A/N: Once again thanks to everyone who has given feedback. I really appreciate it. This was a story I had no intention of writing until someone talked me into it.
Tonight was the night.
It was going to happen.
It had to happen.
Rita smiled as she looked over at Dexter who was driving through the town of Miami. She had the sudden urge to take his hand so she did. He looked at her surprised but he smiled. He knew what she was feeling. He felt the same way.
Tonight was the night.
They had planned everything down to the last detail. It was part of the ritual; the wonderful calming ritual. She had always enjoyed helping Dexter research his kills but this time it was different. Rita felt it in her bones. Her blood was buzzing with anticipation for tonight.
Dexter of course had tried to talk her out of it. When they had gotten back from the park he had tried to convince her that this wasn't her. She wasn't like him. She wasn't a killer but he had known. He had known for awhile now. Something had changed inside of her. She was evolving. He tried to blame himself but it wasn't his fault and she told him as much. Something dark had been growing deep down inside of her for such a long time she just didn't know what it was until she had met Dexter.
So he helped her research. He trained her for what was about to come. It had been daunting in a way; the knowledge he was giving her. He was teaching her to be an effective killer; like him. He was making her in his image.
And that's exactly what she wanted.
She knew why the others had failed. Why they had failed him. Dexter both was and wasn't like other serial killers. Most had no role model to teach them. Most had no role models to teach them how to be; much of anything. Most grew up to hate their parents; Dexter admired his. He loved his adoptive family with a fierceness that he didn't quite understand. Rita understood though; she loved her family the same way and Dexter was a part of that family.
Dexter had been taught how to be a serial killer by a police officer. A man with a conscience had raised Dexter; and although he had no discernable conscience of his own the Code of Harry could be seen as one. It was conscience by proxy and when the others he had tried to train had broken the code it had disappointed Dexter greatly.
And Dexter was a man who didn't take disappointment well.
Rita was determined to follow the code.
Not just because she had to but because she understood it.
She believed in it.
And she believed in Dexter.
Together they had researched the man they had seen in the park. The man who had made Rita's blood boil. The irony of his name being Paul didn't escape her. It fit almost too well. They had quickly discovered that he had already done time for child molestation. Rita so very much wanted him to be the one.
However he wasn't a killer.
Dexter was uncomfortable with killing someone who wasn't a killer. He had told her about the child molester he had killed in a moment of rage when he had followed him to his house. Apparently Dexter had seen him with pictures of Astor in a bathing suit. Rage was an interesting emotion. One that Rita was only beginning to understand.
In the end they decided to follow him for a few days if nothing came of it then they would move on. Dexter promised to let her kill the next one no matter who he was. Then one night they followed him to his grave sites.
Apparently he hadn't enjoyed prison and started killing the children he had molested so that way they couldn't testify against him. This little fact put him back in the game. It was going to happen.
Rita could feel it.
Finally the day came. They had convinced Debra to watch the kids while they went out on a date night. It wasn't exactly a lie; they just didn't tell her what kind of date night they were planning.
This was a very special kind of date.
A date that involved a child molester name Paul.
...
"Who are you?" Paul said as he woke up in the cold dark shack.
"Don't you recognize this place?" Rita smiled at him. Dexter had remained in the darkness. They had planned it that way. This was about Rita and her Dark Passenger. If things got out of hand then he would get involved,. Until then he would just watch. "Isn't this where you bring your conquests?"
Rita walked over to the swinging marker board that held the pictures of four young boys who were all Cody's age. They had all been killed by this man. Dexter and she had found the bodies. He had just dumped them like trash.
"No, it wasn't me." He tried to plead.
"Yes it was." Rita walked over to him and smiled brightly from above, "It was you. Neither one of us would be here if it wasn't. The cops couldn't pin anything on you but we both know it was you."
"I'm sorry." He paused crying now, "I couldn't help it."
"You killed them." Rita said more then asked.
"Yes. Please let me go."
"No." Rita took the knife from the table next to them.
"Oh God." The man cried, "Please don't."
"Is that what they said?" Rita paused, "Did you stop?"
With that she plunged the knife into where she thought the man's heart would be.
The red.
The beautiful, magnificent sticky red.
There was more of it then she thought there would be. Dexter had given her what appeared to be a raincoat to wear and now she understood why. She knew Dexter had never been a boy scout but now she thought he might have missed his calling. He was after all always prepared.
The red continued to flow from the man.
The wonderful red.
She stared at it for a long moment and felt something inside of her.
It calmed.
It stopped.
For the first time since she could remember it all stopped. The worry, the self doubt, the pain, it all stopped and she felt….everything.
"How do you feel?" Dexter stepped out of the shadows.
"I feel…" Rita didn't have the words.
"I know." Dexter understood.
"What happens now?"
Rita had the urge to take a trophy. Wasn't that what one in her situation did? She had just killed a man and she wanted…something to remember it by. She looked at Dexter and saw that he understood.
"Miguel wanted one too; I told him it wasn't a good idea." Dexter paused and went over to the gym bag they brought along and took out a box that held some blood slides, "Later he killed someone else and took a ring. This is what I take."
"Blood?" Rita asked.
"Yes." It made sense in a way. He was after all a blood spatter analyst. Who would think twice if they found him with blood slides? "You can take some if you want."
Did she want that? This was Dexter's thing but then again he was willing to share it with her and she really did want to have a trophy so she said yes and Dexter showed her how to take some blood; just a little and put it on the slide.
A trophy.
A reminder.
Something to remember her very first kill.
And it was just the first.
Just the beginning.
It was going to happen again.