Page 23 of Just Now

And he’d gotten angry with her. He’d become impatient, then furious. And then he had stormed into the room where he held her, deciding that he would murder her there and then. He had lost control, a control that he knew he held onto only by a thin thread, as he yelled and screamed and threatened.

He had seen something in her eyes. Defiance, yes. But also a kind of resignation. She had known, as he did, that he was going to kill her regardless of whether or not she followed his twisted rules.

And that had made him pause. For a moment, he had seen himself from her eyes. He had seen the monster he was, the kind of man who killed women and forced their bodies into clothing that didn’t belong to them.

It had frightened him. And in that moment of vulnerability, the woman had struck, getting her hands around his throat.

He coughed. His throat was damaged. He was still hoarse from the attack.

He had managed to overpower her, but it had taken all his strength, and of course, he’d had to kill her. His rage, his anxiety, had reached a crescendo and he’d known there was no turning back. And now, as he forced her limp arm into the tattered sleeve of the men’s shirt, he couldn’t help but feel a sense of grudging respect for her. She had been a worthy adversary, but she had lost in the end.

“What did you think would happen?” he gently mocked her. It was easy to do that now that she was dead, but it had been too soon. Why had he lost control for those crucial moments when she was alive? Why couldn’t he have had a better grip on himself?

He deserved his hoarse throat and the scratches on his arms. Long sleeves would cover them. There was a nick on his face as well.

“I had no choice but to kill you. You didn’t give me a choice.” The anger surged again, but this time, it was woven through with self-pity. He was sorry for himself, he realized. Sorry that he’d been hurt, and sorry that he’d been unable to give this victim as much time as he’d craved. He’d wanted to watch her suffering for longer. She’d robbed him of that pleasure, defied him in the end, but of course, the blame lay with him, too. He couldn’t deny it.

“You lost your temper!” Now, as he carefully slipped her foot into one of the scuffed, steel-capped shoes, he realized there was only one person to blame, only one worthy target of his anger, and that was himself. He could get mad at himself and nobody else.

He laced the shoe carefully, checking his watch, feeling worried about the time. It was already getting light, and this was a risk, but he had to take it. He didn’t want her body cluttering up his room any longer. He needed to go out and get a new victim and this time, he was going to do it right.

“You always swore you wouldn’t be like your mother,” he chastised himself. Although he usually kept those memories tightly locked away, he found them surfacing now, as he remembered those horrific punishments. The pain he’d felt at her hands as a child and a young teenager. The humiliation he’d endured. Her broad, impassive face was etched in his mind, framed by brown curly hair, her eyes as bright and evil as those of the devil himself.

All he was doing now was trying to work through his issues. He had promised himself that. Just a few women, maybe four or five of them, to make up for what he had endured, to set the balance right.

He’d grown up in a tough, abusive household. His mother had favored his older sister, and he’d always been the one to receive the brunt of her punishments. He’d been the one who’d been forced to wear cast-off clothing, old garments, who’d gotten bullied at school for his tattered jeans and his shoes with holes in the soles. And of course, he’d suffered his mother’s worst punishment and humiliation also, while his older sister had never been touched. He’d been locked away, left for hours without food or water, beaten and taunted.

Sometimes his sister had come past too. He’d known her breathing and heard it.

That door had been locked from the outside at all times when he was in there. His sister had never lifted a finger to open it. She’d never tried to help him.

He remembered fighting the latch, breaking his fingernails trying to get the window open, knowing it was too heavy and stiff and that she would have jammed it from the outside so he couldn’t escape. But trying anyway. Trying because he had no other choice and maybe, just maybe, he’d find a way out.

And now he was making his victims do the same, healing himself slowly.

“The only problem is that it’s going to be more of a process than I thought,” he muttered. “I don’t think four or five victims will be enough. My temper is still too bad. I don’t have a handle on it yet.”

Carefully, he laced up the other shoe.

He stood up and looked at the lifeless body lying in front of him. Her limbs were cool and her face was gray. He felt a pang of regret. He had always been careful not to kill his victims too soon. It was part of the ritual, a dance of power and submission that he relished. But this time, he had lost control.

“Don’t do it again! Don’t do that!”

It was as if he could hear his mother’s sharp admonishing tone in his own words.

He couldn’t be on the road to becoming her, could he? Surely not. That would mean that all this had been for nothing. He was trying to get away from who she was, and what she’d done to him. That was exactly why he’d embarked on this process of self-therapy.

It could not be going wrong, it could not! It must be his own fears, messing with his mind.

He shook his head, trying to clear it of the memories that threatened to consume him. He needed to focus on the present, on what he needed to do. He grabbed a large trash bag and began to carefully wrap the woman’s body in it, making sure that none of her limbs poked out. She had to be hidden for the journey to the dumpster, which he needed to embark on as fast as possible.

Not many people would be around, especially at this early hour, but even so, any daylight was more of a risk and he would need to be very careful.

Luckily, he’d identified a dumpster that would suit his needs perfectly, in the backyard behind a nightclub on the outskirts of downtown. The club was usually busy until the small hours, and then as quiet as a grave until mid-morning, when the first cleaners emerged to clear the debris of the night before.

“You always threatened to kill me and put me in a dumpster, Mother,” he whispered, as he completed the wrapping process.

There. She was neatly trussed in the bags and would be almost invisible in the trunk, under a couple of old blankets that would provide camouflage.

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