FICTION BY GRAHAM MASTERTON AND DAWN G. HARRIS

A new collection of terrifying short stories by Graham Masterton and Dawn G Harris Days of Utter Dread which is a collection of highly disturbing and deeply original short stories from the master of horror Graham Masterton and rising star Dawn G Harris. It includes two stories written by Dawn and Graham together, “Stranglehold” and “Cutting the Mustard,” as well as a new story by Graham “On Gracious Pond” which explains the horrifying reason why Lewis Carroll wrote “The Walrus and the Carpenter.” Graham and Dawn are already writing new horror stories together.

“The Colour of Jealousy” below was also written by Graham Masterton and Dawn G. Harris, and will be included in an upcoming short story collection. “The Colour of Jealousy” is an original story that before now has been previously unpublished.

Graham Masterton's debut as a horror author began with The Manitou in 1976, a chilling tale of a Native American medicine man reborn in the present day to exact his revenge on the white man. It became an instant bestseller and was filmed with Tony Curtis, Susan Strasberg, Burgess Meredith, Michael Ansara, Stella Stevens and Ann Sothern.

Since then Graham has published more than 35 novels in the horror genre, including Charnel House, which was awarded a Special Edgar by Mystery Writers of America; Mirror, which was awarded a Silver Medal by West Coast Review of Books; and Family Portrait, an update of Oscar Wilde's tale, The Picture of Dorian Gray, which was the only non-French winner of the prestigious Prix Julia Verlanger in France.

Three of Graham's stories were filmed for TV in Tony Scott's horror series The Hunger, and “The Secret Shih-Tan,” starring Jason Scott Lee, was shortlisted for a Bram Stoker Award by the Horror Writers Association. Another short story, “Underbed,” about a boy finding a mysterious world underneath his blankets, was voted best short story by Horror Critics Guild.

Motion picture rights for Trauma have been optioned by Jonathan Mostow, who directed U-571. The Chosen Child, set in the sewers of Warsaw, was named Best Horror Novel of the Year by Science Fiction Chronicle and highly praised in Publisher's Weekly

Altogether Graham has written more than a hundred novels ranging from thrillers to disaster novels to historical sagas.

You can go to his official website HERE

THE COLOUR OF JEALOUSY
by Graham Masterton and Dawn G. Harris

‘Do you know something?’ said Frances. ‘I can’t remember a time when I didn’t hate you.’

Betty looked back at her with narrowed eyes. ‘You really think I don’t know that?’ she hissed.

Downstairs, a huge thud sounded against the front door.

‘I’ll go,’ insisted Frances. ‘Probably for me anyway; who would want to come and see you?  I told the removal men to bring mother’s bookcase here. You love your musty old antique furniture, don’t you?’

‘You could have asked me first. Where am I going to put it?’

‘I thought you would like it. And besides, what are we going to do with a shabby old bookcase in our new house? Though I can’t think why four pm seems an appropriate time; it’s nearly dark, for heaven’s sake. And put some make-up on—you look like a sour fifty-something—nobody would believe that you’re five years younger than me! No wonder Tom hasn’t proposed and probably won’t now that you’re middle-aged. And hurry up getting ready—the table’s booked for seven.’

After Frances had gone to answer the front door, Betty went over to the fireplace and stared at herself in the mirror. She didn’t know why her sister couldn’t have simply agreed to meet her at the restaurant. She was far too old to need any sort of chaperone now.

Frances had always had a sharp tongue for everybody, especially for her, but it wasn’t so much her constant stream of caustic remarks that had hurt Betty over the years, or made her feel worthless. It was her lack of compassion for her only sister, and her clear refusal now to see that she was the sour fifty-something one.

How was she ever supposed to find the right time to tell Frances the incredible news that she had been appointed as a retail manager in the cosmetics department of Harrods with a hefty pay rise, when she made no secret of how much she hated her?

Betty brushed back her wiry blonde hair, thinking how rich and full Frances’ newly dyed dark chestnut hair looked. When they were young, people had often mistaken them for twins, apart from their hair colour. The same high cheekbones, the same deep brown eyes.

She carefully pencilled in her eyebrows and dabbed on some crimson lipstick. She always remembered that when she used to work on the Chanel counter at her local department store, her closest friend Margo would tell her how full and sensual her lips were, and how beautiful she was. But at the same time she could never forget how Frances had managed to poison that friendship with her critical comments and her half-truths. Tragically, Margo had passed away four years ago, after Betty had lost touch with her.

*****

They arrived at the restaurant at a quarter past seven. While her husband Robert held the door open for them, Frances pushed ahead of Betty into the reception area. A waiter smiled as he passed, and the maitre-d’ welcomed them, rubbing his hands together as if he were greeting minor royalty. ‘Your other guests have arrived and are seated, Mrs Upshaw-Bennett.’

Frances let out a rattling laugh. ‘At least some people know how to turn up on time,’ she said, turning around to give Betty and Robert an acidic look.

Robert gave her an uneasy smile in return. He was having trouble struggling his shoulders out of his overcoat. He had messed up his wavy grey hair, but Betty still thought he looked attractive, like Cary Grant’s slightly more ruffled brother.

‘Mount Rose Restaurant. I remember it well,’ she whispered, as she handed her coat to the maitre-d’.

Frances heard her. ‘Of course,’ she said, primping her chestnut hair and scanning the restaurant for anybody she knew. ‘Why do you think I booked it? I thought you’d enjoy some nostalgia. You’re not going to start snivelling, are you?’

‘It’s where Tom took me on our first date. And my birthday, too.’

‘That’s right. Poor chap wanted to impress you, didn’t he, even though he could scarcely afford it. Nor could you, for that matter.’

Betty frowned at her. How on earth do you know that? she thought, but they were sitting down now, and saying hello to the three other couples that Frances had invited, so this wasn’t the time to ask.

*****

As the waiter approached the table, he handed everyone a menu. ‘Good evening; my name is Lance, and I’ll be taking care of you this evening. Whatever you want, all you have to is ask, and I’ll be only too happy to tell you that we’ve run out of it.’

Everybody else at the table laughed, but Betty was staring over at the corner table where she and Tom used to sit whenever he could afford to take her to Mount Rose. Another young couple were sitting there this evening, but Betty could remember Tom curling his fingers around her blonde hair and tilting her chin to kiss her before the oysters and champagne arrived at the table. After that, she had found herself absorbed in some elaborate story of his and laughing so much that she would get a knot in her stomach. But those days were gone. It had been a month since she had seen him last, and his phone calls had become less and less frequent. He had told her that he was ‘up the walls with work’ and ‘never had a spare moment.’

Just then a voice grew louder beside her. ‘Betty! Betty! We’re holding a birthday toast to me. Where have you drifted off to? Honestly, I don’t know what’s got into you lately. Since you turned fifty, you’re all over the place. You’re not getting dementia already, are you?’ One of the guests laughed in return and smiled at Frances.

Betty turned to meet Frances’ stare. ‘All right, all right,’ she said, holding out her champagne flute so that Lance could fill it up for her. Put a drop of cyanide in hers, Lance, while you’re at it, she thought. She deserves it. But she lifted her glass and said, ‘Happy birthday to Frances. My only sister.’

‘Happy birthday!’ cheered the others around her.

Robert caught Betty’s eye across the table, through the flickering candles on Frances’ birthday cake. He raised his glass again, and she was sure that she could see him mouthing the words, ‘Chin-chin…to you.’

*****

Later that evening, as the taxi pulled up outside her block of apartments, Betty climbed out to see Tom standing in the doorway. He was half-hidden in the shadows, like a character in a 1950s crime film.

‘I’ll see you next week,’ she said to Frances, who was too busy touching up her red lipstick in her mirror to notice Tom. And, ‘Good night, Robert,’ but much more softly.

‘I’ll meet you at the tennis court. Don’t be late,’ replied Frances with a tight smile. Robert simply said, ‘Good night.’

Betty tugged her skirt straight and took her keys out of her patent handbag. She began to walk up the path but it was not until the taxi had turned the corner that Tom stepped out into the streetlight.

‘Tom!’ said Betty. ‘I wasn’t expecting you tonight. How long have you been waiting?’

‘Only about half an hour. But I forgot that it was Frances’ birthday. Well—I didn’t exactly forget, but I didn’t make a point of remembering. I did try to call you but I suppose you had your phone switched off. Is everything all right? Are you all right?’

Betty laid a hand on his shoulder and kissed him on the cheek. He had grown a stubbly beard since she had last seen him and she thought that he must have lost weight. He looked gaunt, and a little haunted.

‘I’m fine,’ she told him. ‘You’ve been drinking again. Come on inside anyway, I wouldn’t want you to have a wasted journey. And besides, it’s started to rain.’

She took him up to her first-floor apartment, opened the door and switched on all the lights. It was warm and neat, her apartment, with crisp white curtains and antique furniture. Beside the fireplace hung a large oil painting of a young woman in a shabby red cloak watching as a princess in a white wedding dress stepped down from her carriage.

‘It was just that when I got your text, Bets—well, I didn’t know what to think,’ Tom told her. ‘What’s this stunning news that you have to tell me in person?’

‘Well, to be perfectly frank, Tom, you’ve been a bit of a stranger lately. I know you’ve been busy at work, but you’ve always been busy at work, and that’s never stopped you from seeing me before, has it? Before I tell you my news, I just need to make sure that everything’s still okay between us. You know—you and me.’

Tom grimaced and looked away.

‘Come on, Tom. I’m a grown woman. You can be honest with me. If you’ve gone off me, at least have the decency to tell me so I can get on with my life.’

Tom looked up at her and his expression was like that of a small boy caught stealing sweets.
‘Not to beat around the bush, Bets, I’ve been having a bit of a thing with somebody else.’

‘“A bit of a thing”? What does that mean? You’ve been having an affair?’

‘Not exactly an affair, no. But a bit of on and off. I mean, I didn’t intend to, but she came onto me so strong—and well, she was strong and I was weak. Like I got possessed.’

‘Is it still going on, this “on and off”?’

‘I don’t know. Like I say, it’s not exactly an affair. She calls me when she feels like it and we meet.’

‘That’s what an affair is, Tom. So that’s why you stopped taking me out and ringing me?’

‘I’m sorry, Bets—I really am. I promise you that I won’t see her again. I swear on my mother’s life.’

‘But if it isn’t her, Tom, it could be somebody else, couldn’t it? How can I hope to trust you after this? Where did you meet her, anyway?’

‘Here,’ he said, looking around the living-room. ‘I met her here.’

‘What do you mean, you met her here? I don’t understand. Who is she?’

Tom took in a deep breath and stared directly at her.

‘It’s Frances, your sister.’

Betty slowly sat down on the sofa. She felt as if her brain had been totally drained of any thought, and that there was nothing inside her head but emptiness, and an echoing of ‘I told you so’ in her late friend Margo’s voice.

‘I’m truly sorry, Bets,’ said Tom. He got up from his chair and came to stand in front of her, holding out his hands. ‘I said it won’t happen again and it won’t.’

‘Get out,’ she whispered, staring at his knees.

‘Bets, please. Aren’t you going to tell me what your news is?’

‘Get out,’ she repeated.

‘Bets –’

‘Get out!’ she screamed at him, picking up a cushion from the sofa and throwing it at him. ‘Get out! Get out! Get out!’

*****

Betty looked at her yellowing blonde hair in the mirror as she thought of Frances and Tom together in her home. As she peeled open the packet of Deviant Rouge hair dye, she remembered Robert lifting his glass at dinner and silently mouthing: ‘To you, Betty’.

She brushed her hair and sprayed it damp, and then began to section it with hair grips and oil her forehead as not to stain her skin. Although she could afford a hairdresser now, she didn’t want to have anyone round to the apartment or have some mindless conversation about holidays. ‘Oh, Frances,’ she whispered, mixing the pigmented hair dye, gripping the brush so tight it could snap. ‘You’ve really done it this time. You’re welcome to Tom. You’ll soon find out that he’s only after one thing. Robert and I shall live a life we’ve always dreamed. A life of freedom from you.’

As she scraped up the final section of hair, she said, ‘You’ve taken Tom, so I’ll have Robert. You never deserved him anyway.’

Just then, her mobile phone rang. It was Tom. Probably drunk now, and feeling guilty, she thought, and so she let it ring until he finally gave up.

When she came out of the shower, she checked her calendar and diary. Tomorrow was Frances’ regular bridge night, so she would be out, and Robert was likely to be home.

‘Tomorrow’s the one,’ she said, circling Tuesday and leaving her diary open on the table.

*****

The next evening, as she picked up her car keys, Betty thought of Robert’s face. Hiswarm smile and the kindness in his eyes that didn’t deserve Frances’ torture. She thought of her own kindness, too, and how she didn’t deserve a snappy, narcissistic woman like Frances as her sister, or a pathetic snivelling character such as Tom as her lover. What did I ever see in him? she asked herself as she climbed carefully into her car to avoid catching her new Victoria’s Secret stockings on the buttons of her mac.

When she arrived at her sister’s house, she saw that Frances’ car was parked in the driveway but Robert’s car was missing. Perhaps Frances’ car wouldn’t start or was low on petrol and so she had taken Robert’s car instead. She inserted her spare key into Frances’ door, pursing her lips and made snapping sounds as though she was visiting to feed her cat. After all, that’s why she still had the spare key, and Frances’ neighbours probably never knew that the cat had died over a month ago and that it was buried in the flowerbed under the kitchen window.

Downstairs was in darkness, although Betty could hear the churning sound of a washing machine coming from the kitchen. She switched on the light in the hallway and then she shook off her mac and hung it up.

Since Robert wasn’t home yet, she decided to go upstairs and wait for him in the bedroom, so that he wouldn’t have any doubt about what she wanted. But she was about to start climbing up the stairs when she was shocked to see Frances appear on the landing, fresh from a bath. She was wearing a fluffy white dressing-gown with her hair wrapped up in a towel. Betty felt prickles all down her spine.

‘Betty?’ Frances called down to her. ‘What in God’s name are you doing here?’

Betty didn’t answer. She could only think of Frances in bed with Tom, and how Frances had probably been ecstatic because she was making love to her younger sister’s boyfriend. I’m prettier than you and I’m cleverer than you and I’m wealthier than you and now I’m fucking the man you thought was yours. My life is so much better than yours.

‘Betty?’ Frances repeated. ‘What do you want? And why are you dressed like that? You’re normally so scruffy.’

Still Betty didn’t answer. She was so angry and so grievously hurt that she couldn’t make her lips form any words. She felt as if her brain was boiling over and it was going to come bursting right out of her eyes.

‘Betty!’ shrilled Frances.

Betty stormed through to the kitchen. She didn’t need to switch on the light because she knew where the cutlery drawer was. She dragged it open so that all the kitchen knives and tongs and spatulas came clattering out, all over the floor. Then she bent down and picked up the largest carving knife and went storming back into the hallway.

‘Betty! What was all that noise? What are you doing? I’m coming down!’

‘Don’t—don’t you worry about coming down,’ Betty told her, as she grasped the banister rail and started to climb the stairs. ‘I’m coming up!’

*****

As she reached the top stair, she lifted the carving knife high above her head. Frances screamed at her, ‘Betty! Have you gone mad? What do you think you’re doing?’

Betty thrust the knife down, but Frances staggered two or three steps away from her, lifting her arms to shield herself, and the tip of the blade only snagged in the sleeve of her dressing-gown. She staggered back again, and collided with the bedroom door, which swung wide open. Betty went after her and stabbed at her again, and this time the knife pierced the lapel of her dressing-gown and blood welled out of her breast.

‘Betty!’ she howled. She threw herself backwards onto the king-size bed, kicking at Betty with both of her slippered feet. As her dressing-gown parted, Betty stabbed her in the left thigh, and then stabbed her again between her legs in a frenzy, twisting at the handle. Frances let out a cry that sounded almost inhuman. She seized the side of the thick rose-patterned duvet and heaved it upwards and over herself so that she would be buried underneath it, for protection. But she could hardly move her legs.

Not that anything could stop Betty now. She clambered up onto the bed so that she was sitting on top of Frances, pinning her down. Then she dragged back the top of the duvet and stared down at Frances with a face like a death mask. Frances could only stare back up at her, frozen in terror and disbelief that this was actually happening.

Betty said nothing. She could think only of Frances telling her that she had always hated her, and how much she now hated Frances in return. Maybe now she understood what being possessed by jealousy felt like. She grabbed Frances’ right hand, tightly squeezing her fingers together, and then she forcibly yanked her arm upright, so that her sleeve dropped down to her elbow. With a single slice of the carving knife she made a deep cut across Frances’ wrist, and blood came gushing out, running down into her sleeve and spattering all over the duvet and the front of her dressing-gown.

Frances tried to scream, but all she could do was utter a gargling sound. Now Betty pulled up her left arm and sliced across her left wrist, too, right down to the bone. Frances waved her arm from side to side in horror, trying to see how deeply Betty had cut her. Blood sprayed all over her face and clung to her hair like shiny redcurrants and soaked the white pillow behind her.

She struggled to get up from under the duvet, but Betty remained sitting on top of her, watching her with no expression on her face at all as she gradually flooded the bed with blood and became weaker and weaker. It took more than five minutes before she lost consciousness and her eyes closed, and another three or four minutes before she gave a thin bubbly gasp and stopped breathing.

‘You bitch,’ Betty whispered. ‘I wonder if Tom would fancy having it away with you now.’

Once she had climbed off the bed, she wiped the handle of the carving knife on the duvet and then she carefully levered it between the fingers of Frances’ right hand. She thought of writing a suicide message on Frances’ phone and sending it to her own phone, but she decided not to bother. A nurse had once told her that two-thirds of people who take their own lives don’t leave any kind of note—either because they don’t believe that anyone will understand why they feel suicidal, or because they simply don’t care what anyone thinks anymore. And besides, no-one would blame a victim of Frances’ abuse, for one day retaliating.

She went through to the ensuite bathroom which was still steamy and still smelled of Frances’ favourite bath gel, Dior Poison. As she washed her hands, she stared at herself in the mirror. Do you know something, Betty, you look amazingly calm for a woman who has just murdered her own sister. You took control over her. Not only that, you’re more attractive in this moment than you’ve been for a long time, if not since the day you were born.

She took a last look at Frances lying in her bloodstained bed with all those florid red roses on the duvet. People are said to be green with envy, she thought, but jealousy—the evil emotion—well, the colour of jealousy has to be red.

She switched off the bedside lamp and left the bedroom, closing the door behind her. As she was about to go downstairs, she heard a car outside, and when she reached the hallway the front door opened and Robert came in, carrying his bag of golf clubs.

‘Betty? What are you doing here? I thought I saw your car outside.’

He propped his golf clubs up against the wall and Betty went up to him smiling and took hold of both of his hands. He was surprised by her informality, her outfit, her new hair colour and this obvious display of affection, but he didn’t try to pull his hands away, and he smiled at her in return, although he still had a question in his eyes.

‘I came to see Frances. You know—to have a chat and sort out our differences and try to be friends again. Well—more than just friends—proper sisters.’

Robert looked around. ‘So—where is she? I know that her bridge night was cancelled. Two or three of the members went down with Covid.’

‘She didn’t answer the door when I arrived so I let myself in with my cat key. She wasn’t in the kitchen or the living-room so I went upstairs and I found her in the bedroom, fast asleep.’

‘You’re joking. She’s usually still awake watching Netflix films long after I’ve zonked off.’

‘Maybe all that champagne she drank on her birthday caught up with her. I tried to wake her but she was dead to the world.’

‘Well, now that you’re here, can I offer you a drink?’ said Robert. ‘I’m afraid we don’t have any champagne left, but I think we still have some prosecco, or sauvignon blanc.’

‘Actually, Robert, I want much more than a drink,’ Betty told him, still holding onto his hands. ‘Can you guess what it is?’

Robert stared at her and she could see all the different questions reeling in his eyes like the symbols in a fruit machine. After a few moments he glanced furtively up towards the landing and said, ‘We can’t do it here. Supposing she wakes up?’

‘Then we can go to my apartment. It’ll be warm because I left the heating on. And I’ve always got some champagne, even if you haven’t.’

‘Betty—’

‘You know about Tom, don’t you?’

Robert took a deep breath, so that his nostrils flared. ‘Yes. I know about Tom. She didn’t even try to make a secret of it.’

‘Then what’s good for the gander is just as good for the goose.’

Robert closed his eyes for a moment, but when he opened them again he leaned forward and kissed Betty on the lips. A lingering kiss that felt as if he had been storing it up for months.

‘Oh, Robert.’

‘You’ll drive?’ he asked her.

*****

As soon as Betty closed the front door of her apartment behind her, she unbuttoned her mac as if it were on fire and dropped it onto the floor. She reached up for Robert’s shoulders and pulled him towards her so that she could kiss him again and again. She was not only burning with lust but with the sheer excitement of having murdered Frances.

Even though she had ended Frances’ life herself, she found it almost impossible to believe that she would never again hear have to listen to her nagging voice, nor have to see her supercilious face, not ever.

‘Champagne,’ she said, hoarsely. ‘Then bed.’

‘Do you know what?’ Robert told her, as he followed her into the kitchenette. ‘You don’t know how many times I’ve looked at you and wished that I’d married you instead of Frances. Right from the very first time I saw you, on our wedding day. I was just about to put the ring on Frances’ finger and I caught sight of you smiling at me, and I thought to myself, I’m making the biggest mistake of my life here.’

Betty took a bottle of Lanson out of the fridge and handed it to Robert so that he could open it. She reached up to the kitchenette cupboard and brought out two antique champagne glasses with twisty stems.

‘I bought this for my old school friend’s birthday next week, but this is a real celebration.’

Robert filled their glasses and they took them through to the bedroom. Betty switched on the bedside lamps and folded back the duvet. The cover had the same red rose pattern on it as Frances’ duvet, because the sisters had each been given an identical present last Christmas by their cousin Phyllis, who worked for Marks & Spencer.

‘Can you unzip me?’ Betty asked Robert, and he came around the bed and stood close behind her. He tugged down the zip of her short black dress and then he put his arms around her waist and kissed and nuzzled her neck.

They undressed as if they were having a race to see which one of them could get naked first. Betty climbed onto the bed and held out her arms for Robert, but when he started to climb after her, she said, ‘Socks, Robert! You’ve still got your socks on!  That’s a total passion-killer!’

‘Well, you still have your stockings on!’

They both started laughing and kissing and when Robert started to run his hands down her sides, Betty shivered with pleasure.

Robert went down on her and licked her until she felt that her whole body was going to explode. Before she could climax, though, he raised himself up and slid himself into her, and began very slowly to rock up and down, almost dreamily, as if he were rowing the both of them down some silent Venetian canal.

Betty leaned up to his ear and whispered, ‘You’re wonderful. You have no idea what you do to me. Why have we not done this before?’

‘You, sweetheart,’ said Robert, ‘you do the same to me. You’re an angel.’

‘Oh, no,’ she smiled. ‘Tonight I’m more like a devil.’

It was then, though, that both bedside lamps started to flicker. They kept on flickering for a few moments and then they went dim, so that only their elements were glowing orange, and the bedroom was engulfed in shadow.

‘What’s wrong?’ asked Robert, lifting himself up, although he stayed inside her.

Betty pulled him back down. ‘Don’t worry about it. It’s probably a power-cut, that’s all.’

Robert bent down again and kissed her, and their tongues wrestled together. Betty felt that she wanted to stay like this forever, and never allow him take himself out of her. They would become one person. No jealousy, no rage between them.

But the door suddenly slammed wide open, hitting the antique wardrobe with a loud bang. Betty raised her head to look over Robert’s shoulder, and what she saw made her choke with terror.

Standing in the doorway, her dressing-gown drenched in blood, her face chalk-white like a clown’s, was Frances. Only this time, her eyes were blackened. In her hand she appeared to be holding up the same carving knife which Betty had used to slit her wrists.

‘Robert, Robert! For Christ’s sake, Robert!’ Betty screamed at him, struggling to get out from under him.

‘What?’ he demanded. He was grinning down at her, because he must have thought that she was having an incredibly wild orgasm.

‘It’s—!’ Betty began, but then Frances came gliding up to the side of the bed, the knife still lifted, and she stabbed Robert in the back.

‘Frances!’ shrieked Betty. But Frances didn’t stop. She stabbed Robert again and again and again, so that his blood went flying all over the sheets and the duvet cover and dripped onto Betty. Robert was too stunned even to cry out. He stared down at Betty with bulging eyes and then he rolled off her.

Betty held up her hands, trying to protect herself. ‘Frances, no! I was angry! I was angry! I didn’t want to hurt you so badly!’

If Frances could hear her, she took no notice. Her eyes were nothing but two black holes, as black and empty as outer space, and her teeth were bared in a furious grimace. She stabbed Betty in the face, piercing her nostrils and her cheeks and blinding her left eye, and then she stabbed her arms and breasts and her stomach. She stabbed her over twenty times, and last of all she thrust the knife where Robert had been, right up to the handle.

Betty lay in a glutinous welter of blood, surrounded by the pattern of blooming red roses. The bedroom, already gloomy, began to grow darker.

Frances stood beside the bed, looking down at her.

‘I can’t remember a time when I didn’t hate you.’ Her voice sounded as if she were speaking in another room.

Betty’s lips moved but she was unable to answer. She could only watch as Frances faded out of sight.

She lifted one hand and stared at it with her blurry right eye. It looked as if she were wearing a long red glove.

Red, she thought. Red is the colour of revenge. The colour of jealousy. 

Copyright © Graham Masterton & Dawn G Harris, 2024.