The room seemed to breathe a collective sigh of relief as the brute stormed away, each glancing furtively from face to face. “The boy called you dad?” Stanley finally asked with unapologetic calm, as though he wasn’t sharing the living room with the disemboweled carcass of his wife’s closest friend. The leader gave a disapproving glare at his son for revealing their relationship in a moment of panic. The kid’s face was a roadmap of terror after witnessing the gruesome murder. He was fighting to catch his breath and had the look of someone about to either vomit or pass out. “What can I call you?” Stanley asked as he pulled a long drag from his pipe. Stanley’s preternatural calm was eerily unnerving under the circumstances.
“Chris,” the man answered stiffly. “Call me Chris.” He lit a cigarette and handed it to his son, nodding for him to take a seat before he fell over. The boy slowly sat and dropped his head, grasping it with both hands.
“Alright, good. Chris,” Stanley said as though greeting an old friend. He nodded toward the couch, inviting Chris to sit with him. “I know this is going to be difficult for you to accept, but even after the ghastly display we just witnessed, you and I want the same thing. And that’s for you and your men to remain safely hidden without having to hurt or kill anyone else, especially my wife. And to that end, I am prepared to do just about anything to provide you sanctuary.”
“Is that so?” Chris muttered, barely aware he’d spoken aloud, his thoughts spinning like a dark whirlpool around the sudden, brutal twist of fate. His fingers clawed through his hair, knuckles white with the shock, before he finally pointed a finger toward the corpse. “My brother just gutted this woman in your living room.” Stanley simply nodded without breaking eye contact. There was a haunting edge to the stare that would have chilled even the most hardened man.
Chris slowly returned the nod, his expression guarded. “Alright, Stan… we’ll see.”
“See what?” the brute thundered as he stomped back into the room, his presence like the thunderclaps pounding the evening. “Just cut their throats. Dump the bodies in the basement, and as soon as we get a chance, we hightail it outta here. There are three highways within two miles of here. We can be gone in minutes.”
“Enough with that shit,” Chris roared, desperate to regain the authority he felt steadily slipping away. “This is still my score, and I’ll tell you when it’s time to kill someone.”
The brute froze, his eyes locking onto his brother’s with dangerous intensity. The air grew thick and oppressive, a silent predator stalking its prey, as everyone in the room felt their breath catch, bracing for the next frenzied explosion. His patience was exhausted, twisted into a frayed, dangerous thread, and Chris, his older brother, was the last to tug at it. Hatred boiled in his veins, each pulse a promise of violence. The dark, forbidden thought of slaughtering all five of them and taking the loot for himself slithered through his mind, a tempting whisper in the shadows. The temptation gnawed at him, but even in his fury, he knew he couldn’t escape alone without ending up in jail—or worse, a nameless corpse rotting in the gutter.
His fists clenched, knuckles white, as he wrestled the urge to kill. But in the end, blood loyalty won out—barely. With a slow, deliberate nod, he forced himself to relent, though his eyes remained fixed on Chris, a silent promise of what could come. He returned the blood-streaked blade to its sheath, the motion a dark truce with the demons still clawing at his mind.
“For right now, I’ll watch the front of the house,” Chris said, his voice low and gravelly. He pointed at the brute, his eyes cold and hard. “You roll this mess up in the rug and get her into the basement. Find something to wipe up the blood and another rug to cover the stain. If the cops show up, this place can’t look like a slaughterhouse. Now move.”
The brute nodded slowly, as if the very act were a burden, before bundling the corpse and storming out of the room, the floorboards creaking ominously under his weight.
Chris turned to his son, his expression unyielding. “Pull yourself together, and head to the back to watch the yard. You’ll have a clear view of anyone approaching from either direction. If you see the cops, come yelling. We’ll have to hide in the basement.”
The kid, eyes wide with a mixture of fear and determination, gave a terse nod and hurried off, leaving Chris with Stanley and Mary, the tension in the room drawn tight as a bowstring on the verge of releasing its deadly arrow.
“Alone at last…” Chris said, pulling a packet of cigarettes from his sweat-soaked shirt. His hands shook slightly as he fumbled with the lighter.
“So it would seem,” Stanley murmured, drawing deeply from his pipe, the smoke curling around him like a spectral shroud. His eyes, sharp and probing despite his age, locked onto Chris. “Chris,” he said, his voice carrying a weight of pensive intensity, “I’m eighty-nine years old, and forgive me, but I am a blunt man. After what we just saw, I’m quite sure I already know the answer, but do my wife and I stand even the slightest chance in Hell of surviving this night?”
Chris flicked the lighter, the flame casting eerie shadows on the walls. “I can appreciate your bluntness, Stan. Hell, I might even admire it under the circumstances. And I am sorry about your friend. I wouldn’t have had that happen. But before I can answer that, let me ask you this—did you mean what you said about wanting the same thing as us?”
“Every word,” Stanley said dryly, his gaze never wavering.
“If that’s true, you have nothing to fear from me,” Chris replied, exhaling a cloud of smoke. His eyes softened slightly, but the steel edge remained. “And I may be a thief, Stan, but you count on that.”
Stanley nodded with a knowing, sardonic smirk, the lie hanging heavy in the air. “I might buy that for now,” he said, his voice dripping with irony, “but what about your giant friend in the back there?”
Chris’s eyes darkened, a shadow passing over his face like a storm cloud blotting out the sun. “Friend?” he chuckled with irony. “I’m sorry to say he’s my baby brother. But he’s also a good thief, doesn’t panic… ever, and I needed another set of steady hands for the score today.” His voice was steady, but there was an undercurrent of something darker, something almost regretful. Chris leaned back, raked his fingers through his hair, and expelled a long, mournful sigh that seemed to carry the weight of years of bad decisions and haunted nights. “Unfortunately, he’s also a damn psychotic. Of course, I’ve always known that, but if I had known six hours ago what he was going to do in that bank and what he just did to that old woman… let’s just say I’m not itching to explore the depths of his madness, Stan.”
The room seemed to grow colder as his words hung in the air, an unspoken threat lingering in the silence. The mention of his brother brought a flicker of something primal into Chris’s eyes, a glimpse of the darkness that lay ahead. It was a darkness that Stanley could almost feel creeping into his own soul, whispering of horrors yet to come.
Stanley’s eyes flicked to the shadows, the suggestion of something monstrous, something barely human. A chill crept up his spine, the kind of chill that whispered of ancient, unknowable terror. He tried to muster a shrug, but it felt forced, a brittle gesture that might shatter under the weight of Chris’s stare.
“Right now?” Chris continued, leaning in closer, his voice a low, deadly whisper that seemed to curl around Stanley’s heart. “You just need to keep your word to me and let me worry about my brother. Do me a favor though. Try harder not to piss him off.” Chris’s gaze was a knife, pressing against Stanley’s composure and threatening to slice it to ribbons.
Stanley managed the slightest, conciliatory half-smile from the corner of his mouth, a tremor of disquiet still lurking in his eyes. His hand tightened over Mary’s, her fingers cold and clammy, like a lifeline in a stormy sea.
Chris stared intensely at Stanley, the silence between them thick and suffocating. A sudden flash of lightning illuminated the room, breathing life into eerie shadows that danced and flickered. Chris flinched slightly, the tiniest crack in his steely facade, but he quickly masked his sudden unease with a deft pivot. “Is there anything to drink, Stan?”
Stanley’s mind raced, desperately seizing on any advantage. “If you’re a scotch man, there’s a decent bottle of single malt in that cabinet,” he said, pointing his chin toward the far wall, his voice steady.
“Be careful, Stan… I might start to like you,” Chris said. His lips curled into a dangerous smile, the momentary vulnerability gone. “I want you to have a drink with me.”
Mary scoffed, the idea of sharing a drink with this man clearly disgusting her, her lip curling in a disdain that seemed almost palpable. Stanley shot her a look so wrought with tension it momentarily froze the air around them, a silent plea and warning all at once. His pulse hammered in his ears as he turned back to Chris, forcing a grin that felt more like a mask than flesh, a thin veneer over the storm of anxiety brewing beneath. “Sure, why not. A drink sounds good right now. Pour one for Mary as well.”
Stanley watched carefully as Chris rose. The room felt heavy with unspoken threats, the shadows darker, the momentary silences deeper. Mary sank into her chair, her tolerance for Stanley’s infinite war-born patience quickly reaching its limit, a quiet rage simmering in her eyes. She watched him with a mix of frustration and anxiety, the fingers of her bound hands intertwined so tightly they trembled.
As Chris fetched the bottle, each flash of lightning lit up the room in stark, blinding white, followed by the deafening roar of thunder that seemed to shake the very foundation of the house. The storm outside felt almost sentient, as if it were in league with the darkness within. The sense of sharing time with evil was palpable, an oppressive weight that pressed down on the room and made every breath a struggle. It felt like something dark and predatory lurked just beyond the edges of the room, its presence as real and tangible as the storm itself. It was waiting for the perfect moment to strike, a malevolent force biding its time in the shadows, watching with hungry eyes and a cold, cruel patience.
About the Author:
Mystery and thriller author K.C. Kissig writes from his home in Northeast Ohio, drawing inspiration from family life with his wife and two children.
