Sacrifice by Wrath James White Read Free Book Online Page B

staircase when Linda walked up the remaining stairs, opened the door, and walked in. Matt hurried behind her. April took a deep breath and considered dashing back down the stairs and out the door, ready to take the bus if she had to. She stared longingly at the front door and then back up at the open bedroom door her friends had just passed through. Cautiously, she crept up the last steps and into the voodoo priestess’s bedroom. She hesitated just beyond the door, leaving it open in case she needed to make a hasty retreat.
    The room was painted a sandy off-white, and every piece of furniture within it was coated with fabric of the same color. White candles flickered by the bedside, and the window was open, blowing a rose-scented breeze up from the garden. Delilah sat on the bed and was draped in clothes made of the same bone-colored fabrics. She stretched out her arms and Linda and Matt rushed to embrace her.
    April stood in the doorway as if expecting an ambush.
    “This is April. She’s the one we’ve been telling you about.”
    “The psychology student?”
    “Yes.”
    “Come in, chile’. Let’s talk. I think you’ll find we have a lot in common.”
    “I seriously doubt that,” April said, trying not to let the woman’s voice hypnotize her into lowering her guard but feeling all her inhibitions melting away nonetheless. The woman seemed to be the same age as them, no older than twenty-three or twenty-four. She was tall and curvaceous, thick but not fat. She looked like a woman was supposed to look, not like the media tried to convince them they should in order to sell exercise and diet products. Her skin was light brown, cappuccino, or cinnamon, with high cheekbones, full lips, a small but wide nose with flaring nostrils, and gray eyes. She had long dreadlocks that hung down past her waist. She wore no makeup and needed none. She was a natural beauty. Nothing like the old crone April had been expecting. At least that made the fact that Linda and Matt had both slept with her a little less disgusting, almost understandable.
    April clung stubbornly to her cynicism, folding her arms across her chest as she shuffled into the room, looking skittishly into every corner and casting fearful glances in back of her before settling her eyes on Delilah.
    “Come sit with me, chile’.”
    April sat across from Delilah on the bed, wringing her hands nervously. Linda and Matt left the bed and walked across the room, where they lounged together on a loveseat beside the window. They immediately fell into each other’s arms, kissing and groping each other as if they were the only ones in the room. April blushed.
    “Don’t be ashamed of them, chile’. Love is one of the few joys this world has to offer folks.”
    “I don’t call that love. That’s just lust.”
    “The two are often indistinguishable from one another. Physical love is just another form of love. A lesser form, baser, more primal, but still love. All love is good.”
    April opened her mouth to speak but could not find an argument worth stating. She disagreed but could not articulate why. She felt confused in this woman’s presence. She doubted herself, could feel herself falling under the woman’s spell, and it was as terrifying as it was liberating. Still, April resisted.
    She wrung her hands like dishtowels as she appraised her host. The woman was physically intimidating. Her large breasts and ass were almost pornographic in their voluptuousness. Her arms and legs were so muscular she looked like an athlete, like Serena Williams. She was the type of woman April would have crossed the street to avoid if she’d been walking toward her. She hated to admit it, but the fact that she was black made it even worse. Something about black people had always struck her as sinister. That she was a woman made her only slightly less intimidating. Her sexuality, however, was almost overwhelming. It was the most intimidating thing about the woman other than the idea that