1 comments/ 7632 views/ 9 favorites Beauty and the Beast Within Ch. 01 By: SusanJillParker Case #1. Catching a train. Accidentally crushed by a subway car. Case closed. Hoping to catch something other than a sexually transmitted disease, Susan sat alone at a high class bar. Looking as beautiful as she could for her to stand out from the pack of women who were desperate for their soul mate of a man in shining armor, she was looking for love. With the bar alive with activity and the noise of people having a hundred conversations all at the same time, the too loud music was giving her headache. Obviously, not the only one looking for the right man, she had a lot of competition tonight. Just as there were lots of men looking for a one night date, there were a lot of women looking for something more, someone special, and a beginning to their lives that had a happy, fairytale ending. Just as there were lots of men looking for sex, there were lots of women looking for love. "I now pronounce you man and wife...and they lived happily ever after." Only she knew that life wasn't a fairytale and even though she was just as beautiful as Cinderella, Rapunzel, or Snow White, she was still single. After breaking off relationships that weren't going anywhere, she didn't even have a boyfriend. Alone with her lonely self, with most men not wanting to commit, most women she knew wanted to get married and have a baby. In the way of Captain Hook's crocodile in Peter Pan when looming too close, with her clock ticking louder as each year passed, she was twenty-nine and still not yet even in a committed relationship. At this rate, she'd be living alone with her cats while her already married girlfriends live out their dreams of having children. Her version of her own fairytale that she didn't have a clue how it would play out, Alice in Wonderland's fantasy was Susan in never land's reality. 'Tick, tick, tick, tick.' Desperate for a man but not just any man, she wanted to be married to someone good looking, kind, smart, generous, and successful. She wanted to start her new life with a good man by her side. She wanted a house with stainless steel appliances and granite countertops. She wanted to be driving a Honda minivan to soccer practice. She wanted what seemingly everyone else had but her. She wanted to be married with children. Yet even more than that, she wanted to be in love. * * * * * With her makeup perfectly applied, her long, blonde hair cascaded down her back as if she a model making a hair commercial. As if she had a light over her head that flashed, her blonde hair was her beacon that told all available men that she was a sexy siren ready for sex when she'd much rather have love. Her natural beautiful blonde hair acted as if it was a flag that waved for the attention of a man, but not just any man. She wanted the right man. Men were attracted to blondes, especially beautiful blondes with big blue eyes, and big tits. In a bar full of women, setting her apart, men noticed the blonde women first, especially natural blondes. Between her complexion and blonde eyebrows, a man didn't have to see her trimmed, blonde pubic hair to know that she was born with this hair. The first step, she just needed them to notice her and she'd take it from there. Her blouse was unbuttoned just enough to show her long line of cleavage and to show that she big tits. As pretty as she could be without having a hair and makeup person following her around everywhere she went, she hoped that her perfume would add to the scent of estrogen that she was putting out there. Sitting there sipping her drink, with her hook already baited and dangling in the sea of life, there was nothing more that she could do other than what she's done. It was now or never, she really didn't want to be sitting on the same stool at the same bar next year without her man and her new life. * * * * * Risking startling her, he leaned down to whisper his words in her ear while ever so softly touching her hand. "How can a man like me get a woman like you to go home with him?" Playing her role as the woman who didn't have any obvious issues, she looked up at him as if she always looked like this, so perfectly put together. He looked at her as if getting women was a problem for him when he was so handsome. Just as he was, no doubt, hoping to get laid, she knew that he was the one to give her all that she wanted for the next forty years. "That's easy," she said. "By swearing your undying love to me while on one knee and holding a small, blue box from Tiffany's," she said with a straight face and without laughing. "In the meantime, you tell me that you're rich, don't live with your mother, and aren't married," she said laughing this time. He looked at her as if he was already in bed with her naked, out of breath, and sweating. He looked with eyes that told her that that he had as much intelligence as he had passion for life. Yet, with just a look, she could tell that he was a player. With just one look, she could tell that if she left this bar with him, instead of walking down the aisle to the altar, she'd be going for the ride of her life. "I'm rich, I don't live with my mother, and I'm not married," he said with a laugh. "That's a good start but what about the diamond ring," she said holding up and waving her finger. "How about if I just buy you a drink for now?" "That will work," she said. And that was how it all started three years ago. Now, the thoughts of him merged through her head with the painful sounds of a high speed train whizzing inside of her brain. She had another headache and this time the pain was excruciating. * * * * * Normally never invisible, a tall, beautiful, blonde with big tits, Susan was difficult not to notice most times. Yet, today, purposely hoping not to be seen, observed, and/or interacted with, she went out of her way not to be identified by anyone, especially by anyone in the crowd of people who surrounded her. They were a noisy, impatient bunch of people. They were a captive, bored audience, stuck on the underground subway platform while waiting for the train to pick them up and rush them through the darkened tunnel to their final destinations. With people talking and laughing too loud on their cell phones, fortunately too wrapped up in themselves and in their conversations, people were too busy to notice her. That's good. In the way that she always wanted to be noticed and in the way that Christopher noticed her the first time they met, she didn't want to be noticed now. Wanting to remain anonymous, she counted on being oblivious to everyone. Lost within a crowd, just another person waiting for the train to take her home, the swarm of people added as much to her disguise as did her dark clothes. As if she was innocuously invisible, the larger the crowd grew, the easily she was able to hide herself within them without being noticed. Even if the surveillance cameras happened to capture her image in the crowd, all it would see was a black form and nothing more than that. Part of a living, breathing organism, she was a single cell. Yet part of the whole, human element as if she was the entire unit instead of just one within the multitude, she was alone with her bad self. Motionlessly, she stood there not moving as if she was the pole holding the ceiling. Hiding herself by not doing anything to call attention to herself, Susan stood against the concrete column dressed all in black as if she was part of the painted background. Looking like a tall, thin, albeit shapely ninja or a paid, female Mafia assassin, even if someone did notice her, if staring at her long and hard enough, someone may, perhaps, possibly perceive that she was a woman and not a man. Yet, even though it was quite difficult to hide her big tits, her oversized, dark clothes hid her shapely form and her womanly figure enough that no one bothered looking closely enough at her. With her head down and her hood pulled down far enough over her head and with it covering most of her face, she tilted her head lower to hide her identity and to remain anonymous from the constant and continual view of the invasive, always recording cameras. As if wearing a uniform, she looked like any other gang member standing on a subway platform while waiting for the train. The only other thing that gave evidence to and revealed her being a woman is when the wind that the subway blew in to herald the arrival of the train forced out a strand of her long, blonde, lush hair tucked inside of her hood. As if she stood there alone while contemplating what she must do, she was silently deep in thought within herself. In the way that no one noticed her with her keeping her head down, she didn't notice anyone either except for the one man that she was waiting for and watching to arrive. Being careful to never make eye contact for her to jog a memory in anyone, she stared at the floor of the train station. Having to remind herself not to make eye contact, she didn't want to be remembered enough to be positively identified should they suspect her, capture her, arrest her, and put her in a police lineup. With her just another working stiff in a crowd waiting for a train to go home, she tried to be as anonymously invisible as she could. Not wanting to be accused of murder and not wanting to be a prime suspect in a police murder investigation, she didn't want to spend her last days in jail. With nothing perceivably different about her and wearing nothing to make her standout, other than being dressed in all black, she hoped that no one would notice her and/or remember her. * * * * * Christopher Snow was a stock investment analyst. He owned his own business on Wall Street. He persuaded Susan to invest all of her life savings with him. Being that she trusted him, she took his financial advice and gave him her money. Instead of investing her money with her new company in their 401K plan or rolling over her previous 401k to invest elsewhere, she invested all of her money, her life savings and the only money she had except for her weekly paycheck, with Christopher. Being that she was in love with him, she trusted him. Why wouldn't she entrust him with her money when she's already entrusted him with her heart? At the time, they were living together as man and wife but without the ring on her finger and without having exchanged vows. At the time, she loved him and she thought that he loved her. Having expressed their love for one another, they were talking about marriage and about children. Now with her thirty-two-years-old, she thought he was going to give her an engagement ring for her birthday, for Christmas, for Valentine's Day, for Earth Day, for Arbor Day, or for Flag Day but he never did. He was so handsome, so smart, and so successful. They lived together for two years after seeing one another for nearly a year. She believed him when he told her that he loved her and wanted to marry her. Now, after he used her, dumped her, and stole all of her money, everything he told her was a lie. How could he do that to her? Why did he do that to her? How could she be so stupid to trust him? He told her that investing her money with him was the safest and quickest way to have financial security. Now she knew that was a lie too. Joining the ranks of common thieves in the likes of Bernard Madoff, she didn't know his investment strategy was nothing short of a Ponzi scheme to bilk millions of dollars from trusting and unsuspecting clients while he lived a lavish lifestyle. His perfect victim, not only did he use her emotionally and sexually, he used her financially too. Now broke, he was the one responsible for her not even having enough money to pay for her own funeral, never mind for her not able to afford health insurance. Next on her short list, for him playing her and breaking her heart, he was doomed to suffer a similar fate as her neurosurgeon, Dr. Paul Martin, would soon suffer. Oh, yeah, going right down her short, soon to be dead list, her ex-boyfriend was number one on her death wish list. * * * * * Having ridden in with him in the morning and leaving with him in the afternoon, she knew his schedule. So predictably precise, he never deviated from the time he went to work or the time that he left the office for home. Thinking his precision made him a safe bet for investing her money with him, he was totally opposite from her. Impulsive and creative, she was more the writer type. Anal and exacting, he was more of the accountant type. Thinking they were a good match, obviously they weren't. Obviously she loved him and he used her. Now that she was dying of her suspected but not yet medically diagnosed brain tumor, if she was dying broke then, taking him with her, he was dying broke too. Evidentially, just as he didn't know that he'd be dead soon, he didn't know that she had a duplicate set of keys to his apartment made. If he knew she still had keys to his apartment, no doubt, he would have changed his locks. A survivor of sexual abuse who was bit obsessive and compulsive from what happened to her after having been sexually used by men, her job to keep herself safe, she always double checked doors and windows to make sure they were locked. Apparently, he didn't. Apparently, he had a normal childhood. Always wanting to stay safe, she made the keys when she first starting living with him. She always carried two sets of keys with her, even the keys to her car, just in case. When she returned to him the original set of keys, he obviously didn't know that she had another set of keys. He never took the time to learn who she was. Had he taken the time to know her as well as she knew him, he would have known that she had a duplicate set of keys. Figuring that he was cheating on her and in case she ever wanted to surprise him, she more expected that he was cheating on her with other women than using her to steal her money. In the way that Zero Mostel romanced elderly, vulnerable women out of their money in The Producers and later Nathan Lane did the same in the remake of the movie, she suspected that Christopher was romancing younger as well as older, more vulnerable women for their money. Yet, not wanting to believe that he was using her just for her money, she didn't think that she could be so stupid. A smooth talker, he was such a player. Even when she was living with him and even when he told her that the women he had drinks with were just clients, she suspected that he was seeing other women on the side. She suspected that he was cheating on her and coming home sticking of perfume and sex, indeed he was. Even though she knew he was cheating on her, still not believing it, she was so hurt that when she found out that he was. She trusted him. She loved him. He broke her heart and now he must die. * * * * * Not much of a gentleman, especially when eager to get home after working hard to steal people's money all day, he was so predictable. He was always first waiting at the exact spot where the train's door would stop so that he could beat the women inside the train to get his chosen seat. When she spotted him in the crowd, nervous that he'd recognize her even when hooded and dressed in all black, she moved closer to him. She worked her way through the crowd to stand one person behind him. She knew that he'd be more focused on the arrival of the train than who was standing behind him. Now standing poised close enough behind him to be within striking distance but not close enough to be noticed, as soon as she heard the train enter the station, she was ready to make her fatal move. With him standing with the toes of his wing tipped shoes nearly over the yellow line, all it would take for her to launch him off the platform and in front of the train would be a quick hand and a stiff arm. Having the body of a pasty faced accountant instead of a blue collar jock, it wouldn't take much of a shove for him to lose his balance and for her to push him from the platform. Positioned within the crowded train station, bored much like everyone else, she waited impatiently for the train. Unlike everyone else, she looked down instead of looking up or looking to where the train would be emerging from the darkened tunnel to enter the train station. Keeping her eye on the back of his shoes, if she could see his shiny shoes, then she knew he was still standing right where she needed him to stand. Then, timing her move by maintaining her watchful surveillance for the train out of the corner of her eye, when the white light that signaled the train was coming extinguished, she had it precisely timed how long the train would take to reach where Christopher was standing. The light extinguished. Ten, nine, eight. She could see the train's headlight light up the tunnel wall. With the sound of the train rumbling in the station, seven, six, and the squeal of the steel wheels against the steel track squeaking as if screaming, five, four, the train commanded the crowd's attention but not hers. Keeping her eyes glued on him, three, two, one, it was someone else who jostled him while jockeying for position. Stuck within a crowd of seething humanity, as if playing musical chairs, they all moved forward at the same time in anticipation of the train opening the doors for them to steal a seat. Just as she reached out to push him forward, someone from behind her pushed her away and moved in front of her to steal her spot. She missed pushing him in front of the train but accidentally, whomever it was who got in her way, accomplished what she needed to do with a shoulder. It was done and he was dead. * * * * * She watched him fall at the same instant that the train was there. Then, horrified and not believing her eyes, she watched him reappear in his panic to scurry back up on the platform. How could she miss him? How could she not have pushed him off the platform? She was right there poised to take her revenge. Son of a bitch, you lucky bastard. Why isn't this man dead? Only, it took her a moment to realize and understand fully his fatal dilemma. Not all of him made it to safety. Half of him was still dangling in the pit. "Oh, my God! Someone help!" As if they were all glued together, the people who stood on the edge of the platform moved back all at the same time. When she looked down, Christopher was looking up at the crowd smiling as if there was nothing wrong. He looked more embarrassed than hurt. Obviously in shock, maybe he saw potential investors but with blood beginning to trickle from his mouth, eyes, ears, and nose, his days of stealing the money of hard working people was over. Stuck between the platform and the train, why he was still alive was a mystery to her. As if stuck in an elevator shaft between the elevator and the floor, he was stuck between the train and the platform. But for the blood beginning to form, from the waist up, he appeared perfectly normal and healthy. Even his dry cleaned white shirt was totally free of dirt, grime, and blood. Yet from the waist down, with his body twisted and mangled from the speed of the train rushing in the station, as soon as they removed the train and extricated him, his vital organs, if they weren't hemorrhaging already, would hemorrhage, and he'd die. Held intact by the train, as soon as they removed the train, he'd explode and he'd be dead. "Serves him right," she said for no one to hear. "Payback is a bitch. What comes around goes around, especially when you fuck with Susan Jill Parker." * * * * * Just a matter of time before he was identified and taken away, as part of her recompense, she needed to rush to his apartment to get what money and valuables he had stashed there. He had a safe behind a picture in his office and she knew where he kept the combination. Maybe with what she'd steal from him now was more than enough to replace what he stole from her before. With her no longer able to work because of her soon to be verified brain tumor diagnosis, the money she'd steal from him would at least make her comfortable. The money she took from him would at least pay for her funeral. What little money she had left, she'd leave to her family. Beauty and the Beast Within Ch. 01 Being that she was dying anyway, from now on, as her way to keep whatever cash she took from Christopher, she imagined charging everything and paying for all that she needed on credit. Takeout food every night instead of cooking, and gorging herself on junk food, ice cream, cake, pies, and candy, she no longer had to worry about her figure. Because she was dying anyway, she no longer had to diet, go jogging, and/or do anything that she didn't want to do. According to the advertised specials, with no money down and no first payment, now she could afford to lease that new luxury automobile that she always wanted. All she had to do was to choose between a Mercedes, a BMW, or a Jaguar. With her having plenty enough to make the first few payments, she didn't think she'd need much more than that or need to worry about the future in the way she always had done before. To be continued... Beauty and the Beast Within Ch. 02 Case #2. Brain tumor and the fast Ferrari. Susan seeks her revenge by taking matters in her own hands. While imagining the worst case scenario, Susan's headache was back again. Only now, unable to afford to see her primary care physician, she was unemployed, had no money, and was without health insurance. Feeling as if the pain was going to split her head wide open in the way that a Californian earthquake splits the ground in half, she wondered if she made the pain worse by imagining all that was wrong with her. Having gone to the doctor complaining about the same headache pain, even though he was an expert in his field, seemingly he couldn't help her. Tired of fighting with doctors for treatment and tired of begging for the medical help she needed to relieve her pain, she was now without medical coverage. That only thing that helped with her headache pain was sleeping. She needed to put a cool cloth on her forehead, close her eyes in a darkened room, and relax while waiting for the pain to subside and for the sleep to take her to a place where there was no pain. Only, as soon as she awakened, the pain returned with a vengeance. She's had lots of headaches before but nothing like this. She wondered if what she had was more than just an ordinary headache or a migraine. Seemingly with her headaches getting worse, she figured she had a brain tumor. Unable to do anything to lessen the pain, when she made any movement at all, walking, talking, or raising her arms, she only made the pain worse. Impossible to find a comfortable position laying down, she spent her day sitting up in a chair or standing. The one thing that helped her was to close her eyes and to remain silently still. Only, she couldn't stay like this laying down with her eyes closed and a cool compress on her forehead all day. She had things to do and places to go. Needing to earn a living to support herself, she had a job to do that is when she was employed. She couldn't live like this. Now that she no longer has a job, when not out looking for a job or going to an interview, she spends most of her days in bed. Hoping to alleviate her pain while helping only for a little while, she was popping pain killers as if they were peppermints. Worried about the warnings on the back of the bottle that stated not to take these pills for more than 10 consecutive days, she had been taking excess pain pills for months. After consulting with her doctor, a renowned brain surgeon, she told him all that she was taking for the pain. He told her not to worry, so long as she didn't take more than three Aleve and more than 4 extra-strength Tylenol a day. She told him about the warning on the back of the bottles that said not to take this medication for more than ten days without consulting with a doctor. "Well, you just consulted with your doctor," he said smugly, "and I told you that the over-the-counter medication is safe to take so long as you don't overdose on it in a twenty-four hour period." Then, one day, while sitting on the toilet moving her bowels, she gushed blood. She didn't just gush a little blood, she gushed a lot of blood. After the second gush and the third gush, she gushed so much blood that she knew that if she didn't call for an ambulance, she'd pass out and die. * * * * * Admitted to the hospital, she remained there for three. Having lost so much blood, she nearly died from stomach bleeding caused by over the counter drug poisoning from taking too much Acetaminophen found in Tylenol and Naproxen found in Aleve. Anally bleeding, she lost half of her blood supply in three huge gushes. Taken to the hospital by ambulance, she had three emergency blood transfusion to save her life. A side effect from taking all of the over the counter pain medication combined with the pain medication prescribed to her by her doctor to ease her pain, Tramadol, which didn't work, she was a mess. Not only did she nearly die but also she developed Tinnitus, a bothersome, not stop, ringing in her ears. If the ringing in her ears wasn't enough, now not only did she have a headache but also she couldn't take any pain relievers to help subside her pain and relieve her constant headaches. "Fucking doctors don't have any idea what in the Hell they're doing by prescribing me these pain relievers," she said angrily. Not only did she still have the headache but also she had nothing to relieve her pain. "This constant ringing in my ears is driving me crazy," she said feeling as if her head was about to explode. Not really thinking it through, but without having any medical insurance that gave her other options, she was desperate enough for some much needed pain relief to seek out the free health care clinic. Willing to try anything, even lying about her symptoms, she needed her headaches and the ringing in her ears to go away. Her way of receiving psychiatric coverage hopefully to subside her headaches, she told a doctor at the free health clinic that she was hearing voices. Hoping then, that he'd treat her for her headaches, instead he treated her for something else and something entirely unrelated. He treated her for Schizophrenia. Her fault for telling the psychiatrist that she heard voices, he misdiagnosed her mainly because she didn't have the health insurance to cover all of the testing necessary to correctly diagnose her mental health condition. Instead of treating her for the headaches that she complained to him about having, he treated for manic depression and paranoid schizophrenia that she didn't have and even gave her medication that she didn't need. If she didn't have manic depression and paranoid schizophrenia before, she had that now with all the needless medication that they gave her and that she finally stopped taking on her own and without consulting the doctor who prescribed the medication. Yet, thinking of the positive instead of only the negative, at least the ringing would override the nonexistent voices, that is, if ever she heard voices in her head. Nonetheless her trying to have positive thoughts about her headaches, she was angry that doctors couldn't and/or wouldn't help her. * * * * * Glad that the day finally arrived that her CT brain scan results were in, she had her doctor's appointment today. Ready to hear the results of her brain scan tests, hoping for the best results but expecting the worst diagnosis, she was glad that she now had the medical insurance that she needed to afford the best medical care and treatment. This was it. This was really it. Today she'd find the reason for her headaches. Today, they'd give her something to lessen and/or totally remove her headaches. Maybe they'd give her something to eliminate or at least lessen the ringing in her ears too. After losing her job before finding a new one, she had a lapse in medical coverage before she had health insurance again with her new job. She was unable to pay for her ambulance ride to the hospital, for her hospital stay, for all the medical test they ran, and for the doctor's bills. While recovering for three, long days in the hospital, a small army of doctors visited her in her hospital room. Not knowing who they were and why they were there, they came by just to say introduce themselves, to say hi, to take her temperature, to listen to her heart, and to ask her if she had any questions. All such a scam, she knew that these doctors were just padding her hospital bills while upping their fees. If they only knew that she didn't have health insurance then, doctors would never waste their billable time stopping by her room. When she was released from the hospital, once they knew she had no health insurance, not willing to waist anymore healthcare on her, they rebuffed her by telling her that what she had was just a migraine headache and to take an aspirin. After her stomach bleeding episode, she was unable to take any pain medication after taking excessive amounts of aspirin, which also contained Acetaminophen and taking extra strength 650 mg Tylenol, and then excessive amounts of Aleve, containing Naproxin, when the Tylenol didn't work. Sometimes, when the pain was worse, as if a pain reliever cocktail, her own concoction while prescribing medication to her without having a medical license, she'd even take them together. Now, she had to suffer her headaches in silence and without ceasing. Even now with her having medical insurance and with her having her appointment made long in advance because the doctor was always so busy, she hated going to the hospital to see the neurosurgeon. He was such an arrogant prick. Always late and seemingly preoccupied when he did finally arrive, never giving her his full, undivided attention, he had enough of a terrible bedside manner to give her a stress filled headache even when she didn't have one. Acting as if the last place he wanted to be was sitting across from her, he made her feel anxious by his diagnosis instead of making her feel relieved by his prognosis. The first time he examined her, he told her that there was nothing wrong with her. No doubt, influencing his medical opinion, he said that there was nothing wrong with her because she didn't have medical insurance. He told her that there was nothing wrong with her when he couldn't charge her insurance company by giving her unnecessary tests and prescribing medication that she didn't need to take. Obviously, with his time more valuable to help someone who had health insurance than to help another human being by easing her pain, obviously he didn't want to take her on as a charity case. Then, when she insisted that there was a lot wrong with her, he's the one who called her a hypochondriac. He's the one who suggested that she see a psychiatrist. When she thinks about how terribly he treated her, she gets so angry. How dare he rebuff her when she was in so very much pain? She swore that she'd never see him again but he was the very best in his field and, unfortunately, if there was any doctor would rid her of her headaches, it would be him. * * * * * Forty-eight-year-old neurosurgeon, Paul Martin loved cars, especially fast, expensive cars. Made in Maranello, Italy and designed by Pininfarina, when he wasn't driving his two-hundred-fifty thousand dollar, 570 horsepower, Ferrari 458 Spider, he was driving his quarter of a million dollar, 500 horsepower, 8 speed, Bentley Continental GT. A special fifteen thousand dollar custom paint color option, his Ferrari had a Rosso Fiorano exterior with crème colored leather seating trim interior. His two tone Bentley, the color of his favorite football team, the Baltimore Ravens, was painted in azure purple and black, velvet metallic, with a royal purple leather interior, anytime anyone saw him driving his custom Bentley, no doubt, they imagined a Baltimore Ravens football star was driving the car. With his personalized license plates that read DR SPEED and FAST DOC, he filled his own prescribed prescription by driving fast cars fast back and forth to work every day. Forcing himself to focus his mind on driving his cars instead of on thinking of his patients' needs, illnesses, pains, and problems, driving his fast cars fast relieved his daily stress. Driving his fast cars fast allowed him to take pleasure from the pain of others who paid him so very much money for the privilege of diagnosing their neurological problems and operating on their brains. An excellent driver, he was always prepared for the unexpected. At the ready for a deer to jump out of the woods and dart across the road, or for an unsuspecting car to pull out in front of him, feeling in control of his finely tuned, professionally setup, and expensive automobiles, he was ready for anything. A mind altering experience, with him serving as an extension of his drivetrain, he was relaxed enough in his cars to feel as if he was one with them. Having spent hours of track time taking high speed driving instruction, confidently in control when driving double and triple the speed limits, he loved his cars as much as he loved driving fast. Other than when driving on the track, the deserted mountain road, was the only place that he could make his Ferrari sing the metallic vibrato of its high pitch song while going through the gears. Too crowded on the weekends, the mountain road was littered with campers and tourists looking for available camping spots while enjoying the scenic views. Sometimes difficult to pass them, he hated tourists. He hated slow, road hogging recreational vehicles and campers, he wished they'd all go away or all go somewhere else. Truth be told, not possessing the social skills that a world renown doctor should have, he hated people and barely tolerated his money grubbing, spoiled, young wife. Able to entertain himself for long periods of time, the only person that he endured sharing his life with was his wife, Priscilla. She understood him enough that as long as he threw enough money at her, she'd leave him alone. As long as he gave her an unlimited spending allowance, she'd suck and fuck his cock whenever he wanted. In the way that rich men hoped to buy their very own deserted island for a few million dollars to get away from the mad mob of people, he hoped to buy and/or build his own private road and/or track one day. One of the benefits of being rich, he was happy that his professional career as a top neurosurgeon afforded him such luxuries that weren't available to the average person. Head and shoulders above the average Joe and Jane, having graduated Harvard University and receiving his medical degree from Yale Medical School, he did his internship at Boston's prestigious Massachusetts General Hospital. Yet, more than his large house and his affluent lifestyle, being able to afford such fine performance and luxury automobiles made him feel special. Where others were content driving their Mustang GT's and Camaro SS's, until and if ever they drove a Ferrari or a Bentley at speed, they'd never know what they were missing, albeit and admittedly at ten times the cost. At the opposite end of the spectrum, with the Ferrari so totally different from the more than three ton Bentley that weighed twice as much as the Ferrari, he drove his Ferrari back and forth to work and drove his Bentley on weekends. Feeling as if he wasn't really driving when driving the Bentley, so eerily quiet, especially when compared to the Ferrari, he felt as if the Bentley drove him. His 35-year-old, ex-model wife, Priscilla, not much of an automobile aficionado preferred riding in the Bentley than in the Ferrari, especially if they had dinner reservations at a posh or swanky restaurant. Suddenly, after becoming rich, she became modest. Having worked as a runway model, a lingerie, fit, and swimsuit model, while spending as much of her modeling days naked as she was fully dressed, inexplicably she didn't appreciate extricating herself spread legged with her short skirt hiked to her crotch from the low slung Ferrari. She complained to her husband whenever having to give the parking valet a free show of her panties, that is, when she wore them. Replaced with fine, superfast automobiles, the fun of their relationship changed when his devotion to his supermodel wife was superseded by superfast supercars. Actually, preferring driving her non-descript, black Mercedes or cream white Range Rover, she didn't like the gawking attention that both the Ferrari and Bentley commanded whenever she was out driving with her husband driving too fast behind the wheel. * * * * * At the expense of keeping his patients impatiently waiting, he loved taking the long way to work via the scenic, mountain road. When the expressway would have him at work 20 minutes sooner, he didn't mind the longer ride that allowed him to rev his Italian supercar to 9,000 rpms while shifting through all seven, F1, dual clutch gears. At the expense of keeping his wife holding supper, routinely having to have his chef reheat his food and his maid wait around to serve him, he loved taking the long way home via the scenic, mountain road. With all of its turns, twists, bends, hairpin curves, and a straightaway that plunged down the mountain, giving his Ferrari and his driving skills a challenging workout, he loved the scenic, mountain road as much as he loved his Rosso Fiorano, 458 Ferrari. A thrill seeking junkie, the faster he drove his Ferrari the more he loved the exhilarating feel of knowing that one false move or one blown tire and he'd fly off the mountain and be dead. The faster he drove his Ferrari, the more he appreciated the subtle and not so subtle traits of driving such a fine, mostly handmade, Italian supercar. "Che bella," he'd say with his Boston accent getting in the way of his non-existent Italian one. Having driven all the modern day supercars, Bugatti, Lamborghini, Maserati, Mercedes, Audi, Mclaren, Aston Martin, Pagani, Koenigsegg, Gumpert, and even a Saleen, hands down, Ferrari was his favorite supercar. There was just something about the feel of them. As if he was one with the car, intuitively, it was as if he could steer, accelerate, and slow without thinking. With some supercars faster and other supercars even handling better than the Ferrari, no matter, a comfortable fit and feeling more in control of the car, he felt as if he fit in the car perfectly and could feel more what the car was always doing. If only by the musical sound of the exhaust, no other car compared to it. No other supercar was the same as driving a Ferrari that was mostly handmade and hand assembled just for him and by his selected optional specifications. * * * * * Ironic that she'd be seeing a doctor, a neurosurgeon with a death wish, when in fact she was armed with her own death list and at the ready to cross out names, Susan took a seat in front of the doctor's imposing desk. After running more expensive and unnecessary tests and after receiving the worst medical diagnosis, expecting the worst medical prognosis, she already knew what her doctor wanted to see her about. "I'm sorry to give you this bad news Sarah," said the doctor coming right to the point and blurting it out, "but you have an inoperable brain tumor." "It's Susan," she said with annoyance. "Pardon?" "My name is Susan and not Sarah," she said. "Oh, sorry," he said. Even though she long suspected that she had a brain tumor, she couldn't believe she had a brain tumor. In the way that John Travolta played George Malley in Phenomenon and could read so very many books in such a short amount of time, a brain tumor may explain why she was able to write so very many erotic stories. It was surreal hearing the doctor making what she suspected official by saying the words, inoperable brain tumor. Yet, keeping the faith, a death sentence before, there's so much more that they can do with brain tumors today. If they can't operate on them, they can shrink them. There are drugs that they can give her to relieve her pain to give her a better quality of life while prolonging her life, she hoped. "A brain tumor?" "Yes," he said seemingly preoccupied with something on his desk, a die cast car of his beloved Ferrari 458. "Are you sure?" She couldn't believe he was racing his die cast car along his desktop as if he was imagining driving it instead of talking seriously to her about her medical condition. If anything, instead of imagining driving his car, he should be visualizing operating on her brain. If anything, he should be paying her the undivided attention that she needs instead of him splitting his focus on a toy car. "I'm sure," he said removing his focus from his toy car to briefly look up at her. Holding up her chin in bravery, she looked at him in shock. "Is that what's causing these terrible headaches?" Paying more attention to his toy Ferrari than he was to her, waiting for him to make car noises, as if he was a little boy pretending to be driving his toy car, he suddenly looked up at her with confusion and curiosity. Beauty and the Beast Within Ch. 02 "Headaches? Yes. Oh. That's right. I remember now. You're the one who complained about those horrible headaches," he said. Needing for him to remember her, she continued reminding him. "You told me that there was nothing wrong with me. You told me that I was a hypochondriac," she said with anger. "You told me to see a psychiatrist to have my head examined," she said wanting to say that I should have had my head examined why I'm seeing you instead of a real doctor. "A brain tumor your size is definitely the reason for your discomfort," he said ignoring what she just said. Even though she thought she was prepared for this news, the worst news of her young life, she wasn't prepared to hear that she was going to die. She was stunned. She thought of all the things that she still needed and wanted to do. Where some terminally ill people want to jump from a plane, scuba dive, or climb a mountain, she just wanted to write her erotica. If anything, now that she was dying, and now that she thought more about it, she always wanted to experience a gangbang and participate in a circle jerk. Now that she was dying, she'd love to have lesbian sex with a stunningly beautiful woman who had big, firm breasts that stood as proud as the young, naked women that Hemingway wrote about while envisioning them on an African coast beach. Perhaps it was her brain tumor that soured her mood and made her food taste so terrible. Twisting her thoughts and turning her disposition to poisonous, not willing to go out alone, if she was going to die, she thought of all the people who she'd like to take with her for all the things they've done to her. Finding much satisfaction in crossing out names that appeared on her death list, she thought of her ex-boyfriend being crushed by the subway train. Obviously she would have had more satisfaction if it was her hand that pushed him instead of someone else's shoulder. "In the way that he could read so very many books in such a short period of time, sometimes I feel like John Travolta in the movie Phenomenon," she said voicing her thoughts and not remembering if she voiced it before or just thought it now. "Could the brain tumor be the reason why I've been writing so very many erotic stories?" She looked to give her the answers to all the questions that she had. "John Travolta? The actor?" "Yes." "Sorry, I don't watch movies. Brain tumors affect the brains in ways that we don't even yet know. We know so little about the brain," he said preoccupied with seemingly something else after he gave her disinterested shrug. "You write erotica?" "Yes," she said and depending upon his reaction unsure if she should be embarrassed or proud. "Interesting," he said giving her no reaction at all. "A bit farfetched but yes, erotic writing could be one of the side effects of you having a brain tumor. We still know so very little about the complexities of the brain." 'Some doctor he is,' thought Susan. 'Bad enough that he doesn't know all that he should know about the human brain and about brain tumors, he doesn't even care that I'm dying. Dead woman walking, I'm going to die,' she said to herself. 'I'm dying. I can't believe I'm going to die all because of the lack of medical care from this incompetent asshole. I told him that I had terrible headaches more than two years ago and because I didn't have medical insurance, he did nothing, absolutely nothing, about them. He could have saved me then instead of verbalizing my death sentence now.' "Just so that I fully understand, it wasn't migraines as you diagnosed when I first complained to you about headaches," she said. "Is that correct?" "Migraines? Is that what I told you?" He looked at her chart. "Oh, yes, of course, migraines. That's right. I remember you now," he said. "The pain of brain tumors sometimes mimics and resemble the pain from a migraine. It's difficult to tell one from the other without a CT scan and, without you having health insurance until now," he said with a shrug and an arrogant, little laugh, "we were unable to run such tests to determine what was happening in your head." Not even giving her the satisfaction of an apology, he showed more interest in his die cast car than he did in her. "I see. Please stop playing with that fucking toy car," she said pausing as if having a hard time to think. "And you told me that I was hysterical," she said wanting to be hysterical now on his incompetent ass. As if she was making it all up, he looked at her with surprised shock. "Hysterical? I did? Did I really say that to you? I don't think that I'd call you hysterical for having a bad headache," he said backpedaling and moving his toy car backwards and to the side as if parking it. "You did," she said. "I'm sorry if I said that. Really I am but I don't recall saying that," he said finally giving her somewhat of an apology. "In hindsight, if I indeed did say that, that was insensitive of me," he said. "Your complaints were genuine and your concerns were valid," he said. "Sometimes the patient knows as much if not more than the doctor does," he said with a plastic smile and an arrogant, little laugh. "You're the one living in your head and not me." With her brain in a tizzy and the questions that she needed to ask not coming to her, she asked the important one that came to her mind but one that he had already answered. "Is there no way that you operate to remove the tumor? Are there no medical advances on the horizon that--" "Operate? No, I'm afraid not. You have an inoperable brain tumor," he said. "Fully formed, it's the size of a small grapefruit. It's as if you have a tarantula squeezing your brain to death." He moved his hand to mimic a tarantula squeezing her brain to death. "I see," she said, even though she didn't and couldn't believe his diagnosis and her dim prognosis. He leaned over his desk to address her as if he was talking to a child or someone who was mentally challenged. "Allow me to illustrate. Think of your brain as my hand and your brain tumor as if a giant octopus that has embraced your brain with all of its tentacles," he said holding his hand up and encapsulating his hand with his other hand. He nodded his sad expression of understanding while, no doubt, wishing that he was the Hell out of there so that he could drive his superfast Ferrari superfast. "Had we discovered the growth of the tumor earlier—" With her face turning a beat red, she stared at him wide eyed. "Earlier? Had we discovered the growth of the tumor earlier," she said emphasizing the word 'we'. "How much earlier? Do you mean two years earlier when I first complained to you about the headaches but didn't have any health insurance. Is that what you mean by 'we' discovering the brain tumor earlier doctor?" She emphasized the word 'we' again. "Would that had been sufficient time and soon enough to save my life doctor?" Playing again with his die cast car as if he was imagining driving his Ferrari, he didn't even look up at her to acknowledge her question? "Yes," he said in a low voice as if his mind was miles away. "But—" Not letting him off the hook, she needed to say all that she needed to say. "But what Doctor? You had your nurse practitioner tell me to take two aspirin. Doing more to exacerbate my bleeding stomach, a lot of good taking two aspirin did for my brain tumor," she said. "You told me to take Aleve, Tylenol 650, and prescribed Tramadol. Between all of the Naproxen and Acetaminophen that I took, is it any wonder that I nearly died and ended up in a hospital bed." As if he wasn't listening to her or didn't care what she said if he did hear her, he looked at her with a face without emotion. "I'm sorry," he said with insincerity. She looked at him with a face full of anger and rage. "Sorry? You told me to rest," she said raising her voice. She wanted to reach across his desk and choke him. She wanted to grab his die cast car and impale it in his eye. She wanted to damage his brain by beating his head with his telephone in the way that he ruined her health. Maybe at the very least, she give him ringing in his ears. "I know and I'm—" Not allowing him to get a word in, she was determined to have her say. "You told me to exercise. You told me to meditate," she said yelling loud enough to give him a splitting headache. "You told me to take up fucking Yoga to relax!" As if looking right through her, the doctor looked at her as if she wasn't even there. "I'm sorry Sarah. Really, there's nothing that I can do," he said looking uncomfortable by the confrontation. "It's Susan. My fucking name is Susan! At least you could get my name right," she said. "I'm sorry," he said again. "Say it! Say my fucking name," she said. "I'm sorry Susan," he said. Instead of continuing to upset herself by getting angry, she gave him a sardonic smile. "Maybe there's nothing that you can do but there's something that I can do to you. I can sue you," she said. He returned her smile with his arrogant smile. "Sue me? For a missed diagnosis at a time when you didn't have health insurance for me to order the tests that you needed to make my proper diagnosis?" He laughed. "Good luck with that. That's your prerogative but, I'm sorry to say, long before you lawsuit made it to court, you'd be dead," he said with arrogant smugness. He was such a prick. They remained in an uncomfortable silence with him looking at his watch as if he was about to ask her to leave. Susan sat silent and motionless while picking her question to ask. "Tell me straight," said Susan. "How long do I have?" Hoping to have a long enough time until they discovered a new cure or operation for inoperable brain tumors, she looked at him with hope and he looked at her with boredom. "How long do you have? That's impossibly difficult to say. It could be next year, next month, next week, or tomorrow," he said with an insensitive shrug. "It depends." "Thank you doctor. Then there's no need for me to keep my next appointment," she said standing to leave. Abandoning his toy car, he stood from his desk. "I can make you comfortable," he said. Now it was her turn to give him the arrogant laugh. "Drugs? You want to give me drugs? You want to blur the last few days of my life. Oh, no. I don't want your drugs. I don't want to be comfortable. I want to remain angry. I have things to do doctor," she said removing her death list to hold it high in the air. "I have people to see and places to go and the last thing that I want is some drug making me a moron like you." She looked at him still hoping that he'd come up with a better alternative. "There are other prescriptions that I can prescribe for the pain that are—" She looked away from him to gather her things in readiness to leave his office. "No thank you doctor, you've helped me quite enough already. You've given me the motivation that I now need to carry out my plans," she said leaving his office. * * * * * "Famed neurosurgeon Dr. Paul Martin was killed instantly today when the Ferrari he was driving left the mountain road, crashed into rocks below, burst into flames, and exploded. Investigators are collecting pieces of the car to see if it was a mechanical failure, excessive speed, or a combination of both that cause the doctor to leave the road," said the nightly news reporting reading the news. As part of their investigation, the police analyzed the security tapes of the hospital garage where the doctor's Ferrari was parked. They found some brake fluid but with so many cars using the parking garage and with that specific parking space not reserved for Dr. Martin's car but for other doctor's cars as well, they were unable to tell if the brake fluid came from Dr. Martin's car or from someone else's car. Seemingly just an unfortunate accident attributed to high speed, it was a sad shame to prematurely lose such an accomplished man. Nothing overtly suspicious, perhaps she was standing there smoking a cigarette, albeit even though she didn't smoke, but there was a tall, blonde woman standing by the back of his car. Unable to get a good enough picture of her, the garage was dark, the video was black and white, and the picture was too grainy to enlarge. Besides, whoever she was, she was mostly concealed by a pole. Case closed. * * * * * Doctor Johnson had his nurse contact Susan for an appointment. This time after receiving bad news, the worst medical news that anyone could get, he gave her some good news. "With the sudden, unfortunate, and untimely demise of Doctor Martin, I've been assigned his patients and when going over your chart, I've made a horrifying but happy discovery," he said giving her a smile. "Yes, what is it doctor? What did you find?" "Your chart was accidentally switched with another patient, an older woman, Sarah Parker who has since died of her illness. The results of your tests belong to someone else," he said. "I don't understand. What are you saying?" "I'm saying that you don't now have a brain tumor. You never had a brain tumor. I'm saying you only have a bad headache that's caused by a nasty sinus infection and inflammation. My nurse will give you the medicine that you need to feel better," he said. Susan sat in her chair stunned. She murdered two men because she thought she was going to die. Not wanting to go alone, she was ready to take whoever else was responsible for her miserable life to Hell with her. Now that she didn't have a brain tumor and wasn't going to die, she was happy, especially after raiding her ex-boyfriend's apartment and making off with enough cash, jewelry, and other personal items to allow her to live a comfortable life. THE END Beauty and the Beast Within Ch. 03 Not nearly done yet, Susan steps out of the shadows to find her next victim. Having gotten away with murder, with her not even a suspect in her doctor's and/or in her boyfriend's murders, what she thought was the end to her psychotic spree of killing men was only the beginning. With the doctor deemed officially killed by driving his Ferrari too recklessly fast on a mountain road, no one suspected her of tampering with his brakes. Case closed. Then, with her ex-boyfriend always in a rush and always standing too close to the edge of the platform when the train was coming, it only took a push of her hand through the crowd of people waiting to board the train to end him. Deemed a tragic accident, there were a dozen eye witnesses to his accidental fall or to his suicide. Case closed. Seemingly, she didn't need a gun to seek her revenge, just some thoughtful planning. Alas, not lasting very long with her on a wildly irresponsible spending extravaganza, thinking that she was going to be caught, charged, tried, convicted, and imprisoned, she spent her boyfriend's money as if there was no tomorrow. Never thinking there'd be today and determined to go to jail broke, she truly believed she'd be spending the rest of her life behind bars in a six by eight foot prison cell. Already imagining her prison walls closing in around her, she never thoughts she'd be free. Surely being a suspect in her doctor's murder, she definitely thought she'd be a suspect in her boyfriend's murder too. Only, not a suspect in either deaths, she wasn't even questioned. Free to continue living the rest of her life, she got away with not only one murder but with two. Now with her going through all of her boyfriend's money so quickly, she needed more cash. If only she could get enough money, living more cheaply there than she could in the United States, she'd move far way to live in a foreign, third world country under a new identity somewhere that no one would know her and no one would find her. * * * * * Being that she had anger issues, a gross understatement, too emotionally distraught to work at a 9-5 job, she could never work at a job again. Being that she's now a psychopathic killer instead of just a crazed woman, with all of her emotional issues of anger and paranoia just a scratch away from the surface, doing better when she's alone, she doesn't do well when with people. At the slightest provocation, she'll fly into a murderous rage. In her chosen line of work as a cold blooded killer, it's better that her victims not see her coming than to be ready to defend themselves against her, a seemingly helpless woman. With her no longer a typical office worker, she's a murderess and on her way to becoming a serial killer. Now that she's already murdered two men, it's much easier to murder a third one. What others would allow to roll off their backs, she couldn't. If ever her boss crossed the sexual harassment line with her, tried to make a pass, or was unfair to her in denying her raises and promotions, with her having a short fuse, she'd no doubt kill him too. Only, she didn't want to kill for nothing. She didn't want to kill because she was angry, hurt, and/or feeling abused. She didn't want to kill out of some convoluted justification to give her an excuse to kill. She wanted to kill for a valid reason and presently her reason was money. She needed to kill to get her enough money to flee the country. Tall, blonde, blue-eyed, busty, and beautiful, no one in their right mind would peg her as a murderess. With her having a killer body as her only crime, those men who'd want to control, use, and abuse her, just want to get her in bed. And if they died in the process of having sex with her then, no doubt, that was many men's perfect way to die. * * * * * Now cold, detached, and calculating, instead of anyone suspecting her and seeing her coming, she'd rather kill someone she didn't know. In the way that she justified killing her doctor and her boyfriend to get even with them for all that they did to her, now she'd rather kill for money than for revenge. She pulled out her old list of the names of the men that she was going to kill when she thought she was going to die. Only, getting as far as her doctor and her boyfriend, she had a long list of men who had used and abused her. Going down the list again but looking more at how much her potential victims could more financial enrich her than what they did to her, she viewed her list of men differently now. Assigning those with money a higher priority, she more needed cash than she did revenge. In the way they used and abused her, it was her turn to use and abuse them. Now it was her turn to put the fear of the Devil in them before they went to their Heaven or to their Hell. In the way that so many men have lied, deceived, and cheated people for money, now it was her turn to murder for money. Only, other than advertising on Craig's List, Murderess for Hire, how would she possibly find her clients? She imagined herself being a female equalizer, definitely, she could do that. With her righting the wrongs of defenseless women, only there was no money in that for her. Most women didn't have the money she needed to pay her for her vengeful acts of self-righteousness. All the women she knew were victims themselves and were still dependent on men to support them, and were still taking the abuse from men. Done with that, done with a man bossing her around and telling what to do and when to do it, now it was her turn to make men pay. It was then that she realized, one in the same, that her clients were also her victims. Only, she needed a target. Her preferred target, a man who had a lot of money. As much as she'd like to, targeting the man who raped her when she was younger, she couldn't kill a Mafia boss. With him surrounded by the members of his extended crime family, killing a mob boss would, no doubt, get her killed rather than her killing her intended target. Besides, unless she caught him with a briefcase full of one hundred dollar bills, other that the few thousand dollars he'd have in his pocket, the gold jewelry he wore, and the fancy car he drove, unbelievingly and frustratingly, there was no money in killing a mob boss, only revenge. The same thing was true with a drug dealer. As much as she wanted to target a drug dealer for getting her hooked on drugs, she couldn't. Now clean, now not as emotional in her thinking and in her revenge, she saw things more clearly now. With her a pasty white Caucasian woman, albeit a very beautiful woman and wickedly sexy, she wouldn't make it 100 yards near the drug dealer's domain. Moreover, with drug dealers armed to the teeth in the way of ISIS rebels, and with her not even owning a gun, she'd be no match for them. She'd have to do some research on who to kill first. She'd have to identify the bad men, the men that no one would miss and that no one would care were dead. One by one, she'd take them out and in the way that she took her boyfriend's money, she'd take their money too, so that she could not only survive but also thrive. Only, the men that had the money also had power and influence, three things she didn't have. The men with money, power, and influence could take her out before she could take them out. Her secret weapon was her big brain and the element of surprise. Never let them see you coming was her motto. In the way that she was smart about murdering her doctor and murdering her boyfriend, she had to be smart about murdering men who not only used and abused her but also who took physical, emotional, and sexual advantage of women and/or children. If she only killed powerful men who abused and took physical, emotional, and sexual advantage of women and/or children, then she could justify killing them in her mind. Surely, no one but for the pedophile, would care if she murdered a pedophile. A pedophile playground, there were lots of pedophiles in the Catholic Church, even some with money, a lot of money. * * * * * She had to find a man with money who could replenish her pocketbook. She had to find a man in the community that no one would really care if he was dead. She had to find a man who'd be easy to kill. She had to find a man who'd never suspect that he was being targeted. She had to find a man who'd never see her coming. Self-righteous to himself, she had to find a man who was so smugly arrogant in his safety, in his imagined goodness, and secure in his self-perceived honor that he didn't even bother with security. She found such a man in Bishop Timothy O'Brien. With him handling the weekly collections from those churches under his authority, as if he was a mobster who owned a casino, he'd skim from the top before depositing the rest of the money in the Corporate Vatican account. Oxymoronic that a charity such as a church would have a corporate account but the Catholic Churches had not only one corporate account, they had dozens of corporate accounts all over the country and all over the world that funneled their weekly collections to Rome. Suspected of stealing money from those neighborhood church's weekly collections that were in his control, the deposits from bags of collection coins and cash were all funneled through him. Then, if that wasn't enough, there were the larger and sometimes anonymous public donations given to the Catholic charities from which he could skim. Taking from the very poor who needed the money more than he did, she knew Bishop O'Brien had money, a lot of money. Always talking about retiring to Ireland or to live out his life as one of the elder Bishops in Vatican City in Rome, Italy, he seemingly was an easy victim and her next target. She knew he had money hidden somewhere, but where? He couldn't hide his ill-gotten gains in a bank unless he kept his cash in a safety deposit box. Moreover, there'd be no way that she could get him to open his safety deposit box and empty the contents, unless she came up with a plan. The Devil reincarnate, the only way to get to someone like him unhinged was to put the fear of God in him. The only way to get his money was to deliver the Devil to his doorstep. With him above the law and afraid of no man, only God or the Devil could rattle his cage. He had been accused of molesting altar boys when he was a priest thirty years ago. Instead of the church doing something about his crime, they transferred him to another church. Instead of the church taking action against him, they promoted him from Priest to Bishop. He had been transferred six times and continued his abuse against children in each one of his parishes. Then, when he became bishop, being that the hierarchy ignored his bad behavior, he ignored the bad behavior of his parish priests. Instead of defrocking his priests and turning them over to the police for prostitution, he transferred them in the same way that the church transferred him. This was all the justification she needed to murder him. That was all the justification she needed to steal his money. Now, it was time she put the fear of God and/or the Devil in him, enough for him to want to leave town and perhaps retire to his beloved Ireland or to accept a position with the Vatican in Italy. If she could make his life miserable enough here, then he'd want to take his money out of his safety deposit box and flee. * * * * * He lived in a safe community on the best parcel of land in the city. Bordering on lavishly opulent, his house was splendid and worth millions of dollars. For a Bishop, a man of God, and a man of the people, he lived like a King and all at the expense of the Catholic Church. With him ruling the roost in the name of God and making rules and decisions uncontested, he lived like a demi-God more than he did a man of religion, or a man of the Catholic practitioners, or a man of God. Unlike the Nuns who must take a vow of poverty, Catholic Priests don't take such a vow. That's worth repeating. Even though Catholic Nuns must take a vow of poverty, Catholic Priests don't take such a vow. Whatever earnings Nuns receive they give over to their congregation. Whatever earning priests receive they keep. "Wow! That's not right. That's not fair." Priests are paid salaries and are able to buy and own things whereas Nuns are not. A man's world that even stretches to fit religion, it doesn't seem fair that a supposedly holy man should be allowed to accumulate wealth and live in such a fancy house when definitely more holy, Nuns live in a convent. It doesn't seem fair that a Bishop should have a housekeeper and a cook and dine in private while eating the best foods and drinking the best wines when the Nuns must all eat together while not having the best of anything. Just as it's not fair, especially when many religious women are more devotedly holier than many of the supposedly religious men, it's not right that a woman cannot hold a prominent position within the Catholic Church. At least the women don't abuse children. At least the women don't embarrass the church. At least the women don't cost the church millions of dollars in unnecessary lawsuits to settle crimes committed by priests against children. At least the women don't steal the church's money. Even if he wasn't a thief, with everything that he needed supplied by the Catholic Church, she imagined that he was wealthy. A man who didn't have to support a wife, have to pay healthcare, who didn't have children to feed, clothe, and pay college tuitions, and who didn't have to pay rent for where he lived, or pay for the car that he drove must definitely be rich. Without a doubt, Bishop O'Brien was a wealthy man. As rich as a Mafia boss and/or a drug dealer, Bishop O'Brien didn't advertise his wealth with grotesque displays of gold jewelry, and expensive cars. He didn't proclaim that he was someone he wasn't when indeed he was. Yet, in reality, he was just as big a criminal as any Mafia boss and/or drug dealer. * * * * * Rattling his cage, she knew it wouldn't take much for him to take action. She started with writing him letters with all of the names of the boys that he was accused of sexually abusing. With her writing and him receiving a letter every day, she wrote more letters of all names of the boys and all the names of the priests that his transferred priests were accused of sexually abusing. Then, putting him on notice, she threw a brick through his bedroom window with a note attached that read: "God is not happy with you. Repent or die. You must confess your sins. You must answer for what you did to the innocent. The Devil is coming for you for what you did to the children. Repent or die. Repent or die. Repent or die." Because of what was in the note, not wanting to expose his crimes to the police, to have them suspect him guilty, and to have his good name besmirched all over the daily news, she knew that he wouldn't go to the police. Being that he was guilty of such crimes, keeping it quiet and keeping it to himself, she knew that he wouldn't report the incidents of terroristic harassment to anyone. Just as he squashed all of the other crimes that those he directly supervised committed, all of his crimes were squashed too. The Catholic Church was good at keeping things quietly buried, especially when it came to one of their own. Dante Alighieri didn't write his Inferno for no reason. With them deemed the worst of the worst, there was a reason why the Popes were all damned to the Ninth Circle of Hell, the lowest circle of Hell and of the Devil's damnation. Below are direct quotes from Dante's (real name surname Durante) Alighieri's Inferno that Susan mailed to The Most Reverend, Bishop O'Brien. "There is no greater sorrow than to recall our time of joy in wretchedness." "Ye who enter, abandon all hope." "One ought to be afraid of nothing when things possessed of power to do us harm, but things innocuous need not be feared." "Hope not ever to see Heaven. I have come to lead you to the other shore; into eternal darkness; into fire and into ice." "Here pity only lives when it is dead -- Virgil!" "At grief so deep that the tongue must wag in vain; the language of a sense and memory lacks the vocabulary of such pain." "That which had pleased me once, troubled my spirit." "For pride and avarice and envy are the three fierce sparks that set all hearts ablaze." "These dwell among the blackest souls, loaded down deep by sin of differing types. If you sink far enough, you'll see them all." "You've built yourself a God from silver and gold. How does that differ from idol worship, except those people worship one God and you worship one hundred." Her next step was calling in a phony bomb threat in the middle of the night. Rousting him from his sleep, she watched him leaving his house when the police and fire department asked him to leave. After inspecting and sweeping the premises with bomb sniffing dogs, robots, and mechanical devices for two hours, the Bishop returned to bed. Now with angry letters arriving in the mail, bricks thrown through his bedroom window, and a bomb threat, not a stupid man, she knew he'd take his money and run. * * * * * With an antenna innocuously positioned atop of his car trunk, she knew a man who could hack anyone's e-mail account just by positioning his car outside of their house. Figuring that the Bishop wouldn't have sophisticated firewall protection, she paid her friend to hack the bishops e-mail account. With that information, she read his e-mails where, instead of going home to Ireland, he contacted the Vatican for a position in Italy. A man with his power, influence, and connections wouldn't have to wait a year to be transferred. Being that he was close friends with many of the Cardinals, his friends in high positions would give him whatever he wanted. To insure that he received what he wanted, he lied. He wrote the Cardinal that he wasn't in good health and wanted to finish out his career in Rome. With that lie, his transfer to Rome was eminent. She read the e-mail he wrote to order his plane ticket. From there, it was watching and waiting for him to go to the bank. The day before he was scheduled to leave, he visited the bank and with her standing in the lobby, she watched him disappear behind the gate where they kept the safety deposit boxes. Not even walking to the teller to exchange his cash for a bank check, he carried his cash in a briefcase. Good luck with him getting through customs and getting that amount of money on a plane. Maybe because he was a Bishop, they wouldn't check his bag. Maybe because he was a rich Bishop, he'd hire a private plane, one that would otherwise avoid the close scrutiny of the TSA and Homeland Security. Maybe he'd ship the money ahead by special courier, under the guise of official church business. Whatever he planned on doing, she was getting a hold of that money first. Whatever he was planning on doing, she'd never allow him to leave the country with her money. With him leaving early the next morning, he gave his cook and housekeeper the next two weeks off with pay for them to take a break before transitioning to care for the new Bishop, his replacement. Certainly, with him suddenly leaving, it would take some weeks before the church found his replacement. With the church attendances and collections declining, and with the church closing more and more churches, they'd be in no hurry to put another costly Bishop in position. She tailed him back to his house where she had a surprise waiting for him. Being that he was such a public figure and with him giving so very many interviews, everything she needed to know about him was right there online. She paid a man $20 to deliver a tray of extra-large, juicy shrimp, the Bishop's favorite food, and a bottle of superior vintage, fine French wine. Easy to poison the shrimp, she injected poison through the wine bottle cork with a syringe. She flatted down the tiny needle hole in the cork to show that the wine wasn't opened and/or tampered with and that would soon be covered by the hole created by the corkscrew. Beauty and the Beast Within Ch. 03 The poison was something that could be digested and that wouldn't show up in his blood. If anything, he'd appear as if he had suffered a heart attack. If anything, she'd be doing him a favor by taking possession of his money. If anything, he'd be one less powerfully, influential man to abuse his power, abuse women, and abuse children. * * * * * Wearing gloves, stealthily, quietly, and without making a sound, she entered through his unlocked bathroom window. She heard him before she saw him. He was on the floor holding his stomach and gasping for air. Perhaps if she had dialed 911 before leaving with his briefcase full of money, she may have saved him. Only, it was better this way with no one finding his dead body for a day or two or longer now that the cook and the housekeeper were on leave for a couple of weeks. "Help," he said gasping for air. She stepped over him to take ownership of his briefcase. Lugging the small suitcase to her, it must have weighed twenty-five pounds. When she opened it, stacked neatly inside were rows and rows of hundred dollar bills stacked on top of one another. Each pack of money had a five thousand dollar band tightly wrapped around it. Fifty, one hundred dollar bills to a stack. With four rows of ten, there was two hundred thousand dollars on the top row and it went five rows deep, a million dollars. Somehow this holy man and this man of God, had accumulated a million dollars in cash. The thieving bastard had a million dollars. A man devoted to God, how does he accumulate a million dollars in cash without stealing it? Just as she was about to leave him there and abscond with his money, she noticed a second briefcase. He had another briefcase just like the first. She opened that too. In the same way the first briefcase was packed, so wasn't the second one. Two million dollars in cash. She had two million dollars in cash. With this kind of money and with her moving far away, somewhere they couldn't extradite her, Belize, Switzerland, or the Cayman Islands perhaps, she'd be set for life. To be continued...