The Perfect Prey

Seventeen

Holly’s bright smile accentuated her beautiful and nodding blond head when she agreed to leave the deli with him. It had happened so fast he had to plan things on the fly. First of all she wanted to leave her car there and ride with him. That’d be too much of a hint to anyone looking for her. He told her the little Toyota wouldn’t be safe there and had her follow him to a parking garage near the Modis Tower. Then she jumped in with him as he considered all the places they could go to be alone. So far his predatory instincts had been perfect. No one had noticed them together. She’d told him about her wild experiences with other drugs, so he knew that she wouldn’t turn her nose up at the X when he offered it to her. All that was left was the location.

The thrill he knew so well rushed through him like a drug. Like some kind of super Viagra that kept him hard and dangerous as a predator should be.

As he navigated the straight streets of downtown Jacksonville, Holly turned in her seat and said, “Let’s go to my old sorority house. It’s quiet and we can be alone.”

“What about your sorority sisters?”

“Oh, we don’t use it anymore. It got condemned. But it’s really cool.”

He smiled and said, “Sounds like a plan.”

It was hard to describe what she was feeling right now. Almost like electricity making the tiny hairs on her arm stand on end. She’d searched for a long time for someone just like him. It’d taken a while for her to learn exactly what she was supposed to look for, but he had it. The most obvious thing was his looks and athletic ability, but there was something deeper-or nothing deeper, depending on how you look at. He had a cocky, self-confident manner that was difficult to fake. He really did feel as if he was the king of Jacksonville and she was just one of his subjects. She knew that was the perfect attitude.

She had to do something to make up for her last effort to find a man. Billy was his name, and he was a little young at the time, fifteen, but he had a tight, muscular body and a sweet face. She’d taken him to the same empty house and done things the young man had never imagined possible. But in the end he hadn’t handled it well and his immaturity came through. It turned out to be embarrassing, with a lot of crying and begging.

She hadn’t liked the role of older, more experienced lover. She liked this role of bookworm much better. It was almost as if she was an actress in a role, wearing her reading glasses even if she didn’t need them, putting her hair up in a ponytail. She just liked the idea of being someone she really wasn’t. She liked hiding her muscular arms and covering her washboard abs under heavy clothing only to surprise someone later. She doubted she’d surprise him much because the first time he saw her she was at the beach, but it was still a fun facade. Sweet, smart, and safe.

She was pretty confident she’d lulled him into a false sense of security and his expectations were low. He’d be in for the surprise of his life once he knew the real her.

Suddenly she was so excited her lungs couldn’t keep up with the oxygen her body needed.

This was gonna be one wild, fun night.

Since her marriage had broken up and the life she loved had completely ceased to exist, Yvonne Zuni had viewed the detectives who worked for her as her family. Sometimes family members clicked and laughed and all was well. Sometimes family members fought. She knew enough about the history of crimes/persons to know that Tony Mazzetti was the star homicide investigator and viewed John Stallings as a threat. This was something that could be a problem or something she might be able to use for motivation.

At times like this, all alone in her three-bedroom house, in the evening, she sometimes felt a panic at facing the long night alone and being so many hours from going back to the office. She remembered when her evenings were busy with feedings and cleaning, sharing a TV show or quiet conversation with her husband. Back then she had considered giving up her career to spend more time with her family. She really had it all.

She looked down at the roasted chicken she picked at while she read over a few reports, making corrections and suggestions in the margins. Her TV had not been on for anything other than the local news in at least three months, and the house seemed unnaturally quiet with the thick carpet and insulated walls. A sliding glass door allowed the cool night air into the house, but there was no sound from outside.

It was in this silence that the sound of her phone beeping made her jump. She grabbed it off the table in front of her.

“Sergeant Zuni.”

“Sarge, we got a shooting near the stadium.”

It was a JSO dispatcher.

The sergeant said, “Who’s rolling?”

“Mazzetti and Hogrebe.”

“Good. Tell them I’m on my way.”

She closed the phone and smiled. At least she could avoid spending this night alone.

“This is an old sorority house?”

She nodded from the front seat of his Jeep.

“Isn’t it kinda far from the UNF campus?”

She hesitated, then said, “The sorority had to draw from other local schools too, like the University of Jacksonville.”

“I thought sororities and fraternities all came from the same school.”

She just shrugged those cute shoulders.

He parked the car in the rear of the giant old house, then followed Holly’s instructions to pull it into a carport so it’d be safe. The old carport appeared unused, but the idea of a safe, deserted house where he could spend some time with innocent little Holly excited him to the point of explosion. His hunter’s instincts came out as he scanned for other people.

Holly said, “We still get to use the house and no one will be around. We’ll have this grand old place all to ourselves.” She spread her arms like a display model at a car show.

Her smile alone was enough to attract predators, but that cute, athletic body, blond hair, and blue eyes were irresistible to him. He followed her up the cement steps in the back of the house into a dark kitchen. She produced a flashlight from a kitchen cabinet.

“What happened to the lights?”

“We haven’t paid the bill in a while, so we keep the flashlights handy.”

He wondered why she brought him to an empty, abandoned house, but those thoughts faded as she took his hand and led him into the wide living room. There were three couches and a table that made it feel like the main lobby to a sorority house. She pulled him to the longest of the three couches and shoved him playfully, then plopped into his lap and started to kiss him. She wasn’t as innocent as she played.

He decided to let this go on for a while before figuring out how to claim this kill. He could just picture the surprised expression on her face as he did whatever he was going to do. He had a knife with him, but he could also try something new. It was secluded here and quiet. Now might be a good time to be innovative.

His first two questions were the same that everyone else who’d ever visited the house had. The first was, “What about your sorority sisters?” The second was about the lights. Both were easily explained, and if she played it right it could be more exciting. She stopped in front of the back door and made a show out of adjusting her glasses and pulling her blouse tight, then held her hands up like a model to show off the house. Just like everyone else, all he did was shrug and willingly walk inside. This always reminded her of the old Dracula movies in which the ancient vampire instructed people, “Enter freely, of your own will.” Everyone came in. As he stepped through the door and into the kitchen her excitement grew to the point she had to pause to grab hold of one of the old wooden chairs left in the kitchen. He didn’t notice. He seemed distracted as if he was thinking about what was going to happen instead of what was happening now. She never understood why guys idealized sex before it happened but discounted the woman after it happened. It seemed like he was working on a scientific formula in his head, considering all the variables and outcomes. She stepped up behind him after she recovered her senses and placed her hand on his broad shoulder.

She gently led him into the living room with its two comfortable couches. She’d worked hard not to come on too strong yet. She wanted this to last. She wished she could bottle this feeling and save it whenever she was down. If it could last all night it still wouldn’t be long enough. She didn’t want tonight’s adventure to end up like Billy, the teenager. Abrupt and awkward. She’d liked the way his fresh young skin felt under her hands and how he looked as he quivered. Somehow she didn’t get the sense that this guy would quiver much. She saw him more as a strutting, football-star type. He’d think that no matter what he did, women loved it. He was probably right. Holly was already thrilled at the idea of him inside her.

She smiled as she thought about the first time she’d brought someone to the old abandoned house. Had it only been two years ago? It seemed as if she’d been doing it for a lifetime. That guy was a little older, maybe thirty-eight, and it hadn’t been that much fun. He was drunk and sluggish and tended to doze off. He didn’t appreciate her natural ability. He never realized she was playing a role. That time she was the dull-witted barista who turned into a sexual tiger. But the drunken idiot didn’t catch the subtleties and change of personality. He’d been damn near catatonic through the rest of the night. She had high hopes for tonight