John Lutz - Night Victims

New York, 2003

Sally Bridge was exhausted.

Wisteria Chance was a premier bitch.

Her Beetle Davis was a totally unconvincing beetle.

Sally had cast aging Broadway star Wisteria in the planned production of the musical Bug Off. Bug had played to full houses for the past three months at smaller theaters throughout the Northeast. It was now scheduled to open at the Cort Theatre on West 48th Street in less than a month. Sally, who was Bridge’s Casting Call, had done what everyone agreed was a great job of casting some major Broadway players in the roles of various insects. This hadn’t been easy; ego sometimes stood in the way of accepting such roles. After all, no one had ever won a prestigious award for portraying an insect. This wasn’t exactly Shakespeare. Sally had often thought of suggesting they retitle the play McBug.

Most of the cast had overcome early reservations about their roles, especially when they found how delightful the material-an insect version of classic Hollywood-actually was. But Wisteria’s reservations had grown into tentative-ness, then outright hostility. Sally cringed and laughed at the same time, remembering how the haughty Broadway doyenne had stood before the footlights during dress rehearsal, threatening to walk out on her contract and hurling insults at the director and Sally, her antennae vibrating furiously as she waved her legs and arms.

The hell with it, Sally thought, closing and locking her apartment door behind her. She’d eat leftover Chinese takeout from last night, settle down in front of CNN with a glass of white wine, and look in on some of the world’s real problems.

Sally was young to be so successful, only thirty-two, and attractive enough to cast herself in some of the leading roles that crossed her desk. But she’d learned early on that she wasn’t a real actress, didn’t have the fire and ruthlessness and pure commitment. This tall, blond beauty with a busty build and Helen Hunt features loved the business though. And she had a touch for casting and a line of bull for dealing with agents. She also had a genuine affection and empathy that helped persuade actors and actresses to accept the roles she offered.

Her apartment was a junior one bedroom, which meant it was an efficiency with a dividing wall. Though small, it was well furnished, on the thirtieth floor with a great view of Central Park, and the rent was reasonable. Tables, chairs, and lamps were antique and flea market eclectic, mostly chosen by a decorator friend. The soft leather sofa was from Jennifer Convertibles and could be made into a bed for guests. The framed theater posters and playbills on the walls were supplied by Sally, over the objections of her decorator.

The important thing was, Sally really liked the place. And she knew that was important, because she tended to get emotionally involved with where she lived the way other people did with their pets; it would be difficult for her to leave this comfortable corner of the world where she felt secure and could watch the seasons change in the park.

The warmed-up egg foo yung was still good. The muted sounds of traffic filtering up from the street were relaxing. There was nothing too disturbing on the news. The wine made her even sleepier, and she dozed off in the middle of an SUV commercial and woke up near midnight slouched in a corner of the sofa, her cheek lightly glued to the soft leather by dried saliva.

“Yuck!” she said aloud. She forced herself up off the sofa, used the remote to switch off the TV (another SUV commercial-or the same one), and lurched zombielike toward the bathroom.

She brushed her teeth, which woke her up somewhat, but decided to shower in the morning. It took her only a few minutes to undress, slip into her knee-length sleep shirt with the likeness of Marlene Dietrich on it, and switch off the lamp by the bed.

Her mattress was only six months old and soft yet supportive. Pure comfort . . At least there was some reward for exhaustion. She listened to her long sigh drift out into darkness. A brief vision of an SUV, crawling like an intrepid insect up rough and rocky terrain toward a mountain plateau, and then Sally was asleep.

Not yet opening her eyes, she awoke slowly, becoming gradually aware that she couldn’t move. The dream she’d had was half remembered, movement soft and subtle about her body, around, beneath, so gentle. . It was enough to disturb her sleep but not quite wake her.

Until now.

Sally was lying on her back in the dim bedroom, her arms at her sides. One palm was pressed flat to her hip, the other turned outward so that her arm was twisted and ached at the shoulder. She tried to move the arm that hurt, and it didn’t budge. What the hell? How did I get so twisted up in the sheet? The night was warm and there was no blanket or bedspread over the sheet. She should be able to at least goddamn move!

Her eyes were open to slits now, and she could barely lift her head from the pillow to squint and try to see her feet, which were pressed so tightly together that it hurt her ankles. Her calves, thighs, and knees were pressed just as firmly to each other. The area of taut white sheet she could see was wound about her so tightly that her breasts were compressed.

Still, half awake, she was more puzzled than afraid.

Then her heart leaped and began to pound. Movement! Off to the left! Something large and quick! Had she imagined it? She swiveled her head this way and that on the perspiration-soaked pillow, craning her neck so it ached.

But she saw nothing alarming other than the window next to the one that held the humming air conditioner. It was open!

I locked it! I know I locked it!

She wasn’t alone!

Then the mattress creaked and sagged and the form she’d glimpsed was looming above her, straddling her, lithe and angular, large and powerful and dim as the dusk. She tried to scream but her throat was paralyzed. Something was jammed in her mouth, then slapped across her lips, binding them shut. Pain flared in her right side, a deep stinging sensation almost like an insect bite. Bug off! she thought inanely, her mind jumping to the play and casting problems even as she tried to scream against the pressure in and against her mouth, even as she tried to move her arms, her fingers, anything!

Another stinging sensation in her side. Another. Each more painful than the last, and she could only lie mutely and endure, her eyes bulging, her entire body vibrating in agony inside its shroud. Sally knew she was going to die.

End this! she screamed silently. End it, please!

But she was helpless, staring up at the angular dark form above her, into unblinking black eyes that gazed into hers and searched patiently inside her for her pain, for her death. Not to find her death but to avoid it. For a while. Forever.

End it! Please!

NYPD Homicide Detective Paula Ramboquette pulled the unmarked car to the curb in front of the Layton Arms apartments on East 56th Street. She’d been in New York almost a year now, and this was the first case where she, and not her partner Roy Bickerstaff, was lead detective. This was because Bickerstaff was retiring and would be gone by the end of the month.

A large, potbellied man who favored cut-rate woolly suits and ineffective cheap deodorant even in summer, Bickerstaff sat still in his seat and waited for Paula before raising his bulk out of the car. He did have a certain sensibility she hadn’t noticed at first, and he was a good detective. And God knew Paula had seen worse.