Paint It Black (14 page)

'Lethe! Stop that! I'm your father!'

My father was a vampire named Fell.

'You know very well what I mean! Stop this foolishness and put me down on solid ground right this minute, young lady!'

Lethe's face filled his vision, her eyes becoming huge twin harvest moons. Palmer wanted to scream, but there was no breath inside him. The child he had cared for for the better part of three years was nowhere to be found in this strange, glowing woman.

You are the First of my Bridegrooms. The First to engage in the wedding flight. Do not fear me, William Palmer. This is your

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) reward for your years of nurturing. You are being honored.

Palmer shuddered as he felt his penis stiffen, responding to hormonal cues older than upright posture. He kept telling himself that it wasn't happening, that he wasn't being ravaged against his will by a glowing woman as they sped across the night sky, that in fact he had passed out in a pool of his own piss in the kitchen. Even as orgasm seized his body and wadded it up like a piece of old newspaper, he kept telling himself it was just a dream, nothing more.

When he woke up, it was to find himself lying in an orchard, miles from his home. He was naked, his safari shorts lost somewhere along the way. His head throbbed with a monstrous hangover and his crotch was sticky and smelled of sex. Palmer rolled onto his stomach and began to sob, tearing at the grass with clawing hands. Then he threw up.

There was the sound of a twig snapping, and Palmer began looking around for something with which to cover himself.

He froze at the sight of the young native girl, a basket of fruit balanced atop her head, staring down at him. He could tell by her diminutive stature and the shape of her eyes and cheekbones that she was one of the Lacandon, the descendants of the ancient Mayan kings who once ruled the land before the arrival of the conquistadores. The girl regarded him curiously, but did not seem to be afraid or alarmed by his nakedness.

'Are you well, senor?' she asked.

Palmer began to laugh, which made the girl look at him even more oddly. 'No. I am not well at all.' This made him laugh even harder. Then he threw up some more.

8.

She'd overslept somewhat and nearly missed the funeral. She made it just in time to see Shirley Thorne's casket lowered to its final rest. It was made of mahogany and shone like a burnished shield in the dying sun. A large floral tribute rested atop, clutching it like a spider. After each of the mourners tossed the traditional handful of sod into the grave, they broke up and wandered towards the phalanxes of black limos, BMWs, and Rolls-Royces.

Sonja stood at a distance, screened from view by a weeping angel. She scanned the milling crowd, trying to spot the faces of family and friends, but it was no use. The only person she recognized was Jacob Thorne.

He looked considerably older than the last time she'd seen

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) him, five years ago. The iron will and steely resolve that had made him a millionaire several times over had succumbed to rust. Jacob Thorne, once the mightiest industrialist this side of Howard Hughes, had become an old man. When the last of the mourners shook his hand and muttered their sympathies, Thorne did not move to join them in leaving the cemetery. Instead, Denise's father stood by his wife's open grave, hands clasped before him, peering down into the hole as if he could see the future in its depths. No doubt he did.

Sonja moved from her hiding place, gliding between the headstones as if maneuvering across a dance floor. She knew he was not her father. At least not the part of her that called itself Sonja. She knew this as surely as she knew that the sun rises in the east and sets in the west. She opened her mouth to call his name, to say 'Mr Thorne'; but what came out was:

'Daddy?'

Jacob Thorne looked up from his wife's grave. He did not seem surprised to see her. But neither did he appear pleased.

His brow furrowed and his scowl deepened.

'Somehow I knew you'd be here.'

'Mr Thorne? Is everything all right?' Thorne's chauffeur made his way towards the grave site. He was a big man with an obvious holster bulge inside his jacket.

Thorne dismissed his bodyguard with a wave of his hand.

Sonja could see that it was covered with liver spots. 'It's okay, Carl. I know the young lady.'

She joined Thorne at the lip of the grave. It was very dark down there. And lonely.

'I... I'm sorry. Did she ... did she suffer?'

Thorne shrugged, his shoulders looking thin and narrow in his suit. 'In her way. But that was always Shirley's prerogative

- suffering. She was designed for self-martyrdom. Agonizing over Denise was the one thing that kept her going.' He looked at her, his eyes hard. 'You killed her, you know that? Whatever it was you did to her mind that night - the night she finally accepted Denise's death - that was the beginning of the end for her. She just gave up living after that.'

'Please believe me when I tell you I meant only to help her, to free her from her madness. I never intended to harm her.

She ... she was my mother.'

Thorne's pale features suddenly grew red and he began to tremble. He pulled a handkerchief out of his breast pocket and used it to blot his face. 'The hell she was! I don't know who or

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) what - you are, but you are not Denise!'

'No. I am not Denise anymore. But once, a long time ago.

A lifetime ago ...' Sonja bent and gathered a handful of dirt.

It felt damp and rich between her fingers. It struck the lid of her mother's casket with a dull thud. 'Mr Thorne, I did not ask to come into this world. Nor did Denise ask to leave it.

I did not choose to be what I am.'

Thorne looked at her again, the hardness leaking from his eyes. 'No. I guess you didn't.'

'I... I have memories now and again. Some are dim. Others are quite vivid. There is one of a birthday party - there were other children, a clown, a man giving pony rides ...'

Thorne barked a laugh, sounding both surprised and pleased by the memory. 'You couldn't possibly remember that! You were only two years--' He cut himself short, his hands fisting the handkerchief into a ball. 'I mean, Denise was only two years old at the time.'

'Your wife was wearing a dress with a Peter Pan collar and a big skirt - she was so pretty. And happy. And the birthday cake was vanilla with pink icing--'

'Why are you telling me this?' Thorne's eyes gleamed with anger and tears. His voice was tight, wavering on the verge of breaking down. 'Isn't it enough I've lost my wife? Do you have to make me relive the loss of my daughter as well?'

'Mr Thorne, there is another place beyond this world.

Several, actually. Every man, woman, and child holds the keys to heaven and hell within them. There are as many different paradises as there are living things. Just as there are innumerable varieties of damnation. I just want you to know that your wife is happy now.!

'That's what the minister said,' Thorne sniffed contemptuously.

' "She's in a better place, Jacob. She's beyond the pain of this world." Hmph!'

'Mr Thorne, would you say that I might be something of an authority on the supernatural?'

Thorne looked at her oddly, as if it had never occurred to him that a vampire might actually be evidence of there being something beyond the worm and the tomb and the winding sheet.

'Mr Thorne, your wife is at peace. You see, heaven means different things to everyone. And, for your wife, heaven was an afternoon in 1955, celebrating the birthday of her only child.'

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) Thorne nodded his head. 'Yes ... yes, I could see where it would be. I... I-- Oh, God

Tears began to run down his cheeks. No doubt they were the first real ones he'd shed since his wife died. His shoulders shook so violently he looked like he was about to topple headlong into the open grave. 'Dear God, Denise--'

He reached for her with his trembling, old man's hand, but she was already gone.

9.

By the time she got back everything had turned to shit. She could smell it the moment she got off the plane in Cozumel.

The psychic stench a dead relationship gives off is a lot like that of days-old fish mixed with vomit and a garnish of dirty diapers.

The closer she drew to Merida, the more powerful the reek became. She had no idea what had happened during her absence, but it had not been good.

The house was empty when she arrived, the front door unlocked. She scanned for signs of life and came up empty.

The kitchen table was covered with unpaid bills, unopened mail, and empty tequila bottles. Lots of tequila bottles. Sonja went out onto the patio, searching for signs of Lethe's cocoon, but all she found was something that looked like pieces of snake molt, made brittle and black from exposure to the sun.

'Lethe?' Sonja called out, half expecting her stepdaughter to come rushing from some hiding place, giggling in delight at having tricked her. There was no answer.

'Lethe?'

Silence.

She went back into the house and headed for the nursery.

She stared at the plush stuffed animals and coyly smiling rag dolls that lined the shelves and filled every corner of the room. Something behind her eyes began to pulse and ache. She could hear Shirley Thorne's voice singing 'Happy Birthday to You'.

Sonja waded into the sea of stuffed toys, tossing them aside as she searched for her child. Panic and confusion and self-loathing rose in her gut. How could she have been so stupid? How could she have walked off and left the child?

Was this how Shirley Thorne felt when she received the news that her daughter had disappeared? No wonder the poor woman retreated into madness.

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)

'Lethe, this isn't funny anymore! Come out where I can see you!' Failing to get any response with her voice, Sonja called with her mind.

Lethe!

'Lethe doesn't live here anymore.'

Palmer stood slumped in the doorway, arms folded across his chest, watching with unreadable eyes. He looked rough, but he was wearing clean clothes and was freshly shaven. Nor was he drunk. The odor of dead love came off him in waves.

He'd come up behind her without Sonja picking him up on radar. Which meant either she'd been really out of it, or he was screening himself. Probably both.

Bill?

She stepped towards him and he drew back, hugging his elbows as if he was afraid she was going to try and touch him.

'Talk with your mouth,' he rasped. 'I don't want you in my head.'

'What do you mean she doesn't live here anymore? Where the hell is she?'

Palmer laughed, only it sounded more like a hiccup. He hugged himself tighter. 'I don't know where she is. Nor do I want to.'

'What the--? Bill, we're talking about Lethe here! She's only three years old! Where the hell could she go?'

Palmer shrugged and laughed that weird laugh again.

'Palmer, damn it, what's wrong with you? Where's Lethe?

She couldn't have just flown away!'

Palmer's laughter now had the edge of hysteria to it. He guffawed until he couldn't catch his breath and dropped to his knees, doubling over to cradle his heaving stomach. Sonja reached down to touch him but he recoiled from her, shaking his head frantically as he forced himself to speak between bursts of giggling.

'Don't... touch ... me.'

'Palmer, what the fuck is going on? For the love of God, straighten up, man!' She grabbed his elbow, helping him back to his feet. He snarled and lashed out at her with his mind.

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) Had she been a normal human, he might have succeeded in crippling her, but Sonja was far from human. Palmer's attack was the same as that of an angry child, hammering at the legs of his mother with chubby fists. And mother had had enough of it.

She pinned him to the floor with her mind as easily as she might mount a butterfly on a piece of velvet. He lay at her feet, his muscles twitching and jerking as he tried, in vain, to regain control of his body.

'I don't want to play rough, Palmer, but you're leaving me no choice. Now stand 'up.'

Palmer's arms and legs moved jerkily as he obeyed her commands.

The look in his eyes was black and ugly. Sonja looked away, but there was no way she could shield herself from his hate. It was thick and viscous and burned like boiling tar.

She led Palmer's body out of Lethe's bedroom into his own, where she made him sit on the bed. She positioned herself opposite him and withdrew her control. Palmer's shoulders sagged and for a moment Sonja was afraid he was going to pass out on her, but then he straightened his back and took a deep breath.

'Okay, tell me what happened here.'

Palmer glared at her, then glanced in the direction of the patio. 'She - she came out.'

'When?'

He shrugged. 'I ... I don't know. A couple of days after you left. I was too drunk to remember exactly when.'

'What happened when Lethe came out of the cocoon? What did she look like?'

Palmer's eyes suddenly went distant, as if he was seeing something inside himself. 'Beautiful. She was beautiful. She was older than when she went in - she was maybe sixteen or seventeen. But she was beautiful. And she ... and she ...

she was on fire.'

'On fire. Like the pyrotics?'

Palmer shook his head violently. 'No! Not like burning on fire - she was glowing, you know? Like in the pictures of the Virgin Mary.'

'Palmer, what did Lethe say to you? What did she do?'

Palmer took a deep breath and his gaze fell to his hands, which were battling with one another like dueling tarantulas.