Chapter 11

"Holy fuck, dude, I swear I thought their black shit was gonna go apeshit on each other!" Richie cried in a voice somewhere between concern and jubilation.

"Ohmigod, Jason, your own mother!" Melinda said. "Did she do anything to you?"

"Shit, I woulda loved to see her try with what his Dad's sportin'!"

"Richie, you are such a dick sometimes, you know that?"

"Oh come on, he was on our side! Even Jason said his shit looks different from everyone else's shit."

"Yeah, and so does Ms. Bendon's. Think she's on our side, bozo?"

"Fuck you, Melinda, you know that's totally different! This is like--"

"Shut up, both of you!" Jason shouted as he came to a stop.

Melinda whirled around and stared at him, looking stricken. They stood at the western edge of their subdivision where Mist Lane curved north to meet Oak Street, where they sensed the first wisps of shared energy from the link as they headed away from the moved line.

"Sorry," Jason said in a small voice. "I just ... this is a lot to take in. I don't know why I didn't think of it myself."

"I'm not even sure Heather is right," Melinda said in a softer voice. "I kind of hope she's not."

"What the fuck for?" Richie snapped.

She rounded on him. "Because it means it can get at us directly, dumbass!"

"Maybe not directly," Jason said. "Or why go through my mother? It has to rely on your mother to control you and Heather."

"Don't remind me," Melinda said as she squirmed, her hips swaying.

"Are you all right, Melinda?" Jason asked.

"She's been doin' the horny two-step ever since I saw her this morning," Richie drawled.

"Yeah, thanks, Mr. Sensitive," Melinda muttered.

"What did she do to you?" Jason demanded.

Melinda blushed and shook her head. "It doesn't matter, okay? I can deal with it for a little longer." She pressed herself into Jason's side. "Come on, let's keep moving. If we can get away from the damn line maybe I can hold out longer."

Jason nodded but paused when he noticed the soft pressure enveloping his arm. He caught sight of the swell of her bosom against her shirt where her jacket had parted and gave her an inquisitive look.

Her blush deepened. "Yes, they're bigger. Satisfied?"

"I sure am," Richie said with a smirk.

Melinda's head snapped towards him. "I wasn't asking..." She trailed off when she realized that the act of two boys showing interest in her breasts filled her head with the desire to show them a little more than just vague bulges under her clothing, enough to keep the unwanted thoughts of her mother at bay for a little longer. "Thanks," she said in a soft voice.

Jason's gaze lingered, and Melinda's lips twitched into a tiny, forlorn smile. She hugged him, pressing her breasts against him as tightly as she could. "God, I've missed us doing it, Jason," she whispered in his ear.

Jason drew in a slow breath and let it go as a shaky sigh. He hugged her back, reveling in what was the first show of affection anyone had given him for the past few days. His eyes misted as it reminded him of his mother and what she once was before not just the Darkness' latest attack, but before they had ever come to Haven.

He heard her draw in breath as if to speak again, and his heart hammered. If there were ever a bad time for her to say what he had wanted to hear for the past month, this was it. He was on an emotional razor's edge, and all his energy was devoted to stopping a descent into rage. Even something good would shatter the precious calm he had managed to impose upon himself.

Instead, she let out her breath as a sigh, and he sensed frustration within it.

"Oh man, get a fucking room," Richie quipped.

Melinda parted from Jason and thrust her tongue at Richie.

"I can tell you exactly where to put that."

"In your dreams, Richie, at least today. Seriously, can you get your mind out of your pants for a minute?"

"I'd rather have it in your--"

"All right, that's enough propositioning my girlfriend," Jason declared, though there was a trace of amusement in his voice. He had to find humor in something or he would go mad.

"Let's go already," Melinda said, urging both boys forward by shoving their shoulders until they headed down the street. "Jason, I'm really worried now. If something happens to you, we're all screwed!"

"Nothing's happened yet," Jason said in a neutral voice.

"Yet?"

Jason sighed and ran his fingers through his hair. "I think I know where this is going. She's been on my back to get a job."

Richie frowned. "Are you fucking serious?"

"A job? What job? Where?" Melinda demanded.

"That's just it, I have no idea," Jason said.

"I think the Darkness made your Mom loony," Richie said.

"Richie, that's a terrible thing to say!" Melinda cried.

"Come off it, pipsqueak. Where the fuck is anyone his age gonna get a job in a freakin' nowhere place like this?"

"Same place my Mom works, you idiot. What do you think me and Heather have been scared out of our wits about before Bendon started her perverted little sex games with her? We were always afraid our mother was going to send us off to that horrible Inn and become more sluts-for-rent like Mom."

"Hey, news flash, Melinda! Jason's a boy. I figgered you of all people would know what he's got under his jeans."

"Look, stop arguing, please," Jason said, his voice shaky. "I can't take any more discord, not right now. I mean, jeez, you're acting like you did months ago. I thought you two learned to get along better than that."

Both Richie and Melinda had fallen silent, giving each other a sheepish look before turning their concerned and anxious faces back to Jason.

Jason forced himself to take a deep breath. He knew what they were looking for, and guilt weighed on him for failing to live up to it. They wanted him to be the voice of calm and reason, the dispassionate voice of logic wielding the scientific method like a sword to chase away the monsters.

Instead, he felt the monsters had closed in around him, and it was all he could do to keep them at bay, let alone help anyone else. But that was no excuse. Once he had finally accepted the unwanted leadership role, he was stuck with it. Even Debby deferred to him, which was both an honor and downright scary.

"Melinda, Heather is probably right," he said in a voice of forced calm, though it still quavered. "I don't see any other explanation. Obvious answer is that some part of that damn Book survived and the Darkness was able to recover those spells from it."

"Aw, you're shitting me, right?" Richie said.

"Unless you have a better explanation."

Melinda opened her mouth but let out a small husky sigh instead. She shivered and wrapped her arms around herself.

"Melinda, is ... is there something you need to do?" Jason said in a tentative voice.

"Yes, but ... n-not yet."

"Um ... I don't think there's any place we can..."

He trailed off when she shook her head. "Just ... j-just keep talking, okay? Give me something to distract me from ... from this."

Richie shrugged when Jason glanced at him. "Don't look at me, she's been like a clam about it with me, too."

"I don't know what else to say," Jason said. "Except to repeat that nothing's happened so far. And there's been no job postings on the community board."

"The what?" Richie said.

"Community board, dumbass," Melinda snapped. "It's an online place to post jobs and stuff."

"Hey, I'm not all geeked out like nerd-boy here."

"Not to mention you have a computer barely one step above stone knives and bearskins," Jason muttered.

Richie smirked. "Computer's nothing but a porn storage device for me, dude. Anyway, you're doing just what any nerd would. You're over-thinking this. Job gets posted, you don't take it. Simple. Stop making it into fucking rocket science."

"Oh, brilliant, Einstein," Melinda retorted, though her conviction grew more shaky and her voice more husky and strained. "And what if his mother makes him do it?"

"Jesus Fucking Christ, he can't be the goodie-two-shoes son all the time!"

"I don't mean that way. I r-really don't want to draw a picture for you, okay?"

Richie snorted and waved a hand. "Look, if some dumb ball player like me can hold it off while fucking, then him with his ginormous nerd-brain can--"

Jason was sure he would have let into his friend right there, the words ready to be screamed from his mouth, when he noticed Melinda panting, her hips swaying as if to some irregular but sensuous beat. She averted her eyes, her cheeks glowing pink-red. Even through the jacket, he saw the hard points of her nipples. "Melinda, are you--?"

"I-I'm sorry, I have to go home," Melinda said in a tiny voice. "Shit, I hate my mother, even if I adore her pu--" She clamped her mouth shut, her cheeks flaring scarlet. She spun on her heel, taking off before either boy could react.

"Fuck, Melinda, let us go back with you!" Richie cried as he started to run after her. Before he could take more than a few steps, she disappeared around the curve of the street. Richie growled and gave a small rock a vicious kick, hurtling it down and across the street.

"She'll be all right," Jason said, but it was for his own benefit more than Richie's.

Richie stepped up to Jason and slapped him on the shoulder. "You'll be fine, too. Hey, welcome to the motherfucking club." He smirked and nudged Jason with his elbow. "Geddit?"

Jason again wanted to rant about what a horrible trauma this would be to his mother, but he would earn only a well-deserved rebuke from Richie: Jason's mother was so special she had to remain pure as the driven snow while it was okay for Richie's mother to wallow in sexual perversion. Jason could have gone on about how their mothers were two fundamentally different people, but none of it would have mattered to Richie.

He tamed his thoughts and forced a tiny smile in response to Richie's ill-timed joke.

"How'd your mother get the idea about the job?" Richie said. "Sorry about the kidding around before, but, seriously, your mother ain't no dummy."

"She got the idea from her sister, but I think she was just a catalyst."

Richie made a face. "Was that her sitting in the easy chair? Shit, I thought your family had subscribed to the lard-of-the-month club or something. I suppose she's still better to look at than that vulture my Mom insists is my aunt. Anyway, any other news?"

"Yes," Jason said, the syllable becoming a sigh of relief as he thrust his hand into his pocket and yanked out the post-it note. He slapped it into Richie's hand.

Richie gave him an odd look and lowered his gaze to the note. "A phone number?"

"Your father's cell phone."

Richie's eyes snapped up. "The fuck?"

"His cell phone," Jason said, the relief more evident. "I finally found it."

Richie stared at Jason. "Wait, you're ... this can't ... how the hell did... ?"

"You have a good chance of reaching him, I imagine he keeps it with him all the time."

"And how the flying fuck would you know that?"

"Because right now he's a trucker. He drives those big eighteen wheel rigs pretty much across the country. He's always on the move, so it makes sense he'd keep it with him. If you catch him while he's driving, he might have to call you back, but--"

"This can't be his fucking phone number!" Richie shouted.

Jason gave his friend a nonplussed look. He was about to ask what the problem was when he saw Richie's hands were shaking.

"I can't call him," Richie said in a low voice.

For a moment, Jason's eyes blazed. He had spent sleepless hours trying to fulfill a promise of which Richie once took every possible moment to remind him only to get this in return. Jason forced another deep breath but could not keep the edge from his voice. "What's the problem now?"

"I think he'll be mad at me," Richie said slowly. "Yeah, he's mad as hell at me, Jason."

"How the hell would you know until you call him?"

"I have him in my fucking head, remember?" He stared at the post-it note for another few seconds before thrusting it back at Jason. "Here. You call him. He won't yell at..."

He trailed off when Jason grasped Richie's hand and shoved it against his chest with a thump. "He is your father. You call him. I have enough to deal with right now, okay? Getting this number was the most difficult thing I've ever done. Don't make worse by asking me to do the fucking impossible."

A protest hovered right on Richie's tongue, but he forced himself to swallow it and wrenched his hand from Jason's grip. "What the fuck would be so impossible about it?"

"What am I going to say to him? The first thing he's going to ask is why his son won't talk to him instead. What am I supposed to say, that you're too scared?"

"Shut the fuck up!" Richie cried. "I'm not afraid, okay?"

Jason uttered a slow sigh and ran a hand through his hair. "I didn't mean it that way. Sorry. Just ... please, just do this yourself. I don't care how long you want to wait. Wait until you feel the time is right or something. It's up to you."

Despite believing he was in the right, Jason still felt guilty. If Richie did protest again, Jason was not up to arguing. Their short debate had eaten up what little remained in his emotional reserves.

Richie frowned and looked down at the note again. He curled his fist around it and thrust it into the pocket. "Yeah, fine, whatever. Figure he'll tell me how much of an asshole I am whether I call him or not."

"I'm sure it won't be like that," Jason said in a tired voice. "So is there anything else?"

"Hey, uh, can we just hang out for a bit?" Richie said in an almost pleading voice. "Seems like freaking ages since we did that."

Jason could think of a million other things he should be doing, such as contacting Cassie, talking to Mrs. Radson, figuring out just what side his father was on, or brainstorming some way to get out of an inevitable path to ruin. He had no energy for any of them. He turned to Richie and nodded. "Yeah, we can hang out. Come on, let's keep going this way. The further we get from the line, the better."

"I knew you would test it," said Penny with a small smile as she shimmied out of her panties. "I knew you would want to see how far you could push it. Not very, was it?"

Melinda wanted to shout that she could have held out longer if she had not been so shocked by the sight of the Aura around Jason's mother; or if Jason had not responded to the press of her boobs against his arm; or if Richie had not been talking in so suggestive a manner.

The words were drowned in the moisture from her own pussy as her eyes followed the curves of her mother's gorgeous body. Penny's hands slid around her hips as if to draw further attention to them, swaying from side to side.

"Good thing for you I decided to stop here after dropping Heather off before I went to work." Penny sat down and spread her legs. Her fingers slipped over her sex, stroking her wet folds once before drawing her labia apart. "Now you don't have to wait all day to have this."

Melinda shivered and stepped forward, feeling as if she were floating like a leaf upon the water blown by a gentle breeze. The glistening jewel of her desire lay between her mother's beautiful thighs, among the petals of a fragrant blossom which had opened for her.

Melinda dropped to her knees and shuddered as she smelled the wonderful aroma of her mother's nectar. She slid her hands along the smooth skin of her mother's legs and hips, each caress another tiny thrill. Her pussy ached as she leaned forward, drawing in her breath as she touched her tongue to her mother's delicious womanhood so she could savor the taste.

Penny let out a husky sigh as Melinda's tongue swirled around the tip of her clit, then a low moan as Melinda flicked her tongue along the shaft. Melinda felt a hand against the back of her head, gently drawing her forward. Melinda pressed her mouth to her mother's mound, her tongue invading Penny's tight tunnel.

Penny moaned. "Oh, honey, you're so good at this. So very good at licking pussy. I ... I almost wish I had done this earlier."

Melinda did not hear the tiny catch in her mother's voice. Her mother's pussy was the center of her universe. She felt giddy, as if intoxicated, her tongue lapping up her mother's moisture in an increasing frenzy. Her mother panted, trembling with the rise of pleasure. Her hand pressed harder, and Melinda clamped her mouth tight to her mother's sex.

"Oh yes ... yes, that's it ... oh yes!"

Melinda shuddered, her pussy suddenly rising in unbidden pleasure, straining at the edge of unattainable orgasm. The last of her now fading desires pressed her into the duty of extending her mother's climax until Penny squirmed and moaned in utter delight.

Melinda leaned back and rose on her shaky legs, her mind still foggy, her body still reverberating with the need for her own release. She wanted to reject it and curse her body for betraying her, yet when her mother drew her close and played with her pussy, she squealed with delight when it obliged by throbbing wonderfully against Penny's fingers.

In the instant of her orgasm, she shivered as cold tendrils slid among the hot tumult of her emotions. They shaped her desires like putty, stroking the trigger left by the cult and arousing it further.

Penny stood and hugged her daughter. Melinda let out a distressed whimper even as her body flushed hot at the touch of their naked bodies. Penny took Melinda's hand and squeezed it gently, guiding it down to her daughter's pussy. When she drew away, Melinda's fingers had already started stroking the still wet and sensitive flesh.

"I have to go to work, honey," said Penny. "So you just lie on my bed and play with yourself for the rest of the morning."

Melinda's stricken look was lost a moment later when her eyes became half-lidded, a soft and sexy sigh passing her parted lips. She crawled onto the bed, one hand never leaving the lovely wet warmth of her pussy. She spread her legs and squirmed as fingers swirled over her clit.

Penny dressed and bent over to kiss her daughter on the forehead. She paused a moment before saying in a slightly quavering voice, "That's a good little wet and sexy girl. I hope you have several lovely orgasms."

Melinda tried to call out, but it emerged as a gasp as her pussy throbbed, filling her with obedient bliss.

Diane's pleasure had been so slow to rise she wondered if she had only thought she was aroused, despite the copious wetness which squished around her fingers. When she stopped glancing around every few seconds worrying who was watching her, her pussy became properly responsive, and she uttered a soft moan as her need rose with it.

She spread her legs further and tugged down the zipper of her jeans, barely feeling the icy chill. Her fingertips traced gentle circular patterns against her swelling clit, her breath a soft pant. Each rise of pleasure worsened the ache of need. Instead of anticipation of release, she felt only more want and desire.

Diane closed her eyes and tried to reach into the haze, but it again remained quiescent. Her eyes fluttered open as she thought how this had been a foolish thing to attempt. If a minion of the Darkness just happened to catch her like this...

She tried to stop herself, but instead drew her fingers in firm, broad strokes along the length of her slit. She whimpered as her shimmering eyes swept the clearing, expecting someone to step out of the trees and encourage her fall back into slavery. What other reason could there be for her inability to stop herself?

She closed her eyes again, and the blue haze seemed to beckon to her. She tried to push it out of her mind, but it was like pushing against air. Was something coming at her through the line? Had this been some sort of trap after all?

She panted hard with her quickening strokes, her throat somehow not becoming raw from the rush of cold air. Her hand shuddered in another vain effort to stop. Her jeans slid down her legs, exposing the frantic movements of her hand beneath her damp panties. The cold air did not sting, her pussy consuming all her senses.

She lifted her free hand in a feeble, trembling effort to stop the other. It instead slid under her sweater and pawed her breast, rubbing the hard nub of her nipple and shattering what little resistance had remained against her lust.

"Oh G-God, not again," Diane whimpered. "Please not a-again..."

Debby turned off the engine and heard her own heart pounding as she turned her head towards the Conner house. She shivered as something icy slithered against her mental landscape. A terrible sense of presence accompanied the dank chill, and she had the disconcerting sense of being watched.

The extraordinary sensations vanished a moment later but left her trembling. She gripped the steering wheel and took a deep breath. Perhaps some of her own paranoia was at work. Despite her belief in the supernatural, she understood her mind could play tricks on her.

Her skin tingled as she climbed out of the car, as if the air were charged. She turned her eyes towards the front door of the Conner house and walked up to the door, but hesitated before taking the last few steps. She shivered again as a sensation came over her very much like what she had felt just prior to her encounters with Melissa.

She placed a hand over the protective pentagram pendant she wore under her blouse, fully opened her psychic senses, and thumbed the doorbell. The sense of unease mounted when she heard heavy footfalls approach the door, which was yanked open by an annoyed auburn-haired woman.

"What is it?" Audrey snapped. "Who are you?"

Debby was too taken aback to respond. Audrey's psychic aura glowed with an absolute brilliance she had never witnessed before. Like a rainbow made solid, each band stood out in complete clarity. Spikes shot across the bands at irregular intervals, disturbing the layers and sending rippling waves across their breadth.

"I recognize you," Audrey said in an even voice, her jaw tightening. "You're Debby Radson."

From both the tone and the flickers of the woman's psychic aura, Debby surmised that Audrey had likely neither forgotten nor forgiven the night at the campgrounds. "I'm terribly sorry for disturbing you. I hope I have not interrupted anything."

Audrey's eyes flicked up and down Debby's body. Debby felt a vague sense of violation, but she suppressed both a shudder and several awful memories. "Not anymore," Audrey said in a flat voice. "My sister decided to leave early. My husband is driving her back to the city. Now, what is you want?"

Debby wanted to keep Audrey talking so she could study the woman's psychic aura. She ignored the pang of despair when she observed the band representing Audrey's sexuality. It bore the all too familiar mark of the Darkness: swollen to obscene proportions and overlapping into other bands, coercing them to the ebb and flow of its own energies. The spikes which pierced the bands were focused on the worst of the distention, as if some part of her psyche could still resist.

"I wanted to clear the air between us," Debby said. "I believe there are still a lot of misconceptions surrounding the unfortunate events at the campground this past fall."

Audrey folded her arms and leaned against the door frame. Debby might not have caught the very subtle tilt of Audrey's hips had she not also seen the small throb of energy within the sexuality band at the same time. "And are you also prepared to tell me what really happened over Halloween?"

"I am willing to dispel any false rumors concerning that as well."

"Very well. Come in." Audrey swept to one side, her movements once more tainted by a faint sensuality.

Debby kept her eyes on Audrey, too fascinated by what she was seeing in the woman's psychic aura. She saw patterns of energy which twined around one another like vines or slithered between bands like snakes. Tendrils curled and writhed from the swollen sexuality band, twisting around those from other bands in an attempt to subsume them into itself.

The revelation froze her thoughts in place: she was witnessing the very act of the Darkness maintaining its control.

"Won't you sit down, please?" Audrey said as she gestured to the sofa.

Debby settled into a seat at one end. Her hand fluttered to her bosom for a moment to sense the reassuring presence of the pendant. "I would prefer we discuss this with Jason present. I think it only fair he be allowed to hear what we say about him."

Audrey sat down right next to Debby. "He's not here."

Debby looked around for a moment and wished she had taken a seat near the middle of the sofa instead so she could put more distance between them. "Oh? Will he be back soon?"

"I'm not sure, to be honest. Henry gave him leave to stay out all day against my wishes."

Debby nodded slowly, unsure as to whether this was a good or bad development. If Audrey had fallen, the more time Jason spent away from her, the better. Still, Debby had hoped to have a moment to pass him a small jade stone she had in her pocket, imbued with a protection charm against ill will. She had no idea if her feeble magicks could do anything against the power of the Darkness, but any tiny advantage would be to his benefit.

"I'm going to ask you this point blank, and I expect an honest answer," Audrey said. "Whatever happened at that campground, did any of it involve sex?"

"When I arrived at the scene, I saw nothing happening which was even remotely of a sexual nature," Debby declared, which was a partial truth. No one was actively having sex, but it had been obvious that it had happened.

"I'm not sure I believe you. Isn't your kind supposed to be more accepting of that sort of thing?"

Debby tensed but held back her initial retort. She paused until she could work her way past the phrase "your kind" and construct a less emotional response. "I would have never encouraged other parents' children to have sex before they are ready for it."

"Ready for it? Is that for you to decide, then?"

Debby's frustration over slipping some of her own attitudes into her speech despite her best efforts had distracted her from noticing the increasing sultriness of Audrey's voice. "No, I don't decide for them. But I don't control what they do, either. I can only tell you what I have done and what I saw."

"Do you think Jason is ready for it?"

Debby was surprised enough at the question that she paused and finally noticed the changes in both Audrey's voice and her psychic aura. A tingling warmth spread over Debby, and her hand fluttered to her bosom. "That's not for me to answer."

"But surely you know Jason has been having sex with his girlfriend Melinda? And I've heard rumors he's had sex with her older sister Heather as well."

"Please pay no regard to rumors. Teens unfortunately can be cruel and make up the most vicious lies about each other. Especially where the unpopular ones are..." She trailed off when she looked into Audrey's dark, intense eyes, her sexual band pulsing as if experiencing its own sort of orgasm.

"I think he is having sex," Audrey said in a husky voice. "It's all I think about, Debby. All I can think about all day."

Debby's skin flushed. Her fingers curled around the pentacle under her blouse, and she felt her heart pounding under her hand. "Maybe ... m-maybe I should go. This is a bad time to do this, I'm sorry."

She rose from the chair, but Audrey grabbed her arm. Debby tried to pull away, but Audrey bolted to her feet and stared squarely into Debby's shimmering eyes. "Don't you think about it yourself?" Audrey whispered. "Don't you think about the sex he must he having? All the girls he's bedded?"

Debby trembled and tried to back away, but she felt herself slipping under the sea that was the blue-green expanse of Audrey's eyes.

"Think about it now. Think about all the sex. Think about Jason."

Debby shuddered as trickles of erotic imagery leaked around the dam she had crafted in her mind against the Dark influence. Her pussy tingled as fleeting sights of Jason nude or joined to one of the girls flickered through her head.

On their heels came the painful memories of how Melissa had used her body like a plaything.

She yanked her arm from Audrey's grip and managed to take a half-step back, but her eyes remained locked with Audrey's. "This is not appropriate," Debby said in a weak voice. "Not ... not under these circumstances."

"I don't have that luxury," said Audrey. "I can't simply not think about it. I thought ... I thought it was wrong at first, but now..." Audrey paused and let out a shaky breath. She trembled, and her mouth worked for a few seconds as if struggling against the words. Her lips finally twitched into a smile. "But now I understand. Jason is very attractive, isn't he? Even ... sexy. I still understand what that means, don't I? Even after all this time?"