Page 140 of Obsession
“You’re sick,” I hiss, then yelp when he crouches down and grabs my chin hard.
His eyes flash dangerously. “Don’t think I don’t see the darkness in you. We’re of the same flesh and blood, remember? Your evil runs in my veins. Why do you think you gravitated toward Robbie Hammond so easily?” His grip tightens, bruising my cold skin. “Why do you think I had to work so fucking hard for you to notice me? To kill all those women? Cut them up and leave them for you and the world to gawk at? You, Savannah, are sick too. It’s just a fucking shame that you had to recognize it in Robbie before you saw it in me.”
“You’re my brother, or have you forgotten?” I ask, trying to wrench free from his iron grip, to no avail. “It would never have happened between us. It’s sick, Elliot. Sick!”
“And killing your own dad is not?” His chilling words halt my breath. “You think I don’t know what you did?” Leaning over me, he whispers over my mouth. “I know exactly what you did.”
He drops me and rises to his full height. “Besides, it’s not like we grew up together. You didn’t even know who I was until minutes ago. If it weren’t for your obsession with Robbie, you’d have let me fuck you raw.”
I watch as he walks back over to his backpack and roots through it. His shoulders shift beneath his coat, and the moonlight reflects off his hair. “I’ve taunted you long enough with these,” he says, looking at me over his shoulder and wiggling a cola can in the air.
My eyes widen in horror as he turns around, and I catch sight of the other two items in his hands.
Chuckling cruelly, he sits down on his haunches and makes a show of placing the bottle of anti-freeze in the snow.
“At what point did you decide you’d be better off killing our dad?” With his eyes on me, he opens the can and pours it into the cup. It’s the same cup I used that night, the one with ‘Best Dad’ written in large yellow letters on the front. “What I’ve asked myself,” he says casually, waiting for the cola to fizz down before he pours more into the mug, “is if you changed your mind and decided to neutralize him instead.” He puts the empty cola can down and his eyes clash with mine. “Ensure he couldn’t hurt you anymore.”
He waits me out.
Silence settles over the clearing before he continues, unperturbed by my lack of response, “Or maybe you miscalculated how much anti-freeze to mix into the cola to create a deadly concoction. We hear it time and time again, don’t we? Failed attempts. It sometimes takes numerous weeks and numerous poisonings to kill someone. You couldn’t go through with it. Not after that first time when he ended up in the hospital with life-changing brain injuries.”
My heart gallops in my chest when he uncaps the anti-freeze and pours a dash inside. “Is that enough? Maybe it needs some more?”
I shake my head, tears falling freely. “Please, don’t.”
“You were clever to use anti-freeze. Mixed with a soda drink, it tastes sweet. Easy to disguise, unlike a lot of other things. All you had to do was pour some into his drink and then offer it up with a smile.” His eyes sparkle with humor. “Did you stand by and watch him drink it?” Leaning closer, he whispers, “Did you feel a thrill of excitement shoot through you when he took the first sip?”
“Fuck you,” I bite out through my tears.
Shrugging, he straightens up and pours another dash into the drink before bringing it to his nose and pretending to sniff it. “Can’t even smell it.”
I look away, trying to wriggle my wrists free, trying so hard to stay strong despite the terror threatening to consume me.
“While I would love to catch up with you, Sis, it’s time to make you tomorrow’s headline news. First, you’ll drink this, and then I’ll decide on how to display you when you’re dead.” His chin lifts in the direction of the bridge. “This bridge has a lot of history.” A smile curls his lips as he looks back down at me. “I love a tragedy. Don’t you? The reporter who fell in love with a condemned serial killer was to be The Bridge Killer’s final victim herself. Poetic, don’t you think? The audience will lap that shit right up. A classic take on Romeo and Juliet. And me, well, I will have made it into the history books. Who better to report about it? Who better to write about the insight of a deranged killer’s mind than the artist behind the art himself? The heartbroken brother. It’s a bit like Clark Kent, right?” He laughs, shaking his head with amusement before placing the anti-freeze back down in the snow.
He grips my hair and lifts my head off the ground. When he tries to put the cup to my lips, I begin to thrash, bucking wildly. Panic overrides every rational thought in my mind. I need to survive. I need to fight.
“Stop it!” Elliot growls, growing frustrated, his grip tightening on my hair. “Drink the fucking drink.”
I release a guttural scream, fighting and squirming. He releases my hair and slaps me hard.
His eyes flash with raw fury. “I won’t fucking tell you twice, bitch. Drink the fucking drink, or I’ll shove the anti-freeze up your cunt.”
He tries to grab me again, and the drink splashes over the sides as I continue bucking like an animal caught in a trap.
The rim pushes up against my lips, and I press them shut, locking eyes with his dark ones.
Fear ratchets up inside me. This is it. I’m out of options. I’ll die like this.
He releases my hair, and my head thuds hard on the ground, dizzying me briefly. He takes the opportunity to dig his fingers into my cheeks, forcing my mouth into an ‘O’.
With my wrists tied behind my back, my shoulders scream with pain. I try to kick him, but I can’t get any momentum behind it because of my bound ankles.
“I never realized you were such a fucking wildcat behind the flustered looks and shyness. I should have guessed. You needed some fucking backbone to kill your own flesh and blood. Tell me, Sis, what changed? Was it because Robbie stepped onto the scene? He made you feel bolstered?”
I manage to turn my head and bite his hand, hard. Blood explodes in my mouth, and he releases a curse as he drops the drink to the ground.
It quickly melts the snow.
