Victims Nine & Ten

“Cynthia. Hold still. Hold still. Hold still.”

The woman’s face was pale, drawn, and the lips were the blue of an ocean dancing with despair. A man’s hand kept caressing her hollow cheeks, touching with sweet motions, as one would a lover.

“I love you. It’s true. I know I’ve told you before. It’s true. It’s true.”

Her dark black hair, falling in disarray, framed her face in chaos. The hand continued to stroke, gently. Tanned and covered in callous, the contrast was made more striking with the black sleeves that covered the beginning of a tattoo on the wrist.

“Tell Charlie you love him too. Tell him. Tell him. Now, tell him.”


The figure standing over her turned, and using his other hand, began to slap another face. It was a handsome face, gaunt, but still with color. The cheeks swelled with breath as the cough came out, listless though, the force taken by pain and fatigue.

“Charlie, wake up. Cynthia is about to tell you something. Wake up.”

Another slap, another cough, and the dirty blond hair was grabbed – the head turned, and he was forced to look at his wife’s corpse. Her body was covered in a patterned blanket, dark browns mixed with putrid greens. Under the blanket he knew, he knew that was where the story lay. He tried to reach her, but his hands were still bound beneath him.

“Oh Charlie, you can’t move. Look what you did last time? Look what you caused? You can’t move. So just listen while Cynthia speaks.”

Standing, the man who had hovered above them both walked to the TV in the corner of the large, but mostly empty, room. He leaned down, pressed play and stood again to watch his handiwork. The screen flickered to life and there she was, in her wedding dress.

“Listen to her Charlie. She’s going to say it again. Again she.. she’ll say it again. I just know it. She must really love you Charlie.”

The man’s name, his captor, his tormentor, the murderer, was Simon. They’d hire him to do video of their wedding. Beyond that, he knew nothing of him. Both Cynthia and he had been asked over to review the editing of their wedding video, but when they arrived things had gone so wrong.

“I think she really loved us both Charlie. Can you see how she is looking at me? So concerned for me. So lovingly at me. Oh, I couldn’t mistake that Charlie.”

The sound was off. But Simon kept talking. The blood on the floor had begun to puddle, and little spiders were spreading out, as if the floor had cracked red. The coarse rope that held Charlie’s hands tied beneath him was biting into the skin and they became wet each time he moved his hands. A spider crack of blood touched his foot. Simon turned up the volume at just the right time and Cynthia’s voice rang out from the speakers.

“I love you! I love you! I love you!”

“See Charlie,” Simon continued as he turned the volume back down, “she does love you. I fear she loves you more than me. Why did you have to yell at her?”

“I didn’t yell at her psycho, you did. While you were-“ The slap came then. And another followed. They continued until Charlie fell over, his bound body not giving him the ability to stop his fall, and his face smacked into the hard cement floor. More spiders made their web.