Bryan Smith - The Killing Kind

So I’ve made some new friends. This really hot chick and her boyfriend. Think I’m gonna be hanging with them for a while. The chick is fun. I’ve totally bonded with her. The boyfriend is okay. It’s fun to mess with him. The chick’s got this big thing planned and it is going to be a fucking BLAST. I can’t wait.

Oh, I wanted to address some shit I’ve been reading online today. First off, what happened to the Lees was really sad. But seriously, me taking off is totally unrelated. Whatever psycho did that didn’t abduct me. Yeah, I went to their house to collect my babysitting money, but nobody answered. End of story. Kind of creepy to think there were a bunch of dead people on the other side of that door, though. Anyway. So what DID happen to me? Simple. I hooked up with a guy passing through town and decided to take off with him. Total coincidence it happened the same day.

Bottom line, I’m fine. Better than fine, really. I’m finally free. I felt like a prisoner living with my parents and I’m never going back, so tell them to knock off this searching bullshit, okay?

So that’s about it, I guess. I’ve wasted enough time talking to you losers.

OH! I got a tattoo yesterday. My first. Hurt a little, but totally worth it.

Laterz.

Note: Of the more than one hundred comments posted in response to the above entry, only the following received a reply from Julie Cosgrove.

lord_ruthven: I’m not sure what to believe, but it doesn’t really matter. I’m glad you seem to be okay.

Mixedupgirl: You know what? You’re the only person back home I don’t want to drop down a black fucking hole. No bullshit. Still not gonna fuck you, though.

lord_ruthven: Thanks…I guess. What about Alicia?

Mixedupgirl: Fuck her. Seems she told the cops about my bullshit “crush” on John. Next time I see her I’m gonna chop her fucking head off.

lord_ruthven: Hah. Now I really know you’re okay.

March 25

Three hours of lazing about on the beach and splashing in the ocean was more than enough for Chuck. He needed a break from the sun. He gathered up his towel and empty Corona bottles and told Zoe he was going back to the house to take a shower. Zoe smiled and told him she’d be up in a little bit. He leaned down for a kiss, felt her tongue slip into his mouth, and grinned.

“Sure you don’t want to take that shower with me?”

She smiled. “Maybe later?”

He chuckled. “Sure. A guy can never get too clean.”

He went up the beach toward the house, climbing first over a grassy dune and then traversing a short bridge to the fence that surrounded the swimming pool out back. He opened the gate and stepped inside, pausing long enough to blast sand from his feet with a hose. He entered the house through the bottom floor, padded on wet feet to the staircase, and began to climb toward the third floor. He stopped on the second-floor landing when he heard a feminine moan, very faint, emanating from one of the rooms down the short hallway. He turned and stared down the hallway. There were two rooms. Two doors. The one on the right was shut, the one on the left partly cracked. The sound came again. Definitely feminine. Chuck’s penis twitched in his swim trunks.

God, I’m horny.

All that time spent baking in the sun and staring at the wide array of bare female flesh in the vicinity had him worked up. He suddenly wished he’d tried harder to lure Zoe back to the house. He wanted to have some of the same kind of fun someone in one of these rooms was having. He was pretty sure the sound was coming from the partially cracked door. A need to know who it was seized him. He was surprised. He wasn’t normally given to voyeurism, but there was no denying the intensity of the desire. He glanced up the next set of stairs leading to the third floor. Empty. He then checked the stairs leading back to the first floor. Also clear. He took a deep breath and began to move as quietly as possible down the hallway.

This is crazy. What if somebody catches me peeking?

It was a good question. He had no business doing this. It was risky as hell. Yet the impulse was just too powerful to resist. He reached the partly open door and peered through the crack.

He stifled a gasp.

Annalisa and Emily were making out on the bed. They were prone on the mattress, with Annalisa on top. Chuck’s erection pushed painfully against the fabric of his trunks as he watched the two women writhe and kiss. Annalisa didn’t have a top on, just shorts, and Emily was in that tiny white bikini. There was nothing tender about what he was seeing. They were kissing with such hunger, almost as if they were trying to consume each other. Chuck couldn’t believe it. The two were Zoe’s best friends, but he had been pretty sure they loathed each other. But you could never underestimate Emily. He was sure she was the instigator here. Yet he couldn’t begin to imagine how she’d seduced Annalisa.

Annalisa broke off the kiss and sat up, straddling Emily. “I wanna sit on your face.”

She unbuttoned her shorts and twisted around to shimmy out of them. Chuck swallowed a lump in his throat and fought an urge to reach into his trunks. Voyeurism was one thing, but he’d be damned if he’d risk someone catching him in the act of jerking off in the hallway. A thought occurred to him, something that made him frown. Why was the door open? Talk about risky. But it was obvious, wasn’t it? It had been done on purpose, probably by Emily. That’d be just like her. She wanted someone to see this.

He heard a voice from downstairs just as Annalisa began to position herself over Emily’s face.

Joe.

Chuck moved away from the door and hurried up the stairs to the third floor. Heart slamming, he headed to the bar. He needed a drink and he needed it now. The shower could wait. He stepped behind the bar and scanned the rows of liquor bottles, again silently thanking his father for thinking of everything. His dad had a very open mind on the subject of underage drinking. Which made sense, as he’d been quite the tippler since his own teenage days. Chuck had been sharing drinks with his father for years. Some would label the behavior child abuse. Dad just saw it as continuing a tradition.

Chuck dumped ice in a rocks glass and filled it to the rim with Johnnie Walker Black. He had half of it down by the time Joe came thumping up the stairs into the living room. He spotted Chuck at the bar and grinned. His trunks were wet and his feet were coated with sand.

Chuck nodded at his feet. “You’re tracking sand everywhere, asshole.”

Joe shrugged and came over to the bar. “Ain’t like we live here, man. Shit gets dirty, so what? The housekeepers can deal with it. Give me some of what you’re having.”

Chuck prepared another drink and passed it to Joe. “There. I should throw it in your fucking face, though.”

Joe’s grin faltered. “I do something, man? I didn’t do it, whatever it is, I swear.”

“So you and Emily didn’t screw around with Zoe the night I got the shit beat out of me at that bar?”

“At the bar? I thought it happened outside.”

“Never mind that. Answer the question.”

“What do you mean, ‘screw around’?”

“You know what I mean, motherfucker.”

“Chuck…come on. We’re friends. Don’t be like this.”

Chuck squeezed the rocks glass. Hard. Another ounce or so of pressure and it would shatter in his hand. He ached to release it and use his fist as a battering ram against Joe’s face. The need to lash out was almost overwhelming. This wasn’t new. A potential for violence had been simmering just below the surface ever since that night at the bar. He wanted revenge against the people who’d beaten him, but he couldn’t have that. He was too afraid of them. They were genuine sociopaths. Hardened criminals. Just the thought of ever confronting them again paralyzed him with fear.