff groaned and sat back in his chair, his eyes roving around the small office as if a solution to this latest inconvenience could be found written somewhere on the drab gray windowless walls.

"Mr. Carroll?"

"
Yes, Harriet. Tell her I'll be there in a minute."

He released the button on the intercom, rubbed a hand over his face and sighed. Thoughts of his sleep-deprived wife crossed his mind but he forced them away. The day was bad enough without having an attack of ethics.

Shrugging on his jacket, he brushed back the sides of his hair with the palms of his hands and opened the drawer nearest him from which he produced a small bottle of breath freshener.

A quick spray and he was out the door, smiling.

* * *

Lydia ran her manicured nails through the tangles of hair on his chest and sighed.
"You were never this considerate when you were alive," she purred, careful to avoid the gaping wound in his abdomen.

He said nothing.

* * *

"
You wanted to see me?"

Ms. Bernhardt looked over the sheet of paper she had been reading when Jeff entered her office and removed her spectacles.

"Who authorized you to hire Sally Graham for the records department?" she asked, tonelessly.

He shrugged.
"She was perfect for the job. I assumed you'd agree with me on it."

She rose, the seventh story view silhouetting her until she rounded her desk and approached him.
"It would be hard to agree with you on something you haven't mentioned to me, Jeff."

He backed up a step as she neared him, a faint smile flickering on his face.

"Close the door," she commanded and he obeyed, pushing the button in the center of the brass knob that locked it.

In a second she was on him, forcing his back against the door, her lips mashed against his, tongue hungrily searching his mouth.

When they parted, she smiled at him. "You've been naughty again Mr. Carroll."

He groaned as her hand slid over the stiffness in his pants.

"You aren't really pissed about the Graham girl, are you?"

She dropped to her knees before him.
"Who?"

* * *

Janice tossed uncomfortably, ensnared in the arms of a nightmare.

Occasionally, a whimper would escape her slightly parted lips. The sheets were damp with sweat as she turned onto her side, hand outstretched, fingers searching.

At last she found him and the dream began to barrel away down a long hazy corridor as she found solace in the fact, even in unconsciousness, that she was not alone.

Her fingertips came to rest on his arm and through the depths of sleep, a frown surfaced.

So cold.

* * *

Burying him would be the hardest part and she didn't mind admitting that it wasn't woman's work.

So for now, Lydia was content to rest. She was in no rush and she was positive that he didn
't mind.

Her face resting against his naked thigh, she stroked the length of his flaccid manhood and licked her lips.

How simple they were when they were freed of their opinions.

* * *

The office was emptying; pouring out exhausted bodies while two equally spent employees lay intertwined on the floor of the executive director's office on the seventh floor.

Jeff rolled over and crooked an arm beneath his head. He was still wearing his shirt and tie, his pants lying in a heap behind her desk.

She got to her feet and searched for her panties, which she suspected were ripped beyond all hope of repair. Not that she minded. It was a small price to pay for the kind of attention Jeff was able to give her.

"
So I suppose it's nearly that time again?" she mumbled, picking up the ruined panties and frowning at him.

"
What time?"

"
Time for you to go running back to your beloved wife?"

Jeff looked at her through hooded eyes as she stuffed her underwear into her purse. A sly smile spread across his face, causing her to pause when she noticed it.
"What?"

He sighed dramatically.
"My wife didn't sleep last night, so I'm thinking she might sleep through until morning."

"
Really?"

He nodded.
"I'm all yours."

* * *

Janice snored.

Every now and then she would brush against the body beside her and shiver, the cold skin almost enough to drag her back into consciousness.

Almost.

* * *

Eventually, she was sated and her mind turned towards the grueling task of interring her lover. Propping herself up on an elbow, she looked into his glassy eyes and imagined them staring forever upward at nothing but cold unyielding earth.

She smiled.

Sitting up, she reached over onto the nightstand and found her cigarettes.

Through plumes of blue smoke, she readied herself for the job ahead. It was true what they said. A woman
's work was never done.

* * *

"Here we are." She led Jeff into the dark hallway of her apartment.

"
Christ, it's huge. How much are they paying you these days?" Jeff said, in awe of her ultra modern dwelling and wishing secretly that Janice would agree to let him move them to a more prosperous neighborhood, even if they really couldn't afford to. He believed if you acted like you had money to burn, then someone would grant you that ability eventually. It was all image nowadays.

"
Trade secret," she teased and ushered him into the kitchen. "I'm going to get changed, why don't you put on the kettle."

"
I doubt it'll fit me," Jeff quipped, grinning.

She made a face and continued upstairs.
"Smartass."

* * *

Janice was frightened.

Still deep in sleep, something kept flashing through her subconscious that had the potential to drive her mad if it refused to rise to the center of her mind.

As she moaned, at first softly and then more forcefully, her nails dug deep into the flesh of her sleeping partner's arm.

As the dream retuned, she screamed out loud, unable to awake. Her nails dug deeper. And still there was no blood.

* * *

There was blood.

Jeff cursed as he looked at his shoulder in the mirror. In the reflection, his lover floated into view, her hair tousled, her beautiful body lit by the bulb above the glass.

"
You scratched me."