Page 34 of Deadly Obsession
Just like the one in my hands right now. Apparently, his wife had left him not long after he’d returned home.
I’d had no idea.
I’d contemplated selling this gun many times, but my therapist told me I needed to conquer my fears and the things that triggered my PTSD. Any shotgun in general had become one, not so much because he did it. But because the same demons that convinced him to pull the trigger whispered to me many times as well.
Moving down the stairs slowly, I kept the butt of the shotgun in the pocket of my shoulder and the barrel aimed at the ground. The last thing I wanted was to wake anyone up and have them find me creeping down the stairs with a shotgun. That wouldn’t go over very well at all. So, as quietly as I could, I passed the living room and moved straight to the front door. I glanced over to where my boots should have been but didn’t see them. I also didn’t have time to run up and grab another pair. I’d have to go out barefoot.
I reached the front door, opening it enough for me to squeeze out before quickly shutting it behind me. I paused to scan the area outside the cabin and saw nothing of interest, aside from a large shadow beneath my truck. I raised the weapon in my arms, muzzle towards my back tire, as I made a wide sweep around to the rear of the vehicle.
That was when I saw it. A scene so gory it rivalled just about anything I’d witnessed in the Helmand Province. A woman’s body had been mutilated. She lay there on her back with her stomach torn open. The gruesome gash was deep and jagged, the skin uneven with irregular edges along the gaping hole in her abdomen. From her ribs to her pelvis. Her organs sprawled out on the muddied ground, nature already taking its course on her decaying corpse.
Her intestines were pulled out of the chest cavity, looped around her neck and…my mask!They were then twisted under her arms, where they were hooked onto my trailer hitch. Blood was everywhere. On top of the lowered tailgate and all around her body, which was completely nude apart frommy bootson her feet, alongside one of my brand’s hoodies. Between that and the various tattoos I could make out on her skin, I knew easily who the poor soul was.
I also knew better than to disturb what was clearly a crime scene, but we were in the middle of nowhere, with no power and no cell service. That meant no emergency services. So I did what I had to do. Because if there were any clues that could identify the killer, I needed to find them. I sat my shotgun against the back tire and raised the tailgate for a better look. Unintentionally, this had me placing one of my hands in a splattering of what must have been the victim’s blood.
Damn it…
Once the tailgate was secured in the upright position, I rubbed the blood from my hand onto the sleeve of the dead woman’s hoodie. That’s when I noticed something sitting onthe rear bumper, just in front of the license plate. I instantly recognized it as Lyndsey’s phone—it was hard to forget the hot-pink case covered in jewels.
My curiosity piqued, I picked up the phone and illuminated the screen, expecting it to be locked. To my surprise, it wasn’t. With a swipe of my thumb, the screen opened up and I flinched at what I saw. A still shot of an axe breaking through what could only be the leg of a very-nude, very-restrained Lyndsey tied to a very-familiar boat lift. The blur of the photo led me to suspect that it was actually a screenshot of a video. Opening the photos app confirmed it. The killer had recorded Lyndsey’s last moments.
“Fucking monster…” I grunted, tucking the phone into my hoodie pocket before placing my hands onto the sides of my mask, presently resting on the victim’s head. I lifted it slowly, her intestines making a wet, squishy noise as the helmet-like mask slid over her face. “Fuck… I’m sorry, Lola.”
Her face was frozen in a mix of shock and frustration. Parting my fingers, I ran them down over her eyes, closing them for the last time. That was when I noticed the blood on the side of her face, which likely meant she wasn’t wearing it when she died. This in turn meant the killer had already been in my and Sera’s room, despite the cameras I had hidden throughout the cabin. I’d originally assumed it was someone in the group playing a prank, like maybe painting my mask pink.
That was what I got for assuming anything.
As I brushed Lola’s hair back, my glare drifted to the wound on the side of her head and the small numerals carved into her skin:3/6.
“Close with and destroy the enemy,” I cursed under my breath, reciting the start of 3rd Battalion 6th Marine Regiment’s mission. Time and space around me seemed to freeze, my mind racing over everything I knew.
Someone was out here. Someone who knew how to get in and out unseen. Someone who knew how to cover their tracks well, perhaps survive alone in the mountains and was familiar with?—
That was as far as my thoughts got before something hard cracked me against my temple, and everything went black.
TWENTY-ONE
BRIAN
James collapsed like dead weight, falling forward and to the left beside Lola. I slowly lowered his shotgun in my hands and looked down at the mess in front of me.
I couldn’t believe that worked. I’d only seen it done in films before!
When I’d woken up naked in bed, it took me a few minutes to recall last night’s itinerary. Lola had totally begun to come on to me after rejecting me for so long. She’d even offered to let me do body shots off her, which was wild and also my first time! She had finally come around. We had amazing sex in the den on the mattress, despite the other ladies being present. I didn’t remember achieving an orgasm that time exactly, but I was certain she’d climaxed not once but twice.
Fuck, did she actually tell me she’d be my girlfriend? Or was that a dream?
Then, earlier this morning—how much earlier, I wasn’t sure—she’d woken me up for round two! To make things better, in the sleepy haze, I must have confessed one of my more-taboo fetishes. I couldn’t recall when she’d done it, but based on how wet and warm I was, she’d clearly catered to my dark desires.At this point, I was certain she’d likely realized I was all of her favorite book boyfriends rolled into one neat-and-proper package.
None of that mattered right now, though. Because she was dead. Beyond dead.What the fuck had he done to my love?
I looked over at the grotesque scene in front of me, took note of the smell of her decaying body and the maggots already feasting on her corpse, before I stepped off to the side and got sick. My stomach turned inside out in seconds. Fortunately, it was mostly alcohol rather than a full meal. The toxic grog erupted from my throat. Fireball, Budweiser, tequila, and who knew what else spilling all over the already-wet ground.
As I began my second round of emptying the keg that was my stomach, two different voices cried out in incoherent panic. When I looked towards the source, I spotted Jade attempting to hold Danielle up, her screams cutting through the chilled morning air and right into my soul.
“Oh my God, Brian! What the fuck happened?” Danielle’s eyes darted from me to Lola, then to Mustang and back to me. I couldn’t bear to look down at Lola right now. I needed to handle James.
“Ladies!” I snapped. “I need one of you to go get the red duffle bag from my room. It should be on my bed. Please hurry!” I spoke loud enough for them to hear me without losing my control.
