Serial (3 page)

I’d pulled the bag out, carefully dragged her several feet into the thick underbrush and had yanked the plastic off. She’d flopped out, the tarp loosened and I’d unrolled it, letting her body land with a thud down a short embankment.

I’d cursed my DNA inside of her, once again cringed at the thought of being caught, but delighted at the thought of leaving her there. She’d been naked and I had kept her ID back at my place. I’d known that the elements and animals would make quick work of her provided some nosy hiker didn’t come across her remains.

I had been across state lines though, so the word might not make it back to Oregon if she was found.

Besides, there had been no way to link me to her that night. The after hours party we’d left had been full of people higher than myself, and not a damn one of them would be able to say with certainty that I’d left with somebody that night.

I had been just nuts enough, even back then, to assume I’d never get caught. Arrogance perhaps, insanity maybe, but definitely a little bit insane.

I shook the newspaper and spread it out, pouring over the day’s business numbers and let the memory of my first kill drift away.

I couldn’t think about it too much in a place such as this, it excited me to the point of being incapable of anything useful.

I flipped my laptop open and logged into my investment account. If anyone came in, they would have found me in deep concentration on some important task. It was a strategy; I had to fake interest long enough for my throbbing cock to calm down, long enough for me to attend my first board meeting of the day.

***

“Would you like me to take you straight home, Sir?” my driver asked as I settled into the back of the company car. It was long, sleek, black and classic. Unfortunately it would also stand out too much in the neighborhood I wanted to cruise tonight.

I was just looking. Window-shopping if you will. I hadn’t killed a woman for almost three months and I could feel the urge building up in the back of my brain. Work had been a bust, it was a good thing I was the boss or I would have been fired every damn time I started to cycle. I get so distracted I barely remember my own name.

I can’t help it, I truly can’t. I’ve researched addiction, Googled the fuck out of everything from, “How do I stop killing” to “Frontal lobotomy results sociopathy” when the going gets tough.

It wasn’t a morals thing. Don’t get me wrong. I believed I was on a mission and the women who chose me were already dying by the time they’d accepted their fate.

It was more of an inconvenience and timing thing. I’d been doing it for over a decade. I’d killed many, many women. I couldn’t tell you how many off the top of my head, I’d have to count my trophies to be sure, but ballpark around twenty-five.

Chances were I was going to get caught eventually. And I didn’t want to get caught. Getting caught will be such a bore. Such a drag. Such a stock fiasco. Our company shares would plummet once it was realized that the head was a serial murderer.

I was usually very good at business though, the thing that allowed me to slit the throat of a woman and take my knife to her breast was the very same thing that allowed me to make logical business decisions without flinching.

Every CEO was a sociopath. They had to be. Business was not very pleasant, and only the worst men with the darkest hearts survived up the tangled rivers of boardrooms and back room deals.

So I tried to fight my urges, for my family, my business and for the simple fucking fact that I didn’t want to end up behind bars. And of course with my money, behind bars simply meant some country club existence in some executive prison some place back east. But still…

Oh the urges, those motherfucking urges. I was sitting in on a hiring interview today and had almost lost my shit. The most exquisite creature had daintily stepped through the doors on ridiculously high heels and in a finely tailored suit. She had balanced like a newborn fawn, her hair slicked back and severe but her eyes wide and blinking her innocent stare.

It had taken everything I had to not leap across the table and tear her throat out with my bare teeth. I could almost feel her hot blood spurting out into my hand, her nipple torn and rolling between my perfect white teeth.

The entire interview I had attempted to focus on her answers, but couldn’t stop staring at a spot on her neck. She’d had the most delicious little mole right above the point I would drive my knife in to slash her jugular, it had been like a little focal point, a signal for darker times.

I’d creeped her out. I could generally smooth over my sharp edges and have women ready to throw their panties at me like an old school Tom Jones concert. But when the urge builds, I laughed a little too loud and stared a little too long. I couldn’t fucking help it.

So back to the driver, I told him, “Just take me home tonight, John,” and stared out the window at the crowded streets.

He nodded in the rear view mirror and put it in drive. We slid out and joined the hundreds of other cars trying to find their way somewhere that night.

We made small talk, the weather, the stock market. I gave him investment tips to keep him happy.

He’s seen some weird shit over the years and always kept his mouth shut, so I took care of him. But it couldn’t be too obvious, just little tips here and there. I couldn’t outright pay the man for his silence. That would be gauche.

He dropped me off in front of my building, a luxury condo in Arlington Heights. You’ve probably never heard of it.

I tossed him a hundred for the weekend, a little something extra for his services, and headed up to get changed.

That night, I was a redneck. I slipped into the Levis jeans, work boots, tight white t-shirt of a construction worker or tradesman and I got ready to leave.

Before going, I chose an ID from the bureau near the bedroom door. The night’s selection? I was James Ronald Wright, age thirty-one, residing somewhere in California. I was officially in Portland on vacation and I was looking for a good time.

The bonus of working in an industry such as mine was that fake IDs were easily accessible. We thought of them as escape hatches, places to keep money and build up a life in case we needed to flee from investments gone bad.

Lucky for me, I was wearing the name of another. I couldn’t imagine pulling this kind of shit off without the money I had backing it. Maybe I should’ve started a charity assisting broke ass killers, helped a few brothers out. I chuckled to myself at the thought.

Money did make it easier for me, I thought as I drove my newly registered Ford F150 pickup across the bridge to Vancouver, Washington, and pretended to be somebody else. I was looking for easy prey tonight, I had an early breakfast meeting with my parents and I wanted to sneak in a couple hours at the Waffle House. I needed to see her, to drink in the sight of her before I went home to sleep.

I cruised the streets in the beat up truck, slowing near corners where seasoned prostitutes peddled their asses.

I was after something a little more tender though, not the beef jerky twisted bodies of those old whores.

I wanted sweet meat, juicy and freshly culled from the herd.

I turned the corner, drove down a darker side street, a rougher place where you never knew what you were going to get.

I spotted one. Perfect. She looked terrified but was doing her best to hold it together. There was nobody else on the street down there. The older whores had pushed this new little Bambi out of their territory, to the fringes.

Pay dirt for me.

She looked about nineteen. Not even legal to drink and she was there selling her cunt or her mouth to the highest bidder.

But she was beautiful, and that’s all that mattered to me.

“Hey,” I called out and pulled up beside her.

“Hey,” she replied, nodded and stepped closer to the truck.

“What you up to tonight?” I asked and looked in the rear view mirror. Nobody was coming, nobody would notice.

“Whatever you want,” she said and forced a smile on her angelic face.

“I haven’t seen you around here before,” I said and took one last look around, “why don’t you hop in for a ride?”

She took a step towards the truck, extended her hand to open the door and I heard the tell tale sound of a cop car warning signal chirping down the street behind us. I turned in my seat and saw that they had pulled somebody over about half a block away on the main street. She froze with her hand on the door handle and watched them tackle one of the old whores to the ground.

“Don’t worry, sweetheart,” I told her, “it’s got nothing to do with you.”

“You know what?” she replied and stepped back, “I just remembered…I’m really busy tonight.”

With that she turned on her heel and rushed down the street in the direction I’d just come from, straight towards the cop car.

“Good instincts,” I whispered under my breath, “smart girl.” I kicked it into drive and sped the fuck out of there. I didn’t know if she had gone straight to the cops to tell them about the man in the Ford who’d made her small hairs stand on end, or if she was just running home to her comfortable suburban family. I wasn’t willing to stick around and find out.

Frustrated I decided to cross back into Portland. I needed to see
her
, to watch her for a while before home.

I parked across the street, in the shadows. Not that it mattered. I drove different vehicles to the Waffle House so she would have not seen this truck yet. The last few times it was a Jeep YJ, before that a beat up Honda Civic.

She was glowing that night, not just from the fluorescent overhanging lights of the diner, but something ethereal was radiating from her skin, her flesh.

She leaned her head back to laugh. I loved her smile. Her lips were full and painted red, not a color I generally approved of, but on her it looked more like a fifties calendar girl than a common slut.

I unzipped and pulled out my cock, it’s thickness fit perfectly in my practiced grip and I began to stroke as she bent over to pick up a napkin somebody dropped on the floor.

I loved her ass; it was a perfect inverted heart, nice and meaty. I wanted to bite it, sink my teeth in and roll her skin in my mouth.

Not to devour though, just a passionate hickey on her sweet flesh. A tattoo of my ownership, my claim on her. Her body would become my territory and I would drive all others to the fringes.

My strokes increased speed as she busied herself filling napkin containers lined up on the counter. I don’t know why that excited me, but it made her seem safe, domesticated. This was becoming a sick ritual; I’d done it so many times, but that night felt more frantic. My urges combined with my desire to fuck her, keep her, never let her go…they added a sharp edge to my pleasure, it was almost painful.

I finished in one hot spurt down my free hand, my release in one barking exhalation that broke the silence of the truck. I shoved my palm over my dick as if to prevent the expulsion. Shit, I should have brought napkins of my own. My kill kit was out of reach at that moment, and there was nothing to clean myself off.

I lifted my palm to my mouth and drew my tongue up it, warm and wet, cleaned myself up so I could drive home.

I tasted pungent, slightly salty and slightly bitter. It was an acrid sensation in my mouth.

I needed to release my urges before they built to dangerous levels, my cum tasted unhealthy.

I wiped the last of it on my pants, zipped them up and watched her for a few more moments before I started the truck and took myself home.

Something occurred to me later, after my shower and vodka nightcap, when I was cozied down under my goose down duvet on my king sized mattress. It occurred to me that the girl on the street looked an awful lot like my Waffle House angel.

I might have been developing a type. This was not good; I could not develop a type.

Types are what allowed law enforcement to connect the dots. For now, the bodies they’ve found seem random, women of all complexion and all walks of life. If the corpses hadn’t been so badly decomposed, they would have clued in that each one was also missing a nipple as well, but lucky for me our wet weather and abundant wildlife make quick work of human flesh.

I’d have to watch myself on that. I might have to consummate things with
her
in order to prevent myself from becoming too obvious.

If I developed a type, I’m doomed.

But it was going to be difficult, to not kill in her image. She was so utterly perfect in every way, and now I just had to work on wooing her.

I snuggled against a body pillow and imagined it was her. My cock stirred to life again as I imagined smelling her hair and having her expanse of smooth skin pressed against me.

The last thing I thought before falling into sleep was how would I ever help myself from tearing that gorgeous little angel apart?

It seemed impossible in that moment.

Chapter Three

Jude

“Warm up?” she asked me as I pretended to read the newspaper.

I had done it. I was back in the Waffle House. It was fucking depressing during the day, at least at night it had a little ambience, like one of those sad neon paintings people hang in their family room or bar space.

In the light of day, the place was a disaster. Faded photographs of the neighborhood back in the day lined the walls, the booths were threadbare and patched with peeling duct tape, and the counter hosted a number of dusty bottles of cheap wine that probably all turned to vinegar years ago. It was a hole in the wall that badly needed a scrub down. I don’t know how much that would help though, there’s only so much you can polish a turd.

“Sounds perfect,” I smiled and watched her body as she leaned over to fill up my cheap white ceramic coffee mug. There must be a factory in China that pumped these out by the billions to fill the Denny’s and IHOPs of America. This particular one had a small chip on the handle and had seen better days.