Serpent's Kiss (28 page)

    Finished with the washcloth, the nightmare finally receding, she opened up the medicine cabinet, took down her toothbrush and toothpaste, and set to work developing a foamy cleansing solvent for her teeth. She was careful to brush properly to get the maximum benefits from her work.

    Done brushing, she ran water over the teeth of her brush, put brush and paste back in the medicine cabinet, and then returned to the living room.

    A policeman stood next to the couch. He smiled at her and said, "Good evening."

    She recognised him at once for who he really was. Even in the uniform, even wearing a hat, it was clear he was the killer she'd seen earlier tonight in the bookstore. "Your mother was nice enough to let me in." He smiled again. "Women are always suckers for uniforms."

    "Where is my mother?" she said.

    "She's in the bedroom."

    "What have you done with her?"

    He stared at her. "Calm down."

    "I want to go see her."

    "You're really starting to lose it."

    She turned, and started hobbling down the hallway to her mother's bedroom. Her crippled foot slowed her down considerably.

    She heard and felt him right behind her.

    Her mother was on the bed. Her clothes had been ripped off her. Her small breasts and tiny thatch of pubic hair gave her a vulnerable look that broke Marie's heart. The gag in her mother's mouth kept her from saying anything. She watched Marie come into the room.

    "Did he hurt you?" Marie asked her mother.

    Kathleen shook her head. Her face was pale, her eyes frightened.

    "Untie her," Marie said.

    He slapped her hard directly across the mouth. Marie soon tasted blood in her mouth.

    On the bed, her mother made sounds of protest lost in the gag as she rocked uselessly back and forth, straining at the cloth in her mouth.

    "You've got a very nice mother; very co-operative," the killer said. "But we've seen enough of her for now. I want to go back to the living room."

    Marie started to complain again but her mother shook her head. Comply, the gesture said. Go along, the gesture said.

    Marie stared back at the killer. "You're going to kill us, aren't you?"

    "I don't want to talk right now," the man said.

    He grabbed Marie's shoulder and pushed her toward the door. "C'mon, now." Then he wound her hair round his hand and put the knife to her throat. "And don't try to scream or anything foolish. Do you understand?"

    Behind her, Marie heard her mother cry something plaintive behind the gag.

    He pushed Marie out into the hall.

    When she was halfway toward the living room, he reached for the back of her nightgown and tore it in a single violent motion.

    Marie didn't have time to grab it before the two halves of the gown fell away from her entirely. She reacted instinctively by covering her breasts with her hands.

    He shoved her into the living room.

    He kept staring at her breasts. She could not entirely hide them behind her hands.

    At knifepoint, he forced her across the room to the couch. He said nothing. He smelled of sweat and blood. His eyes were crazed. His breath made her nauseous.

    He pushed her down on the couch and then dropped down himself and straddled her.

    She could feel his sizeable erection pushing against her vagina.

    "You're a virgin, aren't you?"

    She said nothing. Beneath her shoulder, she could feel the shape of her father's gun.

    There had to be some way to reach it-

    He pushed his hips tighter into her. "You are, aren't you?"

    "Yes," she whispered.

    He smiled. "Good."

    He reached down to the warmth between her legs.

    His knuckles brushed against her softness.

    "Do you like how that feels?"

    "No," she said.

    "No?" he said. "Maybe not right now. But when I'm inside you, you will. I promise you."

    Again her shoulder rubbed the gun. She had to distract him some way.

    He brought the point of the knife blade to her throat. "Do knives scare you?"

    "Yes."

    "I kind've thought they would."

    "You could run. I couldn't stop you. You could get away before the police come."

    His face was huge in her eyes. He had yellow, slightly crooked teeth and he needed a shave and blood spattered his nose and cheeks and he smelled oily and filthy. Now his mouth opened wide as a cavern and he laughed. "Oh, you're real concerned for my welfare, aren't you? That's just what you'd like to see, isn't it? Me get away." He laughed again, the sound rolling around the dark cave of his open mouth.

    He put some pressure on the knife.

    She felt the tip of it cut her skin. She felt a tiny drop of blood roll down her neck.

    "I'm going to lay this knife right next to me while I'm fucking you. And if you make any noise at all, I'm going to kill you right on the spot. You understand?"

    He took his knuckles again and traced them across the shape of her vagina.

    "You'll want to get wet, otherwise it's going to hurt a lot." He grinned with yellow teeth. "I'm sorry there isn't time for foreplay."

    It was then she brought her knee straight up between his legs and had the satisfaction of feeling her knee collide with his testicles.

    He let out an almost amazing groan of pain. He jerked up off her momentarily, just enough so she could roll over on her stomach and touch the shape of the gun with her fingers.

    He collapsed on her back, ripping out a handful of hair as he did so. "You cunt; you're going to pay for that."

    She wanted to cry but she felt so many emotions-terror, pain, rage, uselessness-that she could do nothing but lie there.

    And let her fingers gently touch the gun.

    He got another handful of hair and started pulling again. Steadily, so the pain would be constant.

    "You try that again, and I'll kill your mother first. You understand me, cunt?"

    She nodded, sobbed.

    His groping hand found her buttock. Began gliding gently over its curve. Then he started squeezing so hard it hurt.

    "Maybe I'll do you back door. Maybe that's the way you'll like it," he said.

    He had an erection again. He pushed it between the mounds of her buttocks.

    Her hand started to tighten on the handle of the gun.

    His hand shot out, grabbed hers. "What the hell you think you're doing?"

    
My God. Has he found the gun? If I don't have the gun then there's no hope-

    "You put your hand down here when I need it."

    He twisted her entire arm, yanking her hand behind her back. He set her fingers on his erection. He had somehow managed to unzip himself.

    Her fingers recoiled at the touch but when he jerked on her arm, making it feel as if he'd snap it in two, she had no choice but to let him guide her hand back to him.

    "You and I are going to be friends," he said as he stroked her hand up and down the shaft of his erection. "Very good friends."

    Abruptly he let go of her arm and pushed himself down between her legs, his penis brushing against her vagina for the first time.

    "You make any noise, cunt, and I'll kill your mother first. You hear me?"

    Unable to speak, she only nodded.

    "Good. Then we'll get along fine."

    He jammed himself up inside her.

    Her entire insides caught fire with a pain that brought swimming darkness to her eyes and a dying cry to her throat.

    
Any sound, and he'll kill Mom.

    He started moving around inside her, finding his rhythm, taking his pleasure.

    She was still completely dry. Each thrust only made her feel the drier. Each thrust only made her clench her fists and bite down on her tongue the harder.

    "Oh, God, cunt, you really feel good."

    The tremulous sounds of his domination were almost as bad as the actual feel of him inside.

    His strokes got longer now. His breathing was obscenely loud.

    She knew he'd be finished in moments. And then he'd kill her. He had no other reason to keep her alive.

    She had to move now.

    Sliding her hand under the blanket, she wriggled her fingers like snakes up the couch until she felt the handle of the gun.

    His hand clamped her wrist!

    So he'd found out about the gun after all. So now there was no hope whatsoever.

    But it had only been a move of passion, his grabbing her arm. He was thrusting faster and deeper; faster and deeper. Despite herself, she was getting wet down there.

    Faster and deeper.

    She grabbed it then and pulled it quickly into her chest, hidden away from his sight. The gun felt huge and wonderful in her palm.

    When he came, he bit her so hard on the neck that he drew blood. She started to whimper-apparently he was afraid she was going to scream-and he picked up the knife and pushed it hard against the back of her neck.

    "Don't say a fucking word, bitch. Not a fucking word."

    She would have to do it quickly, she knew he was much faster and stronger. There was a good chance he would see the gun before she had time to use it, and take it from her.

    He withdrew from her and started to stand up. She could hear the couch springs squeak from the pressure of his knees.

    She could hear his trousers rustle as he began to pull them up.

    And then she rolled over and pushed the gun up, holding it tight in both hands.

    His face reflected both astonishment and fear.

    The first place she shot him was in the groin.

    She shot his penis off. Limp, it dropped off like a piece of brittle statuary. Blood began pouring from the hole in his crotch. For good measure, she put another bullet in the bloody cleft the first bullet had left behind.

    The second place she shot him was in the chest.

    By this time, however, he had tapped into his rage so he was coming for her.

    She scrambled backward off the couch, getting tangled up in the blankets and screaming.

    He reached down and slapped her so hard that she didn't have time to get a shot off.

    He grabbed the gun from her and tossed it behind him on the living room floor.

    Then he picked up his knife from the couch, leaned down and grabbed her hair, and pulled her face up to his.

    "I'm going to enjoy this, cunt. I'm really going to enjoy this."

    
Please, Dad. Please pray for me. Please help me.

    Even with the gun, she had not killed him. And now he was going to kill her.

    He put the cold, clean edge of the knife against her jugular and was about to draw it across her throat when the gunfire broke out.

    At first, Marie had no idea what was happening.

    But as the killer's knife fell from her throat, and as the killer began to pitch forward dead as the bullets slammed into his back, she saw standing there the best friend she'd ever had, her mother.

    Even in the frenzy and horror of this moment, Marie took time to note wryly that Kathleen, after escaping her bonds, had first done the proper thing. She'd put on a robe before coming out into the living room and saving her daughter's life.

    By now neighbours were in the hallway, thundering with words and excited exclamations.

    Kathleen, composing herself, setting the empty gun on the coffee table as if she'd just finished a perfunctory round of target practice, went to the door.

    Marie found her own robe and rose dazedly to her feet. The killer was sprawled face down across the couch. The peppermint stripes of the sheets were soaked red with his blood.

    His face was turned in profile and he shocked her by speaking. He reached out a hand and touched her robe, streaking blood down the light blue cotton.

    His face angled up toward hers. He had changed somehow-the rage was gone and in his eyes there was the sense of a different man.

    He said, "I don't know what they'll do to you. Your name was on the wall. You were supposed to die. They'll punish you for this."

    And then his face fell again to the couch, and he died.

    Marie, shuddering, wondered what he'd meant.
I don't know what they'll do to you. Your name was on the wall. You were supposed to die. They'll punish you for this.

    But then neighbours were pouring through the door. And sirens were exploding on the night nearby. And best of all her mother, Kathleen, was hugging her.

    The long night had ended at last.

    

    

    SHE HARDLY EVER left her room. The others frightened her. She was not sure why but she did not trust them.

    So long into the night she stood at the window, watching, watching, not sure for what, just knowing that at some point she would understand the compulsion to stand here until her legs grew sore and tired.

    And then one night it happened and for long weeks afterward, she wondered if it hadn't all been a dream.

    But no, she knew better than that. It hadn't been a dream. She had indeed visited the tower that stood at midnight in the silver rain like a beckoning finger.

    For a time, she was troubled and of course they gave her shots with long silver needles, and her doctors cooed and whispered and reassured, but she did not tell them of course. Not about the hole in the tower where the serpent had slithered free, nor the way the serpent had come across the floor to her and-