keep getting some sort of feedback…
“Do you believe in the voice whispering in your ear?”�
…Ignore it, there's only the wrap up of the show left…
It was impossible that he knew of the incessant buzzing that had become a throaty whispering in her inner ear. Eva shuddered, an increasing frisson of cold filling her, and faintly heard the voices shouting across the set. She was unaware her reaction had been captured by the television camera with a chilling clarity.
“Have faith in me, Evangeline,”�Luke Angeles whispered throatily. She blinked in bewilderment at the sound of her given name falling so easily from his lips. She felt another quiver assail her and raised bright eyes to him.
How could he have known? There wasn't anyone in society, besides a select few close associates and her immediate family that knew her actual identity.
“How do you know my name?”
“I know a lot about you, Evangeline Keegan. I know more than you’d be capable of understanding in this lifetime, or the next.” HIs lips curved into a semblance of a cryptic smile. Her eyes flew from his face to the set-hand flashing raised fingers, signaling the end of the commercial break.
“I don't know how you found out…” she sputtered, outraged.
“Listen to the voice,” he coaxed hypnotically. “Pay attention, Evangeline. He, alone, will tell you my true identity.”�
She shivered. The hum that resounded in her ears vanished and a throaty whisper replaced it. Eva closed her eyes, her mind aching, striving to breathe as she focused on the soft enunciations. A single word formed, one that spiraled within her dazed mind, and leapt to the tip of her tongue.
“Do you believe in disembodied spirits?” Luke Angeles persisted.
She was close enough to realize, although it appeared he was looking at her, his attention remained riveted to a point just beyond her. A word settling on the tip of her tongue tingled, longing for release, the faintest sound of laughter invading the multitude of murmuring filling her mind.
Dimly, Eva realized a change sweeping over him. The camera didn’t detect the alteration, for he kept his face in profile. The cold grayness of his eyes vanished and, instead, the color became the most unsettling shade of sable, hungrily consuming the clarity of the orbs.
“If you believe, Evangeline, he'll give you my name.”�
…Lucien�
CHAPTER FOUR
There are those that shall never see the light, for the wealth of their evil has made their soul incapable of being salvaged�
The seedy hotel was located just off the last exit of the major interstate, somewhere deep in the bayou of a distant southern state. A foreboding sense of malaise emanated the dilapidated structure and caused many travelers to suffer second thoughts about pausing. Often enough, vehicles would accelerate past the ramshackle lodgings, desperate to leave the crumbling structure behind.
Despite the lack of lighting, and the abundance of refuse and weeds consuming the vacant parking lot, an elderly man ambled across the cracked cement. His gait was joyous and there was a crooked and dizzying parody to his childish skip.
In one hand, he swung a room key. In the other, he held a relentless grip on a half-empty bottle of cheap whiskey. He spun and paused before leaping gracefully into the air. A wild cackle of insane laughter burst from him when he reached the assigned room, his hands oddly steady while he unlocked the door.
The hotel room reeked of decades of stale cigarette smoke and urine. Outside, the sound of rapidly passing interstate traffic rose to a deafening crescendo. Noise and odor were of much concern to the room's single inhabitant, nor the obvious lack of cleanliness. In the span of his lifetime, he had slept in far worse lodgings, and this wasn't as unpleasant as it appeared.
The stooped and crooked figure kicked shut the warped door. The action was that of a much younger man but the thought was ridiculous. The man was elderly, appearing ancient beyond his years, the passage of time unkind.
In truth, he was older than he appeared, or humanly possible.
His face was horrendously pock marked, the pitted scars running deep and only separated by heavy wrinkles. The yellowed whiteness of his hair hung in brittle and limp strands about his shoulders. Each lank lock exuded the stench of smoke, alcohol, and some other underlying odor.
The hand that brought the weight of the whiskey bottle to his cracked and dry lips was gnarled and twisted. Despite his advanced age, his hands didn't quiver. His hold was strong, firm, and slightly unsettling. Taking a