Soultaker Read online

  The beloved voice of a certain delightful young woman answered on the second ring: “Who the fuck is this?”

  Mrs. Cheever shivered with pleasure at the sound of the voice. “This is your humble servant, Ellen Cheever of the Rockville Public Library. I believe I have information of interest to you.”

  Kelsey parked his Olds in the driveway, behind his sister’s tan Volvo. It was four o’clock. His parents, still at work, wouldn’t be home until after five. He entered the house through the front door, moved rapidly through the foyer, and rushed up the stairs to the second floor. The memory of the unpleasant exchange with Mrs. Cheever was still fresh in his mind, and he didn’t want his sister subjecting him to a similar interrogation about his choice of reading material.

  And she would, given the opportunity.

  If anything, she was even more of a literature snob than Mrs. Cheever.

  Upstairs, he walked softly past the closed door to her room. Low moans and a squeak of bedsprings emanated from the other side of the door. Kelsey frowned and edged closer to the door. The muffled sounds of passion continued. He first thought she might be watching Internet porn, but then he heard a hoarse voice call out her name.

  The voice then beseeched God.

  Then called out her name again.

  And so on.

  Definitely not the Internet.

  The voice was so faint he wasn’t able to figure out which of Melissa’s many male acquaintances was putting it to her in there. What he did know absolutely for certain was she would kick his ass if she caught him playing aural voyeur. His sister was nearly six feet tall and was a former member of the Rockville High girls’ basketball team. And anyway, listening to his sister fuck some guy made him feel kind of like a sleaze, so he continued down the hallway and closed himself up in his room.

  He dropped the stack of books on his bed, kicked his shoes off, and settled down in front of his television, folding his legs beneath him Indian style. He switched on his X-Box and put in the latest version of Halo. Ten minutes into the game his cell phone rang. He pushed the pause button and flipped open the phone. “Yeah?”

  “Dude!”

  It was Will.

  “Hey, man. I got some real interesting books from the library. Maybe you could—”

  “You are not going to believe what I just heard.” There was a frantic edge to Will’s voice, an almost jittery tone utterly unlike him. “It’s just fucking insane.”

  “Okay. What’s happening?”

  “Trey’s mom was arrested. My brother’s girlfriend just called him. Trisha. She lives just down the street from Trey. She saw all the cops show up and everything.”

  Kelsey was flabbergasted. “Holy shit.” He felt like he’d been whacked over the head with something heavy. “Why’d they nab that crazy slut?”

  Will laughed. The manic undertone was still there. “Trisha says a bunch of the neighbors wandered out to the scene when the cops showed up. You know how those rednecks are. She doesn’t know all the facts, but she did see Trey’s dad get carted out on a stretcher and put in an ambulance. She even got a look at the sorry motherfucker before they took off. And this is the really fucked-up part. She said all his fingers were gone. Now, maybe my memory’s off, but I’m pretty sure the last time I saw that asshole he had all his fat fucking fingers.”

  Kelsey whistled. “Goddamn.”

  He didn’t know what else to say, so he said it again. “I mean, goddamn.”

  Will snorted. “Yeah. It’s freaky as shit. Jolene was taken away in handcuffs. Nobody knows exactly what happened, but it’s pretty clear she did something pretty fucked-up to Hal.”

  Kelsey couldn’t help the smile that came to his face. “Well…”

  Will was on the same wavelength. “Right. The motherfucker deserved it. No question. Still, you can’t sweep something like this under the rug. Jolene’s not getting out of jail anytime soon.”

  Kelsey had a disquieting thought. “Shit. What’s gonna happen to Trey?”

  The manic edge seeped out of Will’s voice and was replaced by a quiet but obvious unease. “I don’t know. I think he’s being questioned by the police right now. You know that older brother of his? He’s there with him.”

  “Jake? I thought he was in Minnesota.”

  “Yeah, well, he’s here now. And unless Trey gets charged with something, I guess he’ll have temporary custody.”

  Kelsey nodded. It made sense. “Do we know where Jake’s staying?”

  “No. But we fucking need to find out, man.”

  They agreed to make some calls and get back to each other. Kelsey searched his memory, trying to recall whether Trey had ever mentioned names of Jake’s old friends. No specific names came to mind, but the one thing he kept coming back to was a general awareness that Jake was a big drinker. So, say Jake gets into town feeling a little thirsty—where would he go?

  Well.

  If you weren’t into the whole redneck karaoke douche bag scene, there was only one real alternative.

  The Good Times Bar & Grill.

  Kelsey leaped to his feet, grabbed his shit, and hurried out of the room. He was halfway down the hallway when he heard his sister call his name. He halted. The door to her bedroom stood open. Frowning, he turned and peered into the room. Melissa was alone in the room. There was no sign of her mystery lover, but this barely registered. The shock he felt now exceeded what he’d felt when he heard Will’s astonishing news.

  She was on her back in her bed, head and shoulders propped on a pile of colorful, plush pillows, and she didn’t have a stitch of clothing on. Her long, curly blonde hair cascaded over her shoulders and covered the tops of her large breasts. She extended a hand to her brother and beckoned to him with a hooked finger. “Come, Kelsey. Come in and shut the door behind you. I have some things I want to show you.”

  He’d seen his sister naked before, of course, but they’d been little kids then.

  Innocents.

  Melissa wasn’t a little kid anymore. Not even close. She was a full-grown woman.

  A beautiful full-grown woman.

  Kelsey’s jaw dropped. “Um…”

  She laughed. “You’re so cute when you’re flustered, little brother. I’ve always liked that about you.” She giggled. “Among other…things. You’re looking good these days. Fit. You’ve finally lost the last of that baby fat.” She looked him up and down in a frank, disconcerting way. “Mmm…”

  Kelsey’s face reddened. “Um…”

  Melissa swung her legs over the side of the bed, planted her feet on the floor, and stood up, posing for maximum effect. “See anything you like?” She giggled again and the motion of her body made her breasts bounce. “Of course you do. Let’s stop playing games. Time to admit the truth. You want me, and I want you.”

  Kelsey was shaking his head before he even realized he was doing it. He felt light-headed, like he might pass out at any moment. This was crazy. It couldn’t be happening. “No. You’re wrong.”

  She smirked and took a step toward him. “I’ve never been so right. Now come over here and fuck me.”

  Kelsey moved back a step as the initial shock passed. “This is insane. You’re my sister. What’s wrong with you?”

  The smirk deepened as she continued to advance on him. “I’m horny. And so are you.” She laughed. “You naughty little boy.”

  Every bit of Kelsey’s essence rebelled against this. It was wrong on a very basic level. It was obscene. Christ. He loved his sister. Adored her, even. But that love had always been a pure thing, absolutely untainted by the ugliness of incestuous desires. He wanted to scream. To cry. When his sister drew to within a few feet of him, he backed out of the doorway, psyching himself to run out of the house.

  There was just one problem with that.

  A large man was blocking the way to the staircase.

  Not just a large man, but a very tall, very muscular man with a black hood over his head. Except for the hood, the man was nude. His cock stood ere
ct and glistening, pointing at Kelsey. Kelsey yelped. His mind was close to cracking. The world had gone nuts. He felt as if he’d fallen through a crack in reality, or as if one of his most hellish, psychotic dreams had materialized into reality.

  Melissa put a hand on his shoulder. “Relax, Kel. There’s nothing to be afraid of. You’ll see that soon. You don’t know how lucky you are.” Her hand massaged his shoulder. “This is the best day of your life.”

  The hooded man took a step toward him.

  The surge of terror Kelsey experienced broke his paralysis. Before he could think about what he was doing, he rushed forward and swung a foot toward the man’s exposed genitals. The man didn’t have time to react. His pained shriek was astonishing. He wobbled and stumbled backward. Kelsey pressed his advantage, kicking the man again. The hooded behemoth tumbled down the stairs.

  Melissa screamed.

  Kelsey rushed down the staircase, leaped over the man’s still body as he reached the floor, pulled open the door, and staggered outside. He wobbled but managed to stay upright as he made his way to the Olds. Then the keys slipped from his hands and he knelt to pick them up. As his shaking hand closed around them, he heard footsteps pounding down the driveway. He got to his feet and saw his still-nude sister streaking toward him, a hand clutching a large kitchen knife raised high above her head, her face contorted in an awful expression of pure hatred and rage.

  Through some miracle, Kelsey’s fingers found the correct key right away and he unlocked the Oldsmobile. He slipped in and pulled the door shut, slamming the lock down just as Melissa arrived at the driver’s-side window. She pounded on the window and screamed at him. Kelsey started the engine, tore out of the driveway, and raced away from his home at a reckless speed. A few blocks away, his hands started shaking again, this time so badly that he was swerving all over the road.

  A glance at the rearview mirror revealed no sign of his sister.

  He pulled over and waited for the shaking to subside. And as he waited, an image floated into his head: the sneering, sadistic face of Myra Lewis. Despite a lack of evidence, he felt certain Trey’s girlfriend was responsible for whatever had taken over his sister. It was a gut feeling, an emotional reaction, but he was convinced.

  She’s a demon.

  Fucking hell.

  Somehow, Myra had sensed he might be a threat—a threat she needed to eliminate. Kelsey groaned. This was more than he could handle alone. How could he hope to fight something so powerful? People needed to know there was an evil loose in Rockville, something insidious, something that was slowly taking over, but he couldn’t imagine anyone believing something so crazy.

  Jake McAllister. Maybe.

  And Will, of course.

  Kelsey froze and stared through the windshield at the empty road ahead.

  Fuck.

  He had to get to his friend before they did.

  His hands steady now, he restarted the Oldsmobile, pulled onto the road, and sped out of Washington Heights.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  “Shit!”

  Will slammed the phone down in its cradle.

  He’d never find out where Trey’s brother was staying at this rate. How the hell long could his mother and that other woman gab? At least Kelsey’s parents had been cool enough to get Kelsey a cell phone. They cared about their son. His own parents, well-heeled tightwads, refused to even invest a tiny, tiny little bit of money in a second line. It was ridiculous. His dad was a lawyer. He made twice the combined income of Kelsey’s parents. But the old man wanted to teach him the “value of a dollar.”

  “Shit! Shit! Shit!”

  Will’s heart slammed in his rib cage. He knew he needed to calm down. Getting all pissed off was no good. It wouldn’t help Trey, and it damn sure wouldn’t do anything to loosen the parental purse strings. He stared at the phone, wondering how many seconds had passed since the last time he’d checked the line.

  A minute?

  Maybe a little more.

  “Fuck!”

  He did what he always did when he was frustrated. He turned to the poster of Jessica Alba pinned to the wall above his bed. Jessica, clad in a skintight black leather outfit, regarded him with an expression that was both stern and knowing. He had a recurring fantasy in which she slipped into his room in the middle of the night and handcuffed him to his bed. Believing he possessed vital information she required for some unknown reason, she interrogated him with a wonderful ruthlessness, strutting about his room on thigh-high black vinyl boots with stiletto heels, resplendent in all that black leather.

  He pictured it again and felt a little better.

  Until he heard footsteps thumping down the hallway toward his room. He grimaced. These were not happy footsteps. These were not even mildly perturbed footsteps. These were the footsteps of doom, as confirmed by the loud knock on his door a moment later.

  His mother’s voice cracked at him like a gun blast: “William Henry Mackeson, open this door this instant!”

  Will gulped. Anytime his mother used his full name, he knew he was in for it. He slid off the bed and got shakily to his feet. He drew in a calming breath, crossed the room to open the door, and cringed at the expression on his mother’s face. “Uh…what’s the problem, Mom?”

  Alexis Mackeson was livid. Her face was red and her eyes bulged in an almost cartoonish way. She wore a pretty floral-print dress with a scooped neck that displayed impressive cleavage. His mother had a nice figure and she liked to show it off. She flirted with damn near every man she met, and Will suspected she was doing a lot more than just flirting with many of them. With the hours his father kept, she had plenty of free time for infidelity. Once upon a time, Will had loved his mother with a kind of starry-eyed devotion. But that was before he learned some unpleasant truths, including the bitter realization that his mother and father only played at being a loving, happy couple. It was a facade they presented for the world. Alexis looked good on Blake Mackeson’s arm at social functions, and Alexis enjoyed Blake’s money.

  Will dreamed of the day he’d be free of their “let’s pretend” world.

  She shoved her son backward, stalked into his room, and threw the door shut behind her. “You little snot. I will not tolerate rudeness. You damn near deafened me when you slammed that phone down.” She gave Will a hard shake. “Goddammit, boy, I taught you better manners than that.”

  Will sniffled. “I’m sorry.”

  At seventeen, Will knew he was too old to allow this kind of treatment. He wanted to cry, but crying was for pussies.

  The phone rang.

  Will took an unconscious step toward it, but Alexis stopped him. “Oh no, you don’t. You let that phone ring, child. I have to teach you a lesson in manners. Make you see why it’s wrong to be such a miserable little snot.”

  The phone continued to ring.

  Desperation contorted Will’s face. “Mom, that might be Kelsey. I have to talk to him. Trey’s in trouble. We have to—”

  Will was caught off guard by what happened next. She landed a hard backhand blow across his face that knocked him to the floor. Will rolled over and stared up at her, his eyes wide, his jaw aching. He was stunned. His mother had never been the world’s best, but this was the first time she’d ever struck him. She’d never even spanked him for misbehaving as a child. The terror he felt now was something new and awful. For the first time, he believed he truly understood how Trey felt when his parents got liquored up and turned violent.

  He looked into his mother’s eyes and saw nothing but hatred. This was new, too. She didn’t love him, of course, but the pure malevolence in her eyes was horrible. That look penetrated places within him he thought were dead, and he felt his heart break.

  The phone stopped ringing.

  Her nostrils flared. “Get up so I can hit you again.”

  “But—”

  She kicked him, the point of her shoe sending a flash of pain down a shin. “Get up!”

  Will experienced an epiphany then. He kn
ew something was really wrong with his mother, something beyond her control. Mental illness, perhaps, a chemical imbalance that could be corrected with the right medications. He held fast to that notion, telling himself that he couldn’t hold this against her, that she wasn’t as evil, as bad, as she seemed now. He just had to get through this somehow and find a way to get her help.

  He looked at her again, his eyes wide and pleading. “I’m sorry, Mom. I know I was wrong. I’ll never do it again. I—”

  The phone rang again.

  Something about the second call, coming so soon on the heels of the first, communicated urgency. Intuition told him it was Kelsey trying to reach him. He had news about Trey, or he’d located Trey’s brother. Or it was about something else, something equally important, and Kelsey needed to talk to him about it right now.

  “I’ve got to answer that, Mom. It’s probably Kelsey. We’re trying to help Trey.”

  His mom snorted. “Oh, I’m sure it is your little friend. Such a stupid name for a boy, Kelsey. A queer kid’s name. I’m not surprised the little faggot’s up to no good.”

  “What?”

  The phone fell silent again.

  “Don’t play innocent with me, child.” Something in her tone now disturbed him more than the violence. She sounded like a person who reveled in cruelty. To Will, it was as if he was seeing her as she really was for the first time. Another layer had been peeled away, a mask beneath a mask. “You boys are dabbling in things that are none of your business. You know Melissa Hargrove, don’t you? Kelsey’s sister? I was talking to her before your rude interruption. Melissa had a very interesting conversation with Mrs. Cheever from the library.” She chewed her lower lip and studied her son in a way that sent a shiver through him. “What do you know about demons, boy?”

  Will gaped at her. “What?”

  His mother sneered. “Idiot. Can’t you say anything other than ‘what’? Jesus, the average parrot has a larger vocabulary than you.”

  Tears began to course down Will’s face. He couldn’t help it. He didn’t know what was wrong with his mom. He was so stunned by her hatefulness that it took many moments for the implications of her words to sink in. Then it hit him. And now his mom seemed more threatening than ever. He sat up, planted his hands on the floor, and began to scoot away from her.