Dead Man's Song полностью

The “stuff” in question was stack of porn videos that Dylan’s older brother had downloaded and burned to disk; Dylan had promised to swipe them and bring the stash by to share with the twins. Dylan was a bit of an asshole, but he was good for stuff like that, and the twins had no other source for that kind of thing. Dad, asshole that he was, had put parental controls on the home computer. Already Dylan had brought over some copies of Hustler and well-thumbed paperbacks about girls who liked to tie each other up and use whips and stuff. Adrian and Darien loved all of it, craved it, demanded as much of it as Dylan could appropriate. This latest batch was to be the real bonanza because one of the disks had a bunch of sex scenes from movies and there was one that showed Kate Beckinsale and you could see her tits. Adrian hadn’t believed him at first, but Dylan had sworn on it, and the twins had half-bribed, half-intimidated Dylan into bringing over the disks. Dylan always hesitated, because if his older brother ever found out he would skin Dylan alive and hang his carcass out for the crows, but Dylan needed the approval of Adrian and Darien far more than he needed a whole skin. He had promised.

Adrian went quickly to the window, parted the drapes, and cupped his hands around his eyes so he could peer out into the shadows. Darien restarted the game and made Simon Dart draw his gun and blow bloody holes in both assassins. He smiled wolfishly as their blood splattered on the walls. Adrian pressed his face to the glass. It was pitch dark outside and he couldn’t see a thing, and then something loomed up right in his face and he let out a small startled cry. Dylan’s pale face suddenly filled the lower pane of glass.

“Shit!” gasped Adrian.

“What?” called Darien distractedly.

“Little dickhead nearly scared the shit out of me.”

“Is he out there?”

“Yeah.” Dylan’s face looked milk-white in the spill of light from the house, but his eyes were in shadows as he bent toward the glass. He reached out and touched the pane, tapping it with a fingernail. Adrian made a gesture that asked if Dylan had the goods, and the pale-faced twelve-year-old held up a vinyl CD wallet and waggled it. “Oh, yeah!” said Adrian.

“Go let him in,” called Darien. “Hurry up.”

Adrian jerked his thumb to indicate the door and Dylan faded back into the shadows. “Be right back,” he said to his brother, and hustled out of the room to the entrance foyer. If Dylan truly had the promised goods, then the three of them would whisk away to the third floor, which was the sole domain of the twins. Their PS2 could play any kind of CD-ROM, and this was going to be jerkoff heaven.

Smiling in anticipation, Adrian stepped into the foyer, twisted the door handle, and jerked open the heavy oak door. “Come in, come in!” he was saying even as he swung the door wide to reveal Dylan Jamison standing in the doorway. Dylan was only five-three and thin but he had a huge smile on his wide, wet mouth. It was not a nice smile, not a pleasant smile, and the second he saw it Adrian, who had also been smiling, felt the grin drain from his face, leaking like liquid from a broken glass. He stared at Dylan, not understanding at first what he was seeing, and then he slowly, very, very slowly, began backing away from the door. Accepting the invitation to enter, Dylan stepped over the threshold, his smile stretching wider, seeming to tear his cheeks as he grinned, his pale lips pulling tightly back from his teeth. Behind him, other shapes moved, detaching themselves from the shadows, becoming figures that also moved and smiled.

Adrian tried to scream, but his throat had locked shut with the shock of what he was seeing. With a soundless cry of terror, he spun and tried to run, tried to race up the hallway to the family room, but Dylan caught him before he had taken five steps. He caught him by the hair and jerked him back so hard that Adrian’s heels kicked up into the air and something in his neck went Pop! Adrian fell so hard on his ass that a white-hot firebolt of pain shot from his tailbone all the way to the top of his head. Dylan jerked Adrian’s head back and whatever had popped before now went Crack! Lights exploded in Adrian’s eyes and he felt himself being bent savagely backward, his spine arching too far too fast as all of the vertebra in his back popped loudly like a string of firecrackers. With tiny white hands Dylan pushed Adrian’s shoulder and head apart to expose his neck, doing this with such force that the skin on Adrian’s neck stretched and suddenly split, splattering Dylan’s face with bright red dots. Growling low in his chest, Dylan bent close, his smiling lips brushing the soft skin, but then he paused and looked up quickly as a shadow fell over him. The man who stood over him smiled coldly, and in a voice that was no more than a graveyard whisper, he said, “Do it.”