Guilt

Julianne groaned and rammed her forehead against her steering wheel, earning a reproachful honk from her car in response. She quickly unfurled herself from her current position and pulled the key from its ignition, dropping it into her purse without much interest. She slid from the car. She pulled her cell phone from her purse as she slammed the car door behind her. Leaning back against the vehicle, she dialed in Matt’s number and put the phone to her ear.

“If this is a booty call, we are so over,” Matt answered. Julianne offered a half-hearted laugh as greeting. “What’s wrong?”

“My car’s being a dumbass,” Julianne said, turning and swiftly kicking her car’s front tire. “It won’t start. I’m too tired to think—Poe’s really been trying to catch me up on all the hours I’ve missed. Can you please come pick me up? I’ll just look at the damn thing in the morning after I’ve had coffee.”

“No problem, Julianne,” Matt replied instantly. “See you in ten.”

“Thanks. You’re a doll,” Julianne said gratefully.

“Like I didn’t already know,” Matt joked before hanging up. Julianne smiled tiredly and closed her phone, dropping it back into her purse.

A car passed by, its headlights momentarily splashing across Julianne, silhouetting her against the paint of her car, before it drove on and disappeared around the corner. A streetlight positioned just a foot from Julianne’s rear right bumper provided the only light on the dark pavement out front of the body shop. She stood just within its ring of golden light.

Pete seemed to form from the shadows, emerging into her ring of light with no warning. He must’ve stayed a little later than usual too. Julianne paid him zero attention until he directly spoke to her.

“Julianne, I’d like to talk to you,” he said, positioning himself across from Julianne.

“I don’t. Go away,” Julianne answered unsympathetically.

“No, I mean it this time,” Pete said hastily. “I just wanted to know if you’d like to go see a movie with me...or to a nice restaurant. Maybe we could meet for coffee one morning before work?”

And in true Julianne fashion, she said it like it is and didn’t sugar-coat anything. “Listen, Pete, I really don’t like you. I resent it when you feel the need to smack my ass every fucking day. My skin crawls when you touch me. If that whole harassment deal was just an attempt to charm me, you did a horrible job at it, and I’m really not interested at all. Maybe a prostitute will be more willing, but I respect myself more than to date someone like you.”

Pete didn’t respond for several moments. He turned as though to walk away, but with a low growl he whirled back to face Julianne, gripping her arms and throwing her violently to the ground.

Julianne’s purse fell away from her arm, landing somewhere at the base of the car. She landed at an odd angle on her left hip before her left elbow made hard contact with the pavement; however, it stopped her head from cracking against the concrete. She cried out more in shock and pain rather than fear, noticing for a moment only the pain in her hip and elbow.

Then, her fight-or-flight reflex kicked in. She turned over and scrambled frantically to her feet, deciding instantly that escaping would be the best option for the moment. She ran across the pavement out front of the body shop, ignoring for the time-being the sharp jabs of pain going through her hip, which she’d fallen on hardest. Pete soon caught up with her, however, and wrapped both of his arms around her waist before hauling her bodily into the alleyway between the body shop and the building next to it.

Darkness descended around the two of them. There was no source of light in the alleyway. Julianne screamed, struggling against Pete as he dragged her further into the darkness of the alleyway. She felt one arm leave her waist and thought briefly about capitalizing on that fact before a hard palm connected violently with her cheek, leaving her face stinging and pulsing afterwards. Julianne cried out again and felt Pete’s other arm leave her waist. He slammed her back against the brick wall, using his body to pin hers.

“Shut the hell up!” he hissed, his face inches from hers.

However, over the duration of their scuffle, a wind had picked up throughout the alleyway. By now, it was whistling loudly down the alleyway, lifting Julianne’s hair from her shoulders. Neither of them could hear anything else other than the wind.

Then, the wind stilled and silence came with it. The silence had substance, however, like it was an actual weight lying over Julianne’s ears. She had an idea of who was causing this strange phenomenon, and it was confirmed when some invisible force wrenched Pete back from Julianne. His back slammed hard against the opposite wall of the alleyway. For several moments, Pete whirled back and forth looking for the person who had wrenched him away. But no one was there.

The instant Pete turned his attention back to Julianne and took a step towards her, however, a demonic whisper rose from the silence. Julianne recognized it as Kelly’s voice, only mutated with anger.

“Stay away from her!” Kelly’s disembodied voice hissed from the silence. “LEAVE—HER—ALONE!”

Pete gasped and fell back against the brick wall. Julianne felt a hand close gently around her elbow and looked around to find Matt standing there, glaring daggers at Pete. Pete couldn’t respond; he was way too shocked and scared, staring out of wide, wide eyes.

“Thank you, Kelly,” Julianne murmured too low for either man to hear it as Matt pulled her gently from the alleyway.