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Tortured Souls

"You came." The man said, looking impressed despite himself, "You really came...Alone?"

The henchmen who had accompanied Kate inside nodded.

"You're not David."

The man's smile was familiar, but colder. "Nathaniel." he murmured, "David's brother. Didn't know about me, I take it?"

She stayed mute, numb with surprise. He looked and sounded so much like her ex boyfriend--if she could even call him that--and he hadn't corrected her on the phone. She had had no reason to assume he was anyone but David, and as she had entered the room, for a moment her eyes had been fooled, until she stepped closer.

He too wore glasses. He had the same intelligent good looks, and conversely a more innocent face. His eyes were grey, and they caused the hair on her neck to prickle.

"I'm the one." Nathaniel announced, watching her closely, "who had the honor of being in the car, when my brother was killed."

"I see." she said softly, slightly undone by this new face. He smirked at her, and she felt herself stiffening, "Let Will go."

"Ah, Kate, did you really think..." Nathaniel laughed slightly, looking as if she had told him a joke. He was a little skeevy, but one couldn't imagine him to be a big villain, sitting there by himself in the luxurious study of his sprawling mansion that he was. He wore plaid shirt, his glasses were smudged, and he looked younger than her. Misguided--but not evil.

"Did you really think I would let him leave?" Nathaniel breathed, studying her curiously, "So many months I've invested, studying you. I thought...I honestly thought David fucking you would be enough. One of us fucking his little sister. Maybe make a video to humiliate him...but what did David say you were? Frigid little bitch."

She shuddered with anger, "You're embarrassing yourself."

"I don't care." he sat back with a sigh, "I have you here, don't I? Do you know David switched college, only because we learned you went to this one? You fascinated us, mostly me. I hated William...hated him." his face reddened with emphasis, "But David...he's soft. The more he saw you, the less he thought of revenge...as if he could find consolation of sorts, being with you..."

"I'm sorry." Kate whispered, earnest. She regretted how she had treated David. These people might be the enemy, but what they had gone through was horrible.

"Me too. I told him you would be no different from your brother, and I was right, wasn't I?...You went back into their circle the moment you started going out with David. You see why you're here now? We have to keep to plan. We have to have revenge."

She took a deep breath, "Nathaniel--"

Nathaniel jumped up, striding towards the door, and she was forced to follow as his henchmen elbowed her. He spilled out of the empty house into the windy night outside, walking leisurely towards a shuttered garage. The mansion was the kind any of John's friends would have been glad to call home, almost perverse in its normalcy considering the situation. Cars were parked neatly in the driveway, glittering in the glow of the distant street lights, while trimmed lawns chirped with crickets in the night.

"It messes with your head, it does." he was saying as they walked, "Seeing someone killed. I was there when he died, bleeding out his nose. You know I dream of it at the oddest times? Most times I see them killing him. Sometimes...I see myself. Do you know that, Kitty Kat? Sometimes, in the middle of the night...I feel like I'm the one who killed him. Do you know how that feels?"

"I'm sorry." she whispered.

"And he went scot free, didn't he? No jail...no death penalty. He killed a young boy, and all he gets is a slap on his wrist?"