Cataclysm (18 page)

“Deep breath in, mijo.” Ricardo’s voice was a whisper behind him. He must have sensed Dominic’s reluctance, and he was there to get him back on track. He had insisted on accompanying Dominic on the job in case something went wrong, and it wasn’t until he showed hesitation that Ricardo exited the back seat of his sedan and joined him. He was there for moral support, a coach of sorts. It was an honor. Ricardo was a king among thieves and murderers. He didn’t go on jobs, but Dominic was on the fast track to becoming his prince, and he wanted to be there for his adopted son’s first kill. “Good. Now, let it out... nice... and slow, and then squeeze the trigger.”

The gun stopped shaking when he let out a long breath and curled his finger around the trigger, slowly squeezing.

“Please!” the man cried, disrupting Dominic’s concentration. “Don’t do it, kid!”

“Shut the fuck up, singao.” Ricardo didn’t raise his voice. He didn’t have to. His tone was lethal enough to drive the point home. “If he doesn’t do it, I’ll do it myself. Either way, estás muerto.”

Ricardo put his hand on Dominic’s shoulder and leaned down until he was level with his ear. “You don’t have to do this, mijo. Give me the gun, and you can walk away right now. You have nothing to prove.”

A vision of his mother and little brother flashed before his eyes: Colton in hand-me-down pants too high on his shins, the soles of his shoes flapping, and he was entirely too thin. The same was true for Dominic. His mother—well, she was a lost cause, but he still had to care for her because she refused to care for herself. If something happened to her, he and his brother would end up in foster care and they would be lucky if they weren’t separated. It wasn’t a chance he was willing to take. Colton would never survive on his own without his big brother there to protect and care for him.

It was his family versus this stranger’s family. A stranger who had obviously had some underhanded dealings with the wrong people, or he wouldn’t have been in the cowering position he was currently in. There would be blood on Dominic’s young hands, and he was dooming his soul to Hell with this one action. But his family was worth it.

He squeezed the trigger. The shot rang out into the still night air, amplified by the echoing acoustics of the concrete buildings that caged them in. There was no place for the sound to go. It would forever be captured in his memory, and so would the look of horror on the face of the man who was unlucky enough to have been his first kill.

The smell of gunpowder wafted in the air, and the man slumped to the ground. No life remained in the eyes that stared back at him. The man’s last vision wasn’t of loved ones telling him they loved him. It was the face of his killer, a fourteen-year-old murderer.

“Dominic? Are you okay?” Ricardo’s voice was solemn, fatherly. “Give me the gun, chico.”

Ricardo used his large hands to pry Dominic’s stiff fingers from the handle of the gun. Once it was free, Ricardo stuffed the gun into the waistband of his pants under his jacket. Dominic was frozen in place, unable to avert his attention from the dead man. He barely even registered the feel of Ricardo’s arms turning him so that his head was tucked beneath his mentor’s chin.

“It’s okay, socio. It’s all over. You did good. See? I call you
socio
because now you are a man. Eh?” Ricardo squeezed his shoulders.

The sound of his voice changed, as did his height and the shape of his body—even his smell. “That’s my boy! A brutal murderer, just like his father.”

Dominic shoved away from the sinister presence. As he scrambled out of reach, he looked up into the face of evil. Drake.

His first thought was to blast him from his dream, but then reason stomped down the instinct. If he did, it would take too much of his energy—energy he needed to keep from fading out completely. With stifled frustration, he staved off the itch.

“I’m nothing like you!” Even at such a young age, his voice sounded venomous.

Drake took a step forward, gesturing toward the dead man slumped against the brick wall. “You... are
exactly
like me, my boy.”

“You think you can play God!”

Drake regarded him with cool satisfaction. “But isn’t that exactly what you just did? You took that man away from his family. You stole his last breath, the last beat of his heart, and you stand there and call me a monster? Why, you’re no better than me, boy. You are your father’s child.”

“No!” Dominic seethed. The tendons in his neck were stretched taut, and his hands were balled into fists at his sides. He could feel a heightened sense of energy surging through his bloodstream, but he had to keep it at bay. Eventually, Drake would give up on toying with him and go away on his own.

“This is the first of many, many lives, isn’t it, Dominic? How many? Hmm? How many lives do you eventually take?”

A myriad of nameless faces flashed through his mind. There weren’t that many, but even one was too many when he considered the countless innocent lives that were affected by his actions.

And it was all his fault, the soulless bastard of a father.

If Drake hadn’t been warped and demented, if he hadn’t tortured the mother of his children, if he hadn’t plagued their lives with the disease of his touch—his eldest child wouldn’t have had to resort to a life of crime. Yes, the ultimate decision had been his. It was his hand that had dealt the blow of death, but his wicked sperm donor had forced his hand. Dominic might as well have been a marionette and his father the diabolical manipulator in control of his movements.

No more. He would not allow this man to control his actions.

Fury and vengeance fueled his hatred of the man he blamed for everything that had gone wrong in his life. The inferno of ire and spite blazed out of control, hot white energy building and building until it was impossible to control any longer. His emotions won out over his common sense, and every ounce of self-preservation was dwarfed by his need to remove the vile man from his sight.

He narrowed his eyes at his father, and Drake’s facial features morphed until he looked like something that must have crawled out of the pits of Hell. He was demonic, evil reincarnate to the nth degree. Dark laughter slithered out of the demon’s black lips, his teeth, pointed with jagged edges. His eyes became soulless black pits with an eerie orange center. His skin, blood red with puss oozing from gashes cut into his flesh, bubbled with boils and blisters. A gurgling sound erupted from his chest with a hearty laugh that made Dominic’s skin crawl.

A voice that sounded like three baritone men speaking in unison addressed him. “You dare to threaten me with your peon magic, boy? You have no idea the power I have obtained!”

Confidence surged through Dominic with the light of energy that permeated every neuron of his being, and he gave his father a smug smile. He was not afraid. “You have so much power, yet you can’t use it. You are nothing compared to the Light, and you know it. You’re scared, old man. Scared that you’ll be trapped in that godforsaken fowl for the rest of eternity.”

The demon Drake snarled, his lips lifting to reveal black gums over razor-sharp teeth. His chest heaved with angered breaths, and his voice boomed through the small alley. “I will devour your soul, you little pissant, and I’ll have your little brother’s for dessert. Then, I’ll use the bones of your little slut to pick my teeth. You could have saved them all by sacrificing yourself, but now you’ve pissed me off. My power is—”

“Fuck your power! And fuck you!” Dominic spat.

White light spilled from his pores and illuminated him. A pleasant tingling sensation tickled his skin, and every hair on his body stood on end. It wasn’t the same kind of tingling as when he transformed into a ghost. This was something serene, peaceful.

Propelled by an abundance of energy, he rose from the ground. He was weightless, suspended in air as if angels had taken him under the arms. The energy funneled itself into a singular beam that took aim on his target and slammed into the demon Drake’s chest. With a roar, his image exploded into a thousand tiny micro particles that dispersed and dissipated into thin air.

As if the magical spell had broken, Dominic fell, careening toward the ground at a remarkable speed. The wet asphalt, eager to make his acquaintance, lifted to meet him halfway. He squeezed his eyes shut, waiting for the impact, but to his relief, he landed with a thud onto a soft mound instead.

He opened his eyes, finding his face buried in his pillow. He was in his bed, and Kerrigan lay next to him, sound asleep. She stirred, snuggling deeper into her pillow while reaching out to pull his arm around her. Her hand went straight through him and he felt a jolt of shock as her solid form sliced through his translucent one.

She opened her eyes and smiled, and then looked alarmed when she registered his ghost form. She craned her neck around to find the sun shining bright through the window, and then back to him.

“Oh, God! What happened?”

It was as he expected. He had dispelled too much of his energy.

“I fell asleep. He was there again, and I couldn’t... I tried, Querida. Fuck! I tried not to use the energy. He was just—”

Kerrigan tried to quiet him. “Shh, Dominic. It’s okay.”

He could tell by the desperation on her face and the way she held her hand up as if to touch his face that she wanted to hold him, but she couldn’t. And he couldn’t find the strength to force his body back to his physical form.

“I’m fucked, Querida. I’m so goddamned fucked.”

[
1
]Animaniac’s short of Pinky and the Brain, Episode 72. Originally aired on October 6, 1993. Quote is used without permission under Fair Use policies and all rights remain with the original copyright holders.

Dominic remained in his ghost state for nearly two hours before he finally became solid. Kerrigan wasted no time reaching for him. She fisted his T-shirt and yanked him to her even before his face had had a chance to materialize. Once it had, her lips were already pressed to his. Dominic wrapped her up in his arms and entangled his legs with hers, refusing to let go.

Once their frantic need to touch subsided, he cupped her face and looked into her baby blues. “We’re going to figure this out, Querida.”

Her hold on his shirt hadn’t relaxed, and the lost look in her eyes conveyed that she wasn’t as confident as she tried to appear. He kissed her forehead before tucking her head under his chin and hugging her tight. He was just as desperate to hold her as she was to him.

She snuggled closer, gluing every part of her body that she could to his. He felt every inch of it, and so did his libido. He swept his hand down her back and over the swell of her bottom to pull her closer. He was very much aroused. Hard to believe, what with his impending doom looming on the horizon and all, but that was what being near Kerrigan did to him. A pale horse with Death astride its back could trot up to the front porch and ring the doorbell, but as long as she was next to him, he’d be sporting a raging boner.

“I could really use a shower. Care to join me?” The insinuation in his voice was unmistakable.

Despite her gloomy mood, Kerrigan grinned wide. “Are you trying to get fresh with me, Dominic Grayson?”

“Hmm... Just look at it this way.” He took her hand and placed it on his left pectoral, moving it slowly down his body. “You get to see all of this... wet, soapy, and on display for your eyes only. And if you should so happen to want to touch...” He moved her hand lower, past his stomach.

On cue, she bit down on her bottom lip and massaged his erection through his jeans. She moved her hand slow and sensually up and down his length, hating the denim barrier. Oh yeah, she was definitely going to want to touch.

He tilted his head and nuzzled her ear. “Mmm, I take that as a yes to the shower. Let’s go.” The only reason he removed her hand was so that he could roll out of bed and pull her out as well. Besides, he knew there was so much more that awaited them under the hot spray of the shower.