Seventy-One
Him
Despite the suffering in my chest, the world moves on. It doesn’t stop for me to get my bearings, to figure out how to live in a world that doesn’t feel right anymore. Doesn’t feel safe.
I still have a Family to run. Still have responsibilities. But I’m second-guessing almost every choice I make, wondering if it’ll somehow cause me to lose my wife or brothers. In my panic, I’ve forbidden Lou from summoning demons, but I doubt she’s actually going to listen –she might seem sweet, but she has a stubborn streak so long it could wrap around the Earth three times– so now I’m stressing I’m going to wake up to find her gone, kidnapped by the Prince of Pride and taken to Halzaja so he can be her baby’s daddy. Then I’m going to have to figure out how to get her back before Micha realizes.
Or perhaps Micha would be okay with that.
She seems too okay with everything now. Outside of her first day back, she seems like she always did. Laughing with her sister. Helping her with her pregnancy. Acting as if she didn’t just suffer a nightmare most can’t even dream of, and that’s making me even more stressed.
Because I suffered two months at Antonio’s hands, and perhaps he didn’t make her eat her own eye or testicle, but he hurt her just as deeply. And he did it for longer.
I understand, thanks to Maddox and our sessions, that we all heal differently. But how can she even hope to heal if she can’t even admit that what she endured was traumatic?
Exhausted and terrified of losing her to something I can’t fight, can’t beat this time, I flop down onto Maddox’s couch as he sits in an adjacent chair.
I run my left hand through my hair, then get annoyed at the missing fingers and use my other one.
“I can’t sleep with her, Maddox,” I say.
“Is she ready for –”
“Not like that.”
Though she seems to be. She’s pushing me all the time, touching me, kissing me, trying to get me hard, but I’m not ready for it yet.
“I mean actually sleep.”
I tug on my hair. It’s getting long. It needs to be trimmed. I shaved the beard I grew while in captivity, but I haven’t tackled my hair yet. “I just watch her all night.”
Maddox surges to his feet; it seems I’ve finally broken his mask of professionalism. “It’s been six fucking days!”
he yells. “Do you know how bad it is to not sleep for one night, let alone nearly a week!?” He turns his head towards the closed door. “Ma –”
Lunging off the sofa, I tackle him to the ground. I place my hand over his mouth as I lie on top of him. “I don’t want her magic,” I hiss.
I don’t want any healing magic working on me at all unless it’s absolutely necessary. I can still feel the warmth of Eduardo’s touch crawling through my body, infecting me, owning me, and my fingers tighten over Maddox’s mouth. His eyes widen, and he shifts into his shadows, running from me before I can crush his jaw.
“Shit,”
I curse and roll onto my back, my hand clenching into a fist. If he was a second slower, his face would be splattered all over the floor. I press both my palms into my eyes, sleep pulling at me at the same time as it screams for me to stay away.
With sleep comes the nightmares.
Her with Antonio.
Me with another.
Both of us raped in different ways.
And then comes Bambi.
Sometimes, she’s grown and stuck in the same Hel we were.
Other times, she’s just a baby, and Eduardo –
I rip my hands away from my eyes, allowing the light to come streaming back and push away the darkness. “I’m sorry. But that’s why I can’t sleep. I’ll hurt her.”
Maybe even kill her by accident.
“You were awake when you just attacked me,”
he mutters beneath his breath. I still hear him though, thanks to my hybrid senses.
“I’m more controlled with her.”
“Good to know.”
He sits back in his chair. “But maybe you shouldn’t be –”
“No.”
I push to my feet. If he thinks I’ll risk her life just to get some shut eye, then this session –
“Not with her.”
He darts in front of me, holding his hands up to get me to stay. “Here. I was going to say, maybe you shouldn’t be so wound up. You might not hurt her at all. When you’re asleep, you’re not exactly a ninja.”
I stare at him for a moment. Exhaling, I head back to the couch.
“Take the bed,”
he says as he flips off the light. “It’s not like you haven’t fucked in it already,” he mutters.
“Oh my gods, I remember that!”
comes a high-pitched voice from on his desk. Marrabelle, the five-inch tall woman he keeps as a pet, has moved out of his fish tank and now has full range of the room. Thankfully, he has also started giving her clothes – doll clothes that he’s modified to fit her.
“Marrabelle, love, remember what I said about you being quiet?”
“You don’t like it because it makes you feel like you’re not doing a good job?”
she says with a nod. “Oooh –” she says with a moan.
“No!”
he cuts in quickly, blushing hard as his eyes dart to me. I do not meet his gaze. I don’t even want to lie down on his bed now.
But the idea of being able to sleep without harming the woman I love is too much to resist. I collapse down on top of it, trying not to think about what’s happened in it.
“Are you not going to take off all your clothes first?”
the little woman asks, her voice one of disappointment.
“Hey.”
Maddox scoffs. “I’m right here.”
“I wish you weren’t,” I mutter.
“Right. You heard him, Maddox. Out. Mama’s gonna –”
He grabs her and tosses her into a drawer, that he then shuts firmly.
I glance at him finally. “Did you put a silence rune on that?”
I can’t hear her at all.
He shrugs a shoulder. “She has enough air in there for weeks. Besides, it’s my underwear drawer, so she’ll –”
“Maddox?”
“Yeah?”
he asks, a grin stretched across his mouth.
“Shut up and let me sleep.”
“Of course, bruh. I’ll be here when you wake.”
My chest tightens. I haven’t told him all that happened to me onboard Antonio’s yacht, but he still understands that I can’t stomach being alone… That the world doesn’t feel safe enough to sleep in.
That the sleep itself isn’t safe…
Someone is on me.
I’m being waterboarded with Ricks, the smell of tobacco and cedar permeating through the rag covering my face. I cough hard as I struggle to breathe. I jerk my head side to side, trying to throw them off.
But the sickness in my veins has made me weak. Every toss of my head sends sharp pains through my brain. The migraine is making it hard to think.
But I don’t need to think to know this is wrong.
That I don’t want this.
None of these women are my wife.
The rag is removed, and I turn my head, coughing and sputtering and trying to breathe.
And all this time, some whore is riding my cock. Another is humping my foot, forcing it inside her. The third places the rag back over my face and pours more Ricks across it.
I jerk awake, throwing the covers off and jumping to my feet, my fangs already bared.
“Easy, tiger.”
Maddox switches the light on, and I turn my head to the side as I close my eyes.
My heart rate starts to slow.
“Want to talk about it?”
I collapse back onto the bed, perching on the edge of it, breathing hard, my body drenched in sweat.
I shake my head.
So we just sit there in silence until I calm down enough to breathe. It felt so fucking real. I know I will eventually have to talk about it, have to address it, but I’m not ready right now.
I stand. “What time is it?”
He glances at his phone. “Three twenty-nine.”
I drag a hand over my face. “I slept for over four hours, and still feel like shit.”
“Because four hours is not enough sleep, especially if you’re catching up for six days. You should lay back down.”
“I need to see Micha.”
“She’s with Lou and Kiyana.”
“Who?”
“Khalid’s girl. She’s changed her name now that she’s learning how to summon demons.”
A name is power where an eknor is concerned, so if the demons learn the name of the person who’s summoned them, they can break out of the containment circle.
I frown. “Wasn’t that what it was before?”
Maddox shrugs. “No idea, bruh. Khalid always calls her kira, and none of us wanted to ‘disrespect’ her enough to ask what it actually was.”
Because Khalid is fucking mental whenever it comes to her being ‘insulted.’ It’s the same reason I never asked. “At least it’s close,”
I say. Might be easier to remember.
Then my eyes widen as the rest of his words settle in my brain. “Lou’s not supposed to be anywhere near a fucking summoning circle,”
I snap as I run for the door.
“Chill, bruh. Nothing’s going –”
But he can’t guarantee nothing will happen! And if a demon does try to take her back to Halzaja, Micha will try to stop them. Then I’ll lose her all over again. I race down the hall and slide around the banister before taking the stairs down to the basement. I push open the door, terrified I’m going to find an empty room, and don’t breathe again until I see her.
She’s sitting on the floor, smiling at her sister, but there’s a hollowness in her red eyes. A tension to her shoulders. It’s not good for her to keep everything bottled up, but any time I try to suggest she talks to Maddox too, she tells me she’s fine. She looks fine. She sounds fine. But inside? She has to be struggling. I hear her whimpers in her sleep.
“Varius,”
Lou says, not even having the good graces to look ashamed. In fact, she fucking smiles at me, but I’ll deal with her later. Striding across the room, I head for Micha. She jumps to her feet, a wall up around her, a fear in the back of her flat eyes, and I stop. As much as she pushes for sex, she won’t even let me hold her.
I’d be tempted to give in if I thought she’d cuddle after. But I know she won’t. For all her talk about being fine, she’s just not.
Forcing myself to calm, I look at Lou, then at the floor. There’s no summoning circle, and I feel like a fucking fool.
Maybe Maddox is right, and I need to chill out.
Or maybe I just need some more fucking sleep.