Eye for an Eye

didn’t mean it, Sebbie. I’m sorry now. Truly I am.’
    ‘If I couldn’t trust you then, bitch, why should I trust you now?’
    ‘I won’t tell Dieter. I won’t tell anyone. Please. Sebbie. Please. Let me go.’
    He pulled the knife from her skin and stood back. She opened her eyes. With a suddenness that made her start, he reached forward, grabbed her hair, pulled her head back, and lifted the knife high.
    ‘I know you won’t tell anyone, Alice. Not this time.’
    He flashed the knife down to her neck.
    Her scream never surfaced, locked in her throat.
    He released her hair, the point of his blade millimetres from the pale skin of her neck. She held her head still, as if waiting for the pain to hit. Then the tiniest of tremors took hold of her hands, spread to her arms, her shoulders, her chest, until her entire body trembled.
    ‘Look at me,’ he said.
    ‘Oh, my God. Please don’t.’
    ‘Look at me, bitch.’
    She looked at him.
    ‘Will you tell anyone?’
    ‘No.’
    ‘Promise?’
    She squeezed her eyes shut, spilling tears down her face, and nodded.
    ‘You won’t tell anyone?’
    She shook her head.
    ‘Say it.’
    ‘I won’t tell anyone.’
    ‘Say it.’
    ‘I promise I won’t tell anyone.’
    ‘That’s better,’ he said, and cupped her left breast. She opened her eyes. Her breast felt full, supple and soft, and his arousal sent a rush of urgency through his system.
    ‘Take off your clothes.’
    ‘Please. Don’t do this.’
    He ran the flat of his blade over her throat. ‘Take them off.’
    Her fingers trembled as she fumbled with the top button of her blouse, then the next.
    Sebbie watched her slow unveiling in silence, and could do nothing to prevent the stirring in his crotch. It had been a long time, such a long time. With insolent reluctance, it seemed, Alice slipped off her blouse, twisted her arms behind her back, and removed her bra.
    Sebbie’s breath caught at the sight of her nakedness. She looked more full than he remembered, no longer a teenage girl, but a mature woman. Her breasts were white where her tan ended, making her nipples seem large and dark. She looked up at him, cheeks glittering, eyes pleading.
    He pointed the knife at her. ‘Get up.’
    She stood, arms drooping by her side as if exhausted from the effort.
    ‘Everything.’
    ‘Please.’
    He held the knife up. ‘Don’t make me have to ask again.’
    She twisted to the side, unzipped her skirt, let it slip to the carpet. Then she hooked her thumbs over the top of her tights and eased them down her thighs. ‘Please,’ she said. ‘I don’t want to do this.’
    He watched the uncovering of the white meat of her thighs as she undressed to her knees, then down and onto the carpet where she kicked her feet free. His gaze locked on tiny silk panties that seemed wrongly sized for her thighs. He gave an involuntary swallow as he eyed her pubic mound and tried to remember what her bush felt like, how he used to bury his face into her and search for her wetness.
    He fingered his zipper and pulled out his erection and watched her eyes darken with the knowledge of what was about to happen. Somewhere in the dark chasms of his broken mind he heard a voice whisper to him, urging him on. His head tilted to the side like a curious dog, as if to confirm he was hearing her instructions correctly.
    It felt good knowing his mother approved.
    ‘Yes,’ he whispered back to her. ‘Yes, I will.’
    Then he faced Alice. ‘On your knees, bitch.’

CHAPTER 22
     
    Gilchrist lay still, trying to figure out where he was. Then he caught the cold reflection of a glass moon and realized he was looking at the Velux window on the sloped ceiling of his own bedroom.
    Something had wakened him.
    On the floor beside his cupboard door he caught the shadow of Chloe’s painting, its vortices even more wild in the dim light, as if the image had a mind of its own and was trying to cry out to him. He had a vague recollection of bringing it in from his car last night and placing it there before crashing out. And dreaming.
    That’s what had wakened him. A dream.
    A dream about Chloe’s painting. Images came to him, as faint as wisps of cloud. A shape closed in. Then vanished.
    With a spurt of dismay, he realized he was still wearing his shirt and underpants. He swung his legs to the floor and peered at his digital alarm clock: 6:33. He switched on his bedside lamp, pulled open the drawer, slammed it shut. Why did he always search for a