Succulent Prey (33 page)

through the spot where his heart should have been, pinned him to the hood of the car. His head had been removed and lay

on the floor at his feet, stuffed with cloves of garlic. The body was smoldering from where his murderer had tried to set him on fire. The Hayward police had arrived just in time to douse the fire before it did much damage. The entire street smel ed

like roasted garlic and barbecued pork. The most disturbing thing was how

delicious the aroma was. It made the

detective even more aware of the fact

that he hadn't eaten in almost twenty-four hours.

Montgomery knew that the arson had not

been an attempt to destroy evidence but rather a way to ensure that this demon

would never rise again. He walked over

and looked down at the sizzling corpse.

"You poor bastard. What did you do to deserve this?"

"Detective!" A young officer, who looked like he was fresh out of high school, ran into the garage with his eyes wide. He

was sucking in breath in big gulps like a guppy in an empty tank.

Montgomery turned around quickly,

recognizing the excitement in the young rookie's voice. He knew that excitement. It meant they had found something

unexpected.

"What is it?"

"We found more bodies. Lots of them! In the basement. "

"What? Show me."

The young officer led the detective

quickly out of the garage, around the

back of the house, and into the

basement. There a big German

shepherd from one of the K-9 units was

busily digging up the dirt floor. Two other officers were down there beside him with brooms and shovels, uncovering a

skeleton. There were already two others partial y exposed.

"How many are there?"

"I don't know. They're piled on top of each other. Some of them are pretty

old."

"They-they're children!" Montgomery started to get woozy.

"How old did you say the suspect was?" one of the officers asked. "Because these bodies look pretty old. Look at the clothes. I haven't seen shoes like those since the eighties."

Montgomery stared down at one

exposed leg wearing an old pair of

British Knights. He had owned a pair of sneakers just like them years agoback

in 1992. That would have made Joseph

around ten years old. These weren't

Joseph Miles's victims. They were Lionel Ray's. That's why Joseph had come

back here, to destroy the real source of the curse.

His own father.

It took them several days to unearth al the bodies. When they were done the

count stood at twenty-five, ranging in age from six to sixteen. The oldest corpse

was at least a decade old. They had al

been cut to pieces. A slash across the

throat was the kil ing blow. None of them bore any of the marks of cannibalism,

confirming the detective's theory that the senior Miles had been the culprit rather than his son. It looked as if Joe had

done the world a service by taking out

his father. But where was he now?

Forty-six

Alicia winced as the hot water sprayed

from the showerhead onto her raw,

pinkish skin. It had been months since

her ordeal with Joseph Miles and she

had only been out of the hospital a week. She was scheduled to see a plastic

surgeon at the end of the month to

discuss prostheses to replace her stolen mammary glands. She had already gone

through six surgeries, painful skin grafts to cover the gaping hole in her chest

where her breasts had been. Now they

were going to see if they could give her some kind of implants to make her chest look more normal, more like it had

looked before her abduction. Alicia

scoffed as she watched the water

cascade down her smooth, nippleless

chest. She had no il usions. She knew

she would never look the same.

She stepped out of the shower and

appraised her scarred and disfigured

torso. Her chest was now little more than a thin veneer of skin stretched over a rib cage. She could almost see her heart

beating beneath it. She began to cry. The man she had fal en in love with had done this to her.

"Why didn't he just kil me? Why leave me like this?"

They stil hadn't captured Joe, but there had also been no more cannibal kil ings. He appeared to have just disappeared.

Either that or the cure had worked. In a way she hoped that it hadn't. Every night she prayed that he would return for her. To finish the job he had started.

She heard a noise coming from her

bedroom as she gently wiped away the

bathwater and tears with her towel. It

sounded as if someone had opened her

window. Minutes later she heard the

unmistakable sound of footfal s.

"Hel o?"

She clutched the bath towel to her

vandalized chest and peered into the

room. She was not surprised at al to

see Joe standing in her bedroom.

"You got my note? On the message

board?"

"Yes." His expression was almost sad.

"Then you'l do it? You'l do what I ask?"

"Are you sure you want this?"

"I'm sure. I've got a ton of pain pil s from the hospital. I'l take a whole handful. I won't feel a thing."

"I've missed you, Alicia." A tear drizzled down his cheek.

"I missed you too."

"I even set us a table."

Joe turned toward the little kitchen, and indeed a large table, way too big for her tiny apartment, stretched from the

kitchen into the little dining room nook area and partial y into the living room. The table was solid oak and looked

expensive. It was set with a silver serving tray, big enough to hold a large pig and one dinner setting at the head of the

table. A large carving knife sat on top of the tray.

"The table's an antique," she said. "I bought it just for this occasion. Just in case you came back."

"I love you, Alicia."

"I know you do. But I can't live like this," she said, gesturing toward her chest.

"What about plastic surgery?"

"Look at me." Alicia dropped the towel, revealing the hideous scar that

transversed her chest. Joseph sucked in a breath, shocked at his own savagery.

"They can't fix this."

"This may take a while. My appetite isn't what it used to be."

Alicia stepped back into the bathroom

and opened the medicine cabinet. She

had a few Fentanyl patches they had

given her at the hospital to replace the morphine drip she'd been hooked up to

after her last surgery. She peeled one of them out of the box and stuck it on her neck. There was also nearly a ful bottle of Darvocet and a half bottle of

Percocet. She scooped them off the

shelf and took a whole handful of each

and went back into the bedroom. Her

legs began to wobble as she turned and

staggered into the kitchen. The room

spun just before she lay down on the

table. The Fentanyl was kicking in.

"I want you to eat al of me. Don't leave anything. I want to be a part of you

forever."

The Percocet and Darvocet kicked in

now and Alicia could no longer feel her own body. She felt like she was floating. Joe was crying when he raised the knife. He was stil crying when he began to cut through her soft plump flesh. And tears stil fel as he slid the blood moist meat between his lips and swal owed it down. She tasted just like he remembered.

It took him a couple of days to

completely consume her. She was

awake for the first few hours, tel ing him how much she loved him. How happy

she was to bring him so much pleasure.

How she'd wanted this al along. And,

despite himself, Joe did feel those

familiar jolts of ecstasy as he chewed

and swal owed her soft muscle and fat.

She passed away that same night, yet

Joe had continued eating as he had

promised. He ate until her entire body

had been consumed-skin, muscle,

organs, fat, her brain. He even sucked

the marrow out of her bones. He could

feel her life inside of him as he walked out of the apartment with his stomach

distended, fighting back nausea. He

could feel her love coursing through him. He barely noticed the police cruiser until it was right on top of him.

"Freeze! Stop right there! On your knees! Hands behind your head!"

The cop was muscular, middle-aged,

and scared. His partner came from the

other side of the car looking even older and more scared. Joseph hadn't

showered and was stil covered with

Alicia's blood, but that wasn't the only reason the men were scared. Joe had

seen their car across the street three

nights ago when he'd first snuck into

Alicia's apartment. They had both been

behind the wheel, fast asleep. They had been assigned to protect Alicia and they had failed. Joe didn't care anymore. He watched with curious detachment as

they handcuffed him, cursing and praying at the same time.

"We fucked up big time!"

"What did you do to the girl? Go check on her, Nate. I've got him. Fuck! Man,

we're going to be crucified when they

find out we lost a witness!"

"At least we caught the bastard. Who knows, they might even cal us heroes." The middle-aged cop looked at his older partner and shook his head. "I doubt that. I seriously doubt that. See al that blood? It ain't his. And you know what he does to his victims."

The older man's eyes went wide. He ran

up the walkway and into the apartment.

Less than a minute later he was back

out on the sidewalk, throwing up into the gutter.

"Bones! There's just bones up there! He ate her! He ate al of her."

Joe watched the man regurgitate and

tried to hold his own enormous meal

inside of him. He concentrated on

digesting his meal. He knew that they

would want to pump his stomach and he

wanted to keep as much of her inside of him as he could.

They were just putting him in the

backseat of the squad car when another

car pul ed up. A black detective that Joe thought he recognized was behind the

wheel, and next to him sat Professors

Locke and Douglas. The two professors

sprang out of the car before it had even come to a complete stop and ran over to him.

"Don't worry, boy. We won't let anything happen to you. We're going to help you. We're going to cure you." Professor Locke's eyes were beaming with joy. It

looked like he had just won the lottery.

Epilogue

Joe sat behind the glass partition,

staring across at the petite young lady who'd come to visit him. It was the model from his art class. The one who'd

purchased the painting from him.

"How are you doing, Joseph?"

"I'm fine. You don't have to keep coming here, you know."

"I know. I like seeing you, though." She smiled at him in a practiced, seductive way meant to communicate that she

wanted to do more than just see him.

Joe noticed that the woman had begun

putting on weight. Her breasts, thighs, and hips al looked ful er, almost plump. She caught Joe looking and smiled.

"Do you like it?" She stood up and turned around so that Joe could get a

good look at her ass, which had also

increased in size. It was stil smal but now it had some jiggle to it.

"You look good."

"Good enough to eat?"

Joe didn't reply.

"What do you want?"

"I just want to make sure that you're being treated wel , that you're

comfortable. I heard they were

experimenting on you?"

"Yes. I volunteered for the experiments. They are using serotonin inhibitors to

suppress my urges, to help me with my

addiction. Professor Locke is heading

the experiment. He thinks it wil get him a Nobel Prize if he can cure me."

"So? Is it working?"

"I don't know. I guess so. I don't have the urges anymore. Not often, anyway. But

then they keep me locked up and

isolated al the time. No outside stimuli. Nothing to bring the urges on. Except for you. You're my only visitor outside of

doctors and media."

"Do you get urges when you look at me?

" There was an obvious excitement in her voice when she asked the question.

"Yes," Joe replied without looking at her face. His eyes continued to roam her

body. She was starting to look good. No longer the anemic waif he'd first met at his art class months ago. She'd

obviously been studying up on him,

learning more about the type of women

he liked. A few more pounds and she'd

be almost irresistible.

She'd started writing to him after the trial. At first there had just been questions and then the letters had turned almost

pornographic, describing al the things she wanted to do to him and al the

things she wanted him to do to her.

She'd asked him to marry her on more

than one occasion. She claimed she

was in love, that she had been ever

since the day she saw his portrait of her. Now she'd started putting on weight to

make herself more appealing. And it

was working.

Joe's eyes landed on her breasts. That's where the most dramatic change in her

appearance had taken place. When he'd

first seen her she'd had little or nothing up top but now the extra weight had

caused her breasts to swel two or three cup sizes. They looked good, but

something was wrong with them that Joe

couldn't quite grasp.

"I brought you something. Something from me. To show you how much I care

for you. How much I love you." She reached into her purse and pul ed out a napkin. It was folded over to conceal