The Iris Collective - Chapter 38

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The Predator and the Prey

Barron refused to let her out of his sight for the rest of the night after he caught her talking to Senator Ross. Even when he let the other men at the party steal her away for a dance, he would stand at the perimeter of the floor, watching. His arm would drape around her waist, a near permanent fixture, each time she returned to him. The only benefit of his watchful eye was that the most unsavory of the men that she was forced to dance with could do nothing more offensive than whisper crude remarks to her. Unfortunately, it also guaranteed that she couldn’t try again to find a way off of the property.

Her feet were throbbing by the time the last guests were giving her and Barron their well wishes as they stumbled, drunk, out of the gardens. Any miniscule joy she had at the idea of kicking off her heels was overshadowed by Barron’s promise of a repeat performance of his actions in the limousine. She would sooner run a mile in the offending shoes if it would mean that she didn’t have to feel his heavy body on top of hers again. But this moment would never be what she wished, and with each step he brought her closer to the guest house. Her feet were dragging the last few feet to the glass double doors, a futile delay of the inevitable. He ushered her in ahead of himself.

“Finally,” he sighed, his arms wrapping around her from behind as soon as the door had clicked shut. He pulled her body against his as his mouth went to her neck. “I thought they would never leave.”

She didn’t try to fight, pointless as her struggles were against his strength. She had asked for this, told the Collective not to save her, knowing full well what she was signing up for. Though, the reality of her decision was far different than what she had imagined. Sleeping with the man whose hands were currently roaming her body was easy in concept. A simple chore, like taking out the trash, and without the screaming tangled mess that her mind had become.

“You’re beautiful.”

His whispered compliments and gentle hands were somehow worse than the uncaring ferocity of their first encounter. Fear and pain were preferable to this confusing imitation of loving care. Her mind began to cloud, and the room faded as she drifted away from what was happening to her body. Then she spotted it, and clarity snapped back into place with a shocking jolt. In the kitchen, on the island, was a silver platter that held a bottle of champagne in an ice bucket and two crystal flutes.

“Wait.” Her voice was foreign to her ears, as if someone else had spoken the word.

His hands stilled, hot breath on her neck. “We’re going to do this, Vanessa, whether I have to make you or not. You may as well try to enjoy it.”

“I know,” she turned around in his arms so she could face him. “I just… Could we slow down, have a drink first? I think I could be better for you if I could have a little more time to ease into it. I don’t want it to be like the first time.”

He looked down at her with skepticism.

“Please, Chance.” Standing as tall as she could, her face close to his, she looked into his eyes. They were cold, but curious, and she kissed him. He responded by wrapping his arms around her back and deepening the kiss. She fought the urge to clamp her teeth down on his tongue when it entered her mouth, pushing with a gentle pressure against his shoulders before he could take it further. He followed her lead, slowing the kiss until they parted, his forehead resting against hers as he caught his breath.

“That was nice,” he said. “I knew you’d find a way to enjoy yourself.”

She leaned back, forcing herself to smile up at him. “Come on.” Taking his hand in hers, she led him to the kitchen. Maybe Reid was right. She was already a murderer by association, so why not make it official?

Lifting the bottle of champagne from the bucket, there was no resistance or sound, the ice having melted but for a few transparent cubes. Barron grabbed it from her hands, and for a terrifying moment she thought he was going to refuse her request for a drink. Instead, he peeled away the foil cover from the neck of the bottle and popped the cork, handing it back to her.

She looked down. “Thank you.”

The bottle shook as she filled the two glasses, spilling some of the bubbling liquid onto the silver tray.

“Sorry,” she laughed, ants dancing across her nerves.

Grabbing both glasses from the tray, she handed one to Barron. He stared at her for a moment before he tapped her glass with his. The crystal rang out with a cheerful chime as he lifted it to his lips. She watched, mesmerized, the liquid sloshing as he tipped the glass.

He paused before the champagne touched his lips and narrowed his eyes at her. For a moment he contemplated the slender flute in his hand, and chill rolled over her skin as he smiled and upended it. The champagne flowed from the glass to the tile floor at their feet, flooding into the grout lines like rainwater in a dozen tiny swales. She stared at the liquid on the ground, seeping under the toe of her shoe, skin burning where several tiny droplets had landed on the tops of her heeled feet.

“You forget that I know who you really are, Vanessa,” Barron said, “I know all about the methods you’ve used to kill before. Poison, not a terribly original plan, I must say.”

His hand reached for her. Without thinking, she thrust her own glass forward, the rich golden alcohol flying into the face of the man before her. He screamed out and squeezed his eyes shut as it made contact, but he wasn’t fast enough. A thousand red blisters erupted on his once clean, pale complexion. Stumbling, his felt way around the kitchen island until he came to the sink at the center, turning on the faucet and sticking his face underneath the aerated flow of water that issued from it.

“Are you fucking crazy?” The water flowed into his mouth as he yelled, and he came out from under the stream to catch his breath, blinking several times. His once icy blue eyes were covered in a lumpy white film, and soon wouldn’t be visible at all with the swelling of his eyelids. He ducked back under the faucet, groaning in pain, but not enough.

Grabbing the neck of the champagne bottle, it swung at her side as she ambled around the far side of the large kitchen island. His head popped out from the water’s flow again as he heard the click of her heels on the floor, the heels he had made his mother choose for her.

“What are you doing?” he asked, swinging his arms in the air.

She stopped just outside of his reach, leaning her head back when his aimless flailing came close.

“Where are you?” He swung out again, backing away from the sink with hesitant steps.

She followed him.

“Stop it!” He screamed, fear creeping into his voice for only a moment before he latched onto his anger again. “You’re going to die for this, you crazy bitch! You hear me?”

“What makes you think that?”

He jumped back at the sound of her voice so close to him, his foot slipping as it landed in the puddle of acrid champagne on the floor. His arms opened wide to stop his fall, but his fingers missed the edge of the counter by an inch, a loud crack splitting the air as the back of his head hit the tile. The sound of it churned her stomach.

“Uh…”

It was all he could seem to say anymore as he lay dazed on the cold floor. Hiking up her dress, she stepped over his supine form, and straddled his massive chest. His swollen white eyes blinked up at her, and she leaned down until her lips were touching his ear.

“What…” His voice slurred on the word.

“There’s one thing you forgot to account for in all of your knowledge of me,” she whispered, sitting back up and placing the palm of her hand under his bottom lip. His blistered skin ripped underneath her fingers as she leaned her weight against his chin to force his mouth open.

“No… No…”

Her shallow breaths grew deeper, and she grit her teeth, remembering the feeling of him inside of her. The hot humidity of his panting breath on her face as he raped her.

“I’m a fucking murderer!”

She upended the bottle of champagne in his mouth, shoving the neck further in as he sputtered and struggled beneath her. Her hand was a burning wet fire, the liquid bubbling and splashing over her skin with his gagging coughs, but she didn’t let go. Pushing his head against the hard tile with all of her strength, she held on until his body stopped bucking beneath her. He twitched several times after his struggles ended, the now bloody liquid in his mouth flowing over his cheeks to spread across the tile until finally, there was no more movement from the man beneath her.

“Ah!” She shot to her feet, tripping over his legs in her hurry to get back to the still running faucet. Thrusting her hand under the stream of water, she sighed as she felt an instant relief to the burning of her skin. When all the bloody champagne was rinsed from her hand, she turned off the faucet to search for a towel, which brought immediate regret. The skin on her hand erupted in pain the moment the air touched it. In the few seconds it took to turn the faucet back on to saturate her hand, she was shaking and had tears running down her cheeks. Angry red blisters covered the back and palm of her hand. Whatever Senator Ross had put in the champagne, water wasn’t enough to get rid of it.

Grabbing the bottle of dish soap from the edge of the sink, she took several quick breaths and pulled her hand out from underneath the water.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck,” she whimpered, more tears falling as she squeezed the soap over the angry skin. She didn’t want to touch it, in case it would burn her uninjured hand, but there was nothing to use to scrub her skin with. She started ripping open any drawers she could reach, one of them falling onto the floor with a dozen folded washcloths. Grabbing one, she used it to scrub at the blisters. Layers of skin sloughed off in ropey white strings, disappearing down the drain. Rinsing her hand off, she grabbed a new cloth from the floor and scrubbed her skin again with more soap. Once she reached a layer of skin that didn’t come off, she rinsed her hand one last time. The burning was lessened, but still worse in the air than it was under the water. Soaking one last washcloth before turning the faucet off, she wrapped it around her hand to keep the air away. It wasn’t as good as the running water, but it would have to do.

Cradling her arm against her chest, she lowered herself to the floor, leaning back against the cabinets as she tried to catch her breath. Barron’s still form was exactly where she had left it. One of his legs was bent, and his head was pulled to the side by the weight of the champagne bottle still lodged in his throat. She waited, not for him to wake or move, but for herself. To feel the remorse for what she had done to him, the regret, or something other than apathy as she stared at his corpse, but it never came.

She didn’t count the minutes she spent watching his body, but after a while the sky was starting to lighten outside of the windows of the guesthouse. His family would wake up soon. She had to go.

Kicking off her heels, she made her way to the bedroom. A king sized bed took up most of the space along one wall, covered in white rose petals. Opening one door, she found a bathroom. In the bathroom was another door that led into a closet that was bigger than her apartment.

The center of the room was taken up by a large island with drawers on two sides, while the perimeter of the space was filled with rack upon rack of clothes that looked like they had never been worn before. On top of the island were several suitcases, packed and ready for the honeymoon that would never happen. She tore into them, finding suits, dresses, and more lingerie than one person could ever need. In the third suitcase she found what she was looking for, her passport and her phone.

Leaning against the island, she unlocked it with her uninjured hand and typed a message to the Collective’s line.

Request extraction; Barron Estate.

It took less than a minute for a response to come through with a buzz.

About time.

She smiled, her head dropping onto her arms as she sighed. The phone buzzed again.

Eastern perimeter, five minutes.

She stripped off the dress she wore, dropping the washcloth on the counter. There were holes burned into the fabric where it had been covering her wrists. Searching the drawers, she found a pair of loose fitting lounge pants and pulled them on. The racks of clothes held dozens of dresses and suits, with not a single t-shirt among them. She settled on a men’s dress shirt, careful as she slipped her injured hand through the sleeve. The buttons were a struggle with one hand, so she only fastened enough to keep the shirt from flying open, and then wrapped her hand in the washcloth again.

Below the racks of clothes on the wall were several shelves of designer heels—all her size—and men’s dress shoes. A cabinet at the end of one of the racks held the more comfortable footwear. She plopped herself onto the soft carpet and pulled a pair of boots over her bare feet, not trusting her current ability to tie any laces.

The sky was turning pink outside, her breath producing clouds in the air with each exhale. She hugged the building, walking around it until she was on the east side before running across the grass to the tall hedge. Finding an area that looked thin enough to squeeze through, she pushed her way into the bushes, gaining several new scratches on her skin. When she emerged from the other side, she was on a wide empty street.

Looking each way, there was nothing but her and the street lamps, which clicked off as the rising sun graced their tops. An old sedan turned onto the street in the distance. She hugged the hedge, hiding herself as best as she could as it approached. The headlights flashed three times.

Relief flooded her veins, and she ran to meet them, hopping into the backseat as the car came to a stop. She lay down, closing her eyes, the old cracked leather of the seat cool against her cheek.

“Thank you,” she whispered as the car began to move again. “Thank you.”

“Good to see you’re still mostly in one piece.”

Her eyes snapped open, and she pushed herself back into a sitting position. Liam was smiling at her in the rearview mirror. She broke down, sobbing and scrambling over the center console to the front passenger seat, wrapping her arms around his neck.

“Whoa!” The car swerved and he jerked the steering wheel in the opposite direction to correct it. “It’s good to see you too,” he laughed, returning her hug with one arm.

“I didn’t know if you made it out,” she said, sitting sideways in her seat to face him. “I haven’t been able to talk to Eddie since the raid. Is he ok?”

“He’s great. Worried. We’re on the way to him now.”

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