Sociopaths and Serial Killers

BY: Montana

Disclaimer: I do not own Jean-Claude, Richard, Anita, Edward, or anything else that belongs to LKH.

Author Note: This is set after Obsidian Butterfly.

Then as abruptly as the kiss had started, it ended as Edward jerked back. I caught a bewildered look in his eyes, before he schooled his face to his mask. We were back to the mask again. Damn. His breathing was still heavy though, almost as if he had lost control of it. His chest rose and fell rapidly as he studied my face. And at that moment he saw surprise. Surprise that he had kissed me, and surprise that he had drawn back just as quickly when I kissed him.

He stood in a sudden fluid motion, setting me down gently on my feet on the pebbly ground of the creek bed. With a final glance at me, he turned and headed for the house. If I didn’t know any better, I would have said he was running away. But he didn’t run, he walked calmly away. The only thing that gave him away was the barely visible tension between his shoulders. I watched him go as he disappeared into the chaparral. I almost called out to him, but something stopped me. A lump in my throat.

I soon followed Edward back up to the house. He somehow managed to avoid me the rest of the day, those stony walls erected high and strong once again around his emotions. But even while avoiding me, I knew he was keeping an eye on me. Watching over me. Still my body guard. A confused body guard. Is that what this was? Confusion? It may have been. Because he finally let out his softer side, his need with me, once.

It wasn’t like when he was kissing Donna, then he was playing Ted. Even though Ted was becoming a little part of Edward, Edward was still Edward. And when we kissed in the creek bed, Edward had been Edward. He wasn’t playing a part, it had been really him allowing himself something we had never done before. And I had concluded that that was what scared him. What confused him. What bewildered him. It was apart of Edward that he had never had to deal with himself.

And truthfully I would admit, I was pretty confused myself. Why had I kissed Edward back? Until a few days ago, I had never had a romantic thought about Edward. I had often said we might kill each other, but we would never kiss. Well now we had just had the option to kill each other, and kissed instead.

But now I found myself watching him reading on the couch from my chair, even if it was out of the corner of my eye. He was very handsome. My God, was he. But that wasn’t the only reason I was attracted to him, we were way past that. Every time he had ever saved me flashed in my mind. Every time I had ever woken up in the hospital, and he had been there. And put a gun under my pillow for me, no less. How many times had he shown up with an Edward smile, to give me a new toy? A new weapon, our toys. And how many times had he ridden to the rescue, so to speak, for me when I needed him? I trusted Edward, wholly and completely. Now that I thing of it, he was the only person I did trust that much. To be at my back, or to keep my secrets. So then there was the last huge question. Did I love Edward? Well if I didn’t, I should have. Because he was my soul mate.

Darkness fell. We had fajitas for dinner, cooked by Edward once again. He was a good cook. More than I can say for myself. I can do bagels and coffee, and that’s about where it ends. I went to bed early. All the thinking must have exhausted me.

***

“And this is your liver. Can you feel that?” Was the joyous gleeful question that parted Olaf’s lips. I was sliced open, he was enjoying himself immensely. He plucked something out of my insides, and held the small green thing up to the light. “This is your gall bladder.” He smiled. He raised his hands up for me to see. They were bloody, slick with my blood. He put one red finger into his mouth, sucking it clean. Then he kissed me. There was nothing I could do about it. I was tied down naked on an examiner’s table. It disgusted me, my stomach turned. He picked up his knife, and sliced a thin line down my cheek. “Do you know where the phrase ‘pay through the nose’ came from Anita? The Vikings would cut notches into their hostages noses after pillaging a village. Like this.” He began to cut a notch into my nose. The pain was sharp and deep.

***

I sat up in bed fast enough to make me dizzy, a shriek left my lips. Damn dreams. My heart was pounding in my chest. I was covered with sweat, even in the cold air conditioning. With one glance to the open door way I knew Edward was watching me from the shadows of the halls. I had left my door closed, he must have opened it. “Edward?” As soon as I called his name I knew he began to retreat farther into the hall. “Edward, come back, please.” Maybe it was the please. Maybe it was the frantic note in my voice. He came back.

He peeked his head in the doorway, showing himself. He must have seen something on my face, because he walked further into the room, closing the door behind him. “Bad dreams?” he asked, standing by my bed. He was wearing loose sweatpants, black as far as I could tell in the dark. And no shirt. His blond hair gleamed platinum in the moonlight. I couldn’t see his eyes, they were shadowed out. He held his Berretta 9mm loosely in his hand.

“Yeah.”

“Olaf?”

“Double Yeah.”

He stood there looking down at me. He still didn’t let go of the stony expressionless countenance. “Can I help?” There was absolutely no emotion in that word, and yet there was for the lack of it.

I let my breath out, long and slow. “Will you stay with me, the rest of the night? I…I don’t want to be alone.”

“You want me to sleep with you?”

I nodded, remembering how safe I had felt in the hotel when we had shared a bed. He stood there in silence for so long I thought he was going to refuse. But instead he said, “Then move over.” I was in the spot closest to the door. Apparently that was his spot. I did, no arguments. He moved the firestar from under his pillow to mine, and placed the berretta under his pillow. He paused for a moment, but climbed under the covers with me, lying down on his back, looking up at me. I studied him, still sitting in the bed. And then I settled down under the covers, and rested my head on his shoulder. He stiffened for a moment, but then relaxed, wrapping one arm around my waist. The other hand moved in soothing gestures on my back. “Go to sleep, Anita. I will protect you.”

The last words I said before falling asleep again were, “I know.”



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