Once Bitten: Twice Mad

Chapter Three: Whatever the hell it is, it ain't right

Chapter Three: Whatever the hell it is, it ain't right.

March 1887

                Charlotte pushed her heavily pregnant frame from the large four-poster bed and slid into her thin satin robe when she heard the front door to the home she shared with her husband slam closed. She let out a sigh when she realized that her husband was obviously not happy. She glanced out the window at the rain and wind currently battering their farm.

                It was the middle of the night and Jackson was just returning home from his trip into town which meant things had not gone well with the tobacco buyer. She lay her hand over her stomach. They had desperately needed things to go well with the tobacco buyer. Charlotte's hand was trembling as she opened the bedroom door and walked down the hall toward the staircase. Jackson was sure to be in a terrible mood and whenever Jackson's mood went south he took it out on her.

                Jackson had once been a wealthy man. The grand house they still lived in could attest to that fact, though if anyone took the time to really study their home, they would realize that everything was beginning to show its wear and age.

                Charlotte's parents had forced her to marry the rich Tennessee tobacco grower nearly eight years before when she had been nineteen and he thirty-five. He had wanted a pretty, quiet, meek woman to give him an heir while tolerating his temper and his affairs, and Charlotte's parents had wanted the money that came along with giving her to the man.

                It had taken seven years for Charlotte to finally get with child and Jackson had roared with rage and accused her of waiting until he was a pauper before giving him another mouth to feed. Not that there was ever much to eat here as it was.....

                Charlotte came down the stairs but Jackson was not standing beside the door in the foyer. Strange. He usually waited right there for her to join him. As a matter of fact it was clear that the man had kept his muddy boots and wet coat on as he walked back toward the dining room and kitchen.

                Charlotte cursed under her breath, knowing she have to clean the mess before she'd be able return to bed. She put a hand on her aching back, she was due any day now and her body seemed to hurt all over all the time. 

                The crashing of dishes in the kitchen had Charlotte all but running in her bare feet toward the sound. Was Jackson so drunk that he had fallen? She burst into the kitchen and then skidded to a stop on the cool tile floor.

                Jackson had his back to her, but she recognized his coat. Her eyes widened when she saw the blood all around him and the drops steadily dripping from his hands into the puddle that was forming on the light colored tile. Had he been attacked? Had her husband been shot?

                "Jackson?" she asked cautiously and instantly his movements stilled. Charlotte's heart was thundering in her chest and she covered her large stomach with her hands, as if shielding her unborn child as Jackson turned slowly.

                His movements were... twitchy. He kept pausing and starting again and it seemed as if it were hard for him to make the motion.

                Then Charlotte saw his face and her legs nearly gave out beneath her. That was not her husband!  It was his body but those were not his eyes! Those were gray lifeless orbs staring out at her from a face that was bloody and covered in sores and.... Were those bites?  There was a gaping hole in Jackson's chest and that was where the blood was coming from, covering the floor.