He slowly stood back up. “I’m going to let my friends know you’re here, then we can get this party started. Just sit here until I get back.”
Anna could barely understand his words. Her eyelids felt very heavy. She realized something was wrong, but it was hard to hold onto the thought. Her mind simply couldn't work right. Her body felt extremely weak, and she knew she needed help. Without another word, Jesse turned and walked out.
Her purse was beside her, and Anna managed to slide her hand into the cell phone pocket. Easing her phone out, she tried to push the speed dial for her mom. The room reeled as the phone began to ring. Some rational part of her mind told her she only had seconds before she lost consciousness. It was a terrifying feeling.
Her tongue was thick and frozen inside of her mouth, and she was scared of the paralysis and her inability to talk. Iris answered the phone, but it was too late. A tear slipped from the corner of Anna's eye as the cell phone slid from her lifeless fingers.
SOMETIME LATER ANNA regained consciousness. Minutes could have passed or maybe hours. She was still alone in the den of the hunting lodge, the temperature hot enough to be an oven. Her stomach churned, impossible to ignore. Holding her mouth, she stumbled to her feet and quickly looked for a bathroom.
Anna couldn’t take Jesse seeing her like that. The last thing she wanted was the man she loved watching her vomit. She rushed towards the door, barely making it to a snowy spot behind a bush before the vile liquid came back up.
Still disoriented and dizzy, Anna remembered her phone and decided to call Iris again. She carefully made her way back inside, too sick to worry about everyone else. Checking the entire room, she sat down in puzzlement. Her phone and purse were gone.
“Jesse?” she called, as she made her way slowly down the hallway. It was still as dimly lit and as quiet as it had been when she first arrived. Everything felt wrong. Moving deeper into the bowels of the house, a terrible, obnoxious odor overcame her, increasing the churning and queasiness in her stomach.
A muffled sound broke through the quietness. Following the noise, Anna discovered a doorway that led down into the basement. The steps were fairly steep, adding to the vertigo she was already experiencing. A draft swept the odd odor through her nostrils, and she quickly shoved her hand against her mouth to keep herself from gagging. It smelled like roadkill mixed in with something even worse. Something rotten and decaying in the heat of the house. Whatever the smell was, it originated in that room.
In another time and place, Anna would have left. She wanted to leave and never come back. Instead, she made it halfway down the old wooden stairs before sinking down to rest. The basement itself was as dark as the rest of the house and just as hot. It was large and ran across the length of the lodge. Sconces were mounted along the walls, lit with torches. They provided the only lighting. It was very medieval for a modern-day hunting lodge in Alaska.
Anna's eyes finally adjusted to the darkness. Around a wall and across the basement, she saw three men gathered around... something. She was shocked to see it was a very large bed, with a blood-red comforter spread across it. It had two spotlights directly above it, illuminating the bed and the naked blonde in the middle of it.
Head thrown back and legs spread wide, she moaned loudly in between the throaty pants that escaped her lips. Her hands moved between her legs as she masturbated, while the three men stood silently watching. When her head turned in Anna’s direction, Anna gasped. It was Suzi Zellers. Thankfully, Suzi didn't spot her. Too sick and dizzy to move, Anna watched in horror as the scene unfolded in front of her.
The men wore hooded red robes, similar in shade to the comforter found on the mattress. They hadn't bothered closing their robes in any way, and they were nude underneath. Nude and aroused. They stood in the shadows, just watching the woman as she pleasured herself. Not a word passed between them, the only sounds coming from Suzi as she gasped and moaned.
Suzi smiled, enjoying their attention as they watched. “You boys better get a nice, long look at what a real woman looks like before you have to see that fat, bloated whale naked upstairs,” she said, throatily, a sneer crossing her face. Anna was stunned that the other woman even spoke of her, considering the circumstances. Suzi continued, “I was showing Jesse a real good time until she had to knock on the door.”
“Quiet, bitch,” a harsh, distorted voice rasped out from one of the three. To Anna's ears, it didn't even sound human. “We aren't interested in hearing you speak.” Simultaneously, the men moved into the light as if it were orchestrated.
Suzi reached out towards the man standing closest to her. Her hand began to move up and down. The other two men pleasured themselves. Suzi laughed in delight at the sight.
One of them moved to the foot of the bed and yanked Suzi to the edge. He smiled coldly, revealing a row of razor sharp teeth. They were bloody. Anna watched in stunned disbelief. In the light, she identified him as the man who had answered the door. His lust-filled gaze centered on the slit between Suzi's legs.
Anna gaped in horrific shock as his image began to change, his body lengthening and stretching into impossibly large dimensions. His skin tone changed, darkening into a disgusting shade of green and gray. Horns erupted from the top of his skull, one on each side. They were solid and thick at the base, narrowing into a
