Blackout

Chapter Seven

CHAPTER SEVEN

My twenty-sixth birthday, the first since my release, comes up, and Marc and Rita don’t disappoint.

Marc calls to inform me the night before that he has let Casey Dillinger know that I will not be in for work. I gripe a little, but he ensures me that Casey is okay with it, being that it’s for my birthday. Then, he tells me to be ready, bright and early, and that he has left an outfit in my closet with a piece of paper attached to the hanger reading: Birthday Outfit. I walk to the closet and sure enough, it’s there, a peach blouse and white skinny jeans, with some pink stilettos underneath it. I smile, though my stomach is curling in anticipation.

After I’ve eaten breakfast and gotten ready the next morning, Marc whisks me away in a limo. The limo takes us to an airfield, and then I am escorted to a waiting helicopter. The helicopter flies us all over the city, and I am amazed at the views, and at this incredible surprise. Marc and I have become great friends, but this is a little over the top, even from him.

The helicopter lands on the roof of a movie theater, and when we go down the stairs to the main show room, I find a table and two chairs set up right in front of the screen, with candles lit and a bottle of wine in ice waiting for us. I gasp, “Marc, you did not rent out this whole theater.”

He smugly replies, “I sure did. You said you wanted to see Ice Cold for your birthday. So I decided we could have lunch and watch the movie at the same time.”

The movie is just as hilarious as I thought it would be, and the catered food is exquisite. I am being spoiled today, something I’ve never experienced before, and I love it.

When we finally arrive home early in the afternoon, I open the door to find every surface of the living room covered with pink roses. The counters, the floor, the table, the chairs; it seems like there are over twenty vases of different sizes, all filled with pink roses. I gasp, and I turn around, where Marc is standing behind me at the door, smiling at me. “Is this all… for me?” I whisper, turning again towards the living room, astonished.

Marc closes the door and guides me to the couch, and we sit down together. He takes a single rose out of the closest vase and places it in my hand, gently closing my fingers around the stem. “Iris,” he begins, his voice deep of some emotion I can’t understand, “We’ve been friends for six months now, and I’ve really enjoyed spending time with you. But there’s something I have to tell you.”

I feel this strange sensation in the pit of my stomach, and I hold my breath. “What is it, Marc?” I ask quietly.

“I’m in love with you, Iris.” He says with conviction, and before I can respond, he leans in, pulling me to him, and crushes his lips on mine.

And I am swirling in this strange state, my body having transformed to something the same consistency as a jellyfish, my mind not able to comprehend the fullness of what is going on. I m dreaming, I must be. This can’t be happening to me. This amazing man just can’t be in love with me.

If I am dreaming… I don’t ever want to wake up.

Marc kisses me with fervor, tangling his fingers in my hair and pressing me closer to him with his hand on my back. I respond with equal enthusiasm, wrapping my arms around his neck and throwing my leg over his. We kiss intensely, not coming up for air until I begin attempting to unbutton his white shirt.

He grabs my wrists as I am struggling with the top button, and his lips move away from mine. “Wait…”

“Huh?” I say stupidly.

“We don’t have to do anything now. I wasn’t telling you I love you just to get in your pants.”

I giggle escapes my mouth. If only he knew how long I’d wanted him to get in my pants.

He kisses me gently on the lips, and then backs away, looking at me expectantly. I know what he’s waiting for, but I am hesitating to give it to him.

“I’m afraid, Marc,” I say timidly after a short moment of silence.

“Don’t be, Iris. I have loved you since the first moment I saw you in that courtroom.”

I am surprised into telling him the truth. “I’ve loved you for a long time, too. I just... I never thought you felt that way about me. You’re so amazing, and I have all this… baggage.”

“That never mattered to me,” he says, cupping my face in his hands to make me look him in the eye. “Never. Nothing could change how I feel about you. It surprised the hell out of me when I realized it. I haven’t been able to get you off my mind since I first saw you.”

I can’t believe what he’s saying as he continues, “I tried to fight it, but I realized a few weeks ago that there was no point. So I had my mom help me figure out how to tell you.” He chuckles as he runs his hand over his head. “I just-“ He seems at a loss for words. “I’ve never met anyone like you. At first, I thought I was clinging to you so hard because you reminded me so much of my sister. But after getting to know you more, I realized that it was just you, just your inner beauty, and your heart- I couldn’t make excuses for myself anymore. I had to admit that I was falling hard for you.”

My mouth is hanging open as I take in his words. He really loves me… He’s loved me the whole time I loved him. And we both just sat around, keeping it inside… It’s unbelievable. “I never thought someone like you could feel like that about someone like me,” I murmur, ducking my head. “You’re so out of my league-“ He scoffs, but I press on. “You’re this beautiful, generous, thoughtful, successful guy, the whole package. And I’m… well, I’m a rehabilitated serial killer.”

He chuckles, though my statement is one of seriousness. “I trust you not to black out on me,” he responds, and he leans in for another kiss. And we don’t separate until the front door opens, interrupting our intense make-out session.

“Mom,” Marc says quickly, and I wipe the corner of my mouth, embarrassment registering on my face. “Mom, I told her. Turns out, she loves me too.”

Rita comes around and bends down to my level with a huge smile on her face. “My son couldn’t have fallen in love with a better woman,” she says softly, and tears begin streaming down her face as she embraces me.

Marc and I decide to start out slow. Well, Marc decides, really. Honestly, I’m just ready to dive in the sheets with him already. But he insists that we should try to hold out, to be sure of each other before taking that big next step.

So when, three weeks later, he invites me over to his place for the first time, I’m surprised, and a little nervous. I’ve never been over his house before because he enjoys being at his mom’s place to spend time with her. So I’m wondering what’s going to be happening tonight.

Rita leaves that afternoon to go on vacation to Honduras for a week, a trip she’s been planning since before my birthday. So Marc picks me up around six, and we drive across town to his house.

It’s a big place, about twice the size of his mother’s, and it looks very new. It sits on the water of the bay, and the lawn is neatly manicured. Motion sensor lights come on as we pull up, and Marc gets out and gets around to open the passenger door before I can even take off my seat belt. I thank him and blush, and we hold hands as we walk up to the door together.

The inside of the house is even more remarkable than the outside. The outside back walls of the first floor are mostly huge windows and display the huge pool and backyard. The carpets are off white in this room, but I can see red carpeting in another room off the foyer, and wooden floors in what looks like a kitchen across the other side. Expensive paintings hang on the walls around me, and a colossal chandelier hangs above my head.

Marc guides me through the kitchen to the dining room, where a candlelit table covered in red rose petals awaits me, and pulls out a chair for me to sit in. He then goes back to the kitchen and brings out two plates, and pours us glasses of white wine. We toast to love and longevity, and we begin to eat and drink, telling each other about our respective days at work.

After swallowing the last bite of salmon, I take a sip of my wine and lean back, full and content, a little tipsy and more uninhibited than usual. “So, do I get to see the bedroom tonight? Or is that for another night?”

“You can see it now, if you’d like,” he says after a short laugh. “Just let me slip these plates in the dishwasher and we’ll go up.”

Once the dishwasher is running, he takes me by the hand and leads me to a grand staircase just off the foyer. We go up, still grasping hands, and I am marveling the tasteful decoration until we get to a closed door. After opening it and flipping a light switch, he stands back as I take in the room.

Like the table downstairs, everything is covered in red roses. They are in sharp contrast with the white bedding, furniture, and carpeting. Candles are lit on the dresser and nightstands, and soft music plays in the background.

I turn around to find Marc staring intently into my eyes, but I only have a moment to register his intense expression before he pulls me in his arms and kisses me robustly. We move as one, still intertwined, until we fall together on the bed. Then, before I can do anything else, he pulls away from me. I whine a little in protest.

But my whining is cut short when he gently removes my sandals and begins moving his hands slowly up my legs until he reaches my thighs. He clutches my skirt as if he is going to rip it off, but ever so tenderly, he slides it down over my feet and lets it drop to the floor. I realize I am trembling when he begins slowly unbuttoning my blouse, revealing a lacy black bra underneath that matches the panties I’m so thankful I had the foresight to wear tonight. I sit up to help him get the sleeves off my arms, and then lay back again, watching him surveying my body, deciding what he will do next. In a burst of unnatural confidence, I slowly open my legs and slide my hand in my panties. As he watches, he begins peeling off his own clothes until he is standing, naked and glorious, in front of me.

He begins stroking himself, and I watch him grow bigger and harder with arousal. “You’re so beautiful,” he whispers. His hands move slowly, surely… And I am aching for them to be back on my body. So I sit up and slide to the edge of the bed. I slowly fall to my knees, and I pull him closer to me until his rod is inches from my face.

His manhood is pulsing as I take as much of him as I can into my mouth. His moan is quiet and understated, but it excites me even more, and my juices begin to pool as I use one hand to touch myself while the other pulls his shaft into my mouth again. His hands tangle in my hair, and he begins guiding me, thrusting deeper into my mouth until he holds himself deep down my throat for a moment. Then, he pulls back out, panting, and bends down to kiss me enthusiastically, before gently pushing me to lie on my back.

I feel his tongue probing between my legs, and I gasp with pleasure. He is lapping up all my juices, and I love every second of it. I have not been touched like this in so many years that it only takes a minute before I am shaking as I climax. I try to pull away, feeling like I can’t handle any more of the amazing sensation, but he locks his arms around my thighs and holds me in place as he licks up and down my c******s until the shuddering has ceased. Then, quickly, he moves to hover over me, and he enters me swiftly, grunting as he feels the wetness of my core throbbing around him.

His strokes are long and hard, and in no time at all, I am coming again, calling out his name with verve, my toes curling behind his head. He is calling my name too, and then he pulls out and turns me over quickly, yanking me up by my hips until his pole slides back in my wetness. I am bucking back on him and he twists his hands up in my hair, thrusting deeper and deeper inside me. His moans are getting wilder, and he’s moving faster, but I don’t want him to come just yet. So I push him off of me and turn to him, dropping to my knees to pull him inside my mouth again, and I enjoy tasting myself on him.

This doesn’t last too long though, because he jerks me up in his arms and falls down in the bed with me on top of him. I quickly take him back inside me, and I ride him eagerly while he grips my ass so hard I’m sure it’ll bruise. “f**k me!” I cry, and I bounce faster on him until we are coming together, our bodies tangled in a sweaty heap, rose petals stuck to our backs.

“I love you…” he sighs, and I kiss him lightly on the lips before dozing off quickly, happier than I’ve ever been.

The bright sunlight streaming through the open curtains of the window wakes me, and I enjoy the warmth for a while before I realize that I am alone in the bed.

I take a moment to reminisce on the sheer perfectness of last night. Our bodies had molded together perfectly, his hard stone to my soft clay; we had melted in each others’ arms, and I had enjoyed my time there. A strange bout of sadness pulsed through me, and it takes me a minute to understand that I have missed him in the last few minutes since I had noticed his absence.

I rifle through his drawers until I find a plain white tank top and some boxers, and I yank them on quickly, the sooner to see him. Rushing through the door and down the stairs, I find him at the table, breakfast already laid, waiting patiently for me to enter.

“Good morning, beautiful,” he croons, and I grin widely, chagrin washing through me as flashes of the night before run through my head again. “I figured you might be hungry, all those calories we burned last night.”

“I’m famished,” I giggle, and I join him at the table with a light peck on the lips. “Don’t you have to work today?” I ask as I shovel the first bite of grits into my mouth.

He digs in too, and replies, “Yeah, but I wanted to have some breakfast with you first before I dropped you off at home. Do you have to work today?”

“The appointment with Jordan isn’t until three, so I don’t have to go in until then.”

“Hmmmm.”

We finish eating our meal, him making little s****l comments the entire time. As he stands up to put our plates in the sink, I notice he isn’t wearing any pants, just some boxer briefs that are molded to him so perfectly it makes me shiver. I decide to take advantage of the lack of pants before we leave.

“Marc?”

“Yeah, babe?”

“Can you come here for a second?”

He drops the dishes in the sink and returns to me, about to pull out his chair again, but I yank him towards me before he can sit. He looks questioningly at me, but I just drop to my knees and slide his boxers down, and move my tongue down his flaccid member. He groans, and is instantly rock hard. With a throaty chuckle, I look up through my lashes at him and open my mouth wide, allowing him to enter. He moves automatically, driving his c**k in and out of my mouth slowly, caressing my face and jaw when I take him down my throat. His breathing accelerates, and after a few minutes, he pulls me up and bends me over the table, entering me from behind. I cry out with pleasure and he pulls my arm behind me and pushes my leg up on the table. I come quickly, but he’s not done with me yet. He turns me around and lifts me up, carrying me to sit on the counter, and his fingers massage my c******s as he plunges into my deep ocean. I climax again, and moments later, he follows suit, his body shaking, his hands clutching my hips.

He suddenly begins laughing, and I am laughing with him in astonishment. He is so incredible; we are so incredible together. We are perfection.

I hold his hand during the drive home, and every once in a while, I glance over to find his eyes on me instead of the road. Flattered, I blush and turn away every time, only to look again a few moments later.

When we arrive to the house, Marc insists on walking me inside. I object, but secretly I am pleased, because I will probably take this opportunity to have a little more of him before he has to leave. Still holding hands, he escorts me to the door, and opens it for me. He gasps in horror as he opens the door, and, confused, I look inside.

The house is a wreck. The couch and loveseat have huge holes in them and are covered in some thick, black, oily substance. The glass from the coffee table is shattered, there are broken fragments of dishes all over the floor, and scarlet spray paint covers the walls. I look closer, and discover the word PSYCHO written in a neat hand with permanent marker in the middle of the red on the wall behind the destroyed couch.

I cry, “Oh my God!” as Marc mutters an expletive under his breath. He quickly pulls out his cell phone and dials 911.

“Hello? Yes, my name is Marc Reynaldo, I’m at my mother’s house at 422 East Garden Road, and I’m calling to report a break-in.”

I venture deeper into the vandalized house, tip-toeing carefully over a canvas painting on the floor with a large hole through the subject’s face, moving towards my room. The door is open, and I can clearly see the damage from here. My bed frame is broken, egg yolks cover the walls, and the word CRAZY is spray painted on the wall in the same red as the walls in the living room. My dresser has been tipped over, and my clothes are strewn across the floor. I hear Marc explaining about his mother being on vacation, and he hangs up, shouting, “Their on the way, baby, just come back in here and we’ll go sit in the car to wait for them. I don’t want to mess up any evidence.”

I move carefully back to his side, and we retreat back to his car. Marc calls his mother, but she doesn’t answer, so he leaves her a message telling her that there has been a break-in at her house. Then, we wait in tense silence until a police cruiser pulls up in the driveway behind us.

“Stay in the car,” Marc says quietly. “I don’t want you involved.”

I hear Marc greet the officer, and explain again that his mother is out of town. They begin walking up the driveway, passing the car- mercifully with its darkly tinted windows- and walk into the house, leaving the door open behind them. I lose sight of the pair as they round the corner into my room.

This is insane. Obviously, whoever broke into the house was doing so for my benefit. How else could it be explained? The words psycho and crazy written on the walls? And I hadn’t even checked Rita’s room. Hopefully it wasn’t too bad; maybe they had limited the destruction to the common areas of the house and my bedroom.

Things had been peaceful for a while. My life had come together perfectly once things had settled down and the media had moved on. I hadn’t been hounded by the news reporters in a long time, and they had never discovered where I lived, luckily. So how had the vandal found out where I lived? The only way that could be known was by checking my file in Dr. Dillinger’s office. Only the nurses and doctors there would have access, and all of them loved me; no one there had any reason to bother me. So how had this happened? And, more importantly, why?

Marc and the police officer come back outside, the officer writing notes onto a small notepad. I lean the seat back, hoping that he won’t notice me, but it’s pointless, because as soon as he lifts his head up from his notes, he can see me through the windshield, where the tint is not as dark. His eyes widen in comprehension; he knows who I am immediately. He points at me with his pen and asks Marc: “Is that Iris Kilpatrick? Does she live here?”

Marc, with a defeated expression on his face, replies, “Yes, and yes, but I really don’t want her involved. Not saying that you’d leak this to the press or anything, but I don’t want anyone knowing she lives here. It wouldn’t be safe for her, or my mother, obviously. Look at all that damage in there. It was obviously some sort of retaliation.”

“Does anyone know she lives here already?”

“Besides my mother, myself, and her doctor, no. No one knows, or at least, no one should have known.”

“Can I talk to her?”

Marc sighs, and looks at me, gauging whether he should allow it or not. But before he can answer, I get out of the car and walk over to them. I don’t want it to seem like we aren’t cooperating as much as possible, because I don’t doubt he’s already thinking I’m somehow involved. He confirms this with his first question.

“Where were you last night, Ms. Kilpatrick?” He says this in a tone that says, this isn’t an accusation, just a question, but I can easily see through it. Marc titters angrily, but I give him a comforting look and reply, “I was at Marc’s house with him. I spent the night there.”

“And you confirm this, Mr. Reynaldo?”

“Of course!” he retorts, taking my hand and pulling me towards him. “I had my arms around her the entire night, so I’m sure I would have noticed if she randomly disappeared for a few hours to come trash my mother’s home.” I blush, but no one notices, fortunately.

“My apologies, sir. Just covering all the bases.”

Marc puts his arm supportively around my waist, and I lean into him, looking up into his angry eyes, hoping mine can convey the appreciation I feet for his backing me up. He smiles grimly at me.

“Do you have any enemies that you know of, Ms. Kilpatrick?” the officer asks.

“Not any recent ones. I mean, plenty of people hate me, I’m sure. But I haven’t had any issues with anyone. I’ve been staying under the radar.”

“I see,” he mutters, and he jots more notes down in his little booklet.

Marc’s phone rings, and he whispers, “It’s mom,” before he answers it, walking a short way away to tell her what’s going on. The police officer asks me about my workplace, and I reply with information about Casey Dillinger’s physical therapy clinic. He then asks me for a phone number he can reach me at with any more questions. I give him my cell phone number, and then, once he assures me he has no more questions for now, I go back to sit in the car and wait for Marc.

The officer calls for reinforcements and more police cruisers show up. They string yellow crime scene tape around the house, and ask Marc to back his car out of the driveway. This is when I think of my own car in the garage. I ask the officers if I can open the garage door to check on it, and they allow it. I discover my car I just bought a few months ago has been totaled. The windows are all smashed. Someone has dented and scratched every surface of the outside of the car, and the same words in the house have been spray painted all over the interior. The tires are slashed, and the leather covers on the seats have been shredded.

I burst into tears, and Marc comforts me. I can’t lie and say I don’t deserve it; the things I’ve done in the past are so horrible, I probably deserve a lifetime of this pain. These are material things, after all; what I did cut so much deeper, as I took lives. But I thought that maybe everything was balancing itself out. Maybe I was such a good person that I had suffered enough for my crimes. I thought it was my happy time. But my happy time was over so shortly, that I wondered if it wasn’t just a short reprieve before I was to experience the worst pain of all.

Rita catches an early flight home, and after surveying the damage for herself, she gets her home insurance to pay for a nice hotel room until the devastation can be repaired. Meanwhile, I move in with Marc.

I apologize profusely every chance I get, but Rita’s quick to wave it away. Like Marc, she tells me that this isn’t my fault, and that all those things she lost can be easily replaced. She says she’s just happy that I wasn’t there, and that I’m safe.

This brings me up short. It can’t just be a coincidence that Rita was on vacation and I was at Marc’s house when someone just randomly decides to break into the house. Someone would have to have inside knowledge of our family’s plans in order to get in and out cleanly with none of us being there. So it would just happen to be that the first time in a while that no one is going to be at the house all night is when someone just happens to break in? That’s just too lucky to actually be real luck. So it must be someone that knows us.

But I can’t come up with any names, with any person who would have a reason to do something like this. Rita is, like me, loved by everyone at the hospital. Marc spends most of his time with his mother and I, and he doesn’t have a recently jilted lovers that I know of. He does bring strong emotions out of me, and probably other women, too, but the last woman he was with before me was the gold digger Rita had told me about years ago. So unless he’s lying to me, which I don’t believe for a second, there’s no jealous ex to consider.

I can’t imagine how any of the family members of my victims could find out where I live. Besides, even if they did, someone would have already sent the media there for sure. I think of how, when I went to that first hearing about my release, the throngs of people were waiting for me to arrive. Someone had leaked it to them, and they came running, as expected. But not one reporter had shown up to the house in the six months I had been there. Even the angriest of all of the family members, Charles McGuffin, I couldn’t see doing this. He had been on the news a few times talking about me on those few occasions the news crews had found me out and about, but that was as far as he had gone.

The police had asked for a list of anything important or valuable that should have been in the house, like any jewelry or prescription drugs, and that’s when I discovered that most of my medicine had been in my room. I had taken a few days worth with me that night in case I ended up staying over Marc’s house, and then I hadn’t thought any more about it until the police requested the list. I told the police about the medicine, and they informed me that they hadn’t found any, and that they must have been stolen by the burglar. Luckily, it was easy for me to get more pills, but I couldn’t help worrying that the thief had stolen my pills thinking that I would fall off the wagon and have another blackout.

I stress a lot about the break-in until Marc sits me down in bed one night and tells me that he doesn’t want me to worry about it anymore. I’m about to argue, but then he whispers that he feels like it’s negatively affecting our relationship, and that shuts me up immediately. I don’t want this to destroy what we have, because I’m so lucky to have it. So I promise him that I will let it go and try to focus on us from now on. It’s easier said than done, but eventually, I put the break-in behind me and continue living my life.