“Don’t you want me to swallow you, Robert?” She laughed as she lowered her mouth to his neck.
He screamed in pain as her teeth ripped into his flesh and penetrated his jugular. All he could do was watch as his blood squirted intermittently into her mouth.
She lifted her teeth away from his neck and let him get one last look at her beautiful face. The last thing he heard before everything went black scared him more than anything ever had. She spoke to him, whispered in his ear, in a voice that was so fitting to her beauty.
“You were wrong, Robert, I’m not from heaven. I’m from hell.”
Brent Zirnheld
Y FIRST INTRODUCTION TO Richard Laymon was in The Book of the Dead. I instantly went searching for his books and found The Cellar—a book that shocked the hell out of me, as much for what Laymon did as didn’t do. Sure, the characters were well realized, the pacing swift, the plotting tight, and the style smooth, but there was something else of even greater note—the fantastic resolution! Laymon didn’t end it the way so many authors end their novels because Laymon didn’t do what was expected, something that continued throughout his career. That is one of the things that made his books so suspenseful—as the horror mounted you couldn’t relax knowing the characters you loved were going to find a way to overcome their adversity and survive. Sometimes they did, sometimes they didn’t, but you never really knew how the next book or story would end. You could be reading your second, fifth, or twentieth Laymon novel, but your mind goes back to the one with the ending you didn’t expect and you remember and you know and you can’t tell yourself “Everything’s going to be all right,” and that is as it should be for therein is where the suspense really lies.
So when I reach that critical juncture in my own work where I wonder if I should be merciful with a beloved character, I simply ask “What Would Laymon Do?” and I let my hand be guided.
Brent Zirnheld
HE OLD MERCEDES had seemingly come out of nowhere. Its sleek, black form cut through the humid air as its tires threw a mist of water into the air. It was too wet to be taking curves so fast, but Jim Black wasn’t about to let the reckless driving dissuade him from hitching a ride.
Jim threw out an arm with an extended thumb. He’d been headed the other direction, but what the hell? It was about to rain again and with barely anyone cruising the small, two-lane coastal highway, matters of direction were relative.
Realistically, Jim figured he didn’t have a chance in hell of getting a ride this time. Not from someone in a Mercedes who appeared to be hell-bent on getting where he or she was going. He’d probably have to wait for the next car.
Jim showed his best smile anyway; he always prepared for the worst even as he hoped for the best.
The Mercedes slowed, but then picked up speed when the driver got a better look at Jim. It was then that Jim saw the driver’s distinctively feminine features. If it had been a man second-guessing Jim’s bedraggled appearance he would have been the recipient of Jim’s best one-finger salute, but for the blonde’s benefit Jim continued smiling and even offered a nonchalant shrug as if he understood the bitch’s hesitation. Less than a second later, the brake lights came on and the car slowed to a stop.
Jim picked up his bag and trotted the twenty or thirty feet to the stopped Mercedes. When he got a good look at the driver he wondered if he wasn’t the luckiest bastard on Earth.
He opened the back door, tossed his bag to the floor and then hopped into the front seat.
“Thanks for the lift. Where you headed?” he asked, raking a hand through his wet, black hair. His clothes were very damp from the rain, but if she didn’t give a shit about the car’s interior, why should he?
The young lady shrugged. She was a hot little thing, far too young to be the owner of the vehicle. She’d taken daddy’s classic out for a spin and had done the forbidden: picked up a stranger on a deserted stretch of highway. Daddy would be so upset when he discovered her indiscretion.
Without so much as a glance to check for traffic, she darted back onto the highway. Blondie clearly liked living on the edge, or at least what she thought of as the edge. Sure it was a huge drop from the cliffs to the coast below, but she wasn’t really taking much of a chance—not when the vehicle was designed with control and handling in mind. If she really wanted to tempt fate she’d have to add some force to the gas pedal.
Jim eased back in the seat and stretched his legs.
“The name’s Jim Black. And my savior is...” Jim offered his right hand so he’d know what a willing touch felt like.
She eyed him and his hand and then gave her own. It was warm and soft, just as Jim suspected it would be. So was her smile. She’d be so easy to charm. The pragmatism of age hadn’t yet hardened her; viewing the world through reason-tinted glasses was a few years away yet.
“My name is Celeste White.”
“Black and White? You are kidding, right?”
She laughed, shaking her head. “Nope.”
In an instant, her guard had fallen.
“Where you headed?” she asked. Her hair was pulled back so tightly Jim could hear the follicles screaming for mercy.
“Anywhere.”
Jim stared at her delicate face, with its soft, smooth skin and upper class features as if she’d been genetically altered to appeal. However, there was something he’d just noticed in her eyes—they were a bit bloodshot and glassy. She’d recently been crying.
“What?” She had noticed Jim’s smile from the corner of her eye.
“Just admiring your facial structure. You’re very beautiful. Oh, forgive me, I’m an artist; I sometimes notice these things and spout off without realizing it sounds like a lame attempt at a pick-up,” Jim said.
Celeste’s hair was the color of straw, but looked more like dyed silk than dried grass. Now that she knew he was eyeing her, he let his eyes wander along her curves. He followed the jut of her breasts against the tight fabric of her white blouse. Long, tan legs projected from an aqua-colored skirt that fell halfway to her knees.
She gave him a glance, as if to survey his face, too, but then flicked her eyes back to the road so she could make another sharp turn. Though she had caught him staring at her legs, she gave no sign that she might be uncomfortable. She continued to surprise.
Another curve. Celeste took this one at a more conservative speed; maybe she’d decided to be more mindful of the cliffs now that she had a passenger.
“Deserted out here today. Guess everyone is at work,” Celeste said.
“Or school.”
She raised her brows, but didn’t glance his way. “Yeah. That, too.”
“You headed anyplace in particular?” she asked. Her eyes looked furtively in his direction as if his staring was beginning to unnerve her.
Jim breathed in deeply. “Wherever you take me. Ecstasy, perhaps?”
Celeste’s mouth twitched and she looked at Jim longer this time.
“Excuse me?”
Jim smiled. He could have played the game a little longer, made her feel more comfortable and then begun to strip her of her guard, slowly watching her unease grow until fear gave way to terror. But the need was overpowering. He could almost taste her fear; it was like a magnet drawing his libido.
“You heard me.”
With a weak laugh, as though she were acting like she got the “joke,” Celeste tightened her grip on the steering wheel until the color drained from her knuckles. Jim had seen the same reaction so many times before. They always fooled themselves into thinking it was some kind of joke. A trick played by a stranger who lacked social grace.