Grin (5 page)

Dennis stood up, dropping his book. Dani and Teddy turned their heads to the chaos in horror. Dani stepped to the bottom of the stairs, pulling her brother behind her. Dennis looked at his kids. "Get Teddy out of here."

A huge man stepped through the front door. He was dressed entirely in black, from his suit, to his balaclava and gloves. Even the shotgun in his hands was gleaming and charcoal coloured. He looked like a modernized version of Death, his scythe replaced by a pump action shotgun. His boots crunched on the shattered glass, signaling his arrival.

He turned to Teddy and Dani and lifted the gun.

Dennis ran over from the left and swung a fist. His punch smacked the intruder in the face. The giant move sideways, dropping the gun. Dennis, realising time was tight, turned to his children once more. "Get out! Go!
Take the car and run!
"

Dennis turned back to the man before him. He buckled as the man crashed a giant fist into his ribs, and head-butted him, shattering three teeth and slicing his tongue. His gum ripped, filling his mouth with warm blood. Dennis fell backwards, crimson spooling from his damaged mouth. He looked at Dani, pleading, gurgling. "Go…"

Dani pushed Teddy up the stairs, propelled by absolute fear. "Teddy, go. My room, now."

"What about the car?"

"Not now,
go
!"

"Upstairs is stupid; I've seen enough movies to know that!"

She realised it
was
a stupid move, but she needed to get the key and she wasn’t about to leave her brother alone. Between a rock and a black-clad psychopath. "
Just fucking go
."

Teddy sprinted up the stairs, stumbling on the top stair as it appeared too quickly for his small feet. He rounded the hallway and ran above Dani's head. Dani followed slowly, keeping an eye on her father. He was fighting off the intruder. Torn between saving her father and her brother, Dani groaned and climbed the stairs.

Teddy was standing in his doorway. "Dani, quick, in here." Dani ran towards him, her eyes wide. She motioned to her brother. "We should go to my room; we can climb out of the window. It's next to the garage."

Teddy looked past her, watching the stairs with serious concern. "Or, we can hide in my den. He'll never find us in there."

Dani stopped, saying nothing. After a second, she realised it was a brilliant idea. She needed to do one thing first. She held up a finger, indicating for her brother to wait a second, and ran into her room. With a shuffle of the wrist, she unlatched her window and pushed it wide open, into the cool, evening air. She knocked a few books to the floor, making it look like they'd escaped through the window. She hurried back to the hallway and watched the stairs.

A gunshot rang out, crippling her confidence. It was followed by a loud thump as something heavy hit the wooden floor.

Dad?

Then, the footsteps came. Loud, methodical.

Not her fathers, he was barefoot. These were leather boots, heavy and solid.

Edging towards the stairs.

Shit.

Using every inch of will power, and ignoring the warm tears streaming down her face, Dani ambled to Teddy's room and shoved him through the door. She closed it, holding the handle down to make sure it did so silently, and turned to her brother. He was already rifling through his wardrobe, clearing aside a skateboard and some clothes. Within seconds he slid a panel sideways, Dani watched it disappear behind his hanging shirts and trousers.

The entrance was half a door's height, a practical cubbyhole. Teddy ducked down and entered, sliding into the crevice with expertise. Dani walked quickly to it, dropped to her knees and closed the wardrobe behind her. She then crawled into the space and slid the panel shut.

The space was the size of a small, slim room, tucked between two walls – between their bedrooms. For a small boy, it was huge. Darkness enveloped everything, but she could make out posters, toys and some comics strewn to the side. An unused torch sat beside them, propped on a pile of batteries. Dani noticed the opposite side of the wall and realised her wardrobe was beyond it. She shuffled closer, putting her ear to the surface, listening for the intruder.

She heard nothing.

She leaned back against the wooden beams and wiped her face. Instinctively, she reached for her brother's hand and held it tight. It was cold and clammy, shaking.  She could feel his small frame trembling next to her. She pulled him in close, warming him with a sisterly hug. Slowly, her shirt started to dampen under his tears. They were streaming down his face. He didn’t say a word.

For a long moment, they sat in silence.

Then they heard the footsteps.

They were nothing more than muted thuds on carpet. They came from Dani's room. She envisioned the huge man stalking across her bedroom, seeing the window, thinking they'd escaped, and leaving. She wanted the ordeal to end. For a moment, a long, hope tinged moment; she thought he'd done just that.

When her wardrobe doors flung open, smashing against the drawers on the other side of the wall with a loud wooden clunk, she flinched. Teddy held her tighter. She placed a hand over his mouth tightly, keeping him quiet. The clattering of coat hangers smashing against one another, and soft, muted clumps as clothing hit the bottom of the wardrobe, was all they could hear. Dani wanted to close her eyes but found her brain wouldn’t let her. She expected the panel by her side to slide by any second. To see the balaclava face poke through and smile, before a meaty hand reached in and grabbed them.

It didn’t.

It wouldn’t happen. Her shoe rack was right in front of the panel, nestled at the back of her wardrobe. Besides, from her side of the hidden alcove, it didn’t open anyway. Dad had wallpapered over it.

Dad
. A feeling of huge loss nearly overwhelmed her.

Dani realised she was holding her breath. Turning her head to Teddy, she gazed at her brother. She could see the top of his head; it was shaking, trembling with absolute fear. His brown, tousled hair flinched with every movement. She felt terrible. After a moment, Dani focused on the sounds again. She realised they'd stopped.

Was he standing on the other side? Listening?

Dani felt a squirming, harrowing dread in the pit of her stomach. She crossed her legs, hoping she wouldn’t pee in front of her brother.

Then the footsteps left. They grew fainter as he walked away.

Dani finally breathed out. The air whistled through her nostrils and she realised they were clogged with snot. She wiped her face but didn’t dare sniff. Any slight sound right now would be lethal.

She waited five minutes, checking her watch constantly. Her brother didn’t change position or stop trembling. The tears had subdued though.

It was now or never.

She moved Teddy away from her chest. "Teddy," she whispered.

Her brother glanced up at her, his eyes ringed with red raw skin, puffy from rivulets of horror-induced tears. He nodded, not saying anything.

"We need to make a run for it, okay?"

Teddy shook his head and instantly hugged back into her chest again. Dani patted him on the back and allowed it to happen for a moment. She pulled him away again. "I need you to be brave, okay?"

Teddy shook his head, his bottom lip quivering. He sniffed silently, his face screwed in an expression of absolute loss and terror. Dani felt her guts lurch.
What am I doing? He just saw his mother murdered. We should stay here; he's in no shape to move.

He'll find us.

He hasn't so far.

It's only a matter of time.

We can't stay here. We need to go.

Where are the police?

Dani knew she had no choice. If they stayed here, they wouldn’t last the night. The police would come, maybe, after the gunshots. It could take them all night though.

They needed to get out now.

She counted to three in her head. She pulled Teddy away. "Right, we need to go out through your room, down the hall and into my room, okay? We can climb out onto the roof and get into the garage. I can grab my mobile phone too and we can call the police. Then, we'll be safe, okay?"

"What about Mom and Dad?"

The question slammed her in the ribs, knocking the breath out of her. She felt a warm sensation of nausea crawling through her blood. She gulped, realising she couldn’t chicken out now. Their lives depended on it. Vomiting wouldn’t help anyone in this confined space and it would alert the intruder.

Wherever he was.

"We'll help Mom and Dad when we're out. We need to get away from the killer first, okay?" Dani felt like she was deserting her parents. She wondered what Dad would do in this situation. If they were…dead…going back for them would get her and her brother killed. It was a harsh decision, but a sensible one.

Teddy nodded. He wiped his face with his sleeve.

"On three. One, two…" Dani gulped. "Three."

Teddy slid the panel aside and silently crawled into the wardrobe. Dani followed him. Her brother stood up and cautiously opened the wardrobe door. After a second, he pushed the door wide. He turned back to Dani and smiled.

"The coast is clea…"

Teddy's head exploded, showering Dani with brains and skull and blood.

Dani screamed.

Bradley had taken it upon himself to carry out Rhodes' demand. After the fuck up that Dennis made, he didn’t want his boss disappointed again. No repeats and no failures. Rhodes was much easier to work for when he got what he wanted.

Bradley aimed to give him that.

He lowered the shotgun and watched the dead boy topple back into the wardrobe. A grin spread over his lips. He felt the balaclava tickle his facial muscles as he did so. He rolled his tongue over his teeth, dislodging one that Dennis had loosened with his fist. Blood started seeping into his mouth and Bradley rolled the tooth around his bloody tongue before swallowing it, without flinching.

He stood and waited.

He knew the kids were in the partition between the wardrobes. Rhodes had provided a blueprint of the house, as expected. His boss could get anything at a moment's notice and it helped him to be prepared. The girl would listen to her younger brother because, as circumstances dictated, she'd needed to keep him safe. No kid was going to ignore a hideaway hole that no one knew about…well, almost no one. 

He instantly knew this is where the kids would head.

They'd ignored their father's instruction – as most kids normally do, it must be in their genes or something – before he'd put a bullet between Dennis's eyes. He had fight in him, he'd not expected that. I suppose anyone would if their kids were threatened and their wife was dead inches from them. He'd kicked the body over after shooting him. Taking one last look around the room, he'd ambled upstairs. 

The look of Dennis' life ebbing away had made Bradley hard. He got a thrill out of killing people. Carla was a treat. For a split second, he'd been able to ogle her fantastic tits in her tight jumper, those curvy legs swathed in denim. He imagined burying his mouth between her shapely legs, sniffing and lapping at her sex, and bringing her to a violent orgasm. Except, instead of ejaculate, it would be blood seeping from between her legs as he tore her clitoris from her body, chewed it like a sliver of beef and swallowed. He'd then fuck the bloody hole until he released inside of her.

Instead, he shot her. He'd never seen a woman fly so far.

When he saw the daughter, things got interesting.

He couldn’t have her, he knew that, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t take the body with him. For a few days, the body would be fun. He could spend some quality time with her before it decomposed. Hell, maybe he could take Carla too and have a naughty threesome.

Bradley groaned as his penis throbbed in his pants.

You have a job to do…

The image of a mutilated Carla had allowed him to stride into the household, full of confidence and with a raging boner.

A boner that promised to remain for an hour at least.

He snapped back to the mission. The girl, buried somewhere in the closet, screamed.

"I know you're there," Bradley hissed. Silence greeted him. His voice was raspy; his lungs were pumping air and shortening his breath. "You can't escape."

Still no sound. He imagined the girl hiding behind the closed door, staring at her dead brother, maybe going insane. He imagined her eyes wide, her lips trembling.
Do nipples get hard when you're scared? 

I've never had my dick sucked by an insane girl before…especially not a prize like her.

Bradley closed his eyes and cursed silently.
You have a job to do.

A
snick snack
shattered the silence as he reloaded the shotgun.

Let's finish this.

New. Unfamiliar. She'd never felt it before.

As she stared at her dead brother's corpse, his eviscerated skull nothing but a bloody stump on the top of his neck, she felt her body stiffening, her brain shutting down. No, not shutting down, adapting, and shutting
out
the horror before her.

Protecting her.

The inside of the wardrobe was illuminated by Teddy's nightlight, its sole purpose to circle on the spot beside his bed, filling the room with comforting light, to keep the monster in the wardrobe away. 

Except today, a sickening role-reversal was occurring; the monster was on the outside of the wardrobe and the innocent inside.

It wasn't comforting in the slightest.

Dani watched her brother's sticky cerebral tissue slowly slide down the wardrobe's interior wall, propelled by splattered blood and shattered bone fragments. Occasionally, a star or a circle, cast in light, would dance over the massacre innocently, as if nothing had happened. A chunk of brain slipped to the ground, colliding with one of the skateboard wheels, spinning it with a low creak.

Dani's eyes flicked around the small, dark space and she realised the feeling of terror was subsiding and being replaced by something else, something…new.

She glanced down and saw her brother's blood, spattered all over her shirt and jeans. Her hands moved automatically to it and pulled away dark, glistening red, trembling. Her warm, wet eyes closed for a moment, urging herself not to lose it.

"I know you're in there."

The hissing voice, muffled by fabric and laboured breathing, was confronting her. It was the first time she'd heard him speak. Dani opened her eyes and realised she had little choice here, trapped in a wardrobe, between an impassable wall and a man with a shotgun. She swallowed, her dry, scratchy throat making it significantly more difficult. Dani ran ideas through her head and everything came back to one answer.

Surrender.

She couldn’t give up; the intruder massacred her family, right before her eyes.
I'm a dead woman if I give up.

"You can't escape."

And there it was. The truth.

Dani knew this was game over. There was no other choice. She closed her eyes and let the tears roll. She slumped to the ground, landing on Teddy's soft toys – the ones he denied having because he was a 'big boy now' – and resigned.

Guilt wracked her body, making her shake. The tears rolled off her face, dripping onto her blood-soaked shirt, trickling down her chin and onto her neck, making it damp. She felt like she was deserting her family.

The footsteps approached, slowly, muffled on the blue carpet that Teddy had chosen himself. Any second now, the man would aim the shotgun at her face and end her life. Dani didn’t move, didn’t change position, and didn’t look up.

She awaited her fate.

You'll be seeing Teddy, Mom and Dad very soon.

A giant hand reached into the wardrobe and grasped Dani by the hair. She screamed, kicking and thrashing as she did so, before the intruder yanked her into the room. Her feet dragged through the gory remains of her brother, soaking her socks with blood and cerebral tissue. Within seconds, she found herself thrown to the carpet. Her elbows skidded on the rough surface, chafing the soft skin. During the fall, she bit her lip, drawing blood. She composed herself and turned her back to the window, facing her attacker. Her sore eyes looked up at the black behemoth before her. Her lip throbbed.

"Finally, we meet. Hello, Danielle."

Dani wiped her face with her sleeve. She spat blood onto the carpet. "Fuck you."

"Now, now. That’s no way to greet the guest of the house. Your mother would be ashamed of you if she heard that. Not that she can."

Dani licked the crimson from her lips. "Don’t you talk about my…"

The behemoth lunged forward and kicked Dani in the face. Her head snapped back, pain surged to her brain and she groaned, collapsing face first to the carpet. Agony coursed through her tiny body. "I'll talk about anything I want to, young lady. You can't stop me."

Dani pushed herself onto her blood-soaked hands and crawled away, her head pounding with vehement torment. Holding her weight, her arms wobbled, threatening to collapse at any second. She kept one blurry eye on her attacker. He stepped sideways, following his foe.

"Now, let's talk about you."

Dani said nothing. Her eyes didn’t leave the intruder.

"When I came home tonight…I saw your mother. My, what a piece. In a different life, in a different profession, I could have had the time of my life with your mother. Your father wouldn’t have stopped me; hell, I would have made him watch as I made her squeal. Things changed though, when I saw you."

Dani clenched with fear, a swelling emerged in her stomach. She remembered a chat with her mother once. What did she say?
Men are only after one thing. Consent is everything. If you're not ready, don’t feel forced into it.

Her mind flashed back to Ben. Ben kissing Chantelle.

Was that the reason? She wanted to wait and he couldn’t
–
wouldn’t?

You're thinking about this now?

Dani snapped back to reality. She positioned herself on her knees, ready to fight should the behemoth lay a hand on her.

"Things changed. I took one look at you…that fine arse, those shoulders; your skin colour is divine. Even your tits have come in nicely, which is no surprise having seen your mother. And, as much as I would take my sweet time, scour every inch of your body with my tongue and probe every wet crevice gently, then roughly, I can't do that. You're only seventeen. I may be a monster, I admit that, but I have my limits. We built our organisation on respect, loyalty and integrity. If it had been a few years later, when you were twenty, then I would wreck you. But, alas, that isn't to be." The attacker lowered his shotgun and placed it against the wall.

Dani climbed to her feet. Her eyes flicked to the door, her escape. Dani wondered if she could run to the car and get out before this hulking slab of muscle caught her. Her hand patted her thigh, feeling the car key there, her salvation.

She was confident she could do it.

She didn’t have a chance.

The behemoth ducked and thrust a hand up towards her throat. Dani's lithe body elevated from the carpet, propelled through the air, and crashed against the wall. Her rump came to a rest on top of a chest of drawers, which now sat below her. She choked, slapping at the hand that was pinning her to the wall by her throat, killing her. The grip loosened, and Dani could breathe again. Her eyes stared at the attacker, his eyes hidden behind an unnecessary pair of sunglasses. For the first time, she realised every inch of him was covered in black. His head cocked to the side, as if observing her. Like prey. 

Smart
, she thought.
No DNA traces
.

Her heart sunk, realising no one would solve the murders.

She had to stay alive.

"Danielle, you're way too young for me. However, I feel I'm missing something glorious here. I don’t see many women of your calibre in my job, well, women with dignity. I see whores and hookers every day. I mean, who would stick their cock in one of those? Why do that when you can have a glorious, tight virgin, like yourself?"

Dani said nothing. She simply stared at the man. His grip was relentless, holding her effortlessly against the wall. Her hands gripped his solid forearm, more for support than survival. One thought ran through her head.

This man killed your family
.

Dani coughed, clearing her throat. "What's your name?"

"My name is of no importance to you."

"Really? You killed my mother, you slaughtered my father and, worst of all, you blew my little brother's head off. An innocent kid, a kid who never did anyone any harm. I think I earned the fucking right to know your name."

"You father disrespected the code. For that, he had to pay the ultimate price. He knew the consequences."

"What's your fucking
name
?" Dani hissed.

"My name…why? Why is it important? You'll be dead in a minute anyway."

"I want to know who I'm coming for, when I get out of here."

"Really? You'll
come
for me. What makes you think I'll let you live?"

"You would have killed me by now if you were going to. No loose ends means just that. A proper assassin wouldn’t stop to converse with a girl just because he gets a fucking boner over the shape of her arse. You're a fucking amateur."

"I'm not an amateur –"

"– you're an amateur. You blew this, pal. You're going down whichever way you look at it. You think with your dick, like most men do, and it's unravelling for you. You don’t know it yet…but it is," Dani said, smugly. Her pink, blood-spattered teeth stretched into a smile. Blood glistened on her chin.

Bradley felt sweat tingling his forehead. He knew she couldn’t identify him. The hiss in his voice was fake; his clothes covered every inch of his body. He stared at the girl before him. The innocent, yet beautiful, bookworm whose entire body weight rested in just one of his hands, with little to no effort. He had to kill her. Unless…

"A smile, huh? Okay, Danielle. What makes you think you can come and find me?"

"I have my ways."

"Really?"

Dani nodded, licking her lips. Bradley felt the bulge in his trousers once more. He ached to release himself, release inside of her. His eyes, unnoticed behind the shades, eyed her body up and down. She sat on the chest of drawers, her legs spread, enticing him, her chest seemed prominent from this angle. Her arms, bulging with sinew, were clenching his arm, trying to escape. Her slaps only heightened his pleasure. Bradley groaned inwardly, closing his eyes for a split second.

Dani moved, struggling, sensing his weakness. Bradley realised.
This bitch is smart. Had she spread her legs on purpose?

Bradley punched Dani in the ribs, winding her. She gasped and went limp beneath his grip. "I'm intrigued, Danielle. Most women, older, wiser and more experienced, have buckled beneath my demands. Many never lived beyond my visit. You, you
intrigue
me. You want to come and find me, fine. I'm all for sportsmanship. Let's make this interesting."

Dani opened her eyes. The fight ebbed away. "Fuck you," she gasped weakly.

Bradley reached into his pocket and brought out a set of steel kitchen scissors. The gleam of the nightlight caught the wicked, serrated blades. The dark black handles looked sturdy, dangerous.

Dani's eyes widened and she thrashed, once again trying to escape. Bradley smiled beneath his balaclava; he felt the material lift on his sweaty stubble. "I'm all for you coming to find me. Thing is, I have a short term memory for faces," he lied. "So, let me give you something…something that will identify you to me the second you step over my threshold."

Bradley slipped his gloved fingers into the holes on the scissors and worked them open. The blades separated like a pair of steel jaws, the serrated edges glinting in the low light. Dani's eyes widened and she instantly lowered her hands to her stomach and groin, fearing the worst. Bradley chuckled. His hand snapped the blades shut several times, working the mechanism, inciting fear in the young girl. Metallic snaps filled the room.

Dani bucked and thrashed, kicking out at the man who was inches beyond her range. Her legs flailed pointlessly in the air, hitting nothing. Her heels slammed against the chest of drawers, catching the handles, drawing blood beneath her socks. Dani's hands spread over her stomach. She crossed her legs.

Dani gazed at the man, defeated in her struggle, and smiled weakly, no longer scared, wondering if antagonizing this man was sensible. In her eyes, she had lost. Giving up hadn't worked. The next step was death. If she could get him to make a mistake… "Fuck you. Do your worst."

Bradley chuckled again. "I'm so glad you said that. However, my worst is yet to come." The behemoth lifted the scissors, separated the blades, and positioned the crease of Dani's lip between the serrated metal. One, cold blade sat on her tear-stained cheek, the other tickled the inside of the same cheek. Dani tried looking down and found her vision impaired by the darkness and her tears. She could only see the handles of the scissors.

She could feel a lot more though.

Her tongue tasted the cold, metallic intruder in her mouth. Tears welled in her eyes and trickled down her face. Bradley leaned in close. "Are you familiar with a Chelsea grin?"

Dani wanted to shake her head, but fear froze her. Movement could do serious damage. Her eyes spoke volumes and Bradley chuckled again. "You want to come and find me; this will make sure you do. No one forgets a Chelsea grin. It gives you a scar that resembles a permanent smile. Ironic, considering the circumstances. You like smiling at me? After tonight, that's all you'll ever fucking do." 

Her eyes glanced down at the weapon, then up again, falling on the intruder once more. He cocked his head. "My name is Bradley. Remember that when you come and find me."