Luke Delaney - Cold Killing

“Make a sound, you die. Struggle, you die. Do as I say and you live.”

It was a lie. She wasn’t like the others. Clinging to the hope that he could be telling the truth, they’d have done anything for the chance to live. But she had seen his face. She knew he would never let her live. She nodded her head anyway.

“Do you know how lucky you are to have been chosen?” He spoke slowly through clenched teeth. He held the knife to her throat and released his grip.

“I’ll do as you say. I promise,” she pleaded.

He smiled and licked his lips. She felt the knife drop away from her throat slightly. Only a few millimeters. It would have to be enough.

Without warning she smashed her right fist as hard as she could into the underside of his jaw. The knife flashed across her throat, but she’d already leaned back. It slashed through the air. She brought her knee up into his groin. He began to bend double. She sprang for her front door. She would live.

The top of her head suddenly burned with pain. Her run jarred to a stop as her legs fell from under her. He gripped her by the hair, twisting it around his fist as he pulled her back. She could feel the tears stinging the backs of her eyes. She had to scream.

She filled her lungs as he spun her in his grip to face him. She saw him make a quick move, his free arm jabbed toward her. The air in her lungs deserted her, yet she hadn’t screamed. She hadn’t been able to.

It felt like a punch, like having the wind knocked out of her. Nothing more than a dull ache in her chest. Her head was forcefully bent forward. He wanted her to see the knife buried to the hilt in the right side of her chest. He tugged the knife free. It didn’t come easily. Her chest muscles had gripped the foreign body, trying to stem the breach. She wheezed horribly. She could physically feel the air from her lung rushing out through the wound.

He pulled her closer. “Fucking bitch. Slut, bitch. It wasn’t supposed to be like this. This is not as I saw it. This is not how it was supposed to be.”

Pushing her away, he held her at arm’s length. Another flash of his hand. She felt the same dull pain, but something else too. The knife had hit a rib. He pulled to free it, but it wouldn’t move. It was jammed in her rib.

The pain and shock were too much. She fell unconscious. The only thing stopping her falling to the floor was his grip on her hair and the knife wedged in her chest. Finally he let her slip to the floor. He placed a foot on the left side of her chest and pulled on the knife. It wouldn’t move.

“Fucking pig whore,” he hissed. He wanted to spit on her, but wouldn’t risk leaving his DNA in the saliva at the scene.

He stood over her, watching the crimson spreading across her white blouse. Her breathing was shallow, but she was alive. Suddenly he was hypnotized by her. He cocked his head to one side like a bird of prey watching its kill, writhing, trapped under its talons.

But it was spoiled. This was not how he had foreseen it. No matter. He calmed himself. He would finish her quickly and leave. All great men suffered frustration, he reassured himself. He would learn from his mistakes.

He pulled at the knife protruding from her chest. Still it wouldn’t move. She was all but finished, but he wouldn’t take the chance and leave her like this. He peered through the living room to the kitchen. His mind tried to recall what other knives he had seen in the drawer when he had selected the one now embedded in Sally’s chest. Most had felt blunt. He recalled running a finger carefully along their cutting edges, blunt. She hadn’t taken care of them. So be it. He would cut her throat with a blunt knife. It would take longer. It wouldn’t be clean and neat. She had only herself to blame.

He studied her once more. Air leaking from her chest puncture made the blood around the entry wound bubble and hiss. It reminded him of when he was a boy, fixing punctures on his bicycle. Should he drag her to the kitchen, keep her close? No. Quicker to leave her there.

Decision made, he turned and strode to the kitchen. Despite the disappointment, he still felt magnificent. Powerful. Untouchable. Like a god. He knew which drawer to open. The knives weren’t organized. He shifted the knives around with a gloved hand, ignoring the large carving ones. Trying to find something with a four-inch blade. Smooth or serrated edge, it didn’t matter, but it had to be rigid. Thick and strong from hilt to tip. A chopping knife would be best. He’d already used the best one, but he found a substitute. A black-handled vegetable knife. He held the knife up to his face, slightly above his eye line. It would do.

He turned back toward the living room, expecting to see Sally’s head and upper body lying on the floor, the rest of her obscured by the sofa. Instead he saw her open the front door and stagger into the communal hallway. Somehow she had gotten to her feet. He saw the blood smear around the top door bolt. He had underestimated her strength. Her will to live. To survive. It had been a mistake.

Should he flee? He glanced over his shoulder at the open window in the kitchen. He looked back at Sally. Could he reach her before she started pounding on the neighbor’s front door? Would she reach their door? It was less than ten feet away, but it would feel like a marathon to her. He willed her to collapse.

He couldn’t let this happen. She had seen him. His grip tightened around the knife. He watched her stagger sideways, but remain on her feet. He began to walk toward her, long confident steps propelling him forward.

She fell, crashing into her neighbor’s door, and banged her fist twice, as hard as she could, on the door. Still he strode toward her, cutting through the dim red light that now spilled into the hallway. She had to die. She could destroy him. He couldn’t allow that to happen.

It was past 11 P.M. when George Fuller, inside flat 4, heard something crash into his front door. The surprise made him jump and spill some of his beer. The cold drops fell onto his wife’s face as she slept in his lap on the sofa. He had been watching a bad sci-fi film. She woke with a moan.

“George,” Susie Fuller complained, “you’ve spilled beer on me.”

He was annoyed his wife had been woken. Now she would want to watch the other channel. “It’ll be that bloody woman from across the hall again.” He was already up and heading toward the front door. He was a big man. His two favorite places were the gym and the pub. The results were intimidating. “She must be a prostitute or something, the hours she keeps.”

He was only steps away from the front door when he heard the two thumps. They came from lower down on the door. As if someone was sitting on the other side. Someone in trouble maybe? Someone drunk? Drunk, he decided.

“George,” he heard his wife inquiring. “Who is it? What’s going on?”

“Stay there,” he told her. She could hear the anger in his voice. He reached the door and yanked it open. His chest was full, ready to power a verbal onslaught at whoever he found. The door opened wide in one sweep. Sally’s still body slumped heavily onto the floor, at his feet. He could see she was bleeding, but didn’t see the knife.

He sensed danger. Five years as an officer in the Parachute Regiment had honed his instincts. He didn’t think. Didn’t hesitate. He bent over fast and grabbed Sally’s arm. He began to drag her back into his flat. A movement caught his eye. Something in Sally’s flat opposite. He looked up into the dim red light. Something moving fast. Too fast. Was that a man? The dark shape slithered through the small kitchen window and was gone.

He snapped himself back into action, dragging Sally into his flat and slamming the door shut. He bent to examine her then turned his attention to the front door. He secured every lock he could see. His wife appeared in the hallway.