Chapter 6

November Fifteenth

Joseph Bonn walked slowly along the part of the Cleveland river front known as the Flats. The long strip of clubs, bars and restaurants was crowded for a cold Thursday night, and the drone of thousands of conversations being carried on at once filled the air. He wasn't quite sure why he had come here: he didn't drink, or smoke, or even particularly care for music. In fact, he had but one vice, and he would never dream of practicing it in the presence of witnesses. However, he had been unable to bear the thought of another night at home. Perhaps what he had needed was the simple satisfaction of walking among the masses knowing that he was superior to them in the same way that a wolf was superior to the sheep on which it preyed.

He stared with contempt at the people around him. They could never understand the pleasure and gratification that could be had from breaking the will of another; of twisting them until they would perform the most unspeakable acts at his whim. These sheep would never know the thrill of causing the light to fade from the eyes of an innocent.

He paused to watch a young, well dressed, couple argue in the parking lot. The woman of the pair was a beautiful blonde. Likely around twenty years old, she had lush, ripe curves that had not yet begun to sag or soften with age. He idly wondered what she was doing with the man, who was tall and gangly with features that could, at best, be described as "ordinary."

He listened to their slurred tirades with amusement until, with sharp exchanges of the word, 'Fine, ' the argument came to an abrupt end. The young woman ran wildly, an arm covering her face to muffle her sobs. The man staggered off in the opposite direction, cursing under his breath.

As the man vanished into the darkness of an alley, a pair of rough looking men suddenly broke off their conversation to follow after him. Joe grinned at the sight: apparently he wasn't the only predator among the flock tonight. He watched their retreating backs for a moment before his thoughts returned to the lovely young woman. His eyes swept the waterfront, searching for her. He found her at the entrance of a narrow alley, leaning against a building with her face to the wall. After a few seconds, she staggered further into the shadows.

His erection throbbed to life as he considered the unexpected opportunity that had fallen into his lap. With all of the witnesses in the area, he wouldn't be able to take possession of her as he had all of the other young women he had collected at bus stops and shelters for victims of domestic abuse. Even if he could, the secret room that he had constructed in his basement was already occupied, and would be for at least another week

Nevertheless, he only hesitated for a moment before starting in her direction, palming the knife he always carried in his coat pocket. The temptation of the thrill he would get from killing her here, so close to succor, was simply too great.

By the time he reached her, she was deep inside the alley, crouched down with her face buried in her hands. For a moment he merely admired the gentle curves of her buttocks. It was truly a shame that he had to make this quick. He lovingly recalled the faces of his past victims as he prepared to add to the list. Thumbing the release on his switchblade, he moved in for the kill.

He reached for her, intending to clamp a hand over her mouth to stifle her cries as he slit her throat. At the last minute, she spun to avoid his grasp. Coming to her feet, she reached out quickly, too quickly, to take the wrist of the hand that held the knife.

He stared at her dumbly. There was no sign of sorrow or distress on her face; no indication that she was in any way impaired by too much alcohol.

Her sky blue eyes stared back at him coldly. "Well, well, well," she said softly. "How're you doing tonight Joe, you sick bastard you? You're not what we were fishing for, but you'll certainly do." Her lips split in a grin that exposed brilliant white fangs.

This development was so unexpected, so far beyond his experience, that he stood as if paralyzed. Her empty hand flashed towards his throat, and he felt sudden warmth on his neck and chest as his blood gushed freely. Instantly, she pulled him close and pressed her face into the wound she had just inflicted. Although they did not pierce him, he could feel her fangs on either side of the adam's apple that had been torn asunder by her blow. His free arm wrapped around her and held her close as his body exploded in orgasm.

As he fell to his knees, she stopped feeding momentarily to whisper, "You were never a predator, Joe, just prey with pretensions of grandeur."

When he went still, she rose from his corpse. The index finger of her right hand began to ripple, and then abruptly stopped. She stooped to pick up the knife that he had dropped. Squatting near his head, she began to carve.

Several minutes later, the man with whom she had so publicly argued walked up behind her.

"Gee, that was fun," Tom said in a disgruntled voice.

Mia turned, and then winced when she saw his face. His nose was flattened, and his ear was swollen like the head of a cauliflower. Even as she watched, the swelling of the ear receded until no injury was apparent. The nose, however, remained flat.

"How did you ever survive twenty years as a cop?" she chided gently as she reached up to take his nose between her hands. With a sharp twist, she snapped it back into place.

After a grunt of pain, he answered, "I had a gun and a badge when I was a cop." He paused for a second before adding pointedly, "And backup."

Mia made certain that his nose was straight and watched the bruises fade from under his eyes before she replied affectionately, "Sorry, lump, but we netted more fish than expected." She emphasized her words by prodding the body at her feet with a toe.

Tom started in surprise as he noticed the corpse for the first time. Bending in for a closer look, he read the words that had been carved into its forehead. "Damn ... A serial killer," he remarked. "Not a bad catch considering that all we were after was a couple of muggers."

"Speaking of which, did both of them follow you?" Mia asked.

Still gazing at the dead man, Tom nodded, "Yeah, one had a gun. I still can't get clear images from other people's noggins, but it seemed pretty obvious that they wouldn't have hesitated to kill me if I had resisted." His head tilted to the side as he considered his statement. "Well, resisted less effectively, I guess I should say. It was messy, by the way. I could use some help cleaning up."

"Okay," Mia said agreeably. "I just need a few more minutes here. There are probably some families out there that could use some closure." Bending back over Joe's body, she opened the front of his shirt and resumed carving.

"Whatcha doing?" Tom asked curiously.

"Just before he tried to attack me, he reminisced about all of his past victims, mostly by name. I thought I would help the local police out by giving them the list."

"Heh. Kind of you."

"I thought so," Mia replied brightly

When she was done, they decided to carry Joe's body to the alley in which Tom had been attacked to make it look plausible that all of the bodies had been dumped off instead of being killed on site. When they arrived, carrying Joe between them like a friend who had too much to drink, Mia noticed that both of the bodies in the alley had bloodless tears across their throats.

"You fed on both of them?" Mia asked with surprise.

"Well, yeah," Tom replied with more than a little embarrassment, "I couldn't let the second go free after what he saw, and I'm not capable of the good ol' mind zap yet. I figured that, if I had to kill him, I might as well make it matter."

"Waste not, want not," Mia commented with aplomb.

She bent over the bodies. Both were badly beaten. One had bulges under his shirt from shattered ribs. The other was surrounded by a fairly large pool of blood. Placing her palm just above the surface of the grisly pool, Mia rotated her hand in circles. The puddle quickly dried into a fine powder.

"Wax on. Wax off," Tom said from behind her.

"Huh?"

"You know. Mr. Miyagi..." He broke off with a sigh when she continued to look at him blankly. "Never mind. We really need to get a membership to NetFlix. Your education in classic cinema is obviously sadly lacking."

"Classic cinema, eh?" Mia replied. "I can't wait."

She peered around at the surrounding buildings. One of the adjacent apartment complexes was a good eight stories high, easily the tallest building in the vicinity. Her hands rippled, and thousands of nearly microscopic hooks sprouted from her palms and fingers.

Reaching behind herself, she patted her own back and said, "For now, though, how would you like to hop on?"

Blinking his eyes in confusion, Tom replied, "What?"

Mia twisted her head around to give him a randy smile, "We just fed. I'm so horny that I don't think I can wait until we get back to the hotel. Obviously we can't fool around right here. So, if you grab hold, I can carry you up to that nice, flat, secluded roof and have my way with you."

Laughing lightly, Tom walked over and wrapped his arms awkwardly around her shoulders. The second his hands locked across her upper chest, she began to rapidly scale the wall.

"Uh, did I ever mention that I'm scared to death of heights?" Tom asked nervously as they passed the sixth floor.

"You big baby," Mia replied. "A fall from here would barely even bruise you anymore. Maybe you should try to think about what's waiting for you at the top."

"Hmm, that's working," Tom said as he pressed the proof against her round backside.

With a snort of laughter, Mia cleared the low wall that surrounded the roof. Spinning around, she jumped into his arms and pressed her lips to his. He roughly pushed her skirt up as she undid his belt.

Twenty minutes later they were laying languorously entwined on the dirty rubber of the roof.

"I needed that," Mia murmured contentedly into his chest.

"Mmmm, me too," Tom replied as he ran a hand caressingly down her side.

"So, did it work?" Mia asked.

"Uh, I thought so, but, if you're asking, maybe it didn't."

"Not that, silly. That worked just fine," Mia replied. "I'm talking about having the bad men who we knew had hurt a lot of people before try to hurt you, too. Did acting in self defense make it any easier for you to do what we have to do?"

"Actually, it did. A little, anyway. Thanks for humoring me. I appreciate it. By the way, that was quite an impressive performance in the parking lot. Oscar caliber, if you ask me."

Mia giggled softly against his throat, and he could feel her lips curling up into a lazy smile. "You did pretty well yourself, lump. Sean Connery has nothing to worry about, but it still wasn't bad."

"I'm stuck with 'lump' forever now, aren't I?" Tom asked mournfully.

With a snicker, Mia squeezed him softly and replied, "You betcha."

"And I still can't call you sugar plum?"

"Of course you can. You'll just have to find me a badger afterwards."

They giggled together for a few seconds before Mia rolled over onto her back to gaze up at the stars.

"Do you ever miss the Sun?" she asked.

Tom gestured toward the night sky, "What's to miss? Right there are millions of suns. They're just a bit farther away than good ol' Sol." Turning on his side he nuzzled briefly at her neck. "Besides," he added, "you brighten my life so much that I have no need for such a paltry, inconsequential thing as the Sun."

With a burst of delighted laughter, Mia replied, "You say the sweetest things. Corny and cheesy, but sweet." She pulled him close for a tender kiss.

After a moment of companionable silence, Tom asked, "What about you? Do you ever miss it?"

After a thoughtful pause, Mia replied wistfully, "Not the Sun itself, really. When I was a girl working in the fields, the afternoon Sun would warm the crops of oats and wheat, and the most heavenly aroma would fill the air. It was the smell of home, of safety, of summer. It filled me with such contentment that I was certain that nothing bad could ever happen. During the various times that I've lived in more rural areas, I could sometimes catch the slightest whiff of it at the moment I awoke. It was always gone in an instant, though. I miss that smell more than anything."

Tom gave her a comforting hug, and was about to comment when an outcry rose from the street below.

"Time to go," Mia said as she hopped to her feet and pulled on her panties.

Tom nodded in agreement as he, too, hastily dressed. They walked to the edge of the roof opposite the bodies and looked down. Police cars were converging on the area from all directions.

"Now that I think about it, maybe we should have waited until we made it back to the hotel," Mia said regretfully, "They'll see us if we climb down, and they'll be too far away to blur. We're going to have to jump."

"You have got to be kidding," Tom said fearfully, although he knew she wasn't. "I don't think I can do that."

Mia took his hand and gave it a reassuring squeeze. "Shall we go on three?" she asked.

Tom gave her a dubious look, but nodded.

Swinging his hand back and forth, she said softly, "One ... Two ... Three!"

Tom leapt. The moment of free fall was as exhilarating as it was terrifying. The rapid acceleration. The wind rushing by him, tugging forcefully at his clothes and hair. Involuntarily, he found himself letting out a muted whoop of excitement as they plummeted toward the ground below. The sudden, jarring stop at the end was much less fun. Tom's hand was torn from Mia's as he landed badly and rolled across the pavement.

From flat on his back he grinned up at Mia. "That wasn't so bad," he said cheerfully.

Then he tried to stand. The flash of pain through his leg made him cry out and fall back to the ground. Looking down, he saw that his ankle was twisted inward at nearly a right angle to his shin.

"Well, shit," he said with disgust. "Two broken bones in one night. That's a new record for me."

Mia immediately squatted next to him, "Yeah, keep this up, and I'm gonna have to start charging you for my medical services." Taking his foot gently in her hands, she said, "This is going to hurt. Ready?"

At his nod, she twisted and pulled, putting the bone back into place. It would have healed on its own within a few minutes, but the process would have been a good bit more painful and taken time they didn't have. She glanced up as a policeman shined his flashlight down the narrow alleyway in which they had landed. Her eyes narrowed with concentration, and he flashed the beam from side to side before moving on.

Pulling Tom upright, she instructed, "I would like to give you a minute to heal, but we need to get out of here." She draped one of his arms across her shoulders, and looped one of hers around his waist. Together, they hobbled off in the direction of the parking garage in which they had left their car. Within a block, Tom was walking on his own with no sign of a limp. There was no further conversation. Mia was too busy keeping the small army of police that were scouring the area from paying them any mind to speak.

Once safely in their station wagon, Tom sighed with relief, "I don't think I've ever been so happy at the thought of getting back to a hotel room."

"We have another stop to make, first," Mia interjected.

Tom's brow furrowed in confusion. "We do?" he asked.

"Yep, our friend the serial killer was keeping a girl in his basement. Based on the images I got from his mind, I don't know if the police will find her when they search the house. At least in time."

"Alrighty, then. Where are we heading?"

Half an hour later, they pulled to a stop in front of a huge Victorian. Mia examined it carefully, comparing the reality with the second hand memory she had stolen.

"I think this is the place," she said.

They strode casually up the wide sidewalk to the porch, their fingertips rippling and smoothing as they went. Tom tried to peer through the faceted panes of leaded glass that were set in the heavy oak door as Mia held her hand up by the knob and lock plate.

After a few moments, Tom said nervously, "Is this going to take much longer? In a neighborhood like this, we're bound to draw attention to ourselves if we keep standing here."

"Keep your pants on. There are seven different locks. This wacko was a paranoid bugger even for a serial killer."

"Known a lot of serial killers, have you?" Tom asked.

"Only one, but I lived with him for over a hundred years. Does that count? There. That should do it."

The door swung silently inwards, and they stepped inside. Mia paused in the foyer, and peered around carefully, making full use of all of her senses. "Huh. That's interesting," she commented as she led the way to a large living room furnished with overstuffed leather couches and mahogany tables.

Striding over to the stone fireplace that took up most of one wall, she tapped the painting above the mantle. "I'm pretty sure that's a real Van Gogh," she commented as she took hold of the frame. It swung open on hidden hinges to reveal a safe.

"Really?" Tom asked indifferently. "It's kinda ugly. Incidentally, I thought we were here as rescuers, not thieves."

"We are. I just thought that the poor thing deserved a little compensation for what she's undoubtedly been through."

"Oh. Okay," Tom said agreeably. He then watched silently as she placed her hand over the combination dial. It spun rapidly back and forth, seemingly on its own, for several seconds before Mia took hold of the lever. Inside the safe were two stacks of cash and a large manila envelope.