Chapter Six #2
“One day I will engulf you. Wrap you in me and swallow you down, fill you, and tangle you in my tentacles until you can’t bear to be free,” I warn her. Beg her.
My sweet Agatha. She breaks the kiss and asks, “Tentacles? Ohhh. That’s why I couldn’t find your legs.”
Agatha hits her climax, and the world spirals out of focus.
She makes me helpless, and I like it. It’s a new sort of helplessness, not trapped in a dungeon of glass and gold, but trapped in her private world, a spectator who is glad he has this ringside seat.
“Lucius... Thank you for visiting,” she whispers, kissing me with little soft pecks all over my face. “It’s nice to have someone in my head who’s safe.”
Oh. Ohhh, little one. I’m so very dangerous.
But maybe I won’t be—to her.
LOUISA ASHCROFT IS the nicest librarian ever—very different from the tyrant who ran the law library reference section at my university.
Each week, the book club reads a different book, and Louisa is always there, unabashedly championing the sultriest mind candy.
This week, we’re actually going to read something different, a history of Pine Ridge that Gloria White-Creighton (the lady who owns White Pines, where the club meets) recommended.
I know the library has a dozen copies because—get this—Louisa’s hubby, Mortimer, wrote the book!
Know what is even cooler? I know that. I know who runs the book club, who is married to who, and who the local authors are.
“Louisa! I’m here to borrow a copy of your husband’s book if there are any left,” I exclaim, juggling my purse and looking for my library card.
(I got one last week. I’m putting down roots.)
“You get the last one.” Louisa smiles and reaches over to the display next to the circulation desk. “I can’t help but notice those rosy cheeks and that sparkling grin. That is the face of a lady who just got laid or paid. Which is it?” she whispers, leaning forward.
“Louisa!” I giggle. I guess I was the one shamelessly recounting my ex’s bedroom failures in comparison to the hot new book boyfriend we read about this week. That was fueled by wine and everyone else talking about romantic tips, tricks, and things they look back on now and laugh about.
This is what it’s like having friends again, I remind myself, trying not to hug myself and squeal.
Fighting a mental health battle that puts you in a residential facility for months shows you who your real friends are. Guess what I discovered? I didn’t have many, and the ones I did have were far away.
“Sorry, I don’t mean to pry, but you’re glowing.” Louisa looks away. “Card, please?”
“I had the spiciest dream!” I hiss, glad when she looks my way again, her dark eyes shining behind her glasses. “I don’t know if my apartment is haunted or if I just have a dream lover, but—”
Louisa drops the book with a thud. “Ghost?”
I blush and pretend that I must find something in my purse. “Oh. Uh. Yeah, probably just a dream. Anyway, it’s a recurring one. I mean, the same figure keeps showing up. So, how are sales for Mortimer’s book? I hear he’s going to release an audiobook, too?”
“A ghost? Who keeps visiting you? Is he nice? What’s he look like?”
My surprise must show on my face because Louisa is quick to explain, “I believe in ghosts. I’ve even met one. Personally. A very charming and sweet one.”
“I’m not sure if it’s a ghost,” I explain, “it’s likely just a dream, but it was still a great one. His name is Lucius, and he’s gorgeous. In my dream, he’s all shades or white, black, and gray. Kinda purple-y. Did your ghost have legs? Mine doesn’t.”
“What’s he have?”
I whisper, “Tentacles.”
Louisa’s mouth drops open, and her eyebrows arch. “Damn, girl. Lucky.”
“Louisa!”
“Hey, double your pleasure, octuple your fun,” Louisa winks, but there are concerned lines around her mouth and between her eyes, a frown trying to fight its way to freedom.
“I think there are more than eight, but I didn’t really count. That’s not what matters. What matters is that you’re the second—technically third person who didn’t laugh in my face when I said I had a ghost,” I remark with a smile.
“Ghosts and things like that are common around here. Not everyone sees them, that’s all.”
And that’s kinda what Alban said.
A cold shiver runs up my spine. “You believe in them? For real?”
Louisa rocks her hands back and forth. “Asi-asi. Tentacles don't sound like a ghost to me. Unless it’s the ghost of a kraken. I may have to ask Calder about that...”
“Who’s Calder?”
“Janet’s husband.” Louisa scans my card and the book, handing them both back to me.
“What would he know about krakens, living or dead?”
“He’s a little bit of an expert on that sort of thing. That’s all. Where do you live again?”
“By the campus, in those red brick apartments?”
“Hmm. No, that’s not a ghost,” she mutters. “Unless he’s new in town.”
“Ghosts move?”
“Well, not really. Sometimes they have something that they’re attached to that moves with them. I... I think you might have something other than a ghost. Of course, it could just be a really hot dream.”
“Could be.”
I leave and go home, my leftover lunch and my library book the perfect Friday night reading combo.
Except that when I get back to my apartment, I ignore the book and dinner.
I don’t even complete my routine of slipping out of my power-meets-steampunk-meets-elegant work attire and into my silky nighties and matching robes.
I plop down at my little kitchen table and open my laptop.
Berry comes purring across the table, rubbing her chin against mine and hopping into my lap to shed.
With a deep breath, I delete another half dozen emails from my mother and Arnie, ignoring the capitals in the subject line, and open a new search window.
What is something like a ghost that haunts an object but has a non-human form?
Oooh, so much evil artwork pops up.
The internet has a lot of unhelpful suggestions, a lot of them seemingly tied to fantasy video games.
“Lucius, if you’re listening, I don’t think you’re a ghost. You’d better tell me what you are, buddy, or I’m getting a priest over here in the morning.”
“A PHANTASM. A PHANTOM. I didn’t die, and this isn’t my spirit.
I was made into this when forced to leave the mortal realm for a spellbound prison.
There? Happy?” I whisper the words in Aggie’s ear as she sleeps, tonight in simple black silk.
She shivers as my finger trails across her throat.
“They call it transmogrification, I believe. There. Now you know the truth. Are you scared, little one?”
Agatha rolls. Moans. I moan back as she snuggles into me. “I’m sorry they put you in jail. I know what it’s like to be trapped in a cell. Sort of.”
“Who could ever imprison you?” I whisper. She’s so innocent. I kiss her neck and taste the purity, so sharp that it makes everything in me throb in pain.
I’m an addict after only three days. I want more, pain or pleasure, as long as it comes from her.
“People who wanted to keep me from hurting myself. Not a prison. Just... Not free. Complicated.”
She’s silent for a minute, and I dare to grip her thigh, lifting it until it rides up over my waist. Each time I return, I’m stronger.
Tonight, my tentacles flutter and fly, stroking across her pussy, one after the after, licking her with shadowy tongues until she starts to rock against the thick purple-gray rod that’s so hungry for her.
“Why did they put you in jail?” she asks between those world-tipping kisses.
“Jealousy. I took a lover who was free—but her former lover wasn’t ready to let her go.” For the first time in years, I let myself remember her, let myself wonder what happened to her. If I was cast into eternal limbo, what did he do to the woman he claimed to love?
With a shudder, I clutch Aggie closer. “I never see you with a lover, my dearest.”
“Haven’t had a lover in years—until you.”
Her body bounces on mine, her hands wrapping around my neck as her wetness coats the tips of my tentacles and invites me in.
“If you make me your lover, you might not like it. I’m no longer human.
My appetites aren’t the same,” I warn. It’s true.
I want to slide inside her—but I also want to bind her, pull her open, and fill her in every hole.
I lost whatever gentleness human lovers have, and I only have a memory to guide me.
Mostly, what I have is weakness in this world.
If I had my full strength, Agatha would already be bulging, filled with one or two tentacles in both of her holes as I licked up her tears and drank in her screams, not caring if they started off pained as long as they ended up orgasmic.
“I didn’t feel human when I was sick. Really sick. I was just this ball of fear and panic. I almost did something stupid. You’re not... You’re not going to hurt yourself, are you?”
She makes me more human by the second. She worries about me injuring myself, when to anyone else it would be clear that she’s the one in danger. “You inflict all of my wounds,” I whisper. “An arrow to my heart.”
“Romantic devil,” she laughs, and the arrows assail, driving into me.
She’s so kind to me—and she doesn’t realize that she is poisoning herself with every word.
“I’m not going to leave you now,” I hiss.
“Good. Too many people leave when you want them to stay.”
Tonight, I have the strength to pin her down, roll on top of her, and watch her eyes and lips widen in shock. Tentacles latch onto her calves and my hardness rubs against her belly as my tongue slides into her mouth.
If only she’d tell me to leave or remind me I’m a nightmare creature.
But Aggie only digs her fingers into my hair and reminds me what it’s like when someone else wants you. Touches you.
Loneliness and hate melt off of me, and I wish I could punish her for it.
“You belong to me now. Doesn’t that frighten you?” I try.
“Do you belong to me, too?” she asks.
Fucking Bodaceia. Warrior queen. Fearless of everything but what’s in her own head. “All my legions bow before you,” I answer, words dragged out unwillingly.
“Does that mean yes?”
My grip loosens as hers grows more desperate. “Yes.”