Miss Polly had a Dolly (Emma Frost #2) (16 page)

Their lips
parted and Nina
opened her eyes. She immediately felt
remorse for letting go of Blanka's lips. It was like being torn in half. Nina
wanted the kiss to last longer, she wanted them to stay this close forever.
Just the two of them forgetting everything around them, forgetting about the
fat sweaty man who was breathing heavily on the bed now, forgetting that they
were trapped in this place, in this prison of hell. Forgetting the world with
all its strange desires and unpleasantries.

"Yeah, that's the stuff. Now you touch her
breast, bite her nipple," the man said to Nina. He had taken his pants off
and was holding his
thing
in his
hand. He was rubbing it and moaning heavily.

Nina looked at Blanka, looked into her deep
brown eyes where she knew she could escape, swim deep into them like an ocean
and forget all else, just shut out the cruelties of the world. In there, in
those deep brown eyes, was salvation. There Nina found the safe haven that she
had been longing for for so desperately long.

Nina lifted her hand and stroke Blanka's cheek
gently. Then she grabbed her tiny breast in her hand, cupped it, and held it
for a little while. Blanka gasped. Nina smiled and leaned over to kiss her
again, dreaming about those soft lips touching hers once again, but the sweaty
man interrupted them.

"No kissing. Biting," he said and
snapped his teeth. "Bite the nipple."

Nina looked at Blanka again. She was still
holding her breast in her one hand like it was the most important treasure in
the world. Blanka smiled. Nina smiled back. Then she leaned over and put
Blanka's breast in her mouth.

"Yeah. Yeah. That's it," the man
yelled while touching himself. "That's the stuff I like. Now bite the
nipple. Bite it."

Nina let her tongue caress the nipple gently and
closed her eyes listening to the beating of Blanka's heart. Carefully, she bit
the nipple gently. Blanka gasped and moaned. Nina breathed heavily as she
sucked on it and then on the other one, nipping on them, letting them fill her
mouth and tasting the sweet drops of sweat on Blanka's skin. 

"Yeah. Yeah. That's it."

The man kept going, but the girls didn't hear
him anymore, they hardly even sensed his presence in the room any longer. It
was like he wasn't important anymore. Soon he became like a distant figure that
had no relevance to the two of them. Nina simply didn't care about him anymore.
She had finally figured out where she belonged in this forsaken and evil world.
For the first time in her almost fourteen years of living she felt like she
belonged. She had finally come home.

But it didn't last many minutes before she was
pulled out of it and back to the harsh reality of her miserable life. As she
was kissing Blanka's soft skin on her stomach, she was pulled out of her hands,
ripped from her place of safety.

The man had gotten up from the bed and grabbed
Blanka around the waist. He pulled her towards the bed and threw her on top of
it. Blanka whimpered with fear.

"No," Nina said. Her heart racing in
her chest. "Take me instead. She is too young. I have experience."

The man walked over to Nina and hammered his
fist into her face. Nina fell backwards onto the floor, her nose bleeding
heavily. The room was spinning as she was trying to figure out what was up and
what was down. She heard Blanka cry and the man moan and as Nina regained her
sight and was able to focus again, she saw Blanka bent over the bed and the man
bent over her from the back getting ready to enter her from behind. He was
slapping her on her back and behind as he got himself ready. Now he leaned down
to the floor and found his socks. He rolled them into a small ball that he
stuffed into Blanka's throat. She was crying and whimpering looking at Nina for
help as he grabbed her around the waist and forced her to bend over further.
Tears were rolling down her cheeks and the socks in her throat caused her to
have to fight to breathe. Furthermore, the man held a hand across her face so
she couldn't open her mouth and she could hardly breathe through her nose,
either because of her crying. Nina watched with anxiousness as the man entered
Blanka from behind, fear rolling across her eyes while she was fighting to cry
and to breathe. Blanka was trying to scream but ended up gagging. Soon she
started choking. The man behind her was pumping, holding his hand on her face
like he wanted to make it hard for her to breathe. He was laughing and riding
her so hard, Nina was afraid he was going to split her in two. He was so big
and she so incredibly small. Nina started to cry worrying about him hurting
Blanka. She got up on her feet and walked towards them. The man was groaning
and moaning.

"Stop," Nina whispered. Then she
repeated it a little louder. "You have to stop." The man didn't react
he was too deep into what he was doing, sweating like a pig, holding Blanka
down and hurting her badly. Nina could tell by the look on her face she was in
deep pain. That was when she realized Blanka had thrown up in her throat.

"She's choking. You have to stop. She's
choking!" Nina suddenly yelled.

But it was too late. Nina watched Blanka's eyes
rolled back in her head and she lost consciousness.

"Stop!" Nina yelled again and ran to
help Blanka. She tried to remove the fingers from Blanka's face to ease her
breathing so she could cough up the vomit before it blocked her throat
completely and suffocated her. But the man lifted his hand and slapped her so
hard Nina fell backwards and down from the bed. The man kept pumping behind
her, but Blanka was no longer moving. Before Nina managed to get back on her
legs, he came and pulled out with a smile. The man leg her go, but Blanka still
didn't move. Nina ran to Blanka and opened her mouth. She reached down in her
throat and pulled out the socks that blocked her breathing, but it was too
late. Nina felt for a pulse, but there was none.

Blanka was dead.

I ran as fast
as
I could down the corridor followed by Patrick and
another guy who had heard the scream also.

We found Sophia standing in front of an open
door. She had both of her hands to her face and an open mouth. When I got to her
she was still screaming. My heart was beating fast now while a million thoughts
ran through my mind.

Is it Ida? Has something
happened to Ida? Please don't let it be her. Please let it be something else.
Let it be a huge rat or something. Not Ida.

I put my arm on Sophia's shoulder and she
stopped screaming. "What's going on? What happened?" As I spoke I
turned my head and looked inside the room that Sophia was still staring into.
Patrick did the same. Then he started screaming as well holding his hands to
his face.

"Oh my God," he said cupping his
mouth. "Oh my God."

"The door was open," Sophia said
sobbing. "I looked in and found this, found her sitting like that."

I gasped as I realized what it was Sophia had
seen. A small girl was sitting inside the room on a chair, her head hanging to
the side, her eyes staring blank into the empty air. Underneath her chair was a
huge pool of blood that had run down from the chair. The lights in the room
were on and turned towards her like spotlights on stage. Like she was on
display, like the killer wanted us to see her.

"It's not Ida," I said. "It's not
Ida." I wasn't proud of it but a big part of me was so relieved that it
wasn't her, but some other girl. I calmed my breathing and tried to think fast.
That was when I noticed the bowtie. It was sewn into her chest since the girl
wasn't old enough to have developed breasts yet. It made me feel sick. Who
would hurt such a young innocent girl? What kind of sick bastard would do
something like this?

"The police. We need to alert the police.
They're outside with all the contestants by the waiting room. I'll run out to
them," I said.

"I'll go with you," Patrick said and
started walking next to me. The third person who had run to the scene put his
arm around Sophia and helped her sit down on a cardboard box next to them.

We ran through the corridor and not far from the
scene I suddenly spotted Ida walking towards us.

"What's going on?"

"Ida!" I yelled and grabbed her in my
arms.

"What's going on?" she repeated.

"I thought…for one small second there I was
so scared that…" I inhaled deeply then looked into Ida's eyes.
"Something bad happened back there. I want you to walk with me. I don't
want you to see it. Maybe you could go back and be there when your brother comes
out of his audition. He's probably done by now. Could you do that for me?"

Ida looked at Patrick in his red cloak. He
smiled at her and she smiled back. "Okay. I can do that."

"Great. I'll be right back."

I grabbed Patrick's arm and pulled him with me
towards the waiting area. The crowd started screaming when they spotted Patrick
with me, but he didn't seem to notice. He seemed perplexed and out of it. I
spotted Officer Morten right away and ran towards him. Patrick followed me.

"We have a situation in the back," I
said. "It's bad. It's really bad."

Officer Morten became serious. "Is it…?

I exhaled deeply. "Yes. I'm afraid it is.
And it's a child this time. A little girl." It hurt like swallowing knives
to say it out loud.

Patrick seemed pretty out of it and was whimpering
and walking in circles as I spoke to the officer. "Oh man," he said
biting his nails. "She had a bowtie…right here," he said and pointed
at the chest.

"Let's go," Officer Morten said.
"Show me the way."

It was the most
fun
Patrick had ever had. And it was all his own
doing.

You only have the fun you
create yourself. Life is what you make of it. If you get lemons, then…well,
then don't worry about it, just have your fun anyway. Try to stab someone, see
the blood running, feel the power of life and death in your hands. That'll make
you forget everything else.

He wanted so badly to laugh out loud and jump
around in exaltation, but he restrained himself. He had to continue to play out
his act. It was all part of the show. He had to stay in character. And he was
so believable it was almost frightening. Not a soul suspected a thing. He was
as upset and troubled about this as anyone. Maybe even more than most people.
Producer Hanne had heard about it and was now holding his hand as he was
sitting on a chair in the corridor, crying his heart out letting her know how
absolutely
awful
this all was.
How terrified he was that people could be so
evil
,
so
cruel
.

"She was only a little girl," he said
holding a hand theatrically to his chest. Hanne patted him on his shoulder.

From the corner of his eye, Patrick watched as
the police worked the scene. He recognized the officers who had been to his
suite the day before, Nyberg and Gammelgaard. They seemed troubled and
concerned. Their faces so deadly serious. Patrick enjoyed watching them
immensely. He could hardly believe that this was all his work. And what a work
indeed.

Beautiful, Patrick. Your best
one yet. And the lights? The girl killed on her search for fame, put in the
spotlight for the entire world to see. Making her more famous that she would
ever have been on her own? Genius. It's as simple as that. The work of a
mastermind. Some might even say you did her a favor. You fulfilled her dream in
death. Astonishing. You've outdone yourself this time.

"Do you want to go back to the hotel and
rest a little?" Hanne said looking at her watch. "We'll have to take
a break here anyway, probably for the rest of the day till the police are done
examining the room." Hanne sighed and cursed. "Bloody day to chose
and kill someone. We're losing a lot of money here, people. Lots of
money."

Patrick hid his face in between his hands and
peered out inconspicuously between the fingers. He spotted the woman sitting
not too far away. She was the one who had been waiting outside the door when
they heard the scream. There was something about her that made him want to
watch her. She wasn't pretty in the way his many victims had been. But she had
a beautiful face and that annoyed him immensely. She was comforting the other
woman, the one that had found the body, while talking to a police officer. He
was taking her statement and writing down what she said.

"I think I need to talk to the police
first," Patrick said. They told anyone who was at the scene when the body
was found to stay. Afterwards, I would love to go back to the hotel and
rest."

"Alright," Hanne said with a yawn.
"I'll take you then." She looked at her watch again, then pulled out
her phone and started tapping on it. Then she sighed. "Okay. Now it's
official. They've called off the auditions for today. We'll just have to take
the rest tomorrow. It's gonna be one hell of a long day. Better be ready for
that, darling."

Patrick nodded. "I'm ready," he said.
"Aint no killer gonna stop me from doing what I love to do. The show must
go on, right?"

Hanne laughed. It seemed delightfully
inappropriate given the circumstances. Patrick liked that. He wanted to laugh
too, but he had the decency to stay in character. That was what made him a good
actor, a great showman. He never lost his cool. Not in public at least.

"That's my Patrick," she said.
"That's what I like to hear."