Chapter Seventeen

Allander laughed softly as he wiped the noses of the two children. Their arms and legs were bound with gray duct tape and they lay struggling on the couch. The tape was also wound around their heads several times, covering their eyes but leaving the rest of their faces exposed.

The bodies of their parents lay on the carpet next to the couch. The woman's body was sprawled over her dead husband, her limbs interlocked with his. Their heads, arms, and legs were positioned at unnatural angles. Although Allander had intended them to look like two people holding each other intimately, they looked more like broken action figures.

Before arranging this deadly embrace, Allander had carefully gouged out their eyes with a knife he had found in the kitchen. It had taken him some time to get up the courage to approach the woman. The first thing he had done was to wet a towel and smear the white beauty mask off her face.

Now, he sat on a love seat with his knees pulled up to his chest. He hugged himself and grinned as he addressed the children.

"I'm certain that your estimation of your mother and father was rather hyperbolic anyway. Parents are deified by the ... read full excerpt from The Tower: A Novel ebook