Page 34 of Soft Tissue Damage
I glance at the electrical wire again, but I don’t reach for it. Picking it up and taking it with me would be the biggest, most careless mistake of my life. The police would quickly figure out that the killer is some kind of tradesperson.
I pull a plain black baseball cap low over my eyes, put on some gloves, and slip out of my truck, completely weaponless.
It’s time for me to find out who the real Cullan Grant is.
Some neighbourhoods of Blackport have erratic streetlighting, and this is one of them. It’s a quiet, old area, and there are cut-throughs between some of the houses that lead from one residential street to another, and they’re even darker than the semi-lit streets.
I walk on the narrow strip of grass next to the path so my footsteps are silent, and I swiftly catch up with the man. He finally realizes I’m right behind him. He half turns toward me and starts to open his mouth, but it’s too late. I grasp his head in my hand and slam it against a fence post. His knees buckle. I catch him and drag him into a cut-through.
The man is blinking and trying to clear his head afterthe blow. Then he starts to struggle. I snatch the belt from his trench coat, wind it around his neck, and pull it tight.
“Did you ever forgive yourself?” I whisper in his ear. “I didn’t.”
I squeeze tighter and tighter on the belt, listening to him choke. His legs kick on the gravel. He tries to grapple my wrists, but I’m wearing gloves and long sleeves. His eyes bulge, and then he finally stops breathing and goes limp. I don’t unwrap the ligature from around his neck. His heart won’t have stopped beating yet, and he could revive spontaneously if I walk away. I tie the belt tightly around his neck with a familiar knot, and get slowly to my feet.
The night is silent around me except for the distant sound of passing cars.
The ground shifts beneath my booted feet as a wave of pleasure crashes into me. I acted impulsively, and the chaotic freedom is almost as blissful as the murder itself.
The man is sprawled on the path in the darkness. I want him to be found and for word to get out that he’s dead, but not yet. I drag him into the bushes that line the cut-through on one side and leave him there. The gravel probably doesn’t show footprint impressions, but to be on the safe side, I find a short, dead branch and use the twiggy end to wipe out any sign I was there.
Three minutes later, I’m back in my truck and pulling onto the street, slightly out of breath from all the adrenaline pumping through my body. Two minutes after that, I’m on the main road stopped at a traffic light. There are people in their cars all around me. No one has the firstinkling about what I’ve just done. I can feel the burn of the trench coat belt as I pull it tighter and tighter. It’s so intimate, strangling someone. I can’t decide which I like better, stabbing in short, ferocious bursts, or the slow, sustained burn of strangulation. Both are far more satisfying than a distant, clinical bullet in the brain.
Back home, it takes me a long time to wind down. Leon is playing video games in his room, and I pace around the downstairs in the dark, reliving every moment of the murder in vivid, blissful detail. I wish I’d taken that trench coat belt with me or one of the man’s fingers. I’d have a precious little memento of his death, but the indulgence would have been very fucking stupid and linked me to the crime. I have to be disciplined if I want to carry out more murders.
And I do want to because it felt good to kill him.
As I start to calm down, I think about what I’d do differently next time. The murder itself was perfect. I didn’t sustain an injury, unlike the previous time in Fenton when I was beaten over the head. No injuries mean no DNA evidence scattered around. The only thing I would change is murdering someone so close to where I just finished a job, but a dash of recklessness was the spice I needed tonight.
I pull out the recording of Leon and Elena in my living room, wondering if I’ll feel differently about it now that I’m closer to being the real Cullan Grant.
As the video plays, I study the feed. Is it wishful thinking, or does Elena seem less than enthusiastic about thecontraceptive patch than I first presumed? Her expression is bright and open, but her body language is closed and unenthusiastic. As they make out, she keeps shifting around like she’s uncomfortable, and when Leon tries to push his hand up her top, she shuts him down and gets up to leave. He offers to drive her home, and they’re outside in his car less than a minute later.
I consider what I’ve just seen. That was not a woman who’s excited about having sex with her partner, and yet I know from experience that she’s capable of feeling turned on. That she likes being kissed while strong hands caress her.
A dark, hungry thought follows me to bed.
When we kissed, her response was filled with fiery desire, and she couldn’t get enough of me. What if Elena just doesn’t want my son?
Sittingat the counter in the kitchen the next morning, I pull up the news on my tablet, wondering how quickly I’m going to see an article about my late-night deed. As my coffee steams at my elbow, I run my eyes over the headlines. Corruption in the mayor’s office. Rising interest rates. A proposal for a new highway. Nothing about a strangled man, so perhaps the body hasn’t yet been discovered, or more likely, a random killing in Blackport doesn’t warrant a headline. I want to find out if it’s being reported anywhere, but I know better than to perform an internetsearch on an unencrypted device for a murder I committed.
I suppose I won’t be grabbing headlines unless I commit more murders, and the police start to connect them. For that, I’ll need an MO. A modus operandi, my own special way of killing. I don’t want fame. I don’t need recognition. But headlines screaming “Serial Killer on the Loose!” would put Blackport on edge.
I rub my fingers across the bristles of my short beard as I gaze out the window. I like the sound of my enemies being afraid of me long before they see me coming.
As I sip my coffee, I search for “contraceptive patch” and start reading up about it. The patch will start working in seven days, and even if Elena comes off it, her fertility won’t return to normal for one to three months.
I glare in disgust at those words, offended that something is messing with Elena’s ability to conceive. Her precious body is being chemically and hormonally meddled with. I fantasize about going to her apartment right now, ripping the patch from her skin, and giving her a stern talking to. I imagine it in great detail, pinning her arms firmly but lovingly over her head and telling her that there’s no need for the patch if she’s with me. I’d be delighted if she had my baby.
As satisfying as that would be, my cover as her protective, understanding boyfriend’s dad and employer would be blown, and she’ll flee from me as fast as she can.
8
Elena
I’m getting ready at home for babysitting Rosie when someone knocks on our front door. Frowning, I go and look through the peephole to see who it is, wondering why they didn’t use the buzzer downstairs.
Through the fish-eye glass, I see a familiar man in his late fifties wearing a very ugly, very loud shirt. Our landlord. I cringe inwardly and open the door.
