“Angie, I’ll shoot if I have to.” He snorted back the drips from his nose and shook his head to get the tears out of his way. His fingers fumbled the last of the bullets into the .44.
Brian looked through burning eyes and studied his wife where she hung suspended above the bedroom window.
He didn’t know if he could pull the trigger. After all the arguments and the disappointments, all the times she’d said she had a fucking headache and all the times he’d cheated on her, he still wasn’t sure. He loved her. He did. He just couldn’t always show it the way she wanted him to.
He took aim at her shadowy form. “Go away, Angie, I mean it. I’m sorry if I hurt you, baby, but you have to go away now.”
“I know you’re sorry, baby . . .” That sultry, pouting tone was still there.
“Please go away.” He was crying again and his hands were trying to shake.
“But Brian . . . this time it’s not enough. This time ‘sorry’ won’t cut it.”
Her hands pushed and the glass from the window exploded into the bedroom, raining down in jagged blades. Brian pulled the trigger six times, his wrists bucking from the recoil. Thunder ripped apart the night and blasts of fire lit the room in lightning flashes.
He saw the first bullet hit, saw the way her head slammed backward as the lead punched through her skull.
The second shot ripped through her collarbone and blew out a chunk of her back.
The third hit her right breast.
The fourth shattered two ribs on its way through her body.
Then she was falling, and the fifth struck the swell of her stomach where their unborn child rested.
The sixth bullet missed her completely.
She fell out of his sight and he heard her hit the boards of the wraparound porch.
“Oh fuck, Angie, baby, why did you make me do it?”
He got up and moved toward the ruined window, trying to swallow his heart and to get back his hearing. The gun trembled wildly in his hands and he moved as quickly as he could, weapon held at the ready. It was empty, but that didn’t register.
He had to climb onto the bed and move to the headboard to look out the window.
Angie stood up and looked at him from inches away. Shadows blurred her face, but he recognized her just the same. He would know her face anywhere, even with the hole that was dripping blackness all over her white features.
Angie smiled, her faintly blue lips peeled away from her teeth, baring them in a leering, savage expression. “Sorry’s not enough, Brian. Never again.”
Her hand lunged through the window and slapped him across the cheek. The impact made him see stars and knocked him completely off the bed.
He felt numb and dazed, and it took him almost a minute to recover.
When he was able to move again, Angie was gone. He would have believed it was a nightmare, but the window was still broken and his cheek was bleeding from where she’d struck him.
Brian Freemont sat on the floor of his bedroom and looked at the darkness beyond his window. There was nothing to see but darkness. He rocked back and forth, moaning deep in his chest.
II
Ben had no idea where he was going, only that it was imperative that he get there. He ran a good portion of the way, homing in on the need that filled his body.
Maggie needed him. Nothing else mattered. When he could no longer reach his destination walking, he backtracked to the apartments and got into his car, the agitation blooming in his stomach, filling him with nervous energy.
“Maggie . . . Maggie . . . where the hell are you?” The radio was too loud so he shut it off, making himself listen for the sound of her voice. Instead he heard the crows, wild and raucous as they flew into the night air, hundreds of them cawing and cackling into the night.
They flew around his car, soaring in graceful arcs, gliding on currents and peering through his window, yet not one of them blocked his path. It took a while for him to understand, but they were guiding him, their mass of bodies shifting and focusing his direction with subtle shifts in the tunnel they formed around him.
He’d be afraid later. Right now, if the birds wanted to help him get where he needed to be, he would let them. He saw several people staring at the black cloud of birds around him. Many simply looked on, slack-jawed. Others backed away, shaking their heads.
Ben ignored them and so did the crows. For whatever reason, they were all on the same mission.
“I’m coming, Maggie. Just don’t get yourself killed in the meantime.”
III
Tom was getting bored now. Lenny broke too easily and cried like a fucking baby in need of a diaper change. Seeing as he’d shit himself almost fifteen minutes ago, that was fair.
“Lenny, where’s my money?”
“Honest to God, Tom. I don’t know.” He was still capable of using his voice, so Tom knew he hadn’t gone too far.
His little girl, Renee, was in the next room. She was watching TV, because Tom didn’t want her screaming all the way through the torture session with her father.
“Shame if I have to do something to Renee, Lenny. She’s a pretty girl.” He shook his head and frowned for the bloodied man in front of him. “I’d hate to have to change that.”
What was that? A little glimmer of anger in Lenny’s eyes. Was there still a spark somewhere in there that wanted to fight? He hoped so. “Don’t you touch her, Tom. I told you everything I know.”
“How can I be sure of that, Lenny? I mean, where were you all day that I couldn’t get a hold of you?”
“I told you, Maureen needed tests. There’s something wrong with her heart.”
“She’s too young to have heart troubles, Lenny. Come up with a better excuse.”
“She’s got congenital heart disease! Let me go home and I’ll bring you the motherfucking papers!”
“You’re not going anywhere until I get back my money!”
“I don’t have the money, Tom! How many times do you want me to say it!”
“Lenny, the walls are soundproofed, but let’s not test that, okay?”
“You can’t hurt my little girl, Tom. I’ll find the money for you. I’ll fucking steal it myself, but you can’t hurt my little girl.” He was starting to cry again. Pathetic.
“Lenny, I’m a good sport. I’ll give you until midnight to find my money. You have it for me by then, Renee gets to have a nice, safe sleepover. You don’t . . . do the math.”
Lenny looked almost ready to kill him. The restraints might have slowed him down.
“It’s your choice, man. I want my money back. There are only a few people who know the right information to steal it. I already checked with the other one.” He smiled and shrugged his shoulders. “He didn’t have a daughter, but his girlfriend was nice and tight.”
Tom moved over closer, until he could look into Lenny’s swollen eyes. “I’m gonna let you go now, Lenny. Don’t be stupid. Just get it done and we can go back to being friends.”
The man groaned when his wrists were unbound. His fingers looked like purple sausages. He’d have to be careful about that the next time. He could have ruined Lenny’s typing skills; live and learn.
Someone started pounding on the front door. Tom scowled and looked at his newly freed victim. “You stay here, Lenny. Don’t want you getting jumpy while I’m busy.”
The stairs up to the ground-level floor were nicely padded, and he moved up them quickly. He didn’t carry a weapon on him, but he had easy access, so he wasn’t overly worried.
He should have been. By the time he reached the short hallway to the door, it was obvious that somebody was extremely unhappy with the current situation.
“Hold on to your ass! I’m coming!”
The front door came apart before his eyes and large pieces of the wood and beveled glass ripped through the air on a path for him.
Tom dropped to the ground and covered his head; only one piece of wood actually hit him, but it drew a red line of fire across his upper back. “Fuck!”
He scrambled, reaching for his stashed weapon. All he had to do was get into the vent next to the living room entrance and that was easy enough to do. He’d had the vent designed to lift up with ease.
His hand caught the lower edge of the vent cover. Maggie’s bloodied hand caught his wrist.
He looked up and saw the shape she was in: Maggie was covered from head to toe in drying blood that flaked away from her skin. She looked like she’d been dipped in the stuff and then hit with a hair dryer until her clothes were merely damp. Her hair was still pulled back in a ponytail, still had its usual thick curls, but it was rusty brown from the bath she’d taken. Her face, always enchanting, always so hot in that girl-next-door way, was twisted into a look of undiluted hatred. Her dark eyes glared down into his. Her nostrils flared and her full, welcoming mouth showed him nothing but bared teeth.
“Maggie? What the hell?”
Maggie yanked on his arm and lifted him into a standing position. Several tendons in his shoulder let out screams of protest that matched flawlessly with his yelp of pain. When the hell did Maggie start working out?
“Look what you did to my fucking door!” He was a little nervous, but only a little. He could handle a bitch hopped up on too much coke. He had several times in the past. “That’s coming out of your take, Maggie.”
“Shut your face, Monkey Boy.” She had a smile starting. It was dark and dangerous and mischievous and sexy as all hell. He was going to enjoy breaking her, but he’d make her take a shower first. He preferred his blood fresh.
“What did you say?” Now she was calling him names? Definitely time to put her in her place. He figured a good railroad by twenty men would have taken care of that, but she was still ready for more.
Tom was always glad to oblige. He brought his knee up and nailed her on the crotch. He’d learned a long time ago that hitting a girl there hurt her almost as much as it hurt a guy.
She winced in pain and let go of his wrist. He used his other hand to grab a thick wedge of her ponytail, fully intending to bust her pretty face all over his wall. He pushed hard and succeeded in shoving himself back when she didn’t budge. She’d no more moved than if he’d been pushing against his own house.
“Asshole.” She hit him. Not a little girly slap, either. She hauled her arm around and clocked him across the face hard enough to leave him seeing constellations.
“Bitch, that’s the last mistake you’re ever going to make.” Tom stood back up and pumped his arm at her face. Screw her looks, she was about to become damaged goods.
She took the blow to the chin and didn’t even blink. “I told you we were finished, Monkey Boy. I meant it.” Her hand blurred and she caught his nose between her thumb and forefinger. “Did I ever tell you how ugly you are?” She yanked back hard, and Tom let loose a shriek as the cartilage in his nose separated.
He backed into the wall, his eyes tearing furiously, and felt the blood flow from his broken proboscis.
Maggie looked at her handiwork and frowned. “I was kind of hoping it would come completely off. Let me try again.”
Tom ran. He forgot all about the gun in its hiding spot and all about the man he’d been torturing and the little girl he’d planned to rape half to death. He ran.
Maggie let him. She stood perfectly still and followed him with her eyes, a little half smile on her face. He knew the look: it was the one she got when she’d heard a joke that was only a little funny. He didn’t like to think that he was the joke, but right now he had bigger matters to deal with, like staying alive.
Tom’s Camaro was right where it should be and he fished into his jeans for the car keys, trying not to freak out about how much of his blood was coating his fingers.
Maggie followed, pausing long enough to pick up her pepper spray, which remained where she had dropped it earlier. He cursed himself for not picking the damned thing up himself; he could have used it about now.
He almost dropped the car keys while he was fumbling for the right one, but managed to keep them. He opened the door and climbed in at a record-breaking pace.
He closed the door just as Maggie was reaching for him and felt an unsettling jolt of relief.
Then she punched through the tempered glass. Her little hand—and she was practically delicate along those lines— shot through the glass and grabbed at the back of his long hair.
“Maggie! Jesus, girl, stop!”
“Not done quitting yet, Tom.”
She slammed his head into the windshield and shattered the safety glass. Maggie let go of his hair and reached around with her other hand. He was still groaning and stunned when she yanked him across the steering wheel and pulled him across the hood of the car. The glass shattered into tiny diamond shapes, and he got a few scrapes, but nothing compared to what she had already done.
Maggie let him hit the ground in front of his car and looked down at him. “Come on, Tom. I was expecting you to put up a fight.”
He started crawling, and she let him. She just walked a few paces behind him and let him do his thing. Crawling was the best he could manage for a while. After about fifty feet of slipping around on the damp asphalt and then the wet front lawn of his place, Tom stood up. It hurt like hell, but he did it.
“That’s my Monkey Boy. I knew you could do it.”
“Maggie, please . . . uh . . . unhhunnhhh . . . stop. Please . . .” Christ, he was crying! He couldn’t stop himself. He was begging and it was humiliating.
“I bet that’s what Liz was trying to say to the boys gang-raping her.” She still looked plenty pissed off, but her voice was calmer. He had hoped that he could talk his way out of this, or maybe get a weapon of some kind; it was a small hope, true, but it was still there.
“Hey, that wasn’t supposed to happen. I told them they had to play nice.”
Maggie nodded and then slammed her right heel into the side of his knee. Muscles pulped under the impact; bones splintered and his leg bent in ways no human limb was ever designed to.