Marcus watched from the second story window as the figures drew together in the deepening dusk. Cocoa’s blue-black hair caught the light from the nearby streetlamp, glowing with a patent-leather luster that went straight through him. She was the most beautiful thing in the world. She was everything.

Cocoa looked up and smiled, her special, intimate smile that made his heart pound every time he saw it. But she wasn’t smiling at him. Her eyes were drinking in the tall, rangy form in front of her. It was a muscle-padded, basketball-playing, towel-flicking kind of form. Marcus grimaced as the whiskey bit into his throat, then lowered the bottle without taking his eyes from the scene. Damnit. The bitch didn’t even have the decency to hide it. She wanted him to see. She wanted to show him what she thought of him and his scrawny, chartered-accountancy, four-eyed little life. He’d always known it was too good to be true; he’d always known that this was coming, sooner or later, whatever she swore in the middle of their nights together. But to do it like this, right out in front of the whole building, playing the whore where everyone who knew them could see her this was his worst nightmare.

Marcus set the bottle carefully on the dresser and loaded the gun.

The curtain dropped back into place. Julio grinned, teeth shining in the darkness. Cocoa was a sweet little piece of ass, but it was more than that. It was the game behind it. Now that little pinhead Marcus knew for sure -- knew who was going to have his woman. He’d suggested that they meet out there under the street lamp, but he hadn’t expected Cocoa to go for it. Damn, that girl was cold. She didn’t even fight him as he leaned down to kiss her, sliding his hand up under the short, tight skirt she was wearing. He made sure that Marcus could see him. What about that skirt, Marcus, huh? You ever see her wearing that for you? He hadn’t even known she owned anything like it. You could tell she had a nice rack and back, but usually only if you looked under that dumbass big coat she wore over her nurse’s uniform. He grinned down at her as he put his arm over her shoulders and steered her off to his apartment. Maybe later he’d get her back into that little nurse’s uniform or parts of it anyway.

Five minutes later they were wrestling out of their clothes in his apartment. Damn, the girl moved fast when her mind was made up. He lay back on his bed, letting her get a good look at what she was getting. Oh yeah, she liked. She kicked off her panties and jumped up on the bed, straddling his body. She leaned down close until he could smell her skin and feel the tips of her hair brushing his shoulders. Then she changed.

When Julio was five, his mom had taken him and his brothers and sisters to the shore in Jersey. It was in the high nineties, but no one would go in the water. Julio got tired of standing on the blazing sand and ran into the surf, his mother shrieking after him. It was only when he was already calf-deep and facing a big incoming wave that he saw why no one else was in the water. All along the crest of the wave in a sickening pink-white carpet were hundreds of jellyfish, riding the peak and sliding down the trough in diseased-looking lumps. He’d flailed frantically, trying to get back, but the tide of nauseating gelid flesh had boiled over him. By the time his mother had snatched him screaming from the water, the pain was everywhere -- so bad, in fact, that he was standing on the sand twenty yards or more from the water’s edge before he realized that the jellyfish was

That the jellyfish was

Inside his bathing suit.

He looked into the clinging, gelatinous, pinkish-white mass surging upwards over his loins. He screamed, a high-pitched, wheezing scream of sheer terror. The thought struck his mind -- I was just going to fuck that -- and he doubled up, retching so hard that he brought up blood.

It was his worst nightmare.

Cocoa closed her eyes, swaying with the subway car’s movement. She was barely able to force herself upright. The emergency room had been a nightmare, packed with panic-stricken victims and bystanders from a gas main explosion. She’d gone right into the “Zone,” what the doctors called it sometimes -- you sort of stepped out of yourself and let the knowledge and the hands do the work. You had to, sometimes, and you just didn’t look at the clock. She’d gone a shift and a half without even noticing it. It was worth it, seeing the little children quiet and bedded down and that poor gas company worker finally getting some sleep with his family there. Now sleep was all she wanted, too. She dragged her feet up the steps and turned the corner toward the apartment block.

Cocoa smiled up at the light in the window. That Marcus. He was something. She looked down, blushing a little to herself. Yeah, he might even be the One. (Girl, she thought, ain’t no “might” about it, is there?). He was the gentlest man she’d ever met. He had a mind, that man -- a mind for something besides weed, eight ball, and horse. Marcus was going places. She could feel it. Not slick, fast, nasty places, but nice places. Nice, quiet, green places with white picket fences and children. She felt her heart rise as she looked up into the warm light of the window. They were going together.

She felt it as soon as she stepped into the room. It was like one of those movies where the camera spins around and the music shrieks up something nasty and scary. It was bad. It was coming. Cocoa felt herself shrinking down, the world rushing up until she was eight years old standing there in her nurse’s uniform.

Come on, bitch! Gimme the fucking money! I’m the man here and that is my money! Her mother was sobbing, trying to avoid the kicks and punches, holding Cocoa under the coffee table and out of his way. Don’t make me fucking hurt you! Every word was punctuated with a vicious kick until her mother was screaming and covering her head with bloody hands. He’d towered over them like an evil giant from the fairy tales, a blurred figure with snarling heads and cruel, grasping hands, the glowering embodiment of a hundred terror-stricken nights.

She looked up at Marcus. His warm chocolate eyes had frozen over, and his mouth was twisted in an ugly snarl. He raised the gun.

It was her worst nightmare.

Across the street, in the aging brownstone that housed the Alexander Facility for Assisted Living, Mrs. Arcadia Marilith tugged the crocheted blanket a little more firmly over her legs. On her lap, an immaculately groomed teacup Yorkshire terrier frisked excitedly, darting up to her knees to perch with its paws on the window ledge. A moment later, three sharp reports rang out from the tenement opposite, followed shortly by a single and very final shot. Mrs. Marilith nodded approvingly and the Yorkie scampered back up to curl up on her lap.

“Very satisfactory, Iago.” She stroked the sleek little head gently.

Iago gave a comfortable, purring groan. The warm, delicious food was flowing over it in waves. Such a banquet as this was rare and exquisite -- like a fine meal, as much to be respected for its artistry as for its savour. Each course had been rich, complex, and delicately presented. This last, with the two dishes mingling together, was ambrosial.

“Thank you, Leader. I am gratified to please.” It gave an obsequious little wriggle. The Leader’s approval was a rich brandy, the final note to its delicious repletion. Such artistry these humans knew! Such joy in the sensual pleasures of feeding! “But I cannot take credit myself, Leader. Humans are ingenious creatures -- so well versed in tormenting each other. I merely follow in the steps of the Great One.”

Mrs. Marilith raised an eyebrow in surprise. “Indeed? I must look more carefully into his work. I see that you do not exaggerate his gift.” She reached up to a bookshelf and pulled a dusty leather-bound folio carefully down. “Where shall I find your inspiration for tonight, my friend?”

Iago waggled happily, crawling up to get a view of the pages as the aged woman spread the book open on a nearby desk. “It is called Othello, Leader. Allow me to read it to you.”

Dominica Vasquez paused before the door of room five. From behind the door, she could hear a voice murmuring aloud -- a strange, sidelong, evil sort of voice, as if a snake had taken tongue.

Heaven is my judge, not I for love and duty,