Rage, page 2
She fought her way to the surface, reminding herself that every time Richard had taken her to bed, he’d been making love to her bank account. She remembered the mocking tone of his voice just before she’d interrupted his little after-hours tryst.
Sow’s ear, indeed!
She hung up the phone, refusing to give him the satisfaction of hearing it slam. During the long months of recuperation she’d memorized a thousand bitter, vindictive things to say to Richard if and when he called. Now it didn’t matter. He wasn’t worth drawing the breath to speak them.
She lowered her head into her hands and took a deep breath, hoping to ward off the pounding in her head. Too late. The headache had claimed squatter’s rights and wouldn’t be dislodged. It sent spikes of pain to her temples and tendrils of agony along nerves already strung taut.
When the phone rang again she didn’t answer it. Richard couldn’t hurt her anymore. She’d been to hell and back. She was stronger now. Smarter.
That’s when it hit again. Not all at once, but oozing up slowly, like a black, poisonous muck.
The rage.
She closed her eyes and took slow, deep breaths, willing herself to remain calm, but the pressure increased, pounding and pulsating against her temples. It drove her beyond thinking, beyond feeling, beyond pain, until there was nothing left but darkness.
When Blaize regained consciousness she was sprawled on the kitchen floor, her dress torn, wrinkled and smelling of smoke—as if she’d spent the night huddled around a campfire. Flecks of dried mud flaked from her bare feet. She reached down and picked a blade of grass from between her toes, wondering when she’d walked barefoot through wet grass. Yesterday? The day before? She shivered, her chest tight with panic.
Oh God, how much had she forgotten? How much of her life had she lost this time?
She sat up, trembling and disoriented. It wasn’t the first blackout she’d experienced since the accident, and she suspected it wouldn’t be the last. But this one felt different. This one left her feeling dirty and ashamed, with the suspicion that she’d done something terrible that could never be undone.
The phone rang, triggering her memories. Richard. Richard had called. She’d been fine…she thought. She waited for the rage to wash over her again, but nothing competed with the jangle of the phone in the quiet room.
Answer it.
A shiver rippled along her spine. Who said that? She looked around the empty room. No one was there. But she’d heard a voice just the same. A voice that burrowed into her mind. Not one of her own thoughts, but coming from a different place—further back.
Visions and voices.
Answer it, Blaize. The sly voice coaxed again, coming from inside her, but beyond at the same time.
She did, holding her breath until a warm, familiar voice broke through her frozen trance. It wasn’t Richard this time, but Joyce. Blaize trembled with relief at the sound of her friend’s voice.
“Blaize, are you all right?” Joyce asked. “I’ve been calling for hours. I thought we were meeting for lunch today?”
Blaize stared at the dark flecks under her fingernails, wondering why they reminded her of blood. Lunch? That meant it was Tuesday. She shook her head, trying to clear the cobwebs of disorientation. Richard had called Monday morning—she glanced at the wall clock—almost twenty-four hours ago. What had she done during that time? She didn’t even remember getting dressed, let alone leaving the house.
When she found her voice it came out frail and trembling. “Joyce, I had another blackout.”
Concern sharpened Joyce’s voice. “When?”
“Yesterday…today. I don’t know.”
“I’ll be right over,” Joyce said.
“No. Just let me pull myself together. I’ll be fine.”
But Joyce didn’t let her finish. “I’ll be there in twenty minutes,” she said in a tone that left no room for argument.
“Really, I’m okay. Just a little disoriented.” As she spoke, Blaize checked herself over again. Other than the grass, the mud on her feet, and the stains beneath her nails, there were no clues to where she’d been or what she’d done during this latest episode.
Grass and mud. A dry, humorless chuckle escaped her throat. Maybe she’d done some gardening during her blackout. But the way her hands trembled made her suspect it was something worse. Far worse.
“Blaize?” Joyce’s voice was hesitant. “There’s something I have to tell you. It’s about Richard.”
Blaize waited, but she already knew what Joyce was going to say. It was more than a premonition…more like a memory. She closed her eyes, hearing the words as if from the end of a long, dark tunnel while half-formed visions teased her memory.
…a red lighter…rasping, flicking, then finding the safety latch…pressing it in…the grooved metal wheel rolling against her thumb…a spark…a flame…gauzy yellow curtains flaring up…catching…burning…fire, fire, cleansing fire…
She shook her head to clear the vision, focusing on her friend’s voice.
“He’s dead, Blaize. Richard is dead.”
Understanding settled like a cold stone in her belly. She picked at the mahogany flecks under her nails, which looked so much like dried blood, and gave a slow nod.
“I know,” she said. “I know.”
Chapter Two
Spyder Raines woke in a haze. His hands shook. He hadn’t felt this bad since kicking drugs three years, two months and sixteen days ago. He reached for the bottle of vodka he kept on the nightstand. Booze didn’t count. He was still clean as long as he kept away from the drugs.
He poured himself a double and downed it in one long gulp, grimacing as it burned a trail from his throat to his stomach. His hands were steadier now. Barely. He shook his head to clear it and tore the clammy sheets from his sweat-soaked body.
God, he hadn’t had dreams like these since he was sixteen. Erotic beyond anything he’d ever experienced in real life. He’d been having them for weeks now. It was always the same woman. Not one of those picture-perfect models who were a dime a dozen, but a refreshingly sweet and innocent woman. A real woman.
When he closed his eyes, her face stood out sharply in his mind—head thrown back in ecstasy, long, chestnut curls like tangled ribbons across his pillow, eyes gleaming with lust as they rode each other beyond ecstasy, their orgasms going on and on forever, wilder and deeper than anything he’d ever known before. He remembered the way it felt to slide into her, the way her body responded, wrapping around him, how they moved in perfect, exquisite harmony.
He could still feel her warm, satin-soft skin—her neck supple and warm beneath his hands as his fingers tightened and curled, squeezing until her eyes shot open with alarm and her whimpers turned to gasps as she tried to suck air into her lungs. Squeezing. Strangling. Smothering. Harder and harder and harder, his whole body shaking with rage as he gripped her delicate neck so tight, shaking and trembling, then exploding into her with a final mind-numbing cry as he came like he’d never come before, his hands relaxing around her limp and broken neck.
He shook his head and poured another shot. What the fuck was that all about? Flashbacks? Maybe. Although he couldn’t remember having dreams like that even in his wildest drug-crazed days. He caught himself stroking his erection and shuddered. He wasn’t a psycho, despite the crap they wrote in those tabloids, making him out to be some deranged, Satan-worshipping rocker.
Okay, maybe the parts about the women and booze were true. And he’d been in a few fights in a few bars. But he wasn’t a freak. And he certainly didn’t get his rocks off fantasizing about murdering women.
It was the erotic, sexual nature of the dream that turned him on. Not the violence. And the sex was great. Had been, in fact, for the past few weeks. The same dream, the same bed, the same woman. Only the positions had changed as he’d taken her night after night in every way possible, each encounter more fulfilling, more erotic and more satisfying than the last.
Except tonight. Tonight was the first time he’d fucked her to death.
He shook his head, trying to erase the image from his mind. He’d been on the road too long, that was the problem. Friggin’ tour was driving him insane. Everywhere he went, the same groupies, the same tiresome hotel rooms, the same songs over and over. He’d had enough.
His hair hung in damp tendrils along his neck and his skin was clammy with perspiration. Feeling dirty, both inside and out, he walked naked to the bathroom, his erection pointing the way. Tight and hard…still. He still wanted her. Instead of fading, the dream remained vivid, clinging to him like a gauzy shroud.
He couldn’t shake the feeling that if he looked back he’d see her there, sprawled on the bed, luscious and naked and dead, the imprint of his fingers branded across her throat. It took every ounce of strength he had not to take the bottle of vodka into the shower with him.
He turned the cold water on and stepped under the shower, letting the stinging spray pound his skin. When he closed his eyes to let the water run over his head and shoulders, he imagined her face—eyes shimmering, lips full and pouting, fingernails raking down his spine. His hips jerked forward, his erection hard and rigid despite the cold needle-spray of the shower.
He reached down and curled his hand around himself. There were probably a dozen groupies hanging around who’d jump at the chance to offer him the release he needed, and he’d never been one to turn down a good offer. But sometimes it was easier just to deal with it himself. Less messy that way and he didn’t have to see the hurt in their eyes when he sent them home.
Spyder closed his eyes and stroked himself, groaning as images of his dream lover flashed through his memory. He didn’t know her. Even out of the thousands of women he must have slept with, he’d remember that face, those gypsy eyes. No, he didn’t know her, yet she was more real than anyone he could remember. He recalled every curve of her body, the way she felt wrapped around him, the pressure of her long legs gripping his waist.
But there were tiny details he remembered too, like the beauty mark at the edge of her throat where it dipped into the hollow of her neck, the golden splash of freckles across her shoulder. He remembered a chicken pox scar just above her right cheekbone, and the tiny chip of an incisor, not noticeable until she threw her head back and moaned in the throes of orgasm.
He groaned. Since when had his dreams been so vivid, so real? When was the last time he’d noticed such minute details of a woman’s body in a dream—or for that matter, had he ever paid that much attention in real life? He called all of his sexual partners “babe” to avoid having to remember their names.
But not her. Her image consumed him. The thought of her body supple and warm beneath his set him on fire, a fire that flowed like molten lava through his veins, begging for release.
Drawing a quick, shuddering breath, he arched his hips and threw back his head, his hand tightening around his base. And when he was past the point of no return, a name came bursting from his lips as the first hot wave erupted from his body.
He screamed out the name of his dream lover, squeezing tight, his fingers locked around his shaft the same way they’d locked around her throat as he’d squeezed the breath from her lungs. Harder and harder and harder, as his body shook with a long, quivering climax and he cried out in a ragged voice he didn’t recognize.
“Blaize. Oh God, Blaize. Blaize!”
Blaize rubbed her eyes. They felt hot and gritty, as if she hadn’t slept all night. But then, she had no idea what she’d done last night, did she? Ever since Joyce’s phone call, all she could think of was the missing time. Time that just happened to coincide with Richard’s death. Where had she gone? What had she done? If she were to believe the vision, she was right there with Richard last night when he died. But maybe that was just wishful thinking on her part. Hadn’t she wished him dead a thousand times? That didn’t mean she’d actually gone off and killed him in a rage-induced blackout. Did it?
She shivered, not wanting to believe it was possible, but fearing it was. She found herself in the kitchen with no idea what she was doing there. She looked around, as if the answer could be found scrawled across the lemon-yellow tiles.
Yesterday’s newspaper was still rolled up on the counter. She went to the porch to find today’s paper, frantically flipping through the pages for any reference to Richard’s death. Finally she found the article. “Overnight Blaze Claims One Life.”
Damn. Did they have to say “blaze”? Couldn’t they have said fire? It felt too much like an accusation.
She scanned the article searching for any clues, but the fire was attributed to careless smoking and there was no mention of an on-going investigation. She closed her eyes as the vision played over again in her mind.
…holding the lighter to the cigarette end…choking at the sharp, acrid smoke…touching the ember tip to the gauzy yellow curtains…leaving the cigarette tottering on the edge of the table…watching the curtains burn and melt in a blackening eclipse…
She shook her head to clear the vision. Stop it! You’re imagining the whole thing. I couldn’t, wouldn’t… She wasn’t a murderer, and wishing someone dead didn’t make her one.
She read the article a second time, paying closer attention.
“Smoking in bed is being blamed for sparking a fire Wednesday that killed a local Great Falls man. When fire crews arrived at the burning apartment at 1408 Central Avenue, they found the body of thirty-six-year old Richard Cadwell. Investigators believe he died of smoke inhalation.”
There was more, but nothing that eased the tight knot of guilt in her chest. Blaize reached for her coupon clipper and traced the edges of the newspaper article with the razor, cutting it out and carefully lifting it from the page.
That was when her name jumped out at her. She gasped in shock—a sharp, quick intake of air. The article she’d cut out had left a framed opening, exposing her name on the page beneath. It glared at her like an accusation. She blinked, but when she opened her eyes the words were still there, peeking up from the severed edge in all caps—BLAIZE DONOVAN.
The rest was hidden. Blaize couldn’t bring herself to turn the page and find out what else was printed there. Perhaps she was being sought as a suspect. She glanced at the door, expecting the pounding of police officers with questions and handcuffs and Miranda rights.
She closed her eyes, willing this new vision away, but the message remained. It was real, not a vision. Steeling herself, she turned the page slowly, revealing the rest of the message.
What she saw was an ad in the personals section of the newspaper. It had nothing to do with Richard or the fire. The bizarre juxtaposition was simply coincidence. That’s all. But her heart beat wildly and her hands shook as she read the strange message.
BLAIZE DONOVAN
*YOU* have been chosen
Welcome to “THE PLAY”
Act I: Visions and Voices
That was all it said. Blaize had no idea what the cryptic message meant. She blinked and read it again, as if it would make more sense the second time. The ad seemed innocent enough, but for some reason the words sent a chill trickling down her spine. Maybe the newspaper was running a promotional campaign. Had she won tickets to a play? Or maybe it was a coded message meant for someone else.
She was so relieved not to see the words “suspected arsonist” below her name that she didn’t stop to wonder why there were no further clues.
She clipped the ad and stuck it to the refrigerator with an “I Love New York” magnet. She’d worry about it later. The other clipping she hid in her desk. She didn’t want to think about Richard’s death right now. What she wanted was a shower to clear the cobwebs and fear from her brain. Her hair felt greasy, and she was wearing the same sweatpants she’d put on after changing out of her torn dress—which was now balled up at the bottom of the kitchen trashcan. There were laws against destroying evidence, but Blaize didn’t care. She knew she could never look at that dress again.
When the doorbell rang, she just stood there staring at the closed door, afraid to move. It sounded again, sharper and more insistent, as if whoever was there had no intention of leaving until she answered. Resigned, Blaize moved to the door and cracked it open a sliver, relief flooding through her when she saw who was on the other side.
Joyce stood on the porch, tapped her foot with impatience and puffing on one of her ever-present cigarettes. As the door opened, she gave Blaize a long, head-to-toe scrutiny, then shook her head. “You look like hell, girl.”
“Thanks.” Blaize ushered her friend inside and closed the door behind them. She gave Joyce an impulsive hug, feeling her control begin to slip now that there was someone to share the burden. For once she didn’t complain about Joyce’s cigarette habit, hoping it would mask the smell of smoke that still clung to her own hair and clothes.
Joyce tightened the hug before releasing her. “I’m sorry about Richard. I mean…” Her voice trailed off. “Do you want to talk about it? How do you feel?”
Blaize wasn’t sure how she felt, other than scared and confused, but that wasn’t the right answer. “I don’t know,” she said. “I just want it to go away.”
“I know,” Joyce said, squeezing her hand.
No, you don’t know, Blaize wanted to scream. It wasn’t just a matter of regaining her strength and getting back to work. It wasn’t just the shock of Richard’s death. She wondered if she should tell Joyce everything—her fear that she was to blame, her guilt and suspicion. She imagined the look on her friend’s face when she confessed that she thought she had killed Richard.
“Listen,” Joyce said. “We’re going to get you out of this house. The worst thing you can do is sit here all alone.” Releasing her hand, Joyce strode across the room and perched on the edge of the sofa, ticking off enough activities to last a month.
