Eye of the Beholder by Thomas Grant Bruso

Author:Thomas Grant Bruso [Bruso, Thomas Grant]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: NineStar Press, LGBTQIA+, established couple, evil spirits, businessman, law enforcement, mental illness, horror
Publisher: NineStar Press, LLC
Published: 2020-01-15T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Thirteen

Across the room lay two dead bodies. One was covered in a white sheet, soaked and stained with blood. The other, my friend Cheryl, was sprawled out in front of the bed on the floor, her arm dislocated at an unholy bend, raw and bloody, likely from clawing at the carpet as she scuffled.

Zane was at my side. “I’ll call it in,” he said, his hand comforting yet unnerving on my back.

I was too shocked to answer, shaking and crying so hard, my legs felt weak. I couldn’t force myself to step into the room, as much as I wanted to.

Cheryl’s eyes were open, sightless, though still appearing scared as if spooked. Blood covered most of her face, her hair matted with the wet, sticky substance.

I heard Zane talking into his cell phone, down the hall. I couldn’t pull my gaze away from the crime scene. Blood-splattered walls. The heady smell of death hanging in the air. Metallic. Stomach-churning.

A wave of lightheadedness overtook me, and I closed my eyes.

A few seconds or minutes later I heard heavy footsteps running toward me. Zane was screaming, but his voice was muffled, illusory.

He picked me up from the floor, cradling me in his arms. I wasn’t aware that I had collapsed. When I opened my eyes, he was above me, staring into my eyes, panicked. His mouth was moving, but I couldn’t understand anything he was saying.

Woozy, in shock, as if I’d been hit on the back of the head, I lay in Zane’s arms under a dim hallway light. I started talking, but it was too hard to string words together coherently. He was staring at me, crestfallen, and running his hand along my jawline, soothing, caressing, the soft, steady touch was reassuring.

I was in and out of a dream state, I don’t remember Zane carrying me down the winding staircase and propping me in a chair in the foyer. He knelt beside me, holding out his hand and telling me he’d be right back. “Everything is going to be all right,” he said. “Don’t move.”

Through a heavy, dead haze, I watched him open the front door and walk out onto the porch. He was talking on his cell phone when I heard a noise behind me, from down the long hall.

A door opened somewhere in the house. Slammed shut. Then opened again.

I wanted to call out to Zane, but I knew my weak voice wouldn’t reach him.

Gripping the arm of the chair, I pulled myself up and stood, wobbling to the edge of the room and staring toward the door at the end. I had been to Cheryl’s house twice before and knew that door led to a conservatory where she housed most of her prized plants, flowers, and works of art.

The painting!

I turned around to look for Zane but noticed he was still outside on the front porch. Talking. His voice was miles away.

Then I heard a whisper, someone calling my name. “David.”

It was barely audible, but what happened next chilled me.

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