Chapter 10: Good Old Fashioned Villain

"You'll see him in your nightmares, you'll see him in your dreams. He'll appear out of nowhere but he ain't what he seems. You'll see him in your head, on the TV screen and hey buddy, I'm warning you to turn it off. He's a ghost, he's a god, he's a man, he's a guru. You're one microscopic cog in his catastrophic plan, designed and directed by his red right hand"- Nick Cave & Bad Seeds

Salome hurried through the busy hospital hallway. An annoying buzz filled her ears as she hurried passed the nurses that hurried on their routes to the other patients that had just arrived from injuries from the blast. She felt a dizziness come over her but she pushed it away as she forced herself forward.

"Mrs. Martin, you need to go back to your room," a young blonde nurse begged as she grabbed Salome by her shoulders to stop her from going to her intended destination.

Salome glared at her and shoved the woman's hands off of her in anger.

"You need to go back to your room," the nurse begged sweetly as she took in Salome's small cuts that lined her upper cheek and neck from where the glass had cut into her body after the explosion, "Come on, I'll help you back."

Salome grabbed the woman's arm and ripped it from her shoulder and hissed, "Get the hell off of me!"

She pushed the nurse to the side and continued on her way down the hall until she reached the room that she had been trying to get to. As she entered the room the buzzing noise in her ears escaped her and gave her to hear the extremely loud orders of the working nurses in the halls.

Salome hurried toward the bed where her husband still lay comatose. She hurriedly placed a kiss upon his cold and chapped lips as a sob escaped her as she looked down on his emotionless face.

"You really need to be in your own room, Mrs. Martin," Dr. Peele announced as he looked in on the traumatized woman.

She turned quickly and hurried toward him. She grabbed the door and glared at him as her knuckles turned white from the immense force that she was applying to the door. She wished that it could be his own head that she was grasping as she glared into his sparkling eyes that were so full of youth, a youth that she had never really experienced. Those eyes were mocking her.

"Why don't you shut your pie hole," she asked in anger as she slammed the door in a furious rage in his face.

Salome moved quickly back to her husband and sat upon the bed by his side and looked down on him. She could have died and she still had no idea on who was trying to kill her.

"That god damned squaw," Salome hissed as she looked down at Albert, "It couldn't have been her…them."

She shook her head as she placed his limp hand in her own dirtied hand. She felt tears escape her as she looked down at their hands. Their wedding rings matched up perfectly, both made of the prettiest of gold and sharpest diamonds. He had truly cared about their wedding rings and the vows that they had made together.

"I don't know what to do Albert," she whispered as she closed her eyes, "I tried so hard and got so far. Now it seems that I have to lose everything for everything to be back to normal," she raised his soft hand toward her lips and placed a soft kiss upon his hand, "I need you Albert. There's evil in this town and…and…I'm scared."

She felt another sob escape her. She had never felt so hopeless and scared before in her life. She didn't know how to stop any of this. For the first time she had no answers, she wasn't the one that could raise her hand and offer a solution.

The beeps of the machines around her took her away from her thoughts and back to the present. Salome looked at her husband and smiled as she moved a strand of his salt and pepper hair out of his eyes once again.

"I remember when we first met," she whispered with a smile as memories came running back to her.

Salome and her young assistant, Molly James, walked hurriedly up the steps of the capitol building. Molly was hurriedly jotting down Salome Buck's demands for her current homicide case. Salome walked in a quick pace; her sharp stilettos were clacking against the concrete as she hurried toward the door. Her black skirt moved with her lean body as she moved as if the cloth was a part of her skin.

"So you want me to get the case on Lana Winters ready," Molly asked.

Salome rolled her eyes as she pulled her leather bag upon her shoulder as they entered the busy halls of the capitol building. She pulled her sunglasses from her face and placed them inside of her leather bag and turned to look for the office that she needed.

"Did I not just say that," Salome asked in irritation.

"Yes mam," Molly said as she looked toward the ground in slight shame, "So what are we doing here, Ms. Buck?"

Salome smiled and asked, "Do you read the papers Ms. James?"

Molly watched as Salome shoved the heavy newspaper into her hand. She looked down to see a picture of the current senator walking up the steps of the court house. She looked at the headline and shook her head as the words "SCANDAL IN SC!" staring back at her in black, bold letters.

"Senator Martin," Molly asked as she followed in Salome's retreating footsteps as she made her way down the hallway, "You are planning on helping him?"

Salome smiled and replied, "I'm bored."

"But why," Molly asked as she watched Salome turn her back on her and jiggle with the door knob of the Senator's office, "Everyone knows that he did it!"

"Molly," Salome announced happily as she turned on her heel and gave her assistant a bright smile, "Sweetie, don't ever question me."

Molly nodded and lowered her gaze from Salome's almost unnatural burning eyes that seemed as if ever hidden truth of the world was alive in those dark orbs.

"Yes mam," she muttered as she watched Salome's eyes glitter in excitement.

"Molly," Salome announced brightly, "You're fired."

"Fired," Molly asked as she looked up at her boss. She was taken aback by this new turn of events.

"Yes," Salome answered as her brows rose, waiting to see how her young assistant would act with this crushing news that she had just perfectly delivered. She watched as the young woman bit back tears and moved slightly away from her, but did not take her leave. It seemed as if the girl was at a loss of what to do.

"Go away Molly," Salome demanded in a singsong voice as she opened the Senator's door and walked inside, closing it back, and taking her place against the wall to wait for Albert Martin's arrival.

Salome did not have to wait long before the door opened and Albert Martin walked into the dark office without noticing Salome standing in the dark corner with a large smile on her face. The smell of his cologne wafted through the air and made its home in her nostrils where it threatened to make Salome weak in the knees, but she held on strong as she watched him talking into the cell phone.

"I told him that," the senator announced in anger to his lawyer on the other end of the line. "I told him that-"

The signal was lost as he made his way to his desk and turned on the small lamp that sat upon his desk to illuminate the room.

"Hello," he announced into the phone and shook it for a moment in his hand, "Hello?"

He shook his head in irritation and said as he threw his phone upon his cluttered desk, "The devil."

"Oh come now," Salome announced as she pulled herself out of the dark shadows to reveal herself to the handsome, aging senator, "I'm not all that bad."

Albert turned quickly from where he stood and took in the dark haired woman that had an air about her that demanded respect. He couldn't help the smile that tugged at the corners of his mouth as he looked at her dark eyes.

"I recognize you," he announced with a smile as he pointed at her as she stopped in front of him, "You're that little lawyer. You're Salome-"

"Buck," she said with a large grin as she watched him sit in his chair. She felt a strange attraction to this aging senator and she liked it.

"That's Buck with a B," she added with a large grin as she looked into his wondrous eyes, "Not an F."

He chuckled at her flirtations as he looked into her dark eyes. He felt a strange pull inside of him, as if his breath was being sucked away from him as if a succubus had landed upon his chest and was on a mission to leave him breathless. That's how the young lawyer affected him.

"How can I help you, Ms. Buck," he asked with southern charm poisoning each of his words as he looked at her pale skin that seemed to be reminiscent of women from a time that was gone with the wind.

"How's the scandal," she asked with a smile, ignoring his questions completely.

He smiled at her and replied, "They've dropped all investigations."

"I knew they would."

Albert smiled at her reply as he sized her up. She certainly looked as if she could stand her ground. He had heard of her and her father. He had heard the horrible story. He had heard about how she survived such a horrible event.

"How," he asked simply.

She chuckled and replied casually, "I sent a half a million dollar check in support of their foolish cause with one condition…the condition that this little mob thing gets hidden under the table. They were made aware that I have friends in all places, it didn't take very much to persuade them."

"Bribery," Albert asked as he raised a brow at the dark haired angel standing in front of his desk, "That's illegal. You can't do that."

"Of course I can! This is America," Salome hissed harshly, allowing her temper to rear its ugly head for only a moment, "It's how I rule the world."

He smiled at her reply and said, effectively allowing the proverbial bomb to drop, "How's your brother Sally May?"

Salome stopped momentarily and looked into his eyes and gave him a soft smile before she allowed her cold exterior to be put back in its proper place.

"Still a thorn in my side," she answered in agitation.

"You've become more successful than your older brother," Albert informed her with a growing smile as he watched her sashay like a wild jungle cat hunting her prey toward him.

"I don't have an Achilles' Heel," she informed him as she placed her hands upon the armrests of his chair and looked deeply into his eyes, "I am invincible. No one can stop me, I am in control."

"So what did you come here for? You don't need me," he asked, "It takes a lot to leave Trinity."

Salome chuckled as the senator talked about his home town. She placed her index finger under his chin and forced him to look at her and nowhere else.

"You now as well as I do, Senator Martin," she stated with a wicked glint in her eyes, "That nobody chooses anything in Trinity, Trinity chooses for you. It's up to the town if you leave or not."

"Ahh," Albert said with the same wicked glint in his eyes, "The myth of free will."

"Exactly," she replied with a smile wink as she pulled slightly away from him as an overwhelming feeling washed over her like an ocean wave beating down on her on a hot summer day.

"So what does this have to do with-"

"You and I are special," she informed him, successfully cutting him off midsentence, "We are the same. Salome and Albert…it's fate."

"So why are you here, Sally May," he asked as he watched her push herself away from him.

"To tell you that I owe you," she answered casually as she sashayed toward the door to leave his office just as quickly as she had appeared inside.

"You owe me," he asked in slight confusion and then allowed a bright smile to expand over his shaved face as he said in his most Southern voice, "My, my, Ms. Buck, you are nothin' like your big brother."

"I'm nothing like Lucas," she informed him quickly as she stopped and turned to look at him, "We are completely different beings."

Salome smiled at him and turned to walk back toward the door. She opened it only to hear the senator rattling around inside of his desk and calling her name that sent an unwarranted shiver down her spine.

"8 o'clock," he informed her with a smile as he looked into her eyes, "Meet me at the bar."

She smiled at him as she watched him straighten out his black three piece suit and asked, "Are you askin' me out on a date Senator Martin?"

"Yes. I think I am Ms. Buck."

"What bar," she asked.

Albert shrugged his shoulders at her question and chuckled as he replied, "If we meet up at the same bar tonight then we know that we are destined."

"Destined for what," she asked as she felt a deep red blush burning at her pale cheeks.

"Maybe love."

Salome chuckled at his response and shrugged her shoulders, "I can never see myself in what everyone calls love nowadays."

"Neither can I," Albert replied with sparkling eyes as he looked her over once again as she turned away from him to take her leave.

"8 it is," she answered as she opened the door and left him alone in his office for the last time. After that day he would always have company inside this office.

...

Abby walked through the busy hospital hall as nurses moved quickly passed her to help one of the victims of the explosion. She received no injuries from the blast; she owed it all to Salome for falling on top of her during the initial wave that had moved passed them.

"Where's Mary Murphy," she asked quickly as she pulled a blonde nurse by the elbow and jerked her from her path to face her.

"I'm sorry miss but I-"

"WHERE IS SHE?"

"She's in the cursed room," the nurse explained, "It was the only room that we had left after the explosion."

"The cursed room," Abby asked in confusion as she shook her head, "Isn't that where Caleb's mother-"

"Threw herself from the window," the nurse finished and nodded, "its right there," she pointed toward a door with chipped white paint that was closed, "I have to go help the others."

"Fine," Abby answered as she let go of the nurse's elbow and looked over to the closed door. She felt her heart beating fast. Panic filled her when she was told that Mary had been rushed into the hospital just minutes before the explosion.

She had thought that Salome or Zachery had something to do with the explosion, but why would one of them allow themselves to be harmed in the explosion? It certainly did not fit Salome Martin's or Zachery's personality that she had observed for the last few months that she had lived in Trinity, South Carolina.

She knew that there was something more powerful at play in this town. Her lover had been an unlucky victim of that power.

She hurried into the room and closed the door behind her as she announced happily as if she did not have a worry about why her lover was in the hospital, "You won't believe it Mary! Salome and the sheriff are siblings!"

Mary smiled softly as she looked out the window that was nailed shut as a precaution to keep a patient from jumping to their death from the third floor of the hospital.

"I knew you wouldn't care," Mary whispered sadly as she turned away from the shut window and looked at the ash covered reporter. She was no longer looking at her lover, she was looking at a reporter that lusted after a story like a leech lusts after fresh blood.

"What," Abby asked as she looked at the pale face of Mary. She was unaware of the shaking hands of Mary as she moved closer toward her lover.

"You had a relapse," Abby stated casually with a shrug of her shoulders and a bright smile.

Mary shook her head in anger as hot tears fell down her cheeks and ran down her long neck. She quickly wiped them away as Abby shook her head in agitation.

"Look," Abby said, "If you are looking for sympathy then you're looking at the wrong person to give it to you."

Mary felt a blind fury move through her. She balled her fists that still burned from whatever had been laced into the heroin.

"I was poisoned," Mary informed Abby in anger, "Some kind of drug was slipped into the heroin that I took."

"What," Abby asked. Her mind started racing for answers that could answer the question of who had the ability to hide a powerful drug inside of another drug.

"Do you know who did it?"

"Yeah," Mary answered loudly as she rolled her eyes in agitation and exhaustion, "The man that fixed our busted window, but according to the sheriff and his deputy there is no such person by the name of Jackson Jumper in this town! They think that I'm crazy and that I burned my veins on purpose!"

Abby shook her head as she moved toward her lover, but stopped quickly as Mary jerked away from her reach. She looked at her as a hint of resentment crossed Mary's face. She felt her heart beating quickly as Marry shook her head.

"Mary," Abby said in a soft voice, "Lucas and Salome are in on all of this. Everything that happens is because of them. They use this town-"

"This town," Mary screamed in anger, "This town!?"

Abby watched as Mary bit at her lip in an attempt to keep the anger down. In their long life together she had never witnessed Mary lose her temper like she was now.

"I'm sick of hearing you talk about this town," Mary hissed, aggravation laced her words, "about the Bucks with a B," she shook her head once again, "It's like this town has possessed you, Abigail!"

Abby felt a smile pulling at the corners of her lips as she recalled Salome's words on the idea of obsession and possession.

"It's what they want you to-"

"Get out," Mary demanded harshly, effectively cutting off Abby's explanation.

"What," Abby asked in confusion.

"You heard me," she answered, "I'm done with this place! I'm leaving as soon as I'm able."

"But Mary," Abby said as she looked at the harsh eyes of her once weak lover, "I love you."

"No," Mary screamed. The window in the corner of the room rattled at the intensity of her voice. Her eyes bore into the reporter's eyes.

"You love yourself," Mary informed her as she waved her hands around her in agitation, "And that's all you will ever have," she waved toward the door, "Now please, Abigail, leave."

Abby nodded as she pulled herself away from her longtime lover. She walked out of the room and closed the door behind her. She stayed in that place, contemplating the things that Mary had just revealed to her.

Mary turned quickly and jumped slightly as a bloody Native American woman stood in the corner glaring at her with black soulless eyes. The burning sensation reappeared through her body like fire consuming the thin veins throughout her body as she watched the woman smile wickedly at her.

"Death," the woman hissed and pointed toward the nailed window.

A hot wind blew across Mary's face as she looked at the window. She watched as a smoky vision of a frightened woman in a floral sun dress flung herself through the window. There was no sound, there was no shattered glass. The woman just faded away as she moved through the glass as she had done years before.

Mary took a deep breath as her feet moved against her will toward the window. She could hear the chanting and howls from the tribe waiting below her as she edged closer and closer to the window.

...

Salome placed another soft kiss upon Albert's chapped lifeless lips as a single hot tear fell from her cheek and landed upon his cheek.

"We've come so far," she whispered in his ear as she lingered above his face, "I owe you still, Albert."

"Mrs. Martin," a soft voice announced from behind her. She turned to see Floyd, one of Lucas' dimwitted officers, standing in the doorway alone with handcuffs in his hands. She moved quickly away from her husband and stood tall as she glared into his green eyes.

"What is it Floyd," she asked harshly as she wiped the remaining tears out of her eyes.

"I have to take you in," he answered sadly yet not moving from his place in the door frame. He did not dare make a sudden movement when it came to Salome Martin. She could find a way to get all of his money in some law suit. He wasn't that dumb.

"Take me in," she asked in confusion, "On whose authority?"

"For attempted murder," Floyd answered quickly.

"On whose god damned authority Floyd," she screamed as she rushed toward him as a wave of rage crashed over her that threatened to pull her under to her ultimate undoing.

"On mine," Lucas spoke up as he moved from behind Floyd and forced his little sister to turn around in one move.

She hissed in anger as he placed the cold metal handcuffs around her thin wrists as he said, "Nice tattoo Sally May."

Salome smiled as he jerked her back around to face him. She glared at the two men as she jingled the cuffs behind her back in defiance.

"Is this protecin' your own," she asked bitterly, "Puttin' them in handcuffs? People may talk that don't know the truth about us Lucas."

"Let's go Sally," Lucas announced as he pulled his sister out of her husband's room and into the busy hall were everyone stopped to watch as she was hauled out of the hospital.

"Just like old times," she said with a chuckle as they both walked out of the hospital. Her heels clicked upon the ground as he lightly pushed her forward to his blue town car.

"What," Lucas asked just as a loud clashing was heard from above them followed by the piercing scream of a passing by patient.

Salome and Lucas watched as Mary Murphy fell from her third story room and landed miraculously upon the grassy lawn instead of on the hard concrete that made up most of the surrounding area. Salome glanced upwards and smiled at Abby who was looking down at her fallen lover as doctors and nurses hurried to save Mary's slipping life. She smiled at the sparkling shards of glass that surrounded the young teacher and allowed a chuckle to escape her lips as she looked back at Lucas who was looking at her with the same knowing eyes.

"You'd think that if one would want to commit suicide that they would open the window first," Salome announced as she gave a small wink to Abby above her.

Lucas shrugged his shoulders and replied as he helped his younger sister into the backseat of his car, "Some people live off of being overly dramatic."

"You would know," Salome announced with a smile as she watched her brother close the door on her.

Will poor Mary ever get a break?!

And how'd you like how Albert & Salome met?