Pretty Monsters Read online

  Someday Damien would be introduced to the end of my knife, but not yet. Not until I could do it without turning my only friend against me.

  With the cameras offline, Lucien and I move to the service entrance, where apparently the maid always enters and exits the property. At this time, about an hour before dawn, the shadows on this side of the house hang like curtains blocking out everything.

  The whir of the gate's gears kicks on, and we wait until she's pulled out before we slip inside. The back door is locked, but not unexpected. I pull a small tool kit from my pocket and extract my tools. Within seconds I have the door opened, and we let ourselves in.

  At the base of the stairs Lucien stops. "Go have your fun, but remember not to leave any evidence. I've got to go take care of some evidence myself."

  He notices the look on my face, and the way I've already pulled a knife from a sheath strapped to my thigh.

  Shaking his head, he whispers, "I don't like it either, but he's my father. What am I supposed to do?"

  My knuckles clench tight around the hilt as I imagine delivering my brand of justice to Damien Blackthorne. "You know he expects you to take over his empire someday."

  Lucien hangs his head. He's just as much a monster as I am, but neither of us meets the realm of his bastard father. "I know you won't let that happen."

  He was right. I'd never let him sit on a throne built from the blood and pain of innocents. "Do you want me to?"

  "We're wasting time. We don't think about tomorrow, remember?"

  I nod my head. Tomorrow is something I'd given up on before time had meaning to me. Tomorrow is for people who have hope; I barely have morals.

  The sound of snoring grows as I climb the stairs to the second floor. Lucien managed to snag a copy of the blue prints for the house when we were ordered to make this trip. It is standard protocol for us to know the layout of any place we go so we have escape routes preplanned.

  Blue prints list master suites, and unless there is an off book build, they show things like reinforced basements. It doesn't guarantee that the owner of the house actually used the master bedroom, but considering there was also an elevator installed that opened into that room, and that the owner of the house was a fat fucker, it seemed pretty likely.

  While Lucien explores the steel and concrete reinforced basement, my job is what it always is, find the target and take them out. I do as I'm told, but not without a bit of coaxing. Damien always provides evidence of guilt to motivate me. Little does he seem to realize I understand the most likely scenario for one person to amass so much evidence against the scum he sends me after. Considering he isn't a vigilante or in law enforcement, the only remaining possibility is he has been in business with my prey at one time or another.

  Lucien told me to go and have my fun, as if I actually get my rocks off ending people like the unfortunate bastard I am about to meet. Not feeling guilty about killing them, and actually wanting to aren't the same thing. The world is most certainly better without them in it, but left to myself I wouldn't go out of my way to take responsibility to send them on their path to hell.

  With a gloved hand, I turn the knob to the master bedroom. Quickly, I assess my best move. There's about twenty minutes until the maid returns, and Lucien and I need to be waiting near the gate to slip out undetected.

  When I first saw the pictures I allowed myself to feel the only feeling I have with any regularity, anger. The rage burns hot, but it burns fast the older I get. There was a time I reveled in retribution, but I've dispensed enough justice in my life.

  I take my knife out of the sheath at my thigh. It's a standard hunting knife. I'm not so stupid to buy a special order knife that can easily be traced. The problem is that we still have to make our way back through the woods, and a bloody crime scene is bound to have a search party head out for us. The only sure way to avoid getting busted by the police, aside from not actually killing people, is not to have the deaths labeled murder.

  The snoring stops for a few seconds, and I realize he isn't breathing. There are lots of pillows propped up underneath him, and I realize he's on oxygen. This might be easier than I thought.

  I slip my knife back in it's sheath and slip the pillows out from underneath him as would happen if he moved a lot during sleep. Making sure one of them catches the hose delivering his oxygen, I let both fall to the floor.

  He continues to snore, until he's flat on his back, and then the sound stops again. I expect him to wake up, but he doesn't respond. On his night stand there's a bottle of sleeping pills. It's like he wanted me to kill him, because he did most of the work for me.

  After about a minute he starts thrashing around, and I realize he's having a seizure. This is the moment where a normal person would back out. Actually, a normal person never would have entered this house, but this is the moment I decide this man who's name I don't know is going to die.

  I don't need his name though. There were only two pieces of information that sent me here to hold this man's life in my gloved hands. One, Damien Blackthorne wanted him dead. For that reason alone this sad sack's life is over. The other is what Lucien showed me in the envelope. I am only willing to handle the sickest cases. The ones that deserve the fate I bring them.

  This time felt anticlimactic. I mean, am I really responsible for this man's health issues? Sure, I sped him along, but it's clear he was going to end up in this exact same situation some day.

  I watch as his skin slowly becomes a bluish grey color. His movements become jerkier before slowing to a stop. The entire process takes about five minutes. I need to confirm he's dead, but I'm not willing to take off my gloves and feel for a pulse. I grab a small mirror off the other end table and hold it up to his mouth and nose. There's no fog showing signs of breathing.

  I leave the mirror out and find a small vial of cocaine in the drawer. I put it back where it belongs, confident that even in the drawer the police will still suspect drugs played a role in his death. And who knows, Damien might want him dead for exactly that reason. It’s hardly a secret Damien is one of the biggest smugglers in the Midwest. The only reason he hasn't been caught is thanks to the notorious political corruption rampant in Devil's Crossing.

  Downstairs I find Lucien shoving some electronics in his bag. "Did you take those?"

  He shook his head. "No, I used them to corrupt his files. After I made a few copies first."

  "Good, because I made his death look like an accident. Unless we fucked something up, no one will ever suspect anyone was here, let alone us."

  His head tips to the side, and he nods once. "I'm surprised. Pleased, but surprised."

  I look at my watch and gauge that we have about five minutes before the maid opens the gate. "Let's ghost. We've done everything we were sent here for."

  The last minutes waiting in the shadows for the motor of the gate to be triggered by the remote control in the maids car feel the longest. Even longer than the minutes I stood watching another man die, and doing nothing to help.

  "Remind me again why we don't just go over the wall," I demand.

  "Because there's a motion sensor there that can't be shut off remotely. I told you, the security here is tight. You can only enter and leave with either the code or the remote," he whispered back to me.

  Finally, the whine of the motor sounds, and we wait until she's pulling past us to slip out of the gate just before it slams shut. We move through the woods, again silently this time more out of habit than necessity.

  Once we make it to the car Lucien slumps forward leaning against the hood. Whatever he found inside the basement is weighing on him.

  "That bad, huh?" I ask and light up a cigarette.

  "He was my dad's fucking business partner," he bites out and kicks the tire of the car.

  I only nod. Honestly, it's what I've been expecting. "How long are we going to continue to follow his orders? I'm sure it hasn't escaped your notice that your dad fits the same profile of the guys we go after. The ones he sends
us after."

  He hangs his head. "It hasn't, and I don't think it's escaped his either."

  "You think your dad is going to have me killed soon, don't you?" I ask, but with as much interest as you'd ask after the weather. I'd come to terms with the fact Damien likely saw me as expendable.

  "Listen to you. You just asked me if my dad was going to have you killed like I'd ask what was playing at the theater."

  I smirk. "He'd still have to find someone to carry out his order. Even then they'd have to be able to do it. I don't know of anyone else who's been trained since kindergarten to kill, do you?" I take a long drag of my cigarette and blow out the smoke waiting for his answer.

  He looks at me as if I'm a mythical creature just risen to devour the earth. "Most of the time you are just my friend, I forget how royally fucked up you are."

  I salute him. "You should thank me for that shit. If it wasn't me, it might have been you. Your daddy dearest wanted the ultimate soldier. If he hadn't bought me to join the family, it might have been you."

  "Speaking of things that might be me. I don't think it's so much as my dad is going to put out a hit on you as he is going to put a hit on us."

  I can accept I'm easily replaceable to Damien, but Lucien is the prince of his dark kingdom. No way is he going to throw away his only son.

  "I can see you don't believe me, but I found the proof he wanted destroyed."

  "Well, don't leave me hanging, what is it?"

  He takes a deep breath. "My birth certificate, two of them actually. One of them is the one I've seen with him and my mother listed as my parents. There was another one though, with a teenage girl named Natalie listed as my mother, and father listed as unknown."

  "Fuck." I toss my spent cigarette on the ground and snuff it out with my boot. "What are we going to do?"

  Lucien tips his head up. "We're going to fucking survive, and bring the house down on his head."

  "Sounds great, do you have an actual plan?"

  "No fucking idea. We do have an hour ride back to hell though."

  I open the passenger door and jump in. "Sure, let's go back to the place people probably want us dead."

  My Personal Ghost

  Raven

  Like last night, I wait until the giant guarding my bedroom door steps away from his post. I haven't been explicitly told not to leave my room, but the fact there's a sentry posted outside makes me assume I'm not meant to go out.

  This time though, I'm going wearing more than the stupid night gown that was set out for me. Ever since my father brought me back here after my graduation from boarding school maids have been choosing my clothing. There's no accounting for my actual taste. Instead, I've been dressed like a doll in overly feminine clothes that seem to be more appropriate for a young girl, not a mostly grown ass woman.

  For example, right now I'm wearing a knee length pink dress with fucking ruffles. I had clothes I'd packed and brought back with me from school, but I haven't seen them since I moved to this house. I'd call it home, but I don't have a single memory from this house. If I ever lived here, which I doubt, I haven't been back since I was sent to boarding school in elementary school.

  I sneak down the back staircase and hear loud chatter going on in the main room of the house. No one seems to be heading this way, so I take the chance and slip out the back door. This time the sun is setting, and I can see a well-worn path through the trees. It must be where my intruder was hiding last night.

  Curiosity wins, and I decide to follow the path. I'm totally not looking for my personal ghost. That would be silly. His look screamed danger. Granted, he is wrapped in a delicious package, but then the sweetest sins usually are. At over six feet tall he moved like a hunter, all his leonine muscles working together to help him stalk his prey without them even noticing.

  Thinking of him makes me look over my shoulder, but I'm alone with my thoughts, as always. One day soon I'll walk out that door and not return. Something tells me I'd be much better off forging a life for myself alone than to wait and see the reason I'm being treated like delicate porcelain inside my father's house.

  I walk past an old cabin, and the sound of water babbling over rocks lures me further. At the end of the meandering trail there's a weathered dock jutting out over the creek swollen with the early summer rain. It's peaceful here, and the perfect place to watch the sun dip below the horizon.

  Distantly, I'm aware of the passage of time. I lay back on the wood, still warm from the sun, and watch the stars as they come to life. I'm intrigued by the stories humans have found written in distant twinkling masses of hydrogen. The need to define and explain one's life is so fundamentally human, and it makes me feel better to be so utterly lost and confused.

  "Are you ever where you're supposed to be?" a gravelly voice asks, and startles me.

  A humorless laugh bursts from me. "Where am I supposed to be?"

  "In your room," he bites out.

  The sharp smell of pot permeates the air, and I look over my shoulder to see he's smoking again, only not a cigarette this time.

  "Because my father says so." I say to myself. "Well, I'm an adult, so I'm not going to go to my room because Daddy says I have to."

  He strolls down the dock and sits near the edge with his back leaning against one of the posts. "Maybe you should go because there are dangerous monsters out here."

  I sit up and mirror his position against the other post. "I'll take my chances."

  Perhaps it's the pot kicking in for him, but he seems less interested in making sure I'm locked back in my ivory tower this evening. "I've lived here most of my life and I never knew you existed. How is that?"

  I flinch, feeling the sting of his words, whether he meant them to cut me or not. "You'd have to ask my family that." I stare off at the sky, trying to recapture the sense of connection to some thread of the human condition I had earlier.

  "You hate them."

  I shrug one shoulder and don't turn my face to look at him. "I don't know them. They could be any other person to me. I've barely ever seen them."

  "What about your brother?"

  "Lucien?" I ask.

  He blows out a stream of pungent smoke. "Do you have another?"

  Another shrug. "I wouldn't have the first idea. As far as Lucien, I haven't seen him in over six years. I don't think I'd even recognize him."

  Now I turn to look at the stranger. For a fleeting second I entertain the idea that he might be my brother, but I remember Lucien and I have the same very distinct blue eyes. His dark eyes hold mine for an abnormally long time, and I make no effort to end the silence.

  He's so quiet I start to think he's fallen asleep, until his rough voice cuts through the night again. "Why did you come back here?"

  "I've been wondering the same thing for three days. I don't have a job, I'm not enrolled to go to college in the fall. I guess I'm here because I've nowhere else to go."

  "Anywhere else would be better." I watch as he tosses the remainder of his joint into the water and gets up.

  I don't answer him. What's the point? I'm used to not being wanted. My father made friendships nearly impossible while I was away at school since I didn't have permission to ever leave campus and I was constantly shadowed by security. After a while I gave up trying to make friends. I didn't even have a roommate to confide in since I always had a single room.

  Eventually, I make my way back to the house, trying to sneak back in the way I left. My absence has been noticed this time though.

  My father stands in the hall, watching me try and silently close the back screen door.

  "Where were you?" his voice booms.

  I jump at the sound, innately afraid of displeasing him. It isn't like he's ever hurt me besides his emotional neglect, but I have the sense that he can be a very ruthless man.

  "Answer me!" he shouts and roughly grabs my arm, shaking me.

  "Just for a walk to the creek," I finally respond.

  "You are not to leave your room unl
ess you are given permission," he snaps.

  I'm afraid of him, but the side of my brain that governs self preservation shuts down and I'm ruled by pure anger. "I'm an adult. Why all of a sudden do you insist on knowing where I am at any given moment when you haven't cared even remotely when I was a child?"

  He raises his hand. I'm sure he's going to slap me, but he lowers it a second later. His jaw clenches and unclenches, and I know without a doubt he still very much wants to hit me.

  "You are lucky you're worth more to me unmarked."

  Digging his fingers into my upper arm, he starts to drag me through the house, and I'm certain once I am put in my room, I won't be leaving again until I find out what makes me so valuable to him.

  Two figures step out of the shadows, one of them is my ghost and the other is my long lost brother. I recognize the similarity of our features and the crooked smirk he wore the last time I saw him driving away.

  "Father, why are you dragging Raven through the house?" It's the first time in years I've heard Lucien's voice. No longer does it hold the in-between awkwardness of a boy becoming a man. Now it rumbles with a quiet danger.

  My ghost tenses up. I'd like to think it's out of concern for me, but I think it has more to do with a hatred of my father.

  Father shoves me hard, and I tumble into my brother. Lucien reacts quickly and keeps me from falling to the floor. Very subtly he moves me until I'm standing behind him. My ghost shadows his movement and stands at my back.

  They move like a unit. Without a single word or gesture I can detect, they have caged me between their imposing forms.

  "Take her to her room and make sure the dumbass I've got watching her room doesn't let her out again."

  Lucien nods, and any hope I held flies away. He won't help me escape this gilded prison.

  "Of course. If you'd like I can guard her room myself," he offers.