HE HAS THE WHOLE THING ON video.
It's playing right now on his forty-inch screen. The shades are drawn and the volume is maxed. He is alone in the house, sitting on the couch. Naked. The remote is clenched in a sweaty fist.
He leans forward and watches with wide eyes.
'I'm going to kill you,' he says on tape.
The girl screams. She's on her back, tied to the floor, jiggling with fear. Completely his.
The light in the basement is clinically harsh; his very own operating theater. Not one freckle or mole on her nude body escapes his attention.
'Keep screaming. It turns me on.'
She chews her lips, her body shaking in an effort to keep quiet. Mascara leaks down her face, leaving trails of black tears. The camera zooms in until her eyes are the size of bloodshot volleyballs.
Yummy.
The camera zooms back out, and he locks it into position on the tripod and walks over to her. He's naked and visibly aroused.
'You're all the same. You think you're hot shit. But where's all that confidence now?'
'I have money.' Her voice cracks like puppy bones.
'I don't want your money. I want to see what you look like. On the inside.'
She screams when he picks up the hunting knife, fighting against her bonds, her eyes bugging out like a cartoon. Nothing but an animal now, a frightened animal fearing for its life.
It's a look he's seen many times.
'Please-oh-God-no-oh-God-please...'
He kneels down next to her and wraps his free hand in her hair so she can't turn away. Then he tickles her throat with the edge of the blade.
'So pretty. I'm only giving you what you deserve. Don't you realize that? You're an example to the others. You thought you were famous before? Now you'll be even more famous. The first one.'
She trembles before his power, fear radiating from her body like heat. He sets down the knife and fetches the extension cord.
This is the good part.
'Beg for your life.'
More screaming and crying. Nothing coherent.
'You'll have to do better than that. Do you even remember me?'
She catches her breath and stares at him. The moment of recognition is like candy.
Sitting on his couch, he pauses the tape on the scene, eating up her terror. Fear is the ultimate turn-on, and this is the real thing. Not an actress in some fake S/M porno flick. This is the genuine article. A snuff film. His snuff film. He lets the tape play.
'You can't treat men like that. All of you think you can do that to me and get away with it.'
He twists the cord around her neck, pulling it tight, getting his shoulders and back into it.
It isn't like in the movies. Strangulation isn't over in fifteen seconds.
She takes six minutes.
Her eyes bug out. Her face turns colors. She bucks and twists and makes sounds like a mewling kitten.
But slowly, sweetly, the fight goes out of her. Oxygen deprivation takes its toll, knocking her out, turning her into an unconscious blob.
He releases the cord and splashes some water on her face to wake her up.
She's even more terrified when she comes to. She fights so hard, he thinks she might break the twine. Her voice is raw and painful-sounding, but the screaming goes on and on.
Until he strangles her again.
And again.
He does it four times before something in her neck finally gives and she can't breathe even when he takes the cord off.
She writhes around on the floor, a private death dance just for him. Wiggle and twitch, gasp and moan. Her eyes roll up and her tongue sticks out and she turns colors.
He climbs on top and kisses her as she dies.
Though excited and aroused, there is still more work to do before he can fully enjoy her. He goes off screen and comes back with the plastic tarp.
This next part is messy.
He uses the hunting knife like an artist uses a paintbrush. Slowly. With care.
Then he adds his signature.
