Hunted Dreams (29 page)

“For now, this is all so
yummy
.” His smile morphed into a grin. “Can I have that spoon now?”

The dusty, rocky night, shining beyond the glass like the surface of the moon. Was it as airless out there as in here?

Give me strength.

“Little Kat, did you just say something?” the killer gasped, smiling and clapping.

She looked at him, then. So plain, so average, so normal. Short, brown hair, round bulb of a nose, cheeks and chin scratchy with three days’ beard growth. The only slightly extraordinary things about him were his round, bright blue eyes that sparkled with good cheer.

Kat extended her left fist, in which she clenched a tablespoon. She walked toward him, spoon leading the way, eyes fixed on his bushy brown eyebrows. She’d learned days ago not to meet his gaze.

The man lowered his brows in confusion but continued smiling.

In a clear and quiet tone, she spoke. “I was talking to the universe, not to you. The only thing I have to say to you is that I hope you die.” She extended the spoon to him.

The man gasped and grabbed the spoon from her fist. “Kat, what a dr—”

She whipped her right hand from behind her back and lunged forward.

Although pointed, the steak knife did not immediately penetrate his stomach. Sobbing, growling, Kat leaned all her weight against the end, and with a wet popping noise, the pointy tip broke the surface, plunging the serrated blade to the hilt.

Roaring, the killer staggered to his feet and started toward her. She scrambled backward, yanking her nightgown to her armpits and pulling three more knives from the waistband of her flowered panties.

The man halted.

She brandished a single knife in her right hand, two in her left. “That one didn’t do it, but one of these will.”

The man doubled over, and blood sprinkled the dark blue throw rug. His left hand fumbled for his right pocket.

“You left it in the bedroom,” Kat reminded him.

Hunched over, the hilt protruding from his fingers, the man stumbled toward her, a red trail guided his footsteps.

Shrieking, Katana rushed forward and rammed the second knife home in his arm. The blade skidded off something hard,—bone, probably—and she lost control of it. The knife slid out of his arm and clattered to the ground.

The killer cried out and swiped a heavy hand in her direction. She easily evaded it.

“Two more!” she cried, a knife in each hand.

The killer shuddered and dropped to a knee not five feet from her. She hoped he was dying. With a groan, he twisted around and fell flat on his back.

Kat stood there, vibrating in indecision. Should she stab him again, make sure he was dying? Run out the door and over to the nearest neighbor’s place, a half-mile away? Was he faking? Would he follow her?

Sobbing in terror, knives pointed straight at the man who’d murdered her family and spent three long days talking about it in intimate detail, she edged away from him and toward the sliding glass door.

Her fingers felt huge and greasy as she messed with the locking mechanism. She unlatched the door by feel, keeping her body twisted toward the man, knife held threateningly toward him.

The door screeched open.

“I hope you die,” she whispered, and raced out the door to the neighbor’s.

“You were gone by the time the police arrived,” Katana murmured.

“I’m heartier than I look,” the man said, patting his fleshy belly.

“Where did you go?” she asked him.

The man chuckled and reached a hand out to her. She slapped it away and flashed her teeth at him. “My dear, I don’t know where I went. I exist exactly as you remember me, sixteen years ago. I haven’t aged, haven’t escaped anywhere but to the back of your mind. In a way, I guess I am a ghost.”

Katana drew in a deep breath, one that shuddered in spite of her best efforts. She stepped back from the man and studied his bland physicality, his twinkling eyes, his lank, sandy brown hair. He looked like some kind of televangelist or maybe a bit player on some children’s show.

“Why did you kill them?” she asked him, her voice low, hoarse.

He stretched his arms toward the ceiling, and her eyes fluttered to take it all in. “Poor thing. You must not remember how often we discussed it.”

She shook her head. “You said you liked killing, that it felt good. But you didn’t kill me. There was more to it.”

“Trust me, little Kat, I planned to kill you, too. I just thought a nice visit would make it that much sweeter.”

“You didn’t hit me, didn’t rape me, didn’t do anything beyond force me to relive the grisliness of my family’s death. Over and over and over.”

Reliving the horror. Fresh anguish all day long.

This is all so
yummy.

I haven’t felt so full since leaving home.

She inhaled through her nose. Before freezing solid, her stomach sent a cold, sickly jolt up her spine. She felt like laughing. She felt like throwing up. Instead, she drew her sword from its scabbard.

“You’re a Leech,” she whispered.

The man laughed. “Funny how it all comes full circle, isn’t it?” he asked.

Her mind sparked with a hundred thoughts. She put a hand to her head to keep it from blasting open and spilling a tidal wave of questions and feelings. Finally, she stood before him, Katana Anders, sword in hand and memories of that horrific experience slicing into her.

Once again, she breathed slowly. “So what do we do now?” she finally asked him, voice steady.

“I vote we spend some more quality time together, but I suspect you have something slightly bloodier in mind,” he offered through his always-smiling mouth.

She cocked her head to the side. “You know, when I decided to stop running and start fighting the horrors in here, my mind supplied me with this sword.”

The killer nodded. “Makes sense, especially given your fondness for sharp weapons.”

“Shut up,” she said. “Your time for talking is over. I got stronger, events started sticking to my memory. And always, when I tried to wake up, this scene blocked me. But I’m here now, I’ve faced the memories, and you’re the only horror left.” She dropped her sword to the ground. “I really don’t need this anymore, do I?”

“You’re saying y—”

“Shut up,” she said gently. “Your voice means nothing. Your words aren’t even formed from real air. If you’re going to attack me, do it. Let’s get this over with so I can wake up.”

Still smiling, the man lunged forward and grabbed the sword. He pulled upward, grunted, and almost stumbled to the ground. He pulled again, muscles in his arms straining. The sword remained in place on the floor.

When he rose, Katana blessed him with a sweet smile. “This is my dream, and these are my rules.” She took a step toward him, grinning, and the man scrambled backward.

“I tried stabbing someone to death,” she mused, still smiling. “I may take your advice after all and see how much more satisfying it is to strangle them.”

After showering, Reed sat naked on his bed—correction, on the bed he temporarily occupied—and set the alarm on his cell phone for two hours later, a habit he’d adopted for at least the past week. The average sleep cycle lasted around ninety minutes. Two hours gave him plenty of time to rejoin Katana and awaken in time to search the house. He didn’t deserve to rest soundly until he’d found her.

He donned his boxers and lay down on the bed. Katana’s world, created and maintained as a carnival funhouse, a prison house of horrors meant to wring every last drop of pain from someone who had already endured too much. Through the looking glass, she’d said. And yet still his favorite part of the day.

Reed slept.

Katana’s body ached. Breathing abraded her throat. Her head pounded. She felt a literal pain in her behind, dull and throbbing. Her tongue clumped like a dried loofah in her mouth.

She tried to talk, and her voice emerged as a scratchy groan.

“Shh, shh,” a voice, deep and feminine, soothed.

Her eyelids, weighing at least as much as Volvos, creaked open a millimeter, then two. Dim, jaundiced light poked its way through her dilated pupils. She croaked in protest.

“It’s okay,
mija
,” the voice crooned.

“Thirssy,” she hissed.

A moment later, an ice chip slipped between her lips, melting before reaching her throat. Another followed.

“Don’t worry, honey,” the voice whispered. “Waking up is scary. You’ll go back to sleep in a little bit.”

“Hurts,” Katana whispered.

“I know, honey, I know.” A warm hand smoothed over her face. “While you’re awake this time, we’ll move you a little bit, okay? Maybe stay awake for a few minutes, take the IV and catheter out for a minute? Does that sound good?”

Katana’s eyelids slid open another few millimeters. Haloed by the yellow light, a smiling, light brown face peered down at her.

“‘N hosp’al?” she slurred.

The woman hesitated for a moment, looked away, and then nodded and smiled at her. “That’s right,
mija
. You’re in a hospital.”

Before the phone finished its second round of digitized rooster crows, Reed had sat up in bed. He smacked the phone into silence and glared hazily at the wall.

He hadn’t dreamed of Katana. He never, ever forgot their reunions, always encountered her within the first two hours of sleeping. She hadn’t been there for him to find.

Reed jumped out of bed, threw clothes over his boxers, and slipped into the hallway, all within one minute of waking.

Katana spent the first couple of hours waking slowly, reacquainting herself with her senses, and finally looking around the room.

It didn’t look much like a hospital room. First of all, the only light source came from a floor lamp shoved into the opposite corner. Secondly, the room measured about twenty feet by fifteen and featured wood paneling. A staircase covered in stained beige carpet led upward and beyond the low ceiling. Her bed linen was, or had once been, a bright and crackling white, but it now needed a fresh laundering. Finally, Katana knew few hospital rooms that crammed delivery boxes, a disheveled cot, and food-laden card tables along the periphery.

Smelling something that should have ignited hunger but instead inspired nausea, Katana attempted to sit up. A moment later, her muscles cramped and aching, she dropped back down to the bed.

“Why am I here?” she asked the woman who had introduced herself as Luisa.

“Accident,
mija
,” Luisa called. She hunkered before an open cabinet across the room from Katana’s bed. “Let’s talk about it later, when you’ve rested some more.”

“Why can’t I remember waking up before?” Katana persisted. She wiggled her fingers, her toes, a feat that shouldn’t have required as much concentration as it did.

“You spend much more time sleeping than waking,” Luisa said. She approached the bed with a new pillow in hand and replaced the slightly damp one. Her fingers smelled like microwaved food.

After sinking into the fresh, sweet-smelling pillow, Katana lifted a shaking right arm. “How long have I been here?”

Luisa glanced over her shoulder at her. “Later,” she said briskly.

“If I sleep a lot, I’ll probably forget.” Katana sighed. “Just tell me: Is it longer than a month?”

Luisa raised her eyebrows at her and sighed before nodding slightly. “You don’t wake up so much—maybe every three, four days. Only for a while. Not much. You don’t talk. This is the first time. You’ll go back to sleep soon. Got to rest to heal, you know.”

Her tongue swiped over her lips. “The first time in how long?” Katana pressed.

Luisa threw up her hands. “I been here five, six weeks. I don’t know before that.”

At least six weeks. No wonder her arms shook, her throat burned, her legs felt like jelly. With a half growl, half grunt, she resituated herself to take the pressure off her backside. It might be well padded, but it needed some relief.

“Where is my—” she began.

“No more questions, please. I don’t know what to say,
mija
. They said—you know. They said you wouldn’t wake up this much,” she blurted, and then snuck a glance at Katana.

“Who? My doctor?”

Luisa turned and flashed a tentative smile. “Your doctor, yeah.”

Katana swallowed and worked her saliva into a less sticky paste. “I don’t want to get you in trouble,” she said. “Could I get more ice?”

The other woman’s smile widened, this time into something more genuine. Her wide hips swishing, she bustled to the bedside with a carafe in hand.

“I’m sleepy,” Katana mumbled after the third ice chip. Her eyelids dipped downward.

“Sleepy time soon,” Luisa said cheerfully, and with no small amount of relief. “I’ll put your IV in another vein. You got to switch veins sometimes, you know. You need to pee with the catheter out? I got a bedpan.”

Katana shook her head. To the sound of Luisa explaining the procedures for bathing her, she rested her eyelashes against her cheek.

Two hours after awakening, Reed was thrilled the rest of the household slumbered. His fury would have blasted through their thoughts like a blizzard. The only rooms he hadn’t felt, knocked, and kicked his way through tonight belonged to the home’s other four inhabitants, and he’d spent hours in them on other days. In short, he’d searched this entire goddamn house a hundred times and found nothing.