Spider - Michael Morley [31]
‘And “After”,’ says Spider, replacing it with another shot.
This time the woman’s naked-anddead. She’slying on her back, hands across her chest and her hair looks unnaturally red against her shockingly white skin.
Lu notices something else.
The dead girl is lying on the same type of table that she is tied to. Maybe the very same table!
Spider takes the photographs away and smiles. ‘Don’t be nervous, Sugar. I know what you’re thinking and you’re wrong, oh so very wrong. You’re not naked because I’m going to do anything sexual to you. There may be a time for intimacy. But not now. Not in this life.’
The words don’t compute in Lu Zagalsky’s brain. Not now – what did he mean? Not in this life. She’s heard every kind of wacko talk about every kind of crazy shit that turns them on. Piss on me, dress me in rubber, drag me around on a dog lead, but never anything like this. This shit just doesn’t happen.
Spider moves behind her. He combs his fingers through her tangled hair as it dangles off the edge of the bondage table. The moment reminds him of when he was a young boy waiting in the hairdresser’s salon while his mom had her hair washed leaning backwards over a sink, a strange man laughing all the time and soaping her hair so vigorously. More than anything he had wanted to play with the magical clouds of bubbles that tumbled on to the floor. But the strange man wouldn’t let him and kept brushing him away, telling him to sit down and let mommy have some time without being pestered by him.
Spider rubs the tips of his fingers into her hair, just like he’d seen the man do with his mom, then he smoothes the palms of his hands over her face and forehead to wipe away the bubbles. ‘You have nice hair, Sugar, but you should take better care of it. Maybe not use so many sprays, and get a slightly classier cut; I’m sure you can afford to indulge yourself every once in a while.’ He gently massages her temples and forehead and then moves back to the stool, so he can sit facing her once more. Dark thoughts cross his mind. Thoughts of how he would like to explore her body when she’s dead; relieve himself in the cool of her orifices and then hold her freshly limp corpse until all her energy has flowed into him.
He touches her face again. ‘Do you like flowers?’ he asks.
What the fuck? Do I like flowers?
He stares down on her again, his wild eyes boring into her, his crazy voice croaking out crazy words.
‘Have you ever seen Spider Lilies?’ he continues. ‘They’re so beautiful, so white and fragile.’
Lu’s never even seen normal lilies let alone these Spider things that Mr Crazy is babbling on about.
‘One day, I will lay them all over your body. I will cover you in them. And when others have forgotten you, I will always bring Spider Lilies to you.’
Spider spins around and walks away from her. He feels the urge rising within him, stimulating him, arousing him.
He wants her now.
He wants to feel the magic of owning her.
Possessing her.
Consuming her.
Killing her.
But Spider knows he mustn’t let the want overwhelm him, he mustn’t let the fire within him wreck all his plans.
He won’t give in to it.
He’s learned not to.
Spider knows how to control the current that’s surging through his veins and prevent it overpowering him in just one moment of blind, bloody passion.
Lu Zagalsky is in a cold sweat. With her head freed of the neck noose, she manages to turn her face for the first time, craning sideways towards the sick mudak who’s in the corner of the room, looking away from her. What she sees sends another ripple of panic through her. And, despite the futility of it all, she starts kicking, and straining at the ropes around her wrists.
It isn’t just the ceiling that’s covered in black plastic. Every inch of the whole room, all the walls and even the floor are covered in the stuff.
It’s as though she’s inside a giant bodybag.
And it’s about to be zipped up.
22
Florence, Tuscany
Jack waited until the train guard had checked his ticket and left the carriage before he settled down to work on Massimo