Free Once Upon a Halloween by Richard Laymon Page A

and all of a sudden the noose goes over my head and someone pulls it. Like there was a guy behind me doing it, some kinda maniac."
        In his peripheral vision, Hunter saw Eleanor turn her head toward him. Even though he still heard her urine drilling the water, he lookedat her. She asked, "What's the story? This place got ghosts?"
        "I wouldn't know," Hunter said. "I've never been here before I just ran here to get away from you and those other creeps."
        "It's got something," she said.
        "That's for sure."
        "Maybe it's just in that room. You know? Maybe it can't get out. You never know. Weird shit has rules all its own."
        "I guess so."
        "I know so. I'm into some pretty weird shit, myself, in case you didn't notice."
        "I noticed."
        The splashing sound stopped. She reached sideways and spun a roll of toilet paper. "Don't know what that was. Ghosts, they can't do shit like that." She reached down with some paper. "Or so they say."
        Standing up, she twisted around and flushed the toilet. When she turned in Hunter's direction, he saw an angry red stripe high around her neck. Then his eyes traveled downward.
        "Give me a second," she said. She faced the sink, turned the faucet on, and put a hand under the spout to feel the water. " I just wanta wash up."
        "Okay."
        She glanced down at the front of his jeans and smirked. She didn't make a crack, though. Turning away, she bent low over the sink and dipped water up to her face. She rubbed her bloodstainted face with both hands, pink water spilling down her chin and neck and forearms.
        Done cleaning her face, she straightened up slightly, splashed water onto her chest and rubbed her breasts with both hands. She moved them around, squeezed them, swirled her hands all over them. When she finished, they looked clean and shiny and the nipples were stiff.
        Staring at herself in the mirror above the sink, she said, "So what do you wanta do, Hunter?"
        He shrugged. "Get you out of here, I guess."
        "You guess."
        "Yeah."
        She splashed lower, washed the blood off the small cut a few inches above her navel, then splashed her entire belly. As she splashed and rubbed, rosy water spilled downward, slicking her groin, trickling down her legs, making a wet place on the gray rug under her feet.
        She stared down at herself. "That's better," she said. She turned to Hunter. "Better?"
        He nodded.
        "Still think you don't wanta fuck me?" He shook his head.
        She smirked. "All evidence to the contrary aside, huh?" She pulled a towel off a bar and dried her face.
        "I want to get Connie back," Hunter said.
        Eleanor rubbed her neck with the towel. "The gal you were with at the graveyard?"
        "Yeah."
        "She your girlfriend?"
        "I guess so."
        Eleanor's towel-wrapped hand massaged one breast, then the other. "Maybe she got away."
        "If she didn't, I want them to let her go. And I want them to let Shannon and Laura go, too."
        "Don't want much, do you?"
        "If they want you back, they'll let 'em go."
        She chuckled, patted her cut with the towel, then began drying herself below the cut. "You want to trade me for them, is that it?"
        "That's the idea. Do you think it'll work?"
        She shrugged. "Might." Running the towel down her right leg, she bent over and Hunter watched how her breasts hung from her chest and swayed. "You never know. I'm pretty popular... at least with the guys in the group." She straightened up, then bent over again and dried her left leg. "Yeah, they might go for a trade. It 's sure worth a try. Hell, I'm all for it."
        Done drying herself, she tossed the towel to the floor.
        Hunter backed away from the door as she walked toward him He stopped with his rump against the newel post at the top of the stairway. He held the sword in