Lucifer Travels-Book #1 in the suspense, mystery thriller Read online

I was born August 27, 1939. 74 years ago in Natchitoches, Louisiana. I still remember that sticky heat in the summertime. I was the youngest of two kids. My sister Caroline was seven years older.

  As kids, we spent most of our time in the backyard. We didn’t have any toys, so my sister and I would end up tossing rocks at this boarded house across the street.

  Mr. Gaines, who lived across the street, always got on us about throwing rocks. Every day, he’d come outside yelling at the top of his lungs, “Y’all better stop throwing them rocks near my window.”

  I didn’t know what all the fuss was about, because he only had one good window. The rest of his windows was boarded up. I guess he was trying to conserve the last good window he had.

  He was such a strange person, always sitting in that chair guarding that window. You’d think there was hidden treasure behind that board, the way he’d guard it every day. It’s strange, but at the same time amazing to see the value people put in the smallest things. We always put value in material things, while just the feeling of love and adoration becomes second. But it wasn’t second to me because I knew what love was. And I found it in an unfamiliar place. It was from my sister Caroline. She was my mother and father. I still remember her tucking me in every night. I was so grateful for her because our real momma didn’t really give a damn. She looked at that television more than she ever looked at us. But it was my father who made her that way. He’d always hit on my momma like she was some kind of punching bag or something. I remember one time he beat her so bad she couldn’t speak out her mouth for weeks.

  So I don’t blame her for not talking to me. I don’t blame her one bit because the worst thing a person can do to someone is to take away your self-worth, and that’s what my father did to my mother.

  It’s sad when you think about it. But at the same time, it’s funny because my father was a hardworking man. He worked sixteen hours a day in that hot sticky Louisiana heat just to support us. I almost never saw him at home. But when he was home, he only did a handful of things, and that’s eat, sleep, and beat my mother.

  That’s one of many things I wish I didn’t remember because it haunts me when I’m alone. Her screams still resonate in my dreams. They transform my fantasies into nightmares. I can still see the blood dripping from her nose while she crawls on the wooden floors as my daddy screams words that I cannot repeat in this confessional.

  I see him pulling out his favorite belt. The same belt he would always use on her. It was a long leather looking strap that was about two inches wide and four feet long.

  Caroline and I had a nickname for it. We called it our pet snake because every time it came out, it was striking somebody and more times than none, that somebody was my mother.

  He would swing that belt so hard as if he was looking for her to give him a different reaction. But it was always the same scream.

  So he’d hit her harder and harder until he was too tired to go on. Caroline would always run to her room, she couldn’t bear the sound. But I watched every moment.

  In my own mind. I became a witness. I’ve watched for years as my mother was beaten and tortured. I’ve seen her burned and I’ve seen her raped. I’ve seen her teeth knocked out and I’ve seen her eyes swollen so bad they wouldn’t open. I’ve seen her humiliated and I’ve seen her ridiculed.

  But what I also saw was her pleading and begging for mercy. Every day, I saw her pray in every single way and still no answer.

  “Please stop,” my mom would beg every time. Every single time.

  But he wouldn’t stop. Stopping would only show weakness. You see, I truly believe that in my father’s mind, the only way he could justify his actions was by tricking himself into believing that my mother deserved every beating. So stopping because she cried would only show that she didn’t deserve it in the first place and that he was wrong. He couldn’t stop. He couldn’t let himself be wrong.

  The crazy thing is that he wasn’t a mean looking man. No, not one bit. He was a handsome man, at least 6 feet 4 inches tall. He had this long curly blond hair that had all the local women envious of my mother. He was strong too. I remember one time in Natchitoches, I saw him kill a crocodile with his bare hands. I swear I did. I could never forget it. My father was like one of those people you couldn’t forget even if you tried.

  Though the one thing I remember the most was his eyes. He had such beautiful eyes. They were as blue as the deepest part of the sea. I remember him staring at me with those same eyes right after he finished beating my mother, every time. He would walk up to me and hug me and ask me softly in a whisper, “Are you okay?”

  I don’t ever remember answering. I just remember staring as he stared back. The crazy thing is that he always looked at me with love, as if he adored me for some reason. Oh, those beautiful blue eyes as blue as the sea. No wonder I’m afraid of water.

  The priest interjects. “Is your father still alive?”

  “No, he died a very long time ago,” replies Daniel.

  “Oh, I see,” says the priest. “And your mother?”

  Daniel exhales stridently. There is still some pain that hasn’t fully been wiped away yet. “She’s dead also.”

  “Do you have any good memories of your family, at all?” asks the priest.

  “I do. As far as I can remember. I believe it was on Christmas and I was 15 years old.”

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  Both Come From Him