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Hours passed. He’d already had his way with her twice, her body still frozen in the latex, accepting his swollen cock as she milked his precious nectar.

As he entered to have his way with her again, he pushed against her throat, squeezing it. She gasped and moaned, while his body heightened toward climax, and when he orgasmed a third time, she didn’t make a sound.

Curious, he released her, head tipped as he studied her for any movement.

Blue gaping lips and her motionless chest confirmed he’d strangled her to death already. As connected as he could possibly be. The ultimate possession of another human being. Almost God-like.

He bent forward to listen for breath and heard nothing. Still, he didn’t pull out of her. He quite liked staying there a bit longer, and settled down on top of her body, resting his head on her cold, stiff breasts.

So beautiful.

* * *

Fine grains of sand slipped through his hand as he stared down at her empty sockets, from where blue eyes once stared back at him.

He hadn’t meant to kill her so quickly. He’d merely gotten caught up in the moment, excited at watching her struggle to breathe while he fucked her. But he’d hoped to keep her until dawn, and two hours remained until then.

The ruffling of leaves whispered around him as he poured the sand into her eyes, while she lay on a bed of frost-coated foliage he’d piled beneath her. The sand made it easier to look at her, made her less terrifying.

From the ground beside her, he picked up a half-bloomed Queen of the Night he’d clipped from his greenhouse and set it carefully in her crossed arms. Always the same way, because consistency was everything.

He’d scrubbed her vagina clean, douching her insides with oxidizing bleach so as to destroy any evidence he may have left there. Afterward, he dipped her whole body in a tub of pure bleach and a small bit of lye he often used when tanning animal hides.

With the FBI’s involvement, he couldn’t be too careful.

Staring down at her pale, dead face, he felt the compulsion to kiss her, to stroke an ungloved finger down her now-clean face, but he knew better. She’d be scoured for evidence, and the small clues he’d already made a point to place were to be the focus of her murder investigation. He didn’t need any small trace fibers getting in the way of his signatures.

Besides, he could rest easy, knowing she would always be his. From that night on, and forever, her body, her entire being, belonged to him alone.

She was pure. Clean. No longer tainted by her paltry principals that made her a snobby bitch.

No. She’d become virtuous and delicate as porcelain. No one else would ever lay claim to her. Every piece of her belonged to him.

He lifted the pickle jar filled with formaldehyde solution and Marnee’s beautiful blue eyes. His only wish was that he could always remember how breathtaking they looked with her tears.

His little flower had blossomed that night. Had chosen him over everything else, and had taken him with her into eternal sleep. A piece of him would forever live within her.

14

Nola

A loud incessant sound cracks through the void, jarring me out of dreams. As my eyes flip open to the surrounding darkness, I snap my head toward the alarm clock, and army crawl toward it. After slamming my hand against the snooze button, I bury my face in the pillows.

Bits of my dream still linger, keeping me in a semi-lucid state as I turn my head to the side, the events from the night before creeping into my slowly-dawning consciousness.

The last thing I remember is telling Voss about my job. And Harv.

And that my parents conceived me in New Orleans.

Burying my face again, I groan. Why the hell would I tell him that?

I perform a quick pat down, mentally noting my pants and shirt still in place.

So, did I stumble to bed and pass out, or pass out first? Did Voss put me to bed?

Lifting my head, I slam my face into the pillow over and over, stirring the beginnings of a headache. Guy could’ve done a million and one things to me in my sleep, but there’s no evidence to suggest he did any more than help a tipsy idiot not fall down the stairs to her death.

Christ.