ESCAPE BY NENIA CAMPBELL

  Nenia Campbell

  Copyright © 2019 Nenia Campbell

  All rights reserved.

  DEDICATION

  To everyone who believed in me

  and to Heather Crews, the best beta reader

  Table of Contents

  PROLOGUE

  MALACHITE

  TOURMALINE

  AMETHYST

  AZURITE

  LAPIS LAZULI

  SODALITE

  AVENTURINE

  CARNELIAN

  PYRITE

  DIAMOND

  CHALCEDONY

  SERPENTINE

  TIGER’S EYE

  ONYX

  SELENITE

  APATITE

  PEARL

  RHODONITE

  RUBY

  HEMATITE

  AQUAMARINE

  EPILOGUE

  PROLOGUE

  The relationship between the hunter and hunted was fraught with a tension that bordered on the sexual. Locked in a constant state of approach and retreat, never knowing whether to fight or flee, one push away from leaving that suspended state of being: it was elemental. Mercurial. Eternal.

  And for the past seven years, it had been Valerian Kimble’s entire state of mind.

  She had courted danger with all the sensibility of a child, only to find blades and blood instead of a quick and breathless thrill. Real danger, she had found out the hard way, had teeth and liked to bite.

  And she had been bitten—hard.

  Val could smell flowers, their perfume alien and unpleasant in the absence of other sensations. The darkness was so thick with the heavy fragrance that she was choking on their cloying sweetness. With such a bouquet overwhelming her senses, Val shouldn’t have been able to identify the blooms, but she knew what they were. She knew.

  Tiger lilies and basil for hatred. Yellow roses for infidelity. And pennyroyal—

  Pennyroyal to flee, her mind filled in, only it was his voice she was hearing.

  “Hello, Val.”

  The voice—his voice—seeped into the gloom like poisoned honey, promising sin and violent pleasure, but delivering only madness… and death. Because there was rage there, too, just for her. She could sense it like a burr snarled in silk.

  No, she thought, as synapses fired in wild panic. No… no! It’s not him. It’s not.

  But she would know his voice anywhere, and no matter how many times she told herself that she was no longer afraid, a single word from him could send her plunging back into the icy grip of a terror that wasn’t only terror.

  Not quite.

  She shot up in bed, the whites of her eyes flaring as she scanned the shadows. She saw nothing, heard nothing: only the static clip of her heart galloping in her ears.

  And then one of the shadows moved just as she felt the mattress shift.

  Val stilled, a low croak emanating from her mouth as if something small had died there. It was Gavin, exactly as she remembered him before she (killed him) left North Point. He was wearing an open white shirt and faded jeans, moonlight dripping down that bared expanse of skin, and she, she, was trapped in the cage of his arms.

  Just like before.

  “Did you miss me?”

  Panic burst through her like water through a broken dam as her thought finally propelled her body into belated action. She moved violently, nearly pulling her shoulder out of the socket as she wrenched her torso to jab her elbow at his neck.

  He snapped back like a striking cobra as she beat her fists against his chest. She screamed once, piercingly, when he caught her flailing arms, one after the other, pinning them to the bed with a strength that had surprised her before and did so again now.

  She was a gasping fish left to die on land, choking on the very air that flooded her lungs with each desperate breath as the fatal hook lay gleaming in her throat.

  “No.” Val jerked at the feel of his mouth at her breast, sliding against her body in a textured caress as fabric yielded to bare, pebbled flesh. She thrashed and felt the hard pressure of him settle between her legs. Heat unspooled low in her belly in burning hot tendrils even as her mind and flesh recoiled against his touch. “Stop,” she bleated, her voice like a wounded animal’s. “Please, please stop.”

  “Begging already.” There was a pinch as he slid his fingers inside her. She jerked her hips and felt his breath fan against her collarbone. “I’ve hardly even touched you.”

  Tears pricked at her eyes, twin daggers of guilt and self-hatred.

  “But I’m going to.” She felt his tongue like a lash. “Touch you.”

  (I can make you feel whatever I want)

  “No.” She wasn’t sure what was real and what was memory. His touch was acid burning into her skin, his words corrosives melting her brain. “Gavin, please.”

  “You were my greatest work. I made you into what you are.” The pleasure blossoming through her body twisted, gripping her by the throat like a thorny vise. She arched when he bit her, hating him, hating herself, and heard him laugh with quiet satisfaction because he had always liked her best at her nadir.

  (Even in filth you remain a rose)

  “Mine to touch.”

  He moved lower, his mouth brushing over the still-healing scar that he’d carved into her belly with the knife—the knife.

  No, she thought, squeezing her eyes shut against the tapestry of blood and gore from that night threatened to unravel messily before her. Not that. It’s not my fault.

  “Mine to ruin.”

  Down to her pubis, where she felt the lick of cold air a heartbeat before she felt his tongue. “You are mine,” he finished on an inhuman whisper, as if his vocal chords had been raked by chemicals or jagged glass. “Not even death can do us part.”

  “You’re dead,” she cried out. “You’re dead. I killed you.”

  “Yes,” he said, still buried between her legs. “You did.”

  And something in his voice, some ominous note, made her look down, as if her eyes were magnets being drawn to some horrific pole, despite the voice warning her don’t look you don’t want to see this don’t look. Because, of course, she looked.

  She looked and her eyes widened, becoming bigger, and bigger, glutted on horror until they felt like they would pop from the sockets like overinflated balloons.

  She looked and she let out another shrill scream.

  His handsome face was the color of pallid chalk, freckled with spots of advanced decomposition and exposed bone where the flesh had fully eroded away. At his throat was an open red wound that wept like an infected eye. Watery ribbons of blood-flecked pus dripped down his neck in thin, winding strips, staining the lapel of his pristine white shirt.

  No, she thought again, feeling like she was going to puke. Oh God.

  That blackened tongue had trailed over her breasts and between her legs.

  Those rotting fingers had been inside her.

  She shattered through her horror as if it were a mirror and her sanity were the glinting fragments of broken glass. “No!” she screamed. “No, no, no—you’re not real. I killed you. You get the fuck away from me! You’re dead!”

  “Yes, Val,” Gavin said. “Take a look at what you did to me.”

  She did; she didn’t want to, but she did. Her gaze moved as if controlled by him. Bile filled her throat in a hot rush, forcing her to swallow it back along with her next scream. “You drove me to do it. You wouldn’t let me go. Please don’t…” She tried not to gag. “Please don’t hurt me.”

  “I’m not going to hurt you.”

  Before she could feel relief, the bony, cyanotic fingers smeared the taste of her across her lips. Salty, over the rot, like a foul ocean.

  “I’m going to fuck you.”

  She screamed again when he pushed her back against the bed, preparing to mount her with his throbbing, rotting cock. She could feel the infectious heat of it even now, damp against her thigh and scalding like acid.

  “Scream for me, my flower.”

  ▪▫▪▫▪▫▪

  Val shot up in bed, a scream hovering on her lips like a prayer.

  Her pulse throbbed in the side of her neck as if it were a living creature trying to burrow out her skin. She was breathing like she’d been running, but she hadn’t run for years. A dream. The thought came to her as a benediction. It was only a dream.

  She listened carefully over the pounding tattoo of her heart in her ears, lying still and poised in the darkness for the sound of her parents. The house was silent.

  Beneath the sheets, her hand was between her legs. She could feel the dampness of the crotch of her shorts, the flutter of nerves where the fabric chafed between her legs. When she pushed out her hips and shifted her fingers, her clit throbbed.

  Fuck.

  Val let out a ragged breath, hating herself for her weakness as she slipped her trembling fingers beneath her waistband. You’re sick, she told herself, rubbing tight, angry circles between her thighs. You’re as sick as he is.

  But shame was not enough to prevent her from getting off. Half-conscious, lost to the buzzing silence so complete that it seemed to muffle the stealthy creak of the bedsprings and her own hushed gasps, Val could almost forget what her brain seemed so determined to ensure that she remember as the pleasure consumed her.

  Her head fell back, eyes closed, the movement of her hand slowing.

  Almost.

  Heat surged through her like wildfire, leaving her smoldering as her senses

were wiped out one by one. She panted softly, staring sightlessly at the ceiling. Sweat matted the hair at her nape. Her nipples were stiff and sore beneath her sticky, sweat-dampened tank top. She plucked at them before cupping her own breast and squeezing, hard, and shuddered like a candle on the verge of going out.

  (Your move)

  In chess White pursued, leaving it up to Black whether to fight or flee.

  She, playing Black, had fled, but somehow it never seemed to be far or fast enough. No matter how many times Val started over, she always ended up right back at the beginning.

  With him.

  (If you run, I will pursue)

  Oh God, she thought, letting her hand fall to her side. What’s wrong with me?

  But she knew. Deep down, in the blackened recesses of whatever remained of her soul, Val knew. It was him. Always him. Tainting her like the poison she couldn’t get enough of. Past, present, and future. Everything came down to him.

  (Checkmate)

  ▪▫▪▫▪▫▪

  When she woke up, the sun had risen and she could hear the stirrings of her parents downstairs. Val looked around at her room, which was in a bizarre state of limbo. Girlish trinkets from her youth, and the more sedate belongings of her early adulthood. The things from her dorm were still in boxes; she was unable to bring herself to unpack them, fearful that the process would bring about unpacking of a more psychological bent.

  She should have felt safe here, in the room of her childhood, but her memories pressed in against her like moving walls, threatening to crush her under their terrible weight. She no longer talked to the smiling friends in those pictures, and her dusty bike and too-small hiking shoes were relics of the fearless girl she no longer was. Even the rose quilt on her bed—yellow, her favorite color—had taken on sinister meaning.

  Feeling ashamed, Val changed out of the clothes she’d touched herself in, pulling on an old nightdress and terry cloth robe.

  Sunlight poured through the bay windows of the kitchen, catching on the motes and sparking them like flecks of gold and silver. The smell of coffee was potent, blending appealingly with frying bacon. Her mother was at the stove, turning over the cooking strips, though she looked over her shoulder at the sound of Val’s footsteps, offering a tentative smile.

  She never used to be so careful with me.

  “Good morning,” her mother said, still in that overly courteous, chirpy voice. The one she used with guests and people on the telephone. “How are you feeling? Did you sleep all right?”

  Val forced a mangled attempt at a smile. “Yeah.”

  Her mother’s hand hesitated over the pan. “Any nightmares?”

  “Nope.” Val forced out the word. “No dreams.”

  Liar.

  “Wonderful,” her mother said. “Maybe the Ambien’s working.”

  Val thought of the untouched pill bottle on her nightstand and felt an irrational wave of anger. “Yeah, maybe,” she said, folding her arms over the front of her robe.

  “What does Dr. Shenkman think?”

  “I don’t know, Mom. I’m seeing a psychiatrist. Not a psychic.”

  “I was just asking, Valerian.” Her mother sighed. “We care about you.”

  Val was just self-aware enough to know she was being petty but upset enough that she didn’t care. First the medication, now the doctor. Had her mother been thinking about the state of her mental health? Discussing it with others? Did her parents think she was insane? “Well, what do you think?” she snapped, afraid of the answer.

  “I made coffee.” Her mother smiled as if they were both in a commercial and the kitchen was a set. Mother-daughter bonding. Just an ordinary family packaged in wholesome good cheer.

  Would you still smile at me if you knew what I’ve done? The light seemed to dim and Val shivered, folding herself tighter into her robe. Would you still love me?

  There were things one could do, things so terrible, Val was certain they could make someone stop loving you. She was equally certain that she had done some of these things, and as desperate as she was to be proven otherwise, she was equally afraid that she was right. That she had become as awful as the rest of the world seemed to think she was. That she was unlovable.

  Switching off the stove, her mother asked, “Do you want some coffee?”

  Do you love me, Mom? She swallowed the words back, choking on them a little, and said, “Yes.” She sat at the table, noting her father’s paper and a half-empty cup. “Where’s Dad?”

  “Outside.” Her mother’s smile slipped, the first visible snag in this whole façade. “He needed to go take care of something outside.”

  “Why?” Val demanded.

  “It’s nothing.”

  “Was it those people with the paint again?”

  A pause. “It’s nothing you need to worry about.”

  “Really?” Val pushed aside her untouched cup, causing it to slosh dangerously over the rim. “Why don’t you let me decide what I need to worry about? Because last time I checked, I still live here.”

  “Drink your coffee, Valerian.” The cheer was gone now and Val thought, I did that.

  No longer able to meet her mother’s eyes—she doesn’t love you—Val stared down at the molten brown concoction of coffee and milk that swirled in her cup, her angry response simmering on her tongue as she tried to fight back tears.

  Her parents had had to pull up the lawn last month because people kept pouring vinegar on the grass. WHORE had been spelled out in the dying brown blades along with other slurs. Now it was all gravel and succulents.

  But that wasn’t much of a deterrent against kids with spray cans and pomegranate juice. Somehow word had gotten out about who she was, and what Gavin had done. The murders had made the papers and the blame fell to her feet, since nobody could find him. From the public she received not one scarlet letter, but several. She had seen the dripping red letters running down their driveway like freshly spilled blood before her father marched out there with the peroxide. Murderer. Slut. Psycho bitch. Freak. Words could wound just as messily as a blade.

  And speaking of words, there were the phone calls. The horrible phone calls. Just last night, someone had said to her in a low, rough growl, “Those girls are dead because of you, you fucking bitch. You know what I’d like to do to you is rip your tits off and shove them up your cunt so you fucking choke on them while I tear your ass apart.”

  And then: “Why don’t you do the world a favor and kill yourself, you slut? Not even your parents want you alive.”

  She had hung up the phone without answering, thinking it hadn’t bothered her because she hadn’t cried (although her hand had been shaking, yes—she’d had to try three times before she could replace the phone in its cradle). She had told herself she was stronger than that, but she wasn’t, and then later that same night, as if to prove her right, she’d had the dream.

  No, she hadn’t held the blade to the throats of the people Gavin had killed, but she was his creature, his little project, and everything he had done, he’d claimed to do because of her. For her. She knew her parents already mourned the loss of their innocent daughter, that they found it hard to reconcile that image with the girl she was now, and yes, perhaps it would be easier for them if she died so they didn’t have to mourn parts of her as they slowly peeled off and died away in pieces.

  What would her psychiatrist say if he knew her real thoughts? That she hated herself more deeply than anyone else could? That she still heard his voice in her head, and that the dreams where he tortured her made her touch herself until she couldn’t think? She’d be on something a hell of a lot stronger than Ambien, that’s for sure.

  And if they ever find his body, you’ll be in jail.

  Val looked up from the coffee, steeling herself, and saw her mother’s face crumple as she tried ineffectively to erase the look of concern. “We should get security cameras,” she said, too loudly. “The people defacing our house might decide to do worse. They won’t stop.”

  “We’ll discuss it later,” her mother said, like she was a fucking child.

  Val’s anger spiked. “You’re just going to let them get away with it?”

  “I said we’ll discuss it later. I don’t want to think about this right now.”

  It. As if all her problems could be summed up so concisely, so succinctly. She blustered on, propelled by the helpless flow of anger. “What about the phone calls?”

 

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