“Yes,” she said a moment later.
Bobby narrowed his eyes. “Yes? What the fuck does that mean?”
“You asked if I ever wanted to kill someone for the sheer pleasure of it. Yes.” Rowan glared at him, trying to keep her emotions under control. She wanted to scream and rage and tear at these binds, but knew that was what he wanted.
“I would get intense pleasure killing
He reached over and slapped her, knocking her over. She struggled, tied to the chair. The coppery flavor of her own blood poured into her mouth and she swallowed, gagging.
Bobby laughed. “Such spunk. You were always a brat. But you were scared of me. I knew it. You’re scared of me now. I see it. And you will die.” He stood and stared down at her, his cold blue eyes vindictive. “But you will beg for mercy before I’m done.” He kicked her and walked away.
She closed her eyes and took deep breaths. It hurt, but there was no real damage. She needed to loosen the ropes, break free when he least expected it. But she had no intention of escaping.
Not until she killed him.
She wished she knew his plan. She thought he’d just use her as a punching bag. Literally beat her to death. She wouldn’t break. She’d been trained to withstand torture. To retreat into her mind, force herself to think of something other than the situation.
But Bobby wanted to break her. He’d started by sending her the funeral wreath, the hair, the lilies. He fully intended to kill her, but first he wanted her fear. Her tears. She mentally prepared herself for the worst.
She had no idea.
He came back, untied her from the chair, hoisted her up, and half-carried, half-dragged her to the living room. He tossed her onto the couch and righted her so she sat up as straight as possible. She felt the ropes on her wrists loosen. Just enough to give her hope that she could manipulate the binds and free herself.
“This is your life, Lily bitch.” He sat down in a recliner and turned the television on with the remote control.
It was one of those large-screen televisions, fifty or so inches across. When the screen lit, Rowan was staring at a wedding picture.
Her parents.
“Robert MacIntosh married Elizabeth Pierson on June first,” Bobby said, his voice singsong, mocking. “Typical spring wedding for a boring couple. He had a future, could have gone places and done things with his life, but the bitch kept him tied to home with a bunch of brats.”
Bobby glanced at her. “You all should have been killed. Six fucking kids. What were they thinking? The house was a fucking zoo all the time. If I didn’t keep you all in line, there’d never be any peace and quiet.” He paused, a gleam in his eye as he glared at Rowan. “But I know why. She did it to keep Daddy with her. Got herself pregnant every time he had a thought of leaving the whore.”
Rowan was careful to show no reaction. She wouldn’t allow Bobby’s words to affect her. She looked at her parents on the screen. Her father’s dark hair and brilliant blue eyes. Her mother’s fair skin and white-blonde hair.
It was like looking at herself.
They looked happy. At least when they first got married. You saw it in their eyes, in the way her father beamed at her mother, in her mother’s half-smile, half-laugh, caught forever in time.
What had happened? Had her father started hitting her mother after they were married? After they had children? When did the abuse start, and why did her mother stay with him for so long?
“Did you know the bitch was pregnant when they got married?” Bobby said, his voice spitting out venom that made Rowan unconsciously shiver. “She got herself pregnant, trapped him into marriage. I was born in November. June, November. Hmmm. All their hypocrisy. Church on Sundays, no swearing, no fun. Yet they were out screwing around. Good enough for them, wasn’t it?”
Rowan didn’t think the hypocrisy had anything to do with church or swearing. It had to do with her parent’s relationship. With her father hitting her mother and her allowing it. With her accepting all his apologies. With their all going to church as a family and pretending they were normal.
They were anything but normal.
Rowan hadn’t realized the image on the video was paused until Bobby pressed “play” and the image switched to a baby. He paused it again.
“Me,” he said, with both disdain and pride in his voice. “The only MacIntosh worthy of being born. The bitch should have had her fucking tubes tied, but no, she couldn’t keep Daddy trapped if she couldn’t get herself knocked up.”
The baby was beautiful. Bald, with startling blue eyes. Round and chubby. Bobby sat in a little baby chair in front of a Christmas tree, about a month old. He could have been the Gerber baby.
Bobby. How could a beautiful, innocent little baby turn into a monster? Rowan closed her eyes.
“Open your eyes!”
She felt the sharp sting of something on her face. Tears sprung to her eyes at the sudden, unexpected pain, but she swallowed them. She glared at Bobby. He had a whip in his hand.
“Don’t close them again. You don’t want to know what I’ll do.”
“You can torture me, but I won’t break,” she said through clenched teeth, anger seething beneath the surface.
“We’ll see.” He grinned.
The videotape started rolling again. The baby picture stayed on for another minute, before switching to a picture of Bobby, Melanie, and Rachel. A portrait, taken at the shopping mall. Bobby was three or four, Melanie a year younger, and Rachel a baby.
They were three beautiful children, Bobby fair, Mel and Rachel dark-haired like their father. Young, happy children.
Bobby didn’t look cruel. But was any four-year-old capable of knowing he was going to grow up and kill his family? Kill innocent human beings in his warped sense of vengeance and revenge?
Bobby didn’t pause the pictures. Several snapshots of the three oldest MacIntosh children rolled across the screen. At birthday parties. At Christmas and Easter and wearing their Sunday best. Playing in the yard, in the park, having a tea party in the backyard.
Rowan searched Bobby’s eyes for the turning point, when he had changed from a happy little boy to a murderous thug who terrorized his younger siblings.
Then she saw it. Not in Bobby, but in Melanie and Rachel.
They were young girls, four and six or so, and Rowan saw
Had their mother known? Had she known what Bobby did to her other children? She would have had to, Rowan thought. Rowan remembered many times when her mother had told her to take Peter outside, away from Bobby. All the times Mel had taken them for ice cream. The sullen look in Rachel’s eyes whenever Bobby had been in the same room.
Her mother had known. Yet she kept them all in that house. Knowing Bobby terrorized them. Taking the abuse of her husband yet welcoming him in her bed. Rowan would never understand her mother. She couldn’t hate her, though she wanted to. After all, she was dead. Murdered by her abusive husband.
They were all dead.
Except Bobby and her. And Peter, Rowan thought gratefully. Peter was safe in Boston.
If Rowan died at Bobby’s hands, she would die knowing Bobby hadn’t won. Peter was alive. And because Bobby thought he was dead, he was safe.
The images started flashing by rapidly, pictures of Mel and Rachel and Mama. Where had they come from? As she watched, she realized that the same ten or so pictures repeated. Over and over. They looked familiar to her, but why?
Her photo album. He’d found her cabin in Colorado and stole the one thing she had left of her family.
Suddenly it stopped on Mama’s bloody body.
