Psycho Inside Me

Psycho Inside Me

By

Bonnie R. Paulson

Captiva Publishing

www.bonnierpaulson.com

Copyright © 2013 Bonnie R. Paulson

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means without the prior written consent of the publisher, excepting brief quotes used in reviews.

This book is a work of fiction and any resemblance to any person, living or dead, any place, events or occurrences, is purely coincidental. The characters and story lines are created from the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

This book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This book may not be resold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to the purchase-point and purchase your own copy.

Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

Cover design – Ashley Byland from Redbird Designs.

Acknowledgements

Bear – You temper me. I love you.

Mom/Connie – I love you, Mom!

Cassie – Thanks! You and Brent know why… Love you!

Kammie – The phone calls and shared excitement mean the world to me. Thank you!

Shelley – Awesome as usual. I haven’t the words. Thanks!

Jill, Misty, and Christy – thank you so much for your help in organizing my thoughts and making it read better. I couldn’t do it without you!

Ashley – Holy cow, the covers, girl. You’re amazing!

Story 2 Story family! You’re awesome as usual. Thank you for your support. Such a terrific group of talented authors. I appreciate all you do for me.

Readers – most important. I hope you like it. I love you all!

~13 years old~

Chapter 1

My first kill was sloppy, but I was only thirteen
. And I was lucky – extremely lucky. I’ve gotten much better.

Seven da
ys after my thirteenth birthday, I followed the Centennial Trail which ambled along the river through the small city I lived in. Spokane residents passed me, not a lot, but they rode bikes with their silly aerodynamic helmets, or they pushed forward in pairs on rollerblades, gangly in their pads and armor. As far as I could see, I was the only one on foot.

Donkey Island protrude
d into the river like a finger hooking into the waves. Abandoning the paved trail and taking a well-traveled dirt path was the only way onto the peninsula.

My favorite time of day approached. I’d sit on a huge boulder and watch the Canadian geese land on the water, honking back and forth in
this weird mix of words I thought meant they checked on each other. Sometimes, I’d see the blond head and broad shoulders of Deegan Ford as he passed by and I’d wave. But only if I was brave enough.

On the boulder, I settled into this great little niche where my butt fit just right.
I slid my brown backpack from my shoulder and dug through the front pocket for the manicure set I’d gotten for my birthday. Dad had picked out the blue set with clippers, tweezers, cuticle scissors, a metal fingernail file, and a small bottle of sparkly nail polish. I’d had a snag on my thumbnail for the last half-mile which was driving me crazy.

Bent over my nail, filing away, I didn’
t hear their approach. But the sudden proximity sent chills down my spine.

“Well, if it isn’t
Cassie Mulligan.” Bobby rounded the front of my rock, thumbs hooked in his jean pockets. His cohorts – Jimmy and Jason flanked him, smirks ruining the friendliness of Bobby’s tone.

“Hi, Bobby.” I nodded at the Js. I didn’t care which was which. I didn’t care that the most popular boys in high school knew my name.
Small enough town, everyone knew everyone.

The geese honked loud and flew away, abandoning the water that had moments before
offered protection. Through the trees, the trail snaked along – empty. I searched for someone, anyone, but couldn’t see anybody.

Which meant nobody could see me.

I was alone with boys notorious for bullying. Maybe they wanted to steal something. I swallowed. “Whatcha guys doin’?”

Bobby’s
toothy grin curdled my insides. “No one. Yet.”

His joke didn’t make sense, at least not completely.

“Oh.” Fell from my lips. Something wasn’t right. My boulder was no longer safe. A vibe in the air screamed danger. I gripped the fingernail file in my fist and looked over my shoulder. Almost in sync with my movement, a rustle in the bushes and a flash of red disappeared down the eastern turn of the trail.

Bobby’s face tightened. He jerked his head and muttered to the Js. “Check it out.”

One of them laughed with an edge to the sound. “Don’t start without us.”

But Bobby didn’t even acknowledge them. He stared at me and I was too scared to look away.

The boulder put me at chest height for him. He wasn’t the tallest guy I’d seen or the shortest. A member of the wrestling team, he had the stereotypical stocky build made of all muscle. I’d never noticed before how mean the crinkles at his eyes made him look.

He held my gaze and yanked his belt off.

Then undid his zipper.

A
snarl to his lips punctuated the plop as his jeans fell to the ground. “I’ve always wanted to screw a pastor’s daughter.”

My s
tomach ached and my mouth dried up. “Preacher. He’s a preacher.”

He pulled back from advancing on me and quirked his eyebrow. “What?”

“My dad. You called him a pastor.” I swallowed, fear obviously making it difficult to shut up. The air had suddenly dried. “He’s a preacher.”

“I don’t care what he is. I’
m going to screw the miss-priss right out of you.” He moved toward me again.

H
olding my muscles as stiff as I could, I lifted my arms to ward him off, my hands in firm fists. I didn’t know what to do. His breath pushed over me, the alcohol suddenly rich in the cooling air. Under his shirt, a flash of pale flesh scared me. I’d never seen a boy’s thing before! He placed his hands on either side of my hips. Bobby slapped my hands down. I shrieked, the air trapping in my throat.

He pushed up on me, reaching
for the hem of my skirt. “Let’s see if you’re as sweet as you act.”

I couldn’t move. Arms stiff in front of me didn’t do much when he yanked the A-line knee length skirt up to my waist, revealing my pink flowered white panties beneath.

A sob wrenched free. “Please, don’t.”

“Don’t what?
” Bobby didn’t even give me the courtesy of leaving my underwear intact as his fingers brushed the skin of my upper thighs and he grasped the thin fabric of my underwear. The tiny tearing sound scared me more than the dangerous glint in his eyes. The late spring breeze hit my privates with startling abruptness. He smirked. “Peach fuzz. Nice.” I tried squeezing my legs together and received a fist to the cheek.

And he roughly cupped the whole of me. I whimpered, holding in my tears.

But the boulder held me further from him than he’d planned. He stepped closer, his hand unmoving except to pinch the soft skin of my inner thigh. “Yeah, you’re gonna like this. You asked for it, didn’t you? Yeah, you did. You want this.” Bobby reached between his own legs, eyeballing me.

I closed my eyes
but couldn’t shut out the shuffling as he moved closer to take me. So that’s how I would lose the mysterious virginity the girls in class whispered about. No one spoke to me about it. Never directly. Never.

His hand disappeared and I braced for him to enter me. But Oomph! and Thud! I opened my eyes, pushing my skirt down with Bobby’s absence. Deegan held Bobby by the shoulder, throwing a fist into his stomach. “What are you doing, man?”

Bobby shook off Deegan’s hold and stumbled backward. I held my fists firmly in front of me in a hopeful attempt that he couldn’t get to my body. Wouldn’t fall on me. The metal fingernail file wouldn’t be taken from my aching grip.

Bobby’s
heavy weight fell on my arms. I screamed, choking on my fear. Oh, man.

Silence for a split moment
. Deegan and I watched each other.

Bobby gurgled and spluttered.
We turned our attention to him. I shoved his heaviness off me.

B
right red blood soaked everything. My hands dripped warm goo. I took inventory of my body. Nothing hurt. I wasn’t the one bleeding. Everything seemed intact. A small slice of the fear faded into relief. I was okay.

Bobby wasn’t.
He rolled to the ground from the side of the boulder, clutching for the back of his neck.

R
ed liquid spurts hurtled through the air in random directions in some weird rhythm like a heartbeat. Puh-spurt, puh-spurt.

I
didn’t run. I couldn’t. It was like watching a train wreck I’d caused. Oh crap. I’d only meant to keep him off me, away from me.

Deegan pulled Bobby further from me, dropping his spasming body to the ground.
Bobby’s fingers slid from his neck, over and over. On his back he gasped, but ineffectively.

I couldn’t stop staring.
There was so much blood. Hands shaking, I climbed from my rock. “Deegan, what do we do? Holy cow, what have I done?”

Bobby’s
saturated clothes scared me.

I wracked my brain. In a book I’d read once, a woman had used a handful of moss like gauze. I scanned the rocks and silt for anything mossy or spongy, but only
long thin blades of grass reached toward me from the landscape. So close to the water’s edge, damp soil prevented plants from growing abundantly.

E
yes clenched and unclenched, Bobby reached for me, his hand bright and glistening in the afternoon sunlight. I grabbed for the closest tuft of grass I could reach, yanking the blades, roots and all, to his neck. I shoved his hand away, but couldn’t get my makeshift bandage to his neck while his clutching fingers continued to grapple for the wound.

“Cassie, don’t.
He’s not going to make it.” Deegan’s low growl surprised me. Bobby heard him, and his eyes darted side to side in fear.

“Stop. I need to put pressure on it.” A part of me wondered if putting pressure on the neck wouldn’t cut off
Bobby’s air. He had to quit bleeding soon. I had no idea how long it would take someone to bleed out. I spoke to Deegan, even as my hands pushed at Bobby. “He might.”

But
Bobby’s head fell to the ground. Both hands dropped limp beside his body.

“No. No. Wait, hang in there, Bobby. Come on.” I pushed the grass to the cut. So much blood. I had no idea where the exact hole was.
Couldn’t exactly see it with the wound on the back, but I tried.

His chest stopped moving.

I froze, staring at him.

Something faded in his eyes.

Kneeling next to him, I reached out and prodded his shoulder. He didn’t move.

“He’s dead. Deegan, oh no. I killed him.” I pushed the back of my hand to my mouth, my teeth digging into the space between the linear bones.
Killing was bad. Terrible. I’d never be forgiven. “I’m going to be in so much trouble.”

The whole thing happened so fast.
I looked over my shoulder for his friends. They’d be returning any minute. I had to do something with the body, didn’t I? They’d know. I’d get in trouble. Someone would say it was all my fault. Oh, man. The cops. My dad. I was going to be in so much trouble.

Poor Bobby.
And yet, I couldn’t completely forgive him – he’d wanted to hurt me, had wanted his friends to hurt me. I understood the concept of forgiveness, but I don’t know if it would take a lifetime or two to apply it to Bobby – even if he did lay dead before me.

Thou shalt not kill.

Yet, something in me didn’t want to leave. I wanted to linger. Watch the body a little more. Seconds before he’d threatened me, wanted to do things to me that would have damaged me psychologically and physically. But… he ended up being the damaged one. I’d started out the victim and then by accident ended up… not.

In the shocked silence, I whispered to Deegan, “This is bad, isn’t it?”
I closed my mouth, breathing in the coppery heat of his blood. Looking again at the scene before me, I recoiled at what had just happened. Shame, disgust, anger, frustration, embarrassment – so many emotions roiled inside me but guilt won out. Bobby had been about to violate me in one of the worst ways, but still, no one deserved what had happened. Even if I was a little glad he wouldn’t get a second chance.

Deegan offered me his hand, pulling me to my feet
, unaware of the riotous storm waging inside me. “We can fix this.”

“Oh? When did you learn how to bring someone back from the dead?”
My sarcasm reared its protective head.

Intermingled with the red blood, a gold class ring winked at me from his
right hand. Without thinking, I moved to slide it from his finger. Deegan placed his hand on mine and shook his head. “No. We’ll do it a different way. Okay?” Like he understood I needed something to remember that day by, something symbolic. Something to help while I wallowed in guilt. I left the ring on Bobby’s finger.

“What do we do?” I turned to him, fingernail file tight in my grip.

“We don’t have a lot of time. I want you to clean that off and then try to rinse the blood away after I move his body.” Deegan and his decisiveness. One thing I’d liked about him when we’d played Kick-the-Can growing up a block away from each other.

I
wiped the fingernail file on some rock moss beside me but that hadn’t removed the blood. Dipping it into the water inches from where I knelt, I shook it back and forth to clean it and then stuffed it in the case. The little tool had made a great weapon. And if my dad had given it to me, how I’d used it couldn’t be all bad, right? Justifications didn’t lessen the shaking in my hands or the slow the nausea crawling up my throat.

My backpack needed to be zipped and all evidence
that I’d been there had to be eradicated. I’d seen more than my share of Law and Order.
Focus, Cassie. Just get the job done.
First task down, next I had to rinse the blood. But with what?

Deegan grunted behind me. I turned. He lifted and pushed Bobby’s lifeless body to the edge of the water. The hair on the back of my neck rose. Deegan pushed once, twice, and rolled the body in. The current’s fast fingers claimed Bobby and in less than two seconds he’d slipped beneath the rippling surface. About ten yards down, he bobbed up and then disappeared again. Oh, look, Bobby was bobbing. I chuckled, then turned to the side of the boulder I’d claimed and vomited into the tall grass.

Someone yelled up the trail. I spun toward Deegan, wiping my mouth. And froze.

He’d moved up behind me, inches away, my backpack in his hands. “We have to go.”