A Friend of the Devil Read online

  A Friend of the Devil

  David Beers

  For Aaron.

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  A Glimpse of the Past

  Chapter 5

  Abel and Emi

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Abel and Emi

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Abel and Emi

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Abel and Emi

  A Friend of the Devil

  Epilogue

  On Purpose and Other Things

  Connect with David Beers

  Also by David Beers

  Chapter One

  Even now, with so many people dead and innumerable lives ruined, it’s hard to say if anything could have been prevented. Perhaps Emi and Abel would have remained separated. Perhaps they could have lived their lives without ever contacting one another again. Maybe Abel could have remained in his self-imposed prison, and Emi drank herself into oblivion. Indeed, for many, many people, that would have been a preferable outcome to what actually happened.

  Or, maybe, regardless of anyone’s choices—Vince Demsworth’s or anyone else’s—the two were meant to meet again. Maybe it’s like the Deists believe, that God started a clock a long time ago, and now it’s simply running down until the end of time. Maybe Emi and Abel never had a choice.

  Of course, the world would not see these lines of causality—not when they occurred, nor in retrospect. That doesn’t mean they didn’t exist, though, only that one had to pay close, close attention to understand the totality of events.

  Otherwise, these things might look random.

  Otherwise, it might look like Demsworth’s fault. Or Abel’s. Or maybe even Emi’s.

  Fault is a funny thing, sometimes lying across everyone, and other times touching no one.

  Chapter Two

  Vince Demsworth scratched his left arm without thinking about it. He’d been scratching it for the past thirty minutes, and a trickle of blood now leaked from the torn skin. Vince didn’t feel it, didn’t even know he had hurt himself. Over the past month, he’d been zoning out more and more, though he was as aware of that as he was of scratching a hole in his arm.

  Things had … well, they’d changed for Vince over the past few weeks.

  Had you told him a month ago that he would be sitting in his car, wounding his flesh by repeated and persistent scratching, all while staring at a stranger’s house as rain poured down on his car—Vince most assuredly would have told you to slow down on the LSD.

  A month ago, he’d had plans for his life. Dreams. Goals. Big ones, too. It wasn’t a family and kids that Vince wanted, but power (and maybe a little fame, too). Vince Demsworth, it seemed, was destined for such things. In the first 22 years of life, he’d shown a lot of promise—a lot. He graduated first in his high school class, and then went to the University of Georgia. A state school, to be sure, but still respected. He hadn’t slowed down or slouched there either, but racked up another valedictorian title to his credit. And it didn’t matter what school you went to at that point; if you graduated valedictorian from a major four year university, you were almost destined to be in the money, honey.

  At graduation, Vince had a lot of jobs to choose from. His father said it was too many.

  “A man doesn’t need that many options. How are you supposed to choose the right path if there’s so many?”

  Vince’s mother had hushed her husband and told him to eat his dinner.

  Vince hadn’t chosen the highest paying position, but rather the one that he thought would propel him fastest toward his goals.

  Politics. That was the place for him, and he’d known it since childhood.

  He was hired on as the Assistant Director of the Georgia governor’s re-election campaign, an unheard of move in politics, but another piece of evidence that Vince Demsworth was destined for great things.

  He’d taken to the job like the analogical fish to water. Every day was fun. Every day was a fucking field trip for Vince. He slept when he had to, and that was it. His friends and family asked him when he was coming around, and how come they never saw him. The election had been only six months off at that point, and he said they would all see him just as soon as Governor Perry was reelected.

  And then he had been, in a landslide. He took 70% of the vote, and Vince’s friends and family all said “Amen” and planned on actually seeing their loved one again.

  The governor—God bless him—again recognized Vince’s worth, though. He hired him on, and at 24 years old, Vince Demsworth became the Chief of Staff for Georgia’s governor.

  “Vince,” his mother said, only half joking. “Do you think that I will see you before your father’s funeral? Or will I have to murder the man in order to have lunch with my son?”

  Vince laughed and promised to take more time off, but of course he didn’t. Vince had an engine in his chest, and it wouldn’t let up. Even if he wanted it to (which he didn’t), that engine would keep pumping, pushing forward. It couldn’t be helped, and perhaps his friends and family knew that. They might hope he would make more time, but in the end, Vince was Vince and they all had to sort of marvel at him.

  Many actually believed he would be President one day.

  It wasn’t that farfetched, certainly not when considering his past, as well as his present.

  At least, the present they knew about.

  The present before the last month, because … things had changed for Vince. His stellar past, amazing present, and bright, bright future were all coming to an end and no one saw it. Not even Vince.

  The rain poured down on his car, beating hard. He didn’t have the windshield wipers on, and the water warped his view of the house he stared at.

  This was the fourth night in a row that Vince had sat outside this home, just staring. He’d only slept a few hours this week, still going into work, but his focus wasn’t in the office; it was on this house, or rather the people inside.

  Vince had done his homework. A newly single mother and her child lived in it. The father had left, deciding he needed a younger wife, and that he wasn’t really digging having a kid as much as he thought he might. Vince didn’t care about any of that; they were truly unnecessary details. The important part was that the woman lived alone.

  And that there was a child.

  Vince wasn’t sure why the child mattered, but it did.

  The past month had left Vince very sure about some things and less confident in others.

  Vince kept scratching at his arm and staring out the window.

  Tonight wasn’t the night. Tomorrow. He knew that the same as he knew the child mattered. He was only here doing more homework, making sure he understood as much as he could about this woman and her baby, as well as the schedules of the surrounding neighbors. Vince might not know exactly why he’d started showing up at this house, but he wouldn’t be careless about it.

  If he was going to start murdering people, then Vince Demsworth would certainly be prepared.

  Vince first heard the voice in his sleep.

  It was the only way such a thing could have crept into his consciousness, by worming in through the unconscious. For everything that would come, Vince—the real Vince—never wanted any of it. If his major flaw was ambition, surely that didn’t encompass murder. No, Vince would have never even considered such a
thought on his own, and had he woken up one day and started hearing a strange voice—all the ambition in the world wouldn’t have kept him from seeking help. Vince Demsworth, despite everything he would later be blamed for, was not a bad person.

  He hadn’t awoke hearing the voice, though.

  He went to bed, and that’s when it first came to him.

  It crawled through his subconscious like a spider, light and almost tender.

  Vince, it whispered while he slept, tasting his name. Viiiiinnnnccceeee.

  When Vince finally did wake, he had no memory of the voice. He only felt tired, as if instead of sleeping, he’d been in some kind of dreadful argument for the past seven hours. Something emotionally exhausting.

  No memories, though. No recollection of a voice whispering to him all night.

  Vince, Vince, Vince, Vince, VinceVinceVincevincevincevince.

  I like you, Vince. I like you a lot. Do you like me? Would you like me to stay? Yes. Yes, of course you would like me to stay. That sounds good, doesn’t it? You and I, just doing the old hang out all the time. What could possibly be wrong with that? Nothing. Not a thing.

  How many nights did this strange voice invade Vince’s sleep without his knowing? It’s hard to say, but it did take time. If one were to somehow track it back to the first morning he felt sincerely drained, then perhaps six months? Maybe more?

  These things take time.

  The mind doesn’t grow polluted over the course of mere hours. No, these things creep.

  It’s the only way.

  Vince was, of course, at work when he first consciously heard the voice.

  A month ago. He’d been in the elevator, tired as hell from the night before though without any idea why. He’d been only concerned with grabbing lunch and getting back to his desk. The elevator reached the bottom floor where the cafeteria was, and that’s when his life completely changed.

  He stepped off and saw her.

  She’d been walking across the cafeteria. Vince had never seen her before, and had the voice not spoken then, he probably wouldn’t have ever noticed her. She would have gone on with her life, raising her child, perhaps finding someone else to love as she once had her ex-husband.

  The voice did speak though, and everything changed.

  Her, Vince. Her right there. She’s the one.

  Vince stopped, someone behind him nearly running him over.

  The voice wasn’t his. It wasn’t some thought that fluttered through his mind; it didn’t originate with him at all. Goosebumps rose across his flesh and he felt a sudden need to bolt. To run. He didn’t know where, nor for how long, only that he had to get away from that voice.

  Go. Go see her.

  Vince moved forward at its suggestion, his bright panic almost immediately dying away, the explosion fading into a burning ember that had run out of fuel. Vince walked through the cafeteria until he found the woman again. She picked up something at one of the fast food restaurants as Vince watched from a distance.

  The voice was silent and so was the rest of Vince’s mind.

  All that mattered was this woman. Long brown hair, down past her breasts. She was thin and very pretty, though Vince hardly saw any of that. He was making no judgments on the woman; in fact, he thought almost nothing at all.

  As she walked back across the cafeteria, Vince turned, his eyes never leaving her.

  She got on an elevator, and he finally lost sight of her.

  Vince’s concentration didn’t break then, though. He didn’t begin wondering why he was staring at some stranger, nor what in the world he’d heard when getting off the elevator. Instead, he wandered to an open table in the middle of the cafeteria and sat down.

  Vince sat there for an hour, forgetting completely about lunch, or his exhaustion.

  The voice was speaking again.

  Vince. It’s her, Vince. Yes, she’s the one we want. The one we’ve been waiting for. We just need to go to her and take her and her child. The child is important, yes, but you know that. I know you do. You know all of this because I know it, and we know it, and we are one.

  The words flowed freely, sounding like beautifully mad whispers.

  Was it already too late for Vince Demsworth? Yes, probably. The voice had hold of him, and there was no escape. If it had crawled across his mind like a spider in the beginning, he was now lying helplessly stuck on its web, and with each word, it wrapped him in its silk.

  Vince Demsworth didn’t descend into madness in the cafeteria. Such a thing was much, much too simple for what happened to him

  Instead, he descended into hell.

  Another day passed, but the rain didn’t let up.

  Vince did everything as usual. He woke up after maybe two hours of sleep, shaved, dressed in a suit and tie, then went to work. In the beginning, when the entity had first come to Vince, he’d often been tired in the mornings.

  Exhaustion was a foreign concept to him now. The voice made sure of that.

  You’re not tired, Vince. No way. It’s not possible. Because tonight we can finally have her and her child.

  Vince went through the motions of his day, hardly thinking about the problems that were brought to him. If anyone noticed how absent minded he was, they said nothing. No, the world kept right on spinning and the voice kept right on speaking.

  Yes, yes, yes, it repeated almost constantly. Yes, yes, yes, tonight, tonight, tonight.

  The workday came to a close, but Vince waited at his desk—he was always the last to leave. That was normal.

  The abnormal part (as it had been for the past month) was that Vince only sat there staring at his email. He kept his hands on the keyboard, every once in a while furiously hitting keys. He didn’t actually type into anything, no document or email—only made the appearance of that happening.

  Sometimes the voice told him what to type; sometimes he did it on his own.

  Today, his hands typed out very simple words.

  Kill her. Kill her. Kill her.

  He would pause for a bit, and then type.

  Kill the child. Kill the child. Kill the child.

  Vince repeated that for over an hour while people slowly trickled out of the building. It was Thursday night, and people were going to happy hours and dinners.

  Vince was only waiting for them to leave. To make sure appearances were kept.

  Finally, the office emptied and Vince leaned back in his chair, no longer needing to keep his hands primed over the keyboard. It was only 6:30. There were still many, many hours yet to pass.

  Vince didn’t move, though. He sat there in the chair, staring at the computer monitor in front of him.

  Minutes ticked by, turning into an hour, then another.

  At 8:30, Vince stood up. It wasn’t a conscious thing, and truly, he didn’t know if it was him or the voice that made him do it.

  He only knew that someone might check his keycard timestamps in the building’s system, given that the woman worked here. He didn’t want the card to register him leaving at 1:00 in the morning.

  Vince took the elevator down to the lobby, then exited onto the street. He made his way to the parking deck, bag over his shoulder. It was the same routine he’d done every night for the past year or so. He was a man of habit, a man dedicated to his work, a man with a bright and promising future.

  Vince got into his car and then pulled out of the parking deck. He drove about two miles down the road and pulled into a McDonald’s. He went through the drive-through and ordered two double cheeseburgers, eating them inside his car. He was very careful not to drop grease or ketchup on his suit.

  After, Vince Demsworth sat and stared out the front window. Another hour passed, then another.

  Cars came and went through the parking lot, though none paid any attention to him. Vince Demsworth, boy wonder, was forgotten.

  At midnight, Vince leaned forward, turned the key in the ignition and exited the McDonald’s parking lot.

  He drove 30 minutes to the other side of
town and pulled into the woman’s neighborhood.

  The voice started speaking the moment the car’s tires stopped.

  Oh, yes. This is what we want. This is what we’ve been waiting for. This right here. Her and her child. Her and her child. You will give them to us. Yes, yes you will, there’s no doubt about that. You will build an Altar. A beautiful, beautiful Altar.

  The words played across Vince’s consciousness like piano keys lightly touching down, serenading him. He loved the way they sounded.

  The rain was still coming down, and Vince would end up soaked before he entered the house. He had parked a half-mile down the road. It was the furthest he’d parked from the house, as the last few nights, he’d been across the street, sitting in the gloom but unable to pull himself away.

  Tonight he didn’t want to be close. He didn’t want anyone associating his vehicle with the house.

  If Vince had been fully in control of his faculties, he might have arranged another way to arrive here.

  He hadn’t though, and the time had come. The hour upon him.

  Vince popped the car’s trunk before stepping out of his car, the rain immediately soaking him. His hair matted down against his head and his suit stuck to his skin. He went to the back of the car and pulled out a duffle bag, then closed the trunk.

  Vince walked down the road, the bag over his shoulder and his eyes dark, dark things.

  It took him 10 minutes to reach the house.

  Another four to get inside.

  He spent three hours there. The moon was still shining when he left.