New Revelations: Second Sight Book Two (29 page)

CJ
had worked himself up into a
n
incensed
frenzy as he made the long drive out to the cabin. It was almost
laughable
to think of how easy it was to hide away out here. No one in his family knew about the cabin
.
His uncle had used it to lure boys away with him and do unspeakable things.
His
uncle’s
threats that he would kill him if he ever told were taken gravely.
After his uncle’s s
uicide, it remained abandoned u
ntil he started going up there to get away from all the noise in his head.

The cabin was the key to everythin
g he had planned. Without it, CJ
would’ve had to kill her right away.
People would probably be shocked to realize Melanie was only forty minutes away
from her own apartment
.
Everyone had wild speculations over where the pretty gym teacher could be. Was she hiding out in the city? Did someone murder her and dump her body in one of the many lakes or rivers that covered the area?

If it wasn’t for his scheme,
Melanie would’ve never experienced the pain and torture she had done to him. Every careless smile and girlish giggle had felt like battery acid was being poured on his heart. How could she be happy when all he felt was
hurt
?
How could she move on so easily after telling him each day that she loved him?

CJ
had tried to reason with her, but she would never let him back into her life. She was his world and it didn’t even matter to her. She
just moved on as if he was nothing to her
. Wearing her revealing clothes to the gym and flirting with every guy she crossed paths with. She gave that bald loser
in her spinning class
more attention than she gave him.

His truck made
plenty of noise as it w
ent over the gravel driveway. CJ
hoped the sound drove fear into the bitch’s heart. He stomped up the driveway and unlocked the door. The setting sun cast an eerie glow over the interior of the cabin. It was sparsely furnished with only a small kitchenette, bathroom and
a
bed
with a
lifeless
lump stretched across it
.

She didn’t even move at the sound of his entering. Her eyes were unfocused and simply stared blankly at the ceiling above her head.
Her arms were
above her head and handcuffed to the metal headboard. By bolting the legs to the floor, he had assured
Melanie
wasn’t going anywhere.
She had to be in a hell of a lot of pain stuck in that position, but you would never know it.
After putting up the
fight
of her life
the first day
he had brought her to the cabin
, she had simply stopped.

No matter what CJ
did to her, she would not submit to him. It enraged him to no end. He wanted her
to spend the last moments of her pathetic existence
pleading for her life, promising him anything he wanted. An unresponsive filthy lump on the bed wasn’t how he pictured this in his mind.
Melanie had somehow managed to ruin this aspect of his life as well.

The smell was nauseating.
When he realized that he was going to keep her here for more than a night, he had bought diapers.
Even the humiliation of her ex-lover diapering her wasn’t enough to get her out of her stupor.
It had been two days since he had been able to
make the trip into the forest. She had been sitting soiled for hours upon hours as he was enjoying his life. It gave him some satisfaction since she was giving him none.

CJ
fed her the last time he came and she ate like a mechanical doll. Open mouth. Close mouth. Chew. Swallow. He had tried to incite her, but she wouldn’t react.
He had first burned her by overheating the soup. He then grabbed a fork and repeatedly poked her with it. Her body would tense over the pain, but she did nothing to stop it. He wondered if he had sent her into madness too quickly.
This would be his only regret. The sting of her rejection wiped away any other feelings of remorse. Dying miserable and alone would be retribution for her callousness towards him.

This morning he
realized it had been more than a week
since he took her from her apartment. It had been too easy
to take her
. Melanie was always trying to be the nice one.
When he stopped by her apartment, she i
nvited him in and even
tried to have a friendly chat with him. He
slipped the
GHB
into her soda when she went to the bathroom and soon after she couldn’t even stand up on her own.
It was
effortless
to sl
ip away with her in his uncle
’s
pickup truck and take her to the
cabin.

When she came to and found herself shackled to the
bed, her screams of outrage were
audible through the gag. Whe
n he walked over to the bed, Melanie
tried to fight him off with her legs. His fists and a knife had stopped her quick enough. After he had raped her the first time, she retreated into herself and seemed to never return
.

CJ
was being stupid to keep her alive. He just didn’t know how to let her go. But the longer she lived, the more chance
s
of something happening to ruin everything. Someone could find her. She could escape. The police would realize he had been the one to take her. His panic at the possibilities forced him to drive out here and finish what he had started.

“Beg me to take you back, Mel,” he spat at her face. Her eyes did not move from the ceiling. Repeatedly he had asked her what she was thinking about and she had not answered him.

He ran his hands through her
blonde
hair. His once beautiful girlfriend was now barely
a shell of her former self. Her hair was knotted and oily from lack of bathing. Bruises and dried blood covered her arms and face. Her green t-shirt and shorts she wore on the day he had taken her were caked with blood that had turned a rust color. In this state, she was
a wretched and unlovable thing
. Hatred coiled in his belly and he felt the urge to cause her more pain.

He grabbed a hunting knife with a wooden handle off of the kitchen counter.
Stalking over to her, he taunted her with the knife. “Maybe after I’m through with you, I’ll have some fun with your sister. You know I
always had a thing for blond
e
s.”

He was shocked when she still didn’t respond. It only fueled his anger and he leaped on top of her. “I’m going to kill you tonight, Mel. You’re never going to see anyone you care about. And I’m going to make it hurt, I promise you that.”

His hands shook and he felt almost dizzy over the intensity of his loathing. As seconds stretched on, she finally focused on his face.
After she unsuccessfully tried to speak through the gag, he removed it.
“I’m already dead,” she whispered. “I’ll never give you what you want, CJ. You can’t have me anymore.”

The knife seemed to plunge down on its own accord. Blood splattered everywhere. It drenched his body and seeped into the bedding. He had no memory of bringing down the knife again and again. He couldn’t even recall if she screamed or not. It was as if he
had
completely lost touch with reality and blacked out. When he came to, blood was all he saw until he looked deeply into Melanie’s unseeing eyes…

***

“Kate! Open the door! Dammit, Kate!”

Melanie was screaming. No, Kate realized, Melanie wasn’t screaming. She was dead. It was Kate screaming as she came out of her vision. As her terror subsided, sobs erupted from her. She had failed again. They had been too late to save Melanie. CJ had killed her
just
last night.

Declan’s voic
e yelled at her from behind the closed door of her hotel room
. Running over to the door, she swung it open and collapsed in his arms. He was firing questions at her, but she couldn’t find her voice. It was as if saying the words out loud would make them real. Kate shut her eyes as Declan held her. Behind her eyes, all she could see was Melani
e’s blood—d
r
ipping off of the hunting knife—d
renching Melanie’s body. Nothing could have prepared her for witnessing such a brutal act.
Her sobs turned into dry heaves and she felt it hard to maintain a grip on reality.

“Kate, please,” Declan begged. “Tell me what happened.”

Kate shook her head emphatically. “I can’t…” she moaned.

Declan cupped her face and
he
leaned down to meet her eyes.
His thumb brushed away a few tears that streamed down her face. Her breath came out in gasps and she felt the panic continue to rise in her. It seemed as though she
was falling without anything solid to grab onto.

“Look at me.
” He waited until her hazel eyes locked onto his.
“
It’s over. Whatever you saw has already happened.
You don’t have to go back there ever again,” he promised.

Kate
hiccupped and stepped out of his embrace. Walking over to the nightstand, she grabbed a tissue and wiped at her face. She sat at the edge of the bed and hung her head down. She felt the bed
lower
as he took a seat next to her. “Melanie was killed last night. CJ murdered her in his uncle’s cabin.”

There was a sharp intake of breath next to her. “You’re sure?”

“Unfortunately I am,” she replied. “I saw into CJ’s mind. He drugged her and kept her bound and gagged in his uncle’s cabin. For
nine
days, he tortured her. What kind of sick monster is capable of such a thing?

“
Last night, he flipped out and stabbed her so many times that I lost count. It was
horrific
…” her voice trailed off. Declan pulled her close to him until she was practically on his lap.

“Where’s the cabin? Why wouldn’t anyone check it out?” Declan sounded enraged over the unfairness of it all.
As much as he had denied any emotional attachment, this confirmed that Declan had developed a connection to Melanie too.

“It’s in
Michaux
State
Forest
.” She recalled the name from CJ’s memories. It hadn’t surprised Kate when she found herself inside of his head. He was obviously demented and didn’t have the mental faculties to conceal his thoughts from her
.

Kate squeezed her eyes tight as she further exp
lained the information she glean
ed from the vision. “
Guess that’s a little over a half an hour from here. His uncle took boys there to molest, including CJ. CJ was the only one who knew about it and used it after his uncle killed himself.”

Declan made a noise of disgust.
“I tried to get into
CJ’s
mind
tonight
, but I didn’t see anything. Instead, I had a vision of Brad when he first met Melanie at the gym. I t
hought it was maybe a hint
he was involved since he had been thinking about her.
I had no idea we were too late to find her.” He groaned
in frustration before adding,
“We have to call Delaney and the police.
”

Kate
had promi
sed Delaney mere hours ago
she would bring her sister home to her. This was never the way she
expected
it would happen.
Only l
ast night, she had
seen
a vision of Melanie. It must have been right before she had been killed.
They had been so close
to saving her
.
Sh
e couldn’t help
but play out the many “what ifs” in her head as she thought about Melanie’s slaughter.

“CJ
hated her for leaving him. He wanted to cause her pain and beg for his forgiveness. But she wouldn’t. No matter what he did, she never gave him the satisfaction of
pleading with him for he
r life,” Kate murmured.
“
I think that’s the reason we never saw a vision of what happened to her. She retreated into herself and relived all of her happiest memories,” she explained.

“At least that’s som
e consolation. Maybe it
helped her avoid some of the p
ain,” he said and shook his head
.
“Do you want me to call Delaney?”

She nodded and a
rose from the bed. As Declan dialed her number and set off to the corner of the room,
Kate
reached for her
own
phone on the nightstand. It was almost
ten o’clock
at night and Jared had still not returned her call. She tried to feel
livid
, but the only thing she felt was raw need.
His phone went right to voicemail. “Jared…” her voice trailed off
. The
voicemail record
ed
her silence for several seconds
before she spoke again
. “Something happened. I had a vision tonight and well…Melanie’s dead. It woul
d
mean a lot to me if you would call me back
. Well…
bye.”