dreams for sale
From the twisted mind of Money Lloyd
Prologue Part I
Final Embrace of the Sacrificial Lamb
Time stood still as her oxygen and blood circulation were brutally choked off. Slowly she stopped struggling; clawing and scratching at his hands and forearms, the light in her eyes extinguishing as her life expired. She died hard but then the woman had always been a fighter.
Murder is a highly intimate act, more so than raw, unadulterated sex – like a kiss but one of death rather than affection. This is particularly true when the deed is done by one’s own hand such as strangulation. He would have performed the task barehanded as he preferred, as she deserved but the evidence left behind would have been too incriminating. Not to mention that she didn’t deserve this at all.
The huge, hardened, avaricious man untangled the crimson silk handkerchief that was twisted around her throat with unusual tenderness. The pale moonlight shone through the open patio illuminating her sublime features. Her exotic Egyptian beauty was amplified rather than diminished in her death though her face was contorted in shock and terror. And it was her lovely, almond shaped eyes that told the tale of ultimate betrayal as they stared back into his own, lifelessly, accusingly.
He was not so consumed by his ambition as to be blind to the power of love. She’d captured his heart from the first time he’d laid his eyes on her. And the pleasure she’d given him from the depths of her love canal were not measurable in mortal terms. She’d been his most trusted partner if he’d ever truly had one. Yet his lust for power was insatiable; an appetite for destruction that could never be satisfied. Thus as master and commander of his own destiny, he was slave to it. He and his daughter were her life and she’d given him the best years of his life. However sacrifices had to be made.
Lives were being lost.
Without further thought he completed the ritualistic procedure, the knife and her blood the pen and ink he used to scribe the ancient symbology on the walls and floor; square and compass, cryptic circles and triangles and of course the all-seeing eye.
A single tear dropped from his eye as he entered the lavatory and disposed of his blood stained gloves. He showered in complete darkness, avoiding the full length mirrors and his own repulsive reflection. After cleansing his body he still felt filthy for he could not ever wash his sins from his tortured soul. Some things once done could never be undone. There could be no turning back now.
Lifting the fifty caliber Desert Eagle and a spare clip from the wash basin, he brandished the weapon as he stole across the bedroom chamber to the door leading to the adjacent room. There was more work to be done on this cursed, hellish night. Indeed, before the night was over both he and it would be irrevocably baptized in blood. This was the price that had to be paid for him to become one of The Blood, one of the seven.
Ever so carefully, he opened the door just a crack and peered inside his daughter’s bedroom. Without a care in the world, she slept soundly in the deep sleep of peace.
Back in the bathroom, he crouched waiting in the darkness. The hot shower water he’d left running filled both rooms with steam. Having no concept of time in his current state of mind he had no idea how much of it had passed before they arrived. He saw them before he heard them; dark silhouettes climbing over the patio rail, moving stealthily like phantoms through the steamy fog.
His grip tightened on his pistol as he waited patiently for all four of the assassins to enter his bed chamber. Two of them surrounded the bed while the other two crept quickly to the lavatory. He squeezed the trigger and both rooms erupted in light as the high caliber handgun fired and the first assassin’s head exploded in flame. The blinding muzzle flash illuminated the steam eerily in a collage of yellow and orange.
Before the first assassin dropped lifelessly to the floor, he fired two more shots hitting the second square in the chest, the force of the rounds knocking the fool back into the entertainment center – activating it.
Suddenly music blared from the surround sound speakers. Rising from his crouched position he took aim at the other two gunmen. But before he could get another shot off he was hit. The round from the assassin’s rifle spun him around even as it knocked the big man off of his feet. The room erupted in a cacophony of gunfire as he blasted wildly at the assassins and they returned fire.
As he careened uncontrollably into and over the wet bar the wall behind him was riddled with projectiles from the assassin whose rifle was blazing away on full automatic.
The air was filled with gun smoke, glass, plaster, wood and various other debris. And he was hit again and again. The bullets burned like red-hot lances as they pierced his bulky frame. Frantically, he reloaded and dragged himself up on one knee so hat he could get a shot at the gunman. Again he was hit yet the hand cannon bucked as he squeezed of a round, dropping the assault wielding assassin with a lucky shot to the throat.
He stood staggering on his huge shaking legs. Where’s the last one, he thought, straining to see in the dark, foggy, smoke filled room. Glass and other particles crunched beneath his bare feet cutting them as he stumbled around the bed. And there he was. The last assassin was laid on his back in a rapidly spreading pool of his own blood. The fool was clutching his chest with both hands and the big man could hear the gurgling wheeze of a sucking chest wound. He didn’t know if the grotesque sound was coming from him or his assailant since his breath was rattling in his own chest.
The last assassin’s eyes opened wide in a bizarre parody of surprise as the big man pointed the desert eagle at his face and fired shot after shot after shot, continuing to squeeze the trigger long after the cannon blasts transitioned into the impotent clicks indicating the magazine was empty.
There was nothing resembling anything human left of the would be assassin’s face in a head that was all but completely destroyed. Blood, bone and brain fragments were spread in a splattered pattern on the fine Persian rug.
Injured and bereft of strength, mentally and physically as well as spiritually, the big man limped over to his dead wife and embraced her lovingly. The act of premeditated, cold-blooded murder is a powerful aphrodisiac. This however shamed him more than the act itself and sickened by his own corrupt nature and perversity he wretched.
After recovering from the dry heaves he became aware of the song that was blaring from the speakers, as well as the celebratory sounds of Carnival revelers outside and his own bodyguards trying to bang their way through the huge oaken doors. The song was “The Man Who Sold the World” by David Bowie. As if in sudden realization of his heinous crime, he yelled a bestial roar full of pain, anguish, guilt and loss.
The screams of his daughter fell on deaf ears.
By the time his bodyguards broke in he had fallen to his knees enfolding his wife’s, his love’s lifeless body in his huge arms and he was weeping like a pious priest.
Copyrighted Material. All Rights Reserved. Duplication Unauthorized.
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