Erased (Killer #3)

Prologue

“What the hell?”

The angry voice jerked her out of a dead sleep.

She sat up quickly and pushed long, lank strands of hair out of her face and blinked up at the man looming over her.

Immediately, her heart dropped to the pit of her belly, and she shrank away from him.

“Wh-what time is it?” she asked, her voice gravelly from sleep.

Or rather, lack of sleep.

“It’s supper damn time, and I’m hungry. Where’s the food I work so hard to put on the table?”

She glanced at the clock on the nightstand and gasped.

Had it been three hours since she’d fallen onto the bed, meaning only to close her eyes for a moment?

As her husband had indicated, it was his dinnertime, and he always came home hangry.

From the smell of him, he’d stopped at the bar on the way.

Alcohol and no dinner made him lose control fast.

“I’m sorry,” she said and scrambled toward the edge of the bed.

Before she could swing her legs over the side, her husband grabbed a handful of her hair and dragged her off the bed.

She’d have hit the ground hard if her husband hadn’t been holding tightly to her hair, the pressure making her scalp burn and tears fill her eyes.

“It’s not like you do anything all day. The house is a pigsty, and you’re not even out of your pajamas. You’re disgusting.” He slung her away by the hair.

She hit the wall and slid to the floor on her side. The noise was loud enough to wake the babies in the other room.

One cried, waking the other, so that both were screaming within seconds.

“God damn it!” he yelled. “Can’t you get those brats to shut the fuck up? All they do is scream, day and night. I can’t hear myself think.”

The babies cried louder, their little voices shaking with the force.

They didn’t understand the noise their father made and wanted the reassurance a gentle hand and voice could provide.

Neither of those two things would come from the man standing in the center of the bedroom, shouting louder than the babes.

Their mother glanced toward the door, anxious to go to her babies, but afraid of drawing even more attention to them.

Her husband had yet to raise a hand to them.

She always managed to divert his attention to herself, absorbing the brunt of his ire.

“I can get them to be quiet,” she offered.

“I’ll just be a minute and then I can get your supper. ”

“You should’ve thought about that sooner.

By the time you fix a meal, it’ll be so late it’ll give me heartburn all night.

That, plus the constant screeching, will guarantee yet another sleepless night.

” He snorted, a sneer lifting his lip on one side.

“Had I known how lazy you’d be, I’d have gotten something to eat while I was out.

What good are you to me, anyway? I’m better off without you and those damned kids.

Why’d you have to go and get pregnant? You knew I didn’t want kids.

They’re nothing but spitting, pooping animals I’ll be saddled with for the rest of my life. ”

She bit down hard on the retort that sprang to her lips. He’d been the one to rape her over and over, without bothering to use any contraceptives. She’d been on birth control pills, careful to take them every day to avoid bringing babies into a world with her husband.

One particularly harsh night, he’d beaten her so badly, she hadn’t been able to get up off the floor for much more than to drag herself to the bathroom, vomit and collapse against the cold tiles.

She’d missed a couple of days of her pills because every time she’d tried to get to her feet, she’d passed out.

She’d been as surprised as he had been when she’d learned the constant vomiting meant she was pregnant, with twins, no less.

He’d been so angry when she’d informed him of her transgression, he’d punched her several times in the belly. She suspected he’d hoped to shake the growing embryos loose and cause her to miscarry.

Unfortunately, she hadn’t.

Then, he’d gone on a work-related training session for a month and came back to find her belly had grown so fast, she’d had to go to the doctor.

By doing so, she’d established she was pregnant with twins, and her doctor had taken special interest in her.

The longer she’d carried her babies, the more she’d wanted them.

They would be hers to love and cherish and maybe love her in return.

She was glad her doctor had been interested in the fact that she was carrying twins.

If her husband had tried to force her to miscarry, her doctor might’ve been clued into the fact her husband was abusing her.

However, for the next seven months, she’d managed to protect her belly. Her face, arms and legs...not so much.

She’d gone into labor a month early during her visit to her doctor.

He’d had her admitted to the hospital immediately.

Her husband had been at work. The man had never bothered to come to the hospital.

She’d had to call him to give her a ride home two days later, having to leave the babies in the NICU a little longer.

As soon as she’d arrived home, he’d told her how much he’d missed her and then celebrated her return with a six-pack of beer.

For a brief, exhausted and foolish moment, she’d harbored a slim ray of hope for their marriage, remembering how good they’d had it as a young couple in high school.

That hope had been dashed seconds later when he’d raped her, even though her body had still been sore, her female parts still recovering from the births of twins.

She’d crawled into the bathroom, showered away the blood, cleaned the blood from the floor and gathered the towels and soiled sheets to wash.

Meanwhile, her husband had watched wrestling in the lounge chair, polishing off the last of the beer, and ultimately succumbing to alcohol-induced sleep.

She’d collapsed in their bed only to be woken the next morning to “earn her keep” and make his breakfast.

Despite their early arrival, her babies had been completely formed and healthy, though small. She’d been able to bring them home days later.

Unfortunately, they’d proven colicky, sometimes screaming for several hours straight before dropping into exhausted sleep.

“Shut them up!” he said, pressing his hands to his ears.

She scrambled to her feet, holding onto the wall as she grew lightheaded and almost passed out.

“Do it,” he yelled, “before I shut them up for good.”

Pushing through the fog of dizziness, she staggered out of the room and hurried into the small room across the hall, not much bigger than a closet.

She stared down at the twins, lying together in the crib she’d salvaged from the neighbor’s trash and restored with a little paint, glue and elbow grease.

Their faces were screwed up into grimaces of fear and fury, their lips trembling.

She gently laid a hand on each child’s tummy.

“Shh, babies, everything’s going to be okay.

I’ll make it right. I promise. Shhh,” she said, her voice breathy, a lump forming in her throat.

“Mommy won’t let him hurt you,” she whispered.

The babies’ cries lessened for a moment. When she didn’t pick them up and hold them close to her chest, they raised their voices in renewed unison.

“I said shut them up,” his voice yelled from the other room. “I’ll give you two more seconds to make that happen, or it’s my turn. Jesus, do I have to do everything around here?”

Gathering the babies into her arms, she pressed them to her chest and rocked back and forth on her feet, bouncing them gently.

“Please,” she said softly, “please don’t cry. I just need a few more days to get ready.” She shook her head, knowing she couldn’t put it off any longer.

She’d considered leaving him on numerous occasions before she’d gotten pregnant, but he’d told her she wouldn’t be able to support herself, that she’d end up on the street with the prostitutes, and if she ever managed to leave him, he’d find her and make her regret it.

After she’d found out she was pregnant, she knew she couldn’t afford to raise her babies by herself.

She didn’t have a degree to fall back on.

Hell, she had dropped out of high school to follow her boyfriend, a couple of years older than her, when he’d moved to Dallas to pursue his own career dreams.

Now, after only a few weeks home from bringing these beautiful babies into the world, she realized staying with him would result in severe injury or death. If not her own death, then that of her sweet babies. If she were the first to go, her babies would be next. They’d have no one to protect them.

She had to leave, even if it was with only the clothes on her back. She’d hoped to leave with a few things she’d need for the twins and had started squirreling away what she thought she’d need when she made the break.

A roar of anger erupted from the other room.

Her heart sank to the pit of her belly.

“What the fuck,” he said, his voice moving closer, “is this?” He stood in the doorway with the gym bag—another find from her neighbor’s trash.

He ripped it open and dumped the contents.

A dozen diapers stashed in a grocery bag and four small outfits for the babies fell to the floor.

“It’s just a diaper bag I packed for their next visit to the pediatrician.”

She carefully laid the babies in the crib and dropped to her knees to gather the items.

“And a trip to the pediatrician requires a change of clothing for their mother?” He pulled a pair of faded jeans and a couple of worn T-shirts out of the gym bag and flung them toward her.

She swallowed hard and forced a tremulous smile. “Sometimes, they spit up on me.”

When his hand reached into the bag once more, he pulled out two pairs of panties. “Even on your underpants?” He grabbed her arm, yanked her to her feet and ground the panties into her face, smashing his hand against her mouth and nose. “You’re fucking lying to me.”