Shiver Read Online Free PDF

a sentence.
    And twenty years was long enough to forget.
    Now, it was time to remember.
    From his pocket he withdrew a ring of keys and quickly walked to a back service door. One key slid into the rusted old lock and turned. Easily. He stepped inside and, using a small penlight, illuminated his way. He was getting used to it again, had returned nearly two months earlier. It had taken that long to establish himself, to prepare.
    Silently he crept through a hallway to a locked door leading to the basement, but he passed it and turned right, walking two steps up to the old kitchen with its rusting industrial sinks and massive, blackened and ruined stove. Over the cracked tiles, he made his way through a large dining hall and then into the old foyer at the base of the stairs where a grandfather’s clock had once ticked off the seconds of his life.
    It was dark inside, his penlight giving off poor illumination, but in the past few weeks he’d reacquainted himself with the dark, musty corridors, the warped wooden floors, the cracked and boarded-over windows. Quickly he hurried up the stairs, his footsteps light, his breathing quick as he reached the landing where the old stained glass window was miraculously still intact. Shining his light on the colored glass for just a second, he felt a quiver of memory, and for the briefest of seconds imagined her dark silhouette backlit by the stained glass Madonna.
    He couldn’t linger. Had to keep moving. Swiftly, he turned and hurried up the final flight of stairs to the third floor.
    To her room.
    His throat closed and he felt a zing sizzle through his blood as quick shards of memory pierced his brain. He bit his lip as he remembered her lush auburn hair, those luminous golden eyes that would round so seductively when he surprised her, the slope of her cheeks and the curve of her neck that he so longed to kiss and bite.
    He remembered her breasts, large and firm, as they stretched the blouses she wore, straining the buttons, offering glimpses of rapturous cleavage. She wore slacks sometimes, but she had a skirt, in a color that reminded him of ripe peaches. Even now he recalled how the hem danced around her taut, muscular calves, hitting just below her knees, as she climbed the stairs.
    He felt himself harden at the thought of the curve of her legs, the sway of that gauzy fabric, the way she would look over her shoulder to see him watching her as she ascended the old staircase, the fingers of one hand trailing along the polished banister as the old clock tick, tick, ticked away his life.
    His lust had been powerful then.
    Pounding through his blood.
    Thundering in his brain.
    He’d never wanted any one thing the way he’d wanted Faith.
    He felt it again, that powerful ache that started between his legs and crawled steadily up his body. Beads of sweat emerged on his forehead and shoulders. The crotch of his pants was suddenly uncomfortable and tight.
    He pressed on, to the upper level, his heart racing.
    Room 307 was in the middle of the hallway, poised high over the turn of the circular drive, an intimate little space where his life had changed forever.
    Carefully and quietly, he unlocked the door. He slipped inside to stand in the very room where it had all happened.
    Starlight filtered through the window, adding an eerie cast to the familiar room. The heat of the day settled deep into the old crumbling bricks of a building that, in its century-long lifetime, had been the stage for many uses. Some had been good, others had been inherently and undeniably evil.
    Not that long ago…
    Closing his eyes and concentrating, he conjured up the sounds that had echoed through the corridors, the rattle of carts, scrape of slippers, the desperate moans and cries of the tormented souls who had unwillingly inhabited Our Lady of Virtues Hospital. Those noises had been muted by the chant of prayers and echoing chimes of the clock.
    But Faith had been here. Beautiful Faith. Frightened Faith. Trembling