Page 24 of Some Saviors Can Break You

It was getting harder and harder to wait between kills.

It had only been four days since he dumped the last body in the trash, and already he had sought out his next victim.

He knew the risks. The more often he killed, the more evidence he gave the cops. As careful as he was to clean down each of his victims, there was always the chance that he would make a mistake and leave a piece of himself behind. If he kept the number of kills to a minimum, then he decreased his risks.

But he was finding he could no longer do that.

There was something inside him compelling him to keep going. Each kill, each time he forced someone to see him, instead of feeling soothed like a balm had been smoothed over his anger, all he felt was the burning desire to do it again.

And again.

And again.

He was pretty sure it would never be enough.

Not that he cared. He liked killing, he liked taking his anger out on others, and he certainly had enough anger to parcel out every day for the rest of his life without relieving himself of his burden.

Because killing had become a compulsion, he was already here, standing outside the door of what would be victim number sixteen. He was quite impressed with himself and how smoothly this had all gone. For eighteen months now, he had been breaking into women’s homes, tying them up, and keeping them alive for forty-eight hours while he unloaded a lifetime’s worth of woe onto them. Then he would strangle them, carve his message into their flesh, and dump them in dumpsters, and so far the cops didn't have a single thing to pin the crimes on him.

The more he killed, the more the pressure to keep killing with perfection.

How embarrassing would it be to wind up in prison for what he had done?

Already, he had narrowly avoided a jail cell more times than he could count. That happened when you had an anger problem, and you hated women.

Rapping on the door, he pasted on a bored expression and waited. He found that early in the morning was the best time to get to his victims, they were usually still half asleep, and being startled awake by a knock at the door had them thinking the worst. While they opened the door expecting to see a cop standing there waiting to deliver bad news, they saw him instead and immediately dropped their guard. That was when he swooped.

He knocked again, harder this time, and waited.

Moments later he heard footsteps inside.

When the door was thrown open a pretty young woman in her mid-twenties stood there, wrapped in a fluffy pink robe, herlong hair a wild mess around her face. Her eyes were wide with fear, but when she saw him, she immediately relaxed.

“Morning, ma’am,” he said in his well-practiced disinterested tone. “Sorry to wake you so early, just letting you know that because of maintenance work in the building, we’re going to be turning off the electricity at six. We’re letting everyone know so they can be prepared and have time to cook breakfast and get ready for work and school before we cut it.”

“Thanks so much for letting me know, I’d never be able to do anything with this hair without my hairdryer and a lot of product,” she said with a giggle as she ran her fingers through her messy locks.

He gave her a small smile. “Would you please sign this to confirm that you’ve been notified,” he said as he held out the clipboard.

“Sure thing. You get a lot of people complaining and claiming they weren't informed?” she asked as she took the clipboard.

The second her attention was focused on scrawling her name on the sheet that looked like it had been signed by half the other residents in the building, he made his move.

His hand whipped out, his fingers curling around her throat because he knew that would immediately draw her attention to fear that her air supply would be cut off and stop her from screaming and drawing unwanted attention. As his hand squeezed tightly enough to make her panic, he pushed backward, shoving her into the apartment.

Spinning her around so her body was tight up against his, he moved his hand to cover her mouth while his other wrapped across her chest, pinning her arms to her side and effectively preventing her from fighting. He kicked the door closed and let out a sigh of relief that everything had gone smoothly once again.

Just as he was patting himself on the back for a job well done, he felt something sharp slice into his leg.

His attention diverted, he must have loosened his grip just a little because the woman let herself go limp, and when he went to adjust his hold on her she managed to fling herself forward and out of his grip.

“What did you do?” he growled, looking down to find blood trickling down his leg.

“Protected myself,” the woman said, a smug smile on her face as she ran for the door.

No way was she getting away.

No way.

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