Chapter 20
Tempest used her preternatural senses to zero in on the DiCaviatoppi compound in an old, yet affluent neighborhood of Chicago.
As she arrived, she considered just appearing in his bedroom, but then, where was the fun in that?
Instead, she started at the heavily guarded front gate.
She misted into being right behind the two men standing in the darkness, guns on their hips, huddled beneath heavy coats and hats in their attempt to remain functional despite the heavy snow and ice blanketing the area.
“It’s too fucking cold to be out here like this. Nothing is moving out here!” one of them complained, his gloved hands shoved deep into the pockets of his coat.
“Yeah, well you tell the boss. I’m just going to stay out here and keep doing what I’m paid to do.”
“I ain’t saying nothing to nobody!”
“Yeah, you are. You keep complaining — like it makes a difference. We do what we gotta do.”
“I didn’t say I wasn’t going to do my job, I’m just complaining about it a little first.”
“And during. And after,” the other man said.
Just behind them where they stood close to each other looking out over the snow covered drive leading up to the classic old mansion they protected, Tempest smiled to herself as she reached out and laid a hand on each of their shoulders.
“That hand ain’t gonna help keep me warm,” the complainer said.
“Well, I ain’t got no use for it! Get your fucking hand off me,” his friend answered.
“What? I ain’t touching…” the complainer said, turning toward his friend. That’s when he saw her. “Holy fuck!” he gasped, darting away from the creature standing behind them.
“What are you freaking out about now?!” the other asked, glaring at him as he watched him nearly break his neck on the ice as he struggled to put distance between them.
The complainer had regained his footing and was moving steadily backward as his gloved hand fumbled for his gun beneath his coat.
“The fuck is wrong with you?” his friend asked irritatedly.
“I think he’s a little unnerved by my presence,” Tempest said.
The man startled and spun around, getting a good look at Tempest. She seemed like a beautiful woman, any beautiful woman you’d see walking down the street in any city or town.
Until you looked into her eyes. They were black and soulless.
No pupils, no whites. Just black and empty, like a shark.
They didn’t even shine in the warm lights of the lamps mounted on either side of the gates that protected the house inside the large, stone wall surrounding the perimeter of the property.
It was like the light was absorbed into the emptiness in her eyes rather than reflecting back outward.
“Who the fuck are you?” he demanded, at least holding himself together a little bit better than his friend had.
Tempest sighed tiredly. “I think the better question is, what the hell am I?”
The man’s expression changed to one of irritation, until Tempest smiled.
Her teeth appeared to be jaggedly pointed and uneven, with little pieces of what looked like flesh stuck between a few of them.
Something red and faded seemed to be staining the upper edges of her teeth near her gums. It was a simple glamour to terrify the humans, complete with the rotting flesh smell, but it worked as well as if she really had rotting skin between her teeth.
His eyes widened with fear as he backed away further away from her. “I ain’t got no problems with you! Whatever you’re here for, it don’t concern me!”
“Doesn’t it though?” she asked, shrugging and lifting her hands palm up in question.
About ten feet to her left the complainer had finally managed to retrieve his gun from its holster and leveled it at her.
She grinned at his friend, pretending she didn’t notice the complainer preparing to shoot her. “Watch this,” she whispered.
The complainer held the gun steady and pulled the trigger three times, hatred and determination coloring his face.
Tempest calmly plucked the bullets out of the air one at a time until she held all three in her hand. She held her hand out to show both men.
Both of them were terrified, unsure of what they were dealing with, but knowing beyond the shadow of a doubt that it was not of this world.
“My turn!” she sing-songed happily as the complainer pressed the button on his radio.
“We’re under attack, I repeat, under attack!” he screamed into the radio.
Tempest threw two of the bullets at the complainer and they pierced his body as though fired from a gun. One lodged in his chest, the other right between the eyes. His body dropped into the snow, a steady stain of deep red blood spreading across the blanket of white beneath him.
His friend, turned and started running as best he could on the frozen ground.
Tempest laughed and misted to a place right in front of him, causing him to run right into her as he looked back over his shoulder to try to see where she was.
He bounced off her, stumbling backward as she reached out and grabbed him by the collar of his coat.
“I already said I ain’t got no beef with you! Let me go!”
“I can’t do that. You spent your life protecting the piece of shit living in this house. You helped him hurt people. You helped him terrorize people — even women and little children.”
“Hey! I don’t hurt no kids!”
“But he does. And you keep him safe. Bad choices, my friend. And you know what they say don’t you?” she asked, holding him close enough to her face to smell the rotting flesh between her teeth.
He leaned his head as far away from her as he could, but didn’t answer.
“Don’t you?” she asked sweetly. “Don’t you?!” she demanded angrily, her voice taking on a demonic quality.
“Don’t make bad choices?!” he asked nervously.
She laughed, her laughter tinkling melodically as she taunted him.
Then just as suddenly as she started laughing, she stopped.
“No! Make bad choices, get bad karma. I’m karma.
Nice to meet you.” Her eyes peered into his, and he was unable to look away, instead they began to bubble, his eyeballs simmering in their sockets until their very membranes ruptured and the insides spilled out to freeze on his cheeks in the cold as he screamed in pain.
She dropped him into the snow and stepped away, brushing the still falling snow off her clothes with her hands as she looked around and smiled.
“Well, that’s enough of that. I have an appointment with your boss.
” She walked away leaving the man whimpering and screaming in snow as he clawed at his own eyes.
She got a few feet away and looked back at him.
“Oh, by the way, you’re alive for a reason.
You should tell every single person who works for this man that they need to do everything in their power to take down this organization.
They can call the cops and tell all they know.
They can take it upon themselves to eliminate any they feel is next.
I don’t really care how they do it, but this organization will fall, or I’ll come back.
This is your chance to undo all your bad choices. ”
The man continued sobbing and scooping up handfuls of snow to hold against his eyes.
“Do you hear me?”
He continued to sob.
“Do you hear me?” she demanded in a deafening voice.
“Yes! Yes, I hear you.”
“Good. See you soon, or not. Your choice.”
Inside the mansion security had gone on high alert.
Men ran from other security points, toward the front gate to give assistance to those under attack, while others ran to increase security inside the house for the boss himself.
The head of security stationed four men, in addition to the two that usually stood outside the boss’s door to keep him safe, then took three with him as he threw open the boss’s doors and rushed into the master bedroom, startling the man and the two girls lounging in the large hot tub in the middle of the room.
“The fuck is wrong with you?! Get the fuck out of my fucking bedroom!” the boss shouted angrily.
“We have to secure you immediately, Boss! They’re attacking the front gate!”
“Nobody’s stupid enough to attack the front gate! Get the fuck out of here!” the boss yelled.
The radio at the man’s side crackled as another of the security people updated him. “Johnny’s dead, shot twice. Saul’s alive, but his eyes are burned out of his fucking head! He said some fucking woman did it. A demon woman!”
“The fuck is wrong with everybody? You’re all losing your fucking minds,” the boss snapped.
“Boss…” his head of security started.
“Handle it! And stop being so fucking dramatic! There ain’t no such thing as a fucking demon woman.”
“You gotta listen to me…”
“I don’t gotta do a fucking thing. Now get out and handle this shit! I’m busy!” the boss yelled.
Shaking his head in disbelief, his head of security left the room, taking the liberty of slamming the door behind himself as he went, lifting the radio to his mouth to start barking instructions to the rest of the team.
Tempest waited lounging across the foot of the bed twenty feet from the hot tub, until the security team left the room so she could have the chance to concentrate on the boss for a little while without interruption.
“Get back to it,” the boss ordered the women who were a little unnerved at the threat of someone attacking the home they were in.
“Are you sure it’s safe?” one of them asked.
“Do you think I’d let something happen to you?
” he asked. “You’re my favorite bitch,” he said, laughing as the other girl moved through the steamy water to ease herself up and onto his lap.
“Right after this bitch,” he said, reaching up and pinching her nipple.
“You should take a hint from your friend here. Make somebody feel good — her, me, it don’t matter, but fucking do something. ”
“Ugghh, I think I’m going to puke,” Tempest said, still reclining across the foot of the bed.