Blackwood Farm - Anne Rice [145]
“ ‘Why’s that?’ I asked with belligerent innocence.
“The computer was pushed out of my lap to the floor. Before I could rise from the chair he was beside me, fully realized, and he kissed me on the lips. Then he drew back until he was no more than a foot from me, and his arms slipped around me and they gripped me.
“He moved his lips, and for the first time I heard a true voice come out of him, slow, masculine in tone and without inflection.
“ ‘You’re afraid of me now,’ he said, his lips moving sluggishly.
“ ‘Is that what you want?’ I asked.
“I was terrified. Never once in my brawl with the stranger had I felt this kind of fear.
“ ‘You want me to be afraid?’ I asked. ‘I can’t love you and be afraid of you. I’ll come to hate you if I’m afraid. Did you see how I hated the stranger? Make a choice.’
“Again, he came in for the kiss, and I felt his lips on mine, just as firmly as I had felt Jasmine’s kisses. His hand went down between my legs. He ran his hand under my nightshirt.
“ ‘No, not here,’ I said. ‘Be patient.’
“Again he spoke to me. He spoke.
“ ‘But when you feel it, I feel it. I want it.’
“I felt his hand on my cock, and I gave in. I gave in quickly, and it was over within seconds.
“I sat back in the easy chair and closed my eyes. My body was lulled and humming. There was a time of silence. Perhaps five or more minutes. But he was still there. He was kneeling right beside me, but I couldn’t look at him.
“ ‘Who was the stranger?’ I asked. I opened my eyes. ‘I’ve asked you over and over. Who was he?’
“ ‘I don’t know,’ he responded. The sound of the monotone voice was literally dreadful.
“ ‘Where is the stranger?’ I asked.
“ ‘I don’t know,’ he responded again. ‘If I knew, I would find him and hurt him. I don’t know everything.’ On it went, flat and low. ‘I know lots more than you think I do.’
“I said nothing. I was too afraid. I tried to feel love, not because I wanted to love him but because I was going mad. By tomorrow I might be roaring mad.
“ ‘I want you to leave me now,’ I said. I looked into his eyes. ‘I want you to leave me to think, you understand me?’
“ ‘You think you can command me,’ came that monotone voice. The lips were slightly disconnected from it. ‘You can’t command me,’ he said. ‘But for love, I’ll leave you alone. Beware of what they do to you here.’
“ ‘Don’t frighten me anymore,’ I said.
“ ‘I don’t want to frighten you,’ said the voice. ‘But you must understand they want to change you. They want to make you so you can’t see or hear me.’
“ ‘That can’t be done,’ I whispered. ‘Go now. I must be alone. Don’t you ever want to be alone?’
“No answer.
“ ‘Where do you go when you’re not with me?’ I asked.
“No answer.
“ ‘Tell me,’ I said. ‘Where do you go when you leave? Or do you stay with me, invisible, just watching and learning?’
“No answer.
“I felt him leave. I felt a change of temperature in the room. I heard things stirring, the paper tissue ruffled in its box, the creak of the bed, the faint rattle of the Venetian blinds, then nothing.
“I made the Sign of the Cross. What was I going to do? Where was I going to go to find someone who would understand this? Hell, I needed someone to tell me what to do.
“I went into the bathroom and washed the slimy semen off my legs. I washed my hands. Then I came back, and I took my rosary out of the nightstand. Big Ramona had found it for me. It was a garnet rosary from my First Communion. Lynelle’s gift. I started to say it.
“But I couldn’t meditate on the mysteries. I thought of the stranger. What if he came back to Blackwood Manor? If the Hermitage was destroyed, what would he do? I pictured him, those fiery dark eyes. How perfectly furious he had been, pivoting wild as a dervish as the broken glass assaulted him.
“And if I went to sleep, I’d dream of Rebecca.”
21
“GOBLIN WAS on time for the meeting with the panel of psychiatrists. He was my faithful duplicate again, and the look of contempt and boredom had vanished from his face. He put his arm around me and I could see that he was afraid of what