Legacy (Anathema #2)

by Nick Roberts

“Because your name was literally all over the crime scene, kid. All over the walls, the floor, the car… written with every drop of the good doctor’s blood. Now, are you ready to talk at the station now? It’s fuckin’ cold out

Wrenley’s eyes widened ever so slightly, and she nodded. “Or she had a key to the building and knew the security code. Which the perp could’ve gotten from Dr. Strobel at the murder scene.” “What’d she take from Dr. Strobel’s office” Wrenley cocked her head. “Why do you keep saying ‘she’?” Derrick studied her; she knew. “You know about my past. That’s why you sent your partner out

coffee, right? You thought I’d open up to you if it was just the two of us.”

Wrenley was stone-faced. “It wasn’t necessary to do that,” he said. She held her gaze. “I’ve been trying to get the police to take my story seriously since I was six years old.” “I’m listening, Derr...

Derrick took a drink of the hot, bitter liquid and leaned back like

man twice his age about to tell war stories. “When I was six, my parents and I moved into a subdivision made up of connected townhouses.” “River’s Edge Subdivision,” Wrenley said. “So, you did your homework.

Here’s what happened, despite what years of therapy have tried to convince...

After we moved in, the lady who lived next door befriended me. The way she did it was by dressing up like a princess, kind of like Princess Peach from Super Mario. She said her name was Daisy, and that not only did she want to be my friend, but she wanted to protect me from my mom and dad.” “Bryan and Ellie Stockton,” Wrenley said. Hearing their names caught him by surprise, like they were still alive for that s...

I’ve sat up trying to figure out how she did what she did…how many people she had under her control. I know for a fact that the lady who lived on the other side of the townhouse was under her spell, for lack of a better word. She somehow had a legion of people who perpetuated this lie that she was a recluse with some rare brain disorder. It’s how she was able to live there for as long as she did.

Maren used his rage to get me to do what I did. See, even though I was only six, I had my own issues, and she masterfully used them like puppet strings. I was scared of my parents, scared of the fighting they did before they got better. Maren knew that and fanned those flames to the point where I truly believed my dad was a bad man.”

“What I think happened? No, it’s what really happened. On the night of the flood, the worst flood that town had ever seen up to that point, Maren had my mom tortured and beaten and then dressed to look like her. She tricked my dad into thinking she’d killed me.”

So, when he came after the only person I had left to trust, I shot him. I killed my own father. I’ve had to come to grips with that fact and the circumstances that surround it, but that is an objective truth I’ve had to face.

He’d recovered the gun and killed her before ‘Daisy’ could take her little prince away. When she hit the water and her wig and all her makeup washed off and I saw the hideous thing she was underneath, I realized then and there what happened. I probably couldn’t have voiced it at the time, but I knew this monster had just made me shoot my dad and made him shoot his wife.

Her dying wish was for me to be a light for others, to be of service when life gets dark. That’s the legacy she left behind. Sometimes I think God was

speaking through her in the moment; other times I don’t think God exists at all. And if he did, why would he put us through Hell?”

Derrick saw Maren’s pale, mutilated face, with water rushing over it. He remembered every scar, fresh cut, burn mark and that demonic grin. Once her wig washed off, revealing her baldness, and her eyes, wide-open and fixed in a dead stare of ecstasy. That

Wrenley nodded her head and said, “The perp didn’t just take your old casefile. They got into Dr. Strobel’s desktop computer and accessed the most recent info she had on you—your last session and your grandparents’ address here in Ohio.”

“This person wants us—you—to know that they’re coming. Why else would they write your name in blood all over the crime scene and leave your information open on

computer. They made no attempt to cover their tracks.” Derrick’s eyes lit up. “Hey, doesn’t the airport have security cameras or something? Or even Dr. Strobel’s office? There’s gotta be some footage somewhere, right?”

He took shallow breaths as he stared at the back of what appeared to be a tall female, about the same height as Dr. Strobel. The longer he looked at the back of the person’s head, the more confused he became. Nothing existed in the shot to prove that the person he hadn’t removed his eyes from

Maren, but his gut told him otherwise. Still, once his mind would lean one way, the other side of his brain would counter a rebuttal. After leering at the image for long enough, he said, “Okay.”

“Beth,

and as putrid as her silent dog bombs were, they paled in comparison to the utter taste of death that invaded her senses.

“Yeah, nope,” she said, having seen enough horror movies to know when to get the hell out of a bad situation.

I like this girl. She’s me. 😬😆

Beth made it five steps before she heard someone knock on the glass behind her. Her heart rose into her throat as she spun around and let out an embarrassing little shriek. Someone stood inside the dark building. The figure was motionless, just a silhouette rivaling

the stillness of a department store mannequin.

All she saw was this humanoid outline, presumably watching her every move.

The echo of frenzied footsteps followed behind her, and just as she reached her car, a gloved hand covered her mouth and pulled her head back. Before she could throw an elbow back at her attacker, she felt the sting of a syringe pierce the side of her neck.

But that voice gradually dissolved into the sublime ether of the forced serenity to which she surrendered. She looked at her reflection in the car window and watched with a detached curiosity as someone with skin so pale that it could only be a mask, met her gaze. The long-haired mirage of a face now looked like it was smiling.

Beth’s legs turned to Jello as she stared into the black eyes leering back at her. Before she fully lost consciousness, the lyrics of that damn Blue Oyster Cult song echoed through her mind, playing out like someone slowly turned down the volume of her life: Baby, take my hand, Don’t fear the Reaper. We’ll be able to fly Don’t fear the Reaper. Baby, I’m your man…

The stench triggered a slew of memories and even though her body was sedated to the point that she couldn’t move, she started to panic. She’d been outside and someone had abducted and drugged her. But why?

She wasn’t alone. Other people were in the room, breathing, shifting, moving, groaning, making slurred sounds like she was. As she homed in on the strange symphony, the hairs on the back of

neck stood on end. This horde of strangers was behind her. Her eyes focused on the front of the meeting room where her chair was pointed.

speak. It sounded like Lisa, and if the grogginess of her delivery was any indication, she was in the same drug-induced dilemma Beth was in.

Had he finally gone off the deep end? Was he dangerous all along? Had he been keeping a demon inside him that the whiskey finally freed? Well, she understood they all had that to some extent, metaphorically, but were Derrick’s underlying issues psychotic?

Beth stared at the person standing in the now open doorway. It appeared to be a woman slightly taller than she was. She could tell by the woman’s silhouette that she was thin and perhaps even taller than she appeared because she didn’t stand fully erect.

slack with drooping shoulders and a cocked head, covered by an oily mane of black hair. She wore black clothes that only made it that much more difficult for Beth to fully see what kind of abductor she was dealing with.

Her gait was off like something was weighing her

down. It was only then that Beth saw that the woman carried something in each hand. She studied the dark shapes and finally identified them when the woman heaved them onto the table, illuminated by the few slivers of moonlight.

Directly in front of her, the woman had just placed a massive metal toolbox and a black duffle bag big enough to carry something as long as a tennis racket. The woman stood with her back to the crowd like she was oblivious

to their existence. She positioned the toolbox so that it sat straight and even with the length of the table like she wanted the group to be able to see the front of it. Then, she did the same with the duffle bag, scooting it further to the right side of the table so there was about two feet of room between the two objects.

They were all sitting in a circle just like they would at a regular meeting, but instead of facing one another, they were all turned backwards.

Somehow, this woman had lured them all back to the church, drugged them, and confined them to their chairs. And with her toolbox and duffle bag lit up like some kind of blasphemous altar, Beth

knew she must have a sinister plan. She felt a tear run down her left cheek, not even realizing she had the capacity to cry. The fact that she’d been reduced to tears pissed her off. She thought about her children at home with her mom, and a rage came over her. Just before she could scream at this woman and try to instigate some sort of interaction, the woman turned around. For the first time since she awoke, Beth saw a hint of the face hidden beneath the shroud of black hair. It was porcelain pale with dark eyes. It was the face she’d caught

a glimpse of in the reflection of her car door’s window. Still, even this close, she couldn’t tell if it was a mask or a ...

“What’s…B.S.?” Beth asked, and for the first time, the woman spoke, her voice sexless, rising and falling in octaves like a legion of people wrestled for control of her vocal cords.

“Bryan Stockton,” she said. “Did someone…say Stockton?” Daniel said from way behind Beth. “As in…Derrick?” Shannon said, sitting a little closer. “Derrick told me…to come here,” Beth said.

The mystery ended when the woman tapped the screen, and the cell phone display powered on. The iPhone had a red Otter Box that Beth had seen before. She knew

instantly that she was looking at Derrick’s cell phone.

There was just no other way she could inherit Derrick’s natural cadence—his syntax as Beth’s English teacher mother would say—so effortlessly.