Copyright 2015 MillieAnne Lowe, Orange County, California
Since his childhood, Steele had always thought that he and the darkness were one. In the darkness, away from the temptations of the women he found inadequate, he found comfort. The darkness served as a theater to visualize and relive his pleasurable memories and adventures. In the dark places of his mind, it served as a place to regenerate another murderous event. The darkness was Steele’s personal think-tank.
As he walked beside Stetson, their breaths appeared as small puffs of steam billowing from a fast moving train. Steele’s had two thoughts playing tug of war in his mind. On one end of the rope, his need to kill Stetson. On the other end, his need to see Marilyn. After the allusions made by Agent Parker, releasing his passion with her would soothe his soul. But then, she also was not perfect. She had an attachment with the boyfriend, whose name was Mark. No problem, getting his revenge would be easy. If Mark was there, he would enjoy what Steele planned to do to Marilyn.
The vicious killer took a deep breath and the chill of the air cleared his mind from all the booze. His plans for tonight would be unique. No other girl he had found had been as special as his intended for tonight.
The old lady, her dog, her daughter and two grandchildren had not been killed for any pleasurable reason. The last three girls he had devoured were wayward girls, unworthy substitutions for his first great love, Alicia.
Steele recalled the memories of his first passionate love. As far as he was concerned, his life began when he fell in love with his neighbor’s daughter, Alicia.
Alicia had captured his heart with her youthful beauty of soft creamy skin, sky blue eyes, and soft blonde hair that carried the scent of a new day after a rain. Her sweet voice and innocent thoughts charmed him. In a short time they became inseparable. No one would have imagined that their coming together would begin the most unusual experiences of his life.
When their long walks in the woods were no longer suitable to include their passionate kisses, Alicia breathlessly expressed her how she felt, “My desires to be totally yours match the passion we share.” They ran hand in hand toward her grandfather’s old and worn out barn. Alicia climbed a tall wooden ladder to the loft, and he had followed. Clucking hens scurried around, kicked up small bits of straw, flapped their wings furiously, and fussed in circles. They alerted all who would listen that a stranger was among them. Three resident horses, neighed, acknowledging the young couple’s presence as well.
Up in the loft, the aroma of sweet hay mixed with the scent of liniment, created a warm and sensual ambiance. As their passionate kisses heightened their lust, a howling wind approached. Its strength crashed open the barn doors, blowing every item not tacked down into its swirling cyclone. Splinters of wood shot through the hens like arrows. Two long slivers pinned a Rhode Island Red hen to the base of a thick wooden column underneath the loft. Hay, dirt, and bits of rags, swirled high and low, invading the hayloft where he and Alicia lay naked.
As the debris flew in circles around them, Steele held Alicia closer. The hardness of her pert young breasts against his skin excited him beyond what he had ever experienced. They kissed and caressed the once unknown private places of each other’s bodies. Their uninhibited lovemaking rocked and pulsed with the thunderous rhythm of the storm outside. Their screams of climaxing together matched the high-pitched notes of the howling wind. Alicia’s hair ribbons blew off and her lustrous blonde hair spread in all directions.
The storm became larger, hovering right above them. Horses neighed and screamed their fears, kicked down their stall gates and dashed wildly out into oblivion. Tin cans that once held nails, spilled and clattered in the wind. The noise of the storm screeched like an orchestra warming up for its masterpiece. The musical fabric of chaos circled the two lovers. They chose to ignore any danger and once again fulfilled their passionate desires.
When the storm stopped they had been laying in each other’s arms when suddenly, Alicia screamed. She pointed at her grandfather climbing over the edge of the loft.
His scraggly white hair, electrified, stuck out from his head like a mass of wires. His eyes were wide with disbelief as he looked upon them.
“Get away from me! Stop starring at me!” Alicia frantically searched for her clothes to hide. A new storm, howling like the first one, roared into the barn obliterating everything in its path. The old man stretched out his arms and took a step toward Alicia. Steele remembered instinctively grabbing the pitchfork from its hooks and throwing it at the leering old man.
The blood he saw was bright red. It seeped from where the tines had punctured the old man’s chest.
Alicia held the shreds of her skirt in front of her, tears ran down her face as she mumbled something Steele could not hear. As she shook her head back and forth in denial of what was before her, Steele felt a renewed force in his body. He pulled Alicia down to a remaining dark corner. Giving his passion priority, he left the old man bleeding to death in a pile of debris. Twigs from the nearby woods, chicken feathers, hay, nails, and a feed bag, lay around his inert body… remnants representing his whole life as a farmer. Ignoring her protests, Steele kissed her as he pinned her resisting body down with his. Stretching her arms above her head, he rammed into her with the force he had felt in the storm. Elated with every move he made in her body, his needs renewed with an insatiable appetite.
The chaos of the storm, the killing of another human being, the sight of blood flowing from the body, and the excitement of new pleasures sustained him. The swirling chaos had seduced him, enveloped him, and captured him once, and for all his lifetime.
Steele saw the repulsion in Alicia’s eyes, the soft and dreamy look she had for him was gone. Another whirlwind tore away the side of the barn. Alicia screamed as the wood cracked and the wind whooshed with power, lifting and twirling every small bit in its path. Outside the horses screamed again in fear and galloped away in all directions.
“Let go of me! I don’t want to die here! Let go!” Steele covered her mouth with his hand. These were not words he wanted to hear. As she fought to get away, Steele grabbed a knife partially hidden under a haystack. Then, with every thrust of his body, he pierced her body with the sharp and shining blade and gloried himself with the spurts of blood like her grandfather’s… bright red.
Steele remembered looking down on the violence, as if he viewed everything from a balcony. He stuck the point of the blade under her ribs, cut her in the stomach, pounded the knife in her chest, and when near spent, he slit under her breasts. His final thrust into her body accompanied the flashing steele blade into her throat.
Her blood streamed everywhere, and her eyes had seemed to be looking up into heaven. “Alicia, my Alicia, you are a beautiful sight to behold.” The quietness after her death presented him a masterpiece of his own, and the excitement of his actions was more than he had ever thought possible.
Wiping off what blood he could from his face, hands, and body, Steele put on his tattered pants and shirt that he found plastered against one of the remaining walls. With agility he jumped from the loft and ran outside. The shadows of what remained disclosed the devastation to all that he knew and had treasured. The farm house had been flattened to its foundation. The once thick woods, home to many animals, and chirping birds, suffered the greatest destruction. For as far as he could see, it had been shredded by the storms until only slivers of trees and rough stumps remained. As he stood there, another dark funnel approached, its powerful force moved around and passed him, splintering the barn where Alicia, and the pitchforked body of her grandfather lay. To escape the swirling debris, Steele had jumped over dead animals, and ducked flying pieces of farm equipment. Two other storms came together upon the barn and everything in it disappeared as if it had never existed. Steele remembered all that had happened and how he felt. The darkness made the storms for me.
When neighboring farmers came to help they were in awe of the storm’s total destruction. Steele drew into himself and feigned shock. All the while enjoying his private thoughts.
The blare of fog horns brought Steele back to the present. But he hung on to one lingering thought. Since that time, killing anything had not been a problem. He smiled a wicked smile in the dark.
He and Stetson now stood of the far side of the round house at the end of the pier, more than a mile from the restaurant. They watched a thousand small lights twinkling in the hills, believing that they were just as small and that no one watched them.
Stetson moved closer to Steele. “There’s a smile on your face. What are you scheming about now?”
Steele turned to his rival and smirked, “I’m thinking about what I’m going to do to Marilyn tonight.”
“Oh no, you’re not.” The barrel of Stetson’s gun flashed under the lamp post. “Tonight, you’re going to hell!”
Copyright 2015 MillieAnne Lowe, Orange County, California
millieanne lowe 