“wouldn’t want you dying on me now would I.” He smirks.
He’s sitting in a plush black chair by the window. “Isn’t that the plan? To kill me?”
“No.” He looks offended, and I watch as his eyebrows knit together.
“You don’t want to kill me?” He shakes his head. “Then what do you want?”
He gets up and walks towards the bed. I’m regretting the questions I’ve asked him because now he’s probably going to use my body as his personal toy. But he shocks me. He sits next to me and strokes my hair away from my face.
“I want to keep you.” He whispers.
“For how long.” I strangle a whisper back.
Then he says something that makes my heart stop. My pulse races and I’m not sure if it’s from fear or excitement.
“Forever.”
14
DOVE
The door is ajar when I arrive home. My mother always took pride in keeping the white door pristine. She had a thing about cleanliness, but there are muddy prints all over it.
That isn’t the only thing that I notice that is wrong, it’s the deathly silence. The house was never silent. She hated silence; she said if it was silent she was sure to go insane, so she always had some noise in the background whether it be the radio or some show playing on the television but this was deathly silent that I was sure you’d hear a pin drop.
Swinging open the door, fear shoots through my body. I know something is wrong. I can feel it. The tapping of my footsteps on the ground makes me shudder. It shouldn’t be this quiet.
Opening the door to the living room, the scent of copper and dread fills my body. The door squeaks as it pulls open. Blood pools on the ground. It’s thick and red. It reminds of something out of a horror movie.
There’s nowhere to walk that I wouldn’t step in the pooling crimson blood that is laced across the floor, I look at walls becausethe scent and sight of blood is turning my stomach but that’s no better, blood is smeared across the usually light patterned walls.
I half expect to see my father in the corner reading the morning paper and sipping on a black coffee and my mother playing whatever classical music gets her creative flare going as she paints her next masterpiece at her easel but all I can see is blood, it’s everywhere. A mist of red clouds my thoughts.
I dare not walk any further into the room that no longer looked like the happy home I remembered.
Then I see a bundle of what would be body parts stationed on my mothers floral rug, I’d think that it was fake, it didn’t seem real but I spot her shawl that she always wore around her neck in a mass of the blood and bones.
The pain shoots straight to my now breaking heart but I don’t even have chance to mourn them, heavy footsteps come closer, I look up at the six foot shadowy figure in front of me, dressed in black with eyes as black as night staring back at me and that’s when it finally happens.
I crumble, a sharp piercing scream rips from my throat full of pain and agony.
The memories hauntme even in my dreams. I can’t escape them. They follow me around like a dark passenger that won’t let me be free.
I wake shaking, with tears falling down my face. The nightmare feels like I’m reliving the last moment I saw my parents, and it breaks my heart all over again.
I feel warm arms wrapped around my body. I don’t even try to fight him; I need this. It’s comforting, so I just laythere in his embrace, waiting for the shock of the memories to disappear back into the darkest corners of my mind until they decide to resurface again.
“What gives you such terrible dreams, little bird?” He whispers in my hair.
“Bentley James.” I regret the words as soon as they leave my lips, but I can’t take them back. I’ve finally said his name out loud, and it’s like poison on my tongue.
He strokes my hair and turns my body towards his, offering comfort. I almost forget that he’s holding me against my will as he soothes the last drops of my nightmare out of my body.
“Feeling better, little bird?” It’s almost like he cares, but I know better. I’m just a toy he likes to play with.
I sniffle and nod my head in response. I’m scared if I try to speak that my voice will break and I will once again be a blubbering mess.
“Do you want to talk about it?” I shake my head because I didn’t want to talk about it. What was there to say that my parents just drew the short straw that day when the madman that got his kicks from torturing and murdering people chose our house.
