Twisted Love

My Girlfriend is an X Murderer.

Chapter 1

The little wooden hammer tapped decisively against its resting place. The commanding voice of the judge soon followed demanding order in the courtroom. I tugged at my tie a little nervously. The decision will be announced shortly, that much I knew. I rubbed my sweaty palms down the sides of my pants and hoped the sweat stains will not show against my Armani suit. I was beyond nervous. I was certainly more nervous than my girlfriend who just sat there in the accused box by her very expensive lawyer, a lawyer that I paid for and humiliatingly pleaded for.

I, Matthew Walts had almost gotten down on my knees and pleaded for that good for nothing but very successful criminal lawyer, my very own uncle Richards Walts. I temporarily closed my eyes against that bitter memory. Never again! Never again will I plead with pompous Richards. Hopefully, that was one dick I would no longer have a use for again.

"Order! Order in the courtroom!" called out the ancient judge.

I was certain his days were numbered. No I was not about to call on my underworld connections and do away with him if he produced an unsavoury verdict. I might do that to Uncle Richards; only it was very likely he knew all the same assassins as I did. We were after all blood related.

No, what I meant was the judge was old and obese besides, I bet the clock was ticking on speed dial for his death watch. I just hoped he lasted long enough to give me a favourable verdict. I had a gut feeling things would go my way for not only had uncle Richard out done himself and made a mockery of the state's case but there was just this inexplicable underlying excitement that claimed an unquestionably victory. Call it my inner sixth sense or just craziness but I knew Lori was walking out of here scot-free.

I was still nervous though, I knew Lori would be as accepting to a negative outcome as she had been six years ago when she was first incarcerated in a mental institution for literally axe murdering her whole adoptive family. Her incarceration at age eleven had gratified an enraged nation. In fact, I was sure she made world news. Even now the angry mob that had picketed outside the courtroom could be heard loud and clear across the noise within the courtroom, itself. The public was in disbelief over the states poor handling of the case thus far. I was not surprised. It had been a miss use of the tax payer's money on all counts. Right from day one the evidence produced had been paltry at most. It had been a sheer impossibility for a slight girl of eleven to even wield the heavy axe let alone use it to hack to pieces three adults and four other children.

Not only had the very possibility of an eleven year old wielding the axe that produced those deaths crazy but the very fact that they had all pointed the finger to the golden haired blue eyed angle who sat before them as the culprit was beyond bizarre.

Even so, I believe I can safely say I was the only one who believed her innocence. Ever since that grotesque event six years back, the public had not forgotten. They had been as vindictive over my friendship with her then as they were now. You'd think it was the public's own families that got so brutally wiped out. You'd think that I was a stranger to the pain of losing loved ones for being so callous in my disregard of the public outcry that my actions have produced. I was not. I knew the pain. I knew it well. Having lost my own parents I could more than relate but I was not about to point the finger at one helpless young girl and lay the blame on her fragile shoulders. I saw her clearly for what she was, a helpless victim of public hatred. It was enough that they had locked her away in that institution for six years without a trial, but no longer. She had suffered her time. Suffered her time for a crime she had not committed. I am putting an end to it.

I was personally excused from falling victim to public hatred unlike my honey Lori was, but that was only cause half the public were enamoured by my amazing looks and unimaginable wealth and the other half just think I am either crazy, enamoured by my girlfriends lovely visage, or just being bratty in having my own way. I can only say, on this aspect, the public was likely right on all counts. I was being bratty in getting my own way. Lori was the most beautiful girl I had ever seen. She was the love of my life and I was as rich and as blindingly handsome as the public says I am. But I was not being hoodwinked by Lori's innocence.

Just like I had my sixth sense tingling over the impending success of this case that same feeling was magnified when considering Lori's innocence. I have been so convinced over that fact since my very first meeting her only days after the horrific incident that was still fresh on the lips of everyone the world over. I had been sitting in the waiting room of yet another famous uncle, this time it was Dr Roberts Walts, a PhD in child psychology. Lori had been escorted in by the cops and she had looked as fragile then as she did now. You might be wondering just what I was doing there at my uncles clinic. Dr Roberts had been treating me over the loss of my own parents only in my case their deaths had not been at my hands and their deaths had happened two years prior. No I was sent there by my aunt Lucy, wife to uncle Roberts for misbehaviour of the delinquent kind. I had been undergoing a rebellious phase and I had been putting my poor aunt to her wits end with my constant bout of tantrums, disobedience and outright rudeness. Alright! I will admit it. I was spoilt, rotten to the core. At sixteen the loss of my parents had hit me hardest and I rebelled over the unfairness of it all for all I was worth. They had been my world just as I had been theirs. A freak accident one night made me an orphan.

A billionaire teenage orphan. My parents had gone out that night for a normal business dinner the sort they regularly went out for, but they had not returned that night. A drunk driver blindsided into them smashing into the side of their Bentley, sending them careening over the cliff that took their life. I had been blissfully asleep in my bed not suspecting the very worst, that they had died only miles from where I lay asleep on the very roads that led to our cliff side, sea view home, Belleview mansion. Then the sun rose and with it came the knowledge of the horrors of night before that snatched my parent's life away and left me alone. Uncle Roberts and his wife took me in as their own. They had no biological child of their own instead had adopted my cousin and the bane of my existence Dominic Walts. It was no surprises really that I had flipped out the next couple of years after and hence landed my butt in Uncle Roberts' office for counselling.

So you might ask, why befriended Lori seeing that she murdered her whole family and when I say whole, I don't just mean mother and father, no my dear Lori had butchered both her brothers, her two sisters and even an adult cousin. Lori had been the youngest in her adoptive family and she had somehow picked up an axe that had been almost the same size as her slight frame and hacked the lot to pieces. Large chunks of course, alright they were still mostly whole, only very bloody and very dead. Yes, I had seen the pictures as had the whole world. A thing like that would leak out from even the tight confines of a safe in the pentagon let alone the local media. It had gone viral like no other news before it ever had. The internet hits alone had cause networks to crash all over. To think that slight frame over there brought the World Wide Web to a halt; well really it was on some of the servers that operated it but still. The impact had been huge.

I still recall with great clarity our first meeting. I had been waiting for my uncle to finish up after our little catch up in which he had tried his damndest with a little reverse psychology to get me to amend my ways. I had been fifteen then and already on my way to purgatory for my many sins. I was at the point of no return.

So there I was sitting in the waiting room, seriously at the cross roads of my life and giving my future a real thought for the very first time since my parents passing, when the frail looking Lori sat right opposite me. At first, I had failed to recognise who she was, the pictures that had been splashed across the media had showed a very different Lori, one that was slightly chubby with rosy cheeks. She had looked like the very epitome of a poster child. Her blond hair had been a lush gold and her blue eyes almost electric. So it took a while for me to recognise the waif that sat before me. It was apparent the murder had taken its toll on her. I suspect that was what roused my first bout of protective instincts. From the earlier pictures, Lori had only retained a fraction of her looks. Then I recalled her crime and had immediately felt an unaccountable rage on finally fully recognising her. If it had not been for the two armed guards by her side, I would have bolted over and hit a girl for the first time in my life. As it were, it was all I could do to hold myself back and restrict myself to merely staring daggers at her. I don't know just how long I sat there glaring at her but then she spoke.

"You are right to be angry at me for I killed my family. I deserve your anger," she said in a soft innocent tone so unexpected from a hardened killer for that was what she was despite her fragile countenance.

"So you admit it? You killed your family?" I asked her harshly.

"Yes, I did. I believe I did. If you are wondering how, I will let you know right now that I have no idea," she replied in a soft and polite tone.

"So it's true? What the media reported, that you don't remember any of it?" I asked her, curious.

"Yes, I have no memories of anything. I do not even recall having a family. It is why I am here. The doctor is supposed to help me," she said a little shyly.

I stared at her somewhat astounded. She was not what I had been expecting. She had not a cunning vicious bone in her body. At least not that I could see. I suddenly started to doubt what the world was saying. I stared at her and the longer I stared, the more it became clear. Clear that she was not the murderer, that she had not killed her family and that she was undoubtedly an innocent.

Rap! Rap!

My attention was wrenched back to the present as the judge called order again making me focus back to the current proceedings.

"Due to the safety issues over the mob of people that are camping just outside that door, I am going to call in all relevant parties to hear my decision in private. Will security please escort all those, not directly related to the proceedings out those doors...," the rest of the judges' comments got drowned out by the uproar that followed.

There were several protesting outcries as people were escorted out those doors. When one of security turned to evict me, all I did was raise a commanding brow and the good man wisely backed off. But the rest of those evicted were volubly offensive with most of their curses directed right at my girlfriend.

I was suddenly thankful that this was a juror free trial. It had to be for in the eyes of the whole world my Lori was tried and convicted from day one and even the very public hanging was inevitable. There was no possible way an unbiased individual could be found let alone a whole team of them to make up those vacant seats in the jurors pew.

Watching the disgruntled court room reporters and general public alike exit the courtroom, I recognised more than a few celebrity has-beens and star reporters in the lot. Their glares thrown my way was priceless and had me grinning outright, my girlfriend really has a badass rep.

Chapter 2

The court room was finally empty. The judge was ready to voice his decision.

"The accused is not guilty. Court is adjourned," said the judge with almost comical abruptness before he rose and walked out of the court room through a side door, very nearly leaving a trail of fire in his wake as he burned the rubber off his heels hasting out of there.

I could see the state's attorney was not only, not happy but he was speechless in his shock and sat there gaping at the now empty judge's chair. I could almost see the wheels turning in the head of John Arbucle the third as he finally slowly rose from his seat and turned to glare right at me. He knew it was my doing that it was entirely my doing and he was right. I had waited long enough to get Lori out if that hellhole. It still annoyed me in the extreme that I had to wait till Lori was well past eighteen years of age just so she could stand for trial and be acquitted. I slowly rose to my feet and leisurely made my way to the front to halt by Lori's side. After a quick smile of thanks at my disgruntled uncle, I could see he was not happy with the outcome either despite winning the case. Then I focused all my attention on Lori who still sat there unmoving her gaze fixed on the empty desk before her.

"Lori? Shall we go? We can sneak out using the judge's exit, it's all been arranged," I say briskly eager to get a move on out of here.

I had this vague but unnerving feeling that at any moment, the judge would rush back in and without a by your leave retract his verdict. I did not think it was legally possible for him to retract a verdict but I was not about to stick around to find out. Just then a pair of wide blue eyes floored me with their intensity sending shivers down my spine. Lori looked at me in her quiet way with all seriousness and I knew better than to disrupt her when she was all deep in thought as she now appeared to be so I just waited her out and eventually she rose from her seat and walked towards the exit without another word to me. Hesitantly, I followed.

It was much later that I finally started to panic. It was my first time with Lori that we were alone, not surrounded by other psychiatrists' patients, doctors, nurses, lawyers, police or even the general protesting public. Now it was clearly just Lori and I alone in my car on the way to my mansion. Then I remembered Tim, the driver was with us as he drove us there. I felt a slight better and did my best to ignore the silence that rang loud and clear between us.

But it wasn't long before we reached Belleview Mansion that sat silent and solid on its precarious perch right on the edge of the cliff that overlooked an angry sea. I was actually glad to get out of the car; Lori was strangely more unnerving in the close confines of a car than she had been behind the fenced up screen at the asylum. She had also been unusually, almost poignantly silent. I gazed at her questioningly as she emerged from the car after me but all she did was give me a small smile that told me nothing. I was reluctant to probe further, so I remained quiet and managed a cheery smile in return as I waved my hand in grand gesture before me at the magnificence of Belleview and declared us home in a booming voice that I was sure would reassure Lori and cheer her up to her usual happy self but again she only sent a fleeting smile my way.

Thomas my butler swept the front door opened even as we reached it almost as if he had been just standing there waiting for us. He probably was the staff of Belleview had put forward as many a token of objections over my bringing over my lovely Lori to reside here with me. I have even had some staff who having served with my family collectively for more than fifteen years, quit outright, who had rather faced the uncertainty of a jobless market in the current turbulent economic climate then sleep under the same roof as my darling, shocking, I know but there you have it. People do strangest things all the time. I would of course provide them with the reference they needed to secure another post after all it was not their fault that my darling was the famed X murderer.

Chapter 3

The wind whipped eerily by rattling the rafters and echoing in the woodlands that spread on either side of the mansion. I listened to the whooshing sounds the trees made and rough roars the angry seas made as it splashed against the base of the cliff side.

Living on the very edge had its disadvantages especially on an eerie night like this. It appears a storm might be brewing. A loose rafter could be heard clattering over some window in this god forsaken overly large mansion. I would have loved to do away with this useless place. It was too big a home for me alone but some stupid ancestor, namely my dad who purchased this shit from old money had decreed that the abomination could not be sold...ever...not even by the next few generations of Walts that spew from my loins. It was not a pleasing thought.

I have no idea what dad had been thinking when he purchased this monstrosity. Myself, I preferred a penthouse in anywhere but here. I fluffed one of my many pillows and was about to toss it over my head to drown out the rattling sounds this ancient pile of brick and mortar made when the door to my room opened. I stared at the dark silhouette framed in the doorway before it moved to come through right up to my bedside.

"Lori? Is that you?" I asked making out some glitter of gold that must have been strands of her hair reflecting what glimmer of light it could in this shroud of darkness that a storm pitched night afforded.

I received no response to my questions. Instead, Lori simply reached down and pulled back my covers before slipping into bed with me. I was stunned at first but when she turned to wrap her arms about me before nestling into the crook of my shoulders, I felt myself flush with excitement. I wrapped my arms about her and pulled her in closer. I tried to control my excitement. It had been a long day and a longer yet weeks and months past leading up todays verdict. I was burnt out from all the stress and worry. I had been continuously afraid and worried things might not have gone as planned. It took a toll on my sleeping habits and in all reasonableness I should have passed out from the accumulative effect of my many sleepless nights but I am too worked up to simply let it all go and unwind. I guess Lori must be feeling the same. So I cuddled her closer and rubbed my hand up and down her spine.

Lori had been unusually quiet the whole day. Belleview staff had been barely cordial. But I had expected as much. So after dinner, I had taken Lori aside and admitted as much to her but she had been; only quietly understanding. I think her freedom hasn't sunk in yet. At least that was what I told myself. I continued to move my hand down her back caressingly. I was glad I slept in the nude. She did not seem to mind that molded against me as she was. It would have been better if she had been similarly naked but the feel of her cool silken Victoria Secret night gown against my skin was almost as erotic. I was getting pleasantly turned on but I would not rush her. This was the first day of many in that we would be together. I leaned down to drop a kiss on her hair then pulled her closer still as I settled down to sleep. I felt her smile against the curve of my neck and a while later after my eyes had drooped solid shut I felt her lean over me and press her lips to mine in a soft kiss. She widened her lips into a smile causing mine to respond in kind before she settled back down into her first sleep as a free person.

I awoke to a stiff arm and shoulder. Lori was burrowed against me in a cute and intensely appealing way. I felt a sore need for her that I could no longer deny so I raised up on my side and bent over her sleeping form to drop a hesitant kiss on the edge of her nose.

When she did not immediately respond I shifted my arm out from under her and rolled away from my naked chest and on to her back. She quietly snored on. I grinned wickedly down at her sleeping form and took the time to plan my assault before on hearing a sexy sigh emit from her lush lips. Then I threw those very plans up into the air and indulged in a full blown sensual kiss. Her lips offered no resistance and soon I was devouring her in an open mouthed onslaught.