Riser (Teen Horror/Science Fiction) (Book #1 in The Riser Saga) ((Volume 1)) (25 page)

“So.” Turner let that hang in the air for a good two minutes.

“So,” I said back, trying to figure out what he was going to do next.

“I finally meet the murderer of my only son.”

And there it was. He really
did
blame me for my father’s death.

“No chance of this being a heartfelt family reunion then?” I figured I’d throw that out there.

“No chance,” he said and my blood temperature dropped forty degrees.

“If you had given your blessings instead of your curses, he’d still be alive.” Wow. That was bold. I was really impressed with myself.

Until I saw the look on his face.

I had never seen so much loathing in a person’s eyes before. Not even Jill’s and that’s saying a lot. Maybe I should have kept my mouth shut. But maybe I shouldn’t have. Something about this man made my skin crawl and I realized it wasn’t fear, it was a revulsion that spread through me to every fiber of my soul. If he knew who I was then the attack on the trailer park was intentional. It wasn’t random, it was purposeful and targeted. He was finishing the job he started eighteen years ago.

“Trash.” He said it so quietly and with so much venom I almost flinched instinctively.

Minutes passed with agonizing slowness as we stared at each other from across the room. His dead staff motionless, watching.

Turner focused his attention on the briefcase and opened it as if we were in the middle of a business meeting. He pulled out an electronic reader and he punched up a contract, sliding it to me on the desk.

“Thumbprint, there. It’s your money for the rest of the year.” I could tell he was detached at this point. Maybe I could get through this meeting alive after all. Come to think of it, it was crazy for me to think he’d try anything in such a public setting. How would he explain my dead body after he just had his
private
meeting with me? I had been so worked up on the possibility of an attack I hadn’t stopped to really think about the practicality of it all.

“I’m going to read it first, thank you.” My body and mind were starting to relax a bit. He wouldn’t hurt me. Not today anyway.

“Be my guest.” Turner leaned back in the giant chair folding his hands comfortably over his stomach.

I read the contract fully which didn’t take long since it consisted of two paragraphs. Nothing in it suggested anything of foul play, just a brief summary of how much money I was to receive minus the costs of tuition and materials. It was actually a hefty sum; I’d be able to live out the rest of the year in comfort. If I wasn’t killed first, and therein lied the rub. I thumbprinted the document and it instantly deposited the cash into a savings account. Sweet.

“Can I go now?” I asked hoping he’d say yes.

“No.”

I tensed up. The way he said it chilled me.

Slowly, Turner stood up from his seat and walked over to me. “You’ll be leaving, but it won’t be alive.”

I took my chance.

I whirled around with as much speed as I could muster and bolted for the door. Two of his staff members grabbed me before I even made it a foot. I tried to scream. They covered my mouth, blocking any sound to signal for rescue.

Turner placed a finger on his mouth and smiled wickedly at me. “Are you going to be quiet?”

I nodded my head, knowing no one was outside anyway. Weatherby had made sure that we were to be undisturbed at all costs. That cost was
me
apparently. The man let his hand off my mouth.

“You must be able to tell that my staff here is
special
.” Turner mocked.

“You mean dead? Yeah, I noticed.” I could feel my eyes roll.

“You’ll be like them soon. It’s a quick ceremony, and then you’ll be under my control,” he said, very pleased with himself.

I hadn’t thought about this outcome. Of course. He could kill me and no one would know the difference because everyone would still think I was alive. Everyone except my friends, they’d know, but who cared at that point? How was I going to get out of this? A question I was asking myself a lot these days. Stall. Stalling is good, and then maybe I could think of something in the mean time.

“Do you control them?” I asked not expecting a real answer.

Turner laughed. “You sense my little barrier do you? Tell me, do you know
why
you can’t break through it?”

Oooooh, so condescending. I hated that I was related to this guy, but what was worse, I knew he knew more about my power than I did and that was just annoying.

“I know more than you think.” I said it with as much conviction as I could muster.

And to my surprise, Turner actually paused in doubt. “What do you know?”

Things started to click in my head and I decided to make a gamble. “Everything Jason Keroff knows. He’s been staying with me at Nancy’s.” I was fishing to see if he had Nancy’s house bugged.

And it paid off.

“That boyfriend of yours may have found a way to block our listening devices, but it won’t matter in about ten minutes.” Turner glared at me.

Ryan. Why didn’t he tell me he had blocked Turner’s signal? It didn’t make sense, but regardless of how the signal was blocked, the end result was Turner hadn’t heard anything that happened at Nancy’s. And that meant, he only had the Virtual Reality bar incident for his information on me. Didn’t know what that meant yet, but I knew it was important.

“Syringe,” Turner spat out. He was really going to do this.

The woman called Marion went to the briefcase and pulled out a syringe full of clear liquid.

“It’s a quick poison, you won’t feel any pain. Unfortunately.” His eyes were actually sparkling with that last statement.

Panic. This was a good time to panic.

She leaned in to inject me with the poison.

Struggling was out of the question I was so paralyzed with fear. I was going to die. I was seriously, unequivocally about to die.

The needle was about to touch my neck when…

…I acted on instinct like when I was seven with Bruce and the spider.

THWUMP!

It felt like a tearing of flesh as I ripped into the black holes of all five of the dead bodies. The invisible barrier that kept me out was obliterated. My whole body flushed with the power of it. I almost wanted to burst out laughing from the rush.

I made Marion pull back the needle.

Turner’s face fell in disbelief. “Marion! Inject the girl!”

I reached into the two men holding me and made them grab Turner instead.

Turner was too shocked to react properly. He looked at me with horror in his eyes. “Impossible!”

“Oh, it’s possible, Gramps.” I was gaining my footing and for the first time I knew I was going to get out of this round alive.

I made Marion point the needle at his neck. I had no intention of killing him, but I wanted to get out of this office unscathed.

“Stop! I order you to stop!” Turner was trying to order the corpses, but I had full control.

“You’re going to tell me a few things, or I’m going to have Marion, here, inject you with that poison. Remember, it works both ways. I can bring you back, too and I have no problems with the authorities finding your dead body later in your own bed,” I said as cold and calculated as I could. I was right, too. I could end this now. He’d never bother anyone else ever again. All I had to do was let Marion inject him. We could all walk out of there and no one would know the difference.

Except me. I’d know. I just couldn’t do it.

I wasn’t a killer.

Without warning, Turner’s eyes rolled back in his head and the whites turned a deep crimson. He spouted out words that I didn’t recognize and the air started to charge with electricity. That’s when I felt my grip on the corpses’ black holes start to wane. I had to think fast. I was going to lose control over the dead people very soon.

So, I did the only thing I could think to do.

I disconnected their spinning holes from their bodies, like I did with Bruce when I left him under the tree.

I leapt back from the corpses that dropped to the floor like rag dolls.

This jolted Turner back to reality, his eyes normal once more. He glared at me with an almost awestruck expression.

The five people deteriorated to different levels of grossness before our eyes. Marion was still juicy (that’s about the nicest way I could describe it). Two of the men quickly turned to skeletons and the last two were a grayish blue color and smelled really bad. And I mean
really bad
.

That was my cue to leave.

Before Turner could perform some crazy mojo on me.

“You explain it,” I said and left the room as fast as I could.

I waved at Principal Weatherby as I passed the teacher’s lounge and practically ran back to class. I didn’t look back once. I didn’t have to. I knew Turner had his own mess to clean up.

I hurried into Physics and sat down in a seat near the back. My teacher, Ms. Norbert, nodded to me in greeting, but continued with her lecture, not wanting to disturb her lesson plan. Sitting there without Ryan, Nancy or Bill was bordering on torture. I wanted to tell them everything that happened, but most of all I just wanted to be around people who cared about me. My meeting with Turner ran through my mind over and over again. It hadn’t sunk in yet how close to dying I had come.

About five minutes later the loud speaker came on. Principal Weatherby’s voice sounded shaky and disturbed. “The school is closing for the day… and maybe the week… I…I… please walk to the carpool or parking areas in an orderly fashion. Your parents will be informed when you can… come back… good day.”

Everyone gossiped immediately about the strangeness of Weatherby’s announcement and the nervous trill of his voice.

“Settle down, class,” Ms. Norbert said with firmness. “Now get in single file and do as Principal Weatherby says. Read chapters eight and nine in your readers while you have some time off.” Students made their way to the door. “I’ll be giving you a test on both chapters when you get back so no slacking!” She added with a note of authority and the class groaned in unison.

I made sure I was the last to leave. My heart was racing. I would have given anything to have been a fly on the wall when Weatherby walked into his pristine office and found five rotting corpses on the ground. Especially, since they were alive and kicking ten minutes before. I imagined Turner would be making a massive pay-off to Mr. Weatherby’s bank account; that, and I was sure a clean-up crew was on its way, hence the shooing of children.

When I reached the door I sighed in relief when I saw Bill and his twenty bodyguards waiting for me. The look on his face was a mixture of relief and worry. “Are you okay? What happened?” Bill went in for the hug and I hugged him back. It felt so reassuring and nice after everything I’d been through I almost wanted to cry.

“I’m okay.” my voice sounded muffled as I said this directly into his chest.

I pulled away and gave him a reassuring smile. “I only want to tell it once. Let’s get Ryan and Nancy and get out of here.”

Bill nodded and talked to one of the bodyguards. “We’re headed to the parking lot.”

We made it to the hover-car without a stitch. Ryan and Nancy were waiting for us both with the same look Bill gave me before. Apparently, they were just as worried about me as I was. And rightfully so, it turned out.

When Ryan saw me amidst the circle of guards he pushed through (or I should say he was
let
through, these guys were pretty impenetrable) and held me close. “We were so worried,” he whispered in my ear.

“Really, I’m alright. Let’s just get in the car,” I said back, but I didn’t want him to let me go. As soon as he pulled away from the hug, I grabbed his hand in mine. Aaaaahhhhh. Everything good now.