The next few moments were a haze, Bella remembered shouting, screaming and blood she could remember exactly what happened but she knew two thing the burning in her throat was gone and there was now three bodies in the room with her.
Looking down on what used to be two human bodies Bella felt disgust unlike anything she had felt before, the one that lay at her feet could barely be recognised as human. Most of the skin was gone leaving exposed flesh littered with teeth marks giving it the look of tenderized meat, the head was attached to the torso only by a couple of threads She assumed were tendons and parts of the spine. The face was covered in claw marks which had removed any distinguishing features, Bella feeling of revulsion rose and her hand darted up to her mouth and sweet smell filled her nose, looking down at her hand she saw it was covered in blood and small chucks of flesh was stuck under her nails. Is that hair in the chunks? Those claw marks were hers?
The other was easier to see as a person the only damage was a gaping wound on the side of the neck his face was frozen in surprise, disgust was quickly replaced by guilt and shame. Had she really done this? Why had she? How?
A loud burst of static broke the silence and pulled Bella out of her own head
BTZZZ come in unit 3, over BTZZ
The voice came out in unison between the two radios fixed to the belts of the men, "these guys were cops" she murmured "I killed two cops"
BTZZZ unit 3 come in, over BTZZ
BTZZ unit 4 here i'm a few blocks away i'm going to investigate over BTZZ
Fear began to rise in Bella the image of the open doorway and the bloody hallway being in clear view from the street popped into her mind, but she was surprised how clear headed she felt no panic set in or pushed her into action she thought carefully about her options as if she had all the time in the world. Calmy Bella walked over to the front door not caring about treading through her own blood and pushed the door shut locking it to be sure, "that will buy me a couple of seconds" she thought but seconds seemed like enough time as she began to analyse her situation.
The two policemen were dead. She was covered in their blood. She for whatever reason had killed them. Her mother was dead too. But after killing two cops the police would probably assume she killed her two. Arizona is a death penalty state.
Bella heard a car roll over the gravel in the driveway as it pulled up to the house, "I need to get out of here" she thought "if i can't be found they might assume i was kidnapped, a lot of my blood is on the floor and there was another person here" anger within her began to bubble at the thought of the Stranger "so either they figure out i killed these men or they think i was taken, either way i need to disappear". The engine of the car outside shut off and Bella could hear the creak of a door swinging open, for a second she was amazed by her own hearing but the urgency of the situation pushed its way back into her head. "I need money" she thought, quickly Bella dug through the pocket of the two men in front of her and pulled out their wallets, they had $100 between them "It will have to do" she sighed returning the wallet to where she'd found them. The sound of boots walking along the gravel spurred her on, next Bella ran to her room and retrieved money from her hidden stash, she kept it inside the battery compartment of an old stereo she'd found in the attic. The money was supposed to go towards a dress for prom but needs must she thought.
A light knock came from the front door "Hello is anyone home?" Bella shoved the bills into a jacket pocket and looked down at her blood stained clothes "this will definitely get me noticed" she muttered and grabbed some clothes from her chest of draws, she didn't have time to change here she'd just have to cross her fingers and hope she wasn't noticed until she could change. She bundled the clothes into her school bag and slung it over her shoulder, with everything she needed Bella strode through her house to the living room once more where a couple of screen doors looked out onto the garden. Heart strings pulled as she saw her mother again still laying in her own blood, Bella didn't want to leave her there like that but knew she had to go "I'll find him Mum" she whispered "I'll find him and make him pay, i promise you". Carefully Bella pulled open the door and slowly closed it behind her, She heard the policeman at the front of the house shouting orders through the door but Bella tuned him out needing to concentrate on her escape. Running up to the fence she hopped over and quickly made her escape.
Bella managed to remain unnoticed as she fled the house after a few minutes she arrived at a familiar house, a friend used to live there years ago but had to move the first year of highschool, the orange painted house was now owned by a rich couple from New york who used used it as a winter home. Snowbirds Bella's mother had called them and they had yet to migrate south for the winter so the house was empty. Sneaking around the back Bella found the back door, it was hardly a secure door, it had two glass panels which allowed someone looking in to clearly see the door handle on the other side. Pulling a shirt from her bag Bella wrapped it around her fist like she had seen criminals do on the true crime shows she used to watch and punched the glass. The entire panel shattered as Bella's first passed through it with no resistance, Bella jumped back shocked at what she'd done "that's a lot easier than they make it look on tv" she thought.
Reaching through the opening she unlocked the door and swung it open before cautiously stepping inside, the interior was very different to how Bella remembered it, the living room seemed to have been converted into a dining room with a large oak table in the center, the kitchen had been updated and was now filled with expensive looking pots pans and a variety of different culinary machines. The coffee machine tempted her but at the same time the thought of drinking anything made her stomach turn which she assumed was due to stress or her nerves. Looking through her hazy childhood memories Bella quickly remembered how to find the bathroom and made a beeline for it. It was a small room obviously meant to be a secondary bathroom to another somewhere in the house but it would suit Bella purposes, first she stripped the blood stained clothes off herself and pulled on some of the spare clothes she had brought, she chose a simple generic outfit so as not to draw attention basic jeans and black pullover hoodie combo nothing that couldn't be found in millions of people wardrobes or in every shop across the globe. Once changed she shoved her bloody PJs into her bag, as she did she saw the state of her hands and remembered that her face was probably similarly covered in dried blood. Turning to the sink Bella turned of the tap and held her hands under the warm water expecting the blood to wash away but it had dried to her hands and stuck under her nails and all the little creases of her skin, she noticed a block of soap by the basin so she grabbed it and began to scrub.
After a few minutes the last of the blood finally left Bella hands, she held them up to examine and once she was happy they were clean she decided to move onto the next problem area the face. The trail of blood started around her mouth were it was darkest and ran down to her neck where it stopped as it had met her shirt, pooling the water in her palm Bella was about start on her face when something caught her eye. Her reflection in the mirror above the sink was wrong, Bella found herself staring into eyes she didn't recognise they were as red as the blood that clung to her mouth. At first she thought it was just a splash of on the mirror but when she tried to clean it with her sleeve her eyes were still a dark crimson red.
They weren't her eyes, they were his. The same hungry eyes that Bella had seen on her mother's killer were now staring back at her. Anger built inside Bella as memories began to replay in her head again and again. His teeth around her neck. The blood pooling on the floor. Her mother's body hitting the ground with a sickening thud. The stranger. His eyes.
Her fist flew into the mirror shattering it into countless pieces.