Chapter Ten
“Idon’t like Wednesdays.”
Yes, I am sulking to a cat, but Berry sympathizes. Berry doesn’t like Wednesdays either. Who would, when our reason for existing is out late? Sometimes Aggie goes straight from the office to the book club, which starts around five, I believe. But sometimes she swings home first.
I hope tonight she stops by, just so I can remind her not to tarry too long at the end.
But at least the audiobook Agatha left on is serving two purposes.
I’m thrilled by the five collected works of Agatha Christie, and the laptop generates enough heat that Berry has a new favorite spot, right next to me.
Every now and again, I dare to reach out and pet her little soft triangular ears or wind her teensy tail around my finger.
Sometimes I get frantic purring, and sometimes I get angry kitten kicks and love bites.
“Big scary phantasm, madly in love with a human and her cat,” I sigh, reluctantly withdrawing my hand. I don’t want to waste my energy. Tonight, I’ll emerge and pin my love to the wall, tentacles plunging home into her constantly wet pussy, hands binding hers above her head.
My paper doll, made flesh.
I crane my neck and look into the open closet. Wouldn’t I love to play dress-up with her? Or more like un-dress-up? Would she let me pound into her while she’s only wearing her white lace bra? Or just those black lace-up boots with the ruffles at the top?
“She’s ruined me,” I tell the cat, and the cat gives me a look that clearly agrees.
“But I’m so happy to be ruined,” I whisper to myself, eyes looking longingly at the tiny numbers in the corner of the laptop. Three-thirty.
Not long now.
In fact—
Berry leaps from the chair and runs excitedly to the front door—only to streak back in and dive under the bed as a man’s voice fills the apartment.
Damned warlocks!
“Thank you so much for letting me in. My daughter would absolutely kill me if she knew I already lost her spare key.”
“Well, Agatha’s a good tenant. Happy to help.
You could let her know that in the future, we won’t open a resident’s door without a call-out fee.
They can always hire a locksmith or leave a key with a neighbor.
But since you drove all this way and showed me all those sweet pictures.
.. What can I say? I have a daughter who’s out at Florida State. ”
The conversation continues as I try to sort out what I’m hearing.
Aggie’s dad is in town? From Central America?
He’s a medical missionary, and I thought he wasn’t coming home for months?
Would Agatha even have had time to send him a spare key?
What would be the use of that? He lives in Texas when he’s home—or am I mixing things up?
After a millennium of only hearing bits and pieces of conversations, you get to be great at deductions but also have a crowded memory.
The door shuts, and I hear footsteps moving through the living room. Cabinets opening and closing in the kitchen.
Maybe he’s hungry?
I wish my human lover had a phone other than the one she carries with her.
I would find a way to call her and make sure this is correct.
Or maybe... Maybe Aggie already knows. Her father could have come back unexpectedly, called her, met up with her in town, and had a nice lunch.
Then Aggie gave him a spare key so he could come here and rest after his long travels. Yes. That makes sense.
“Wasteful little slut.”
I stagger inside my swirling, weightless void. What father would say such a thing about his child? I make sure I’m concealed, and in a stroke of sudden genius, I make the surface of the mirror a pretty floral pattern, something that taxes me but lets me stop shifting so I can just watch.
The man who comes into the room carries a briefcase and wears a suit. He doesn’t look like I would expect a medical missionary to dress, but what do I know?
I know that Aggie’s screensaver is a picture of her with her father and June because I’ve been staring at it all day as the audiobook plays.
This is not that man. He’s soft and pale and doughy, and the man on the screen is rangy and tanned with shorts and knobby knees.
“Where does she keep them? What are you hiding from us, little girl?” the voice snarls, and I almost break my camouflage.
It’s Arnie, the stepfather. Arnie the stepfather is ripping open her drawers—rummaging for pills. As he finds them, he looks at them, shakes his head, and snorts, laughing and scoffing.
“Midol? Aspirin? Where’s the real stuff? And—” he pulls up a paperback from her drawer and looks at it with a disgusted sneer. “Little slut, reading this filth!”
For a moment, I think he’s going to tear the book, but he doesn’t. He puts everything neatly back in place and then goes to the bathroom. A short, triumphant cry delivers him back to the bedroom, and this time I see what’s in his briefcase.
Pills. Dozens and dozens of bottles and clear plastic bags of pills, all shapes and sizes.
He holds up Aggie’s two prescription bottles, squinting, and then opens one, counting out small white ovals and muttering.
That bastard is going to drug my Agatha! Panic grips me. I can exit the mirror—I think. But am I strong enough to fight this human? Will I survive long enough to warn Aggie?
“This will put her in a nice, comfy hospital bed with full restraints in a few days.” Her stepfather separates half of Aggie’s pills and holds up a bottle with similar-looking contents. “White versus pale yellow... Hmm. A little dusting in powdered sugar should fix that...”
This man is a pro. He shakes pale yellow pills the color of rich cream in a small vial of white powder and tips them back next to the discarded pills. “There. She’ll never know. She never did before, anyway...”
The sinking feeling in my middle soars back up, a fierce eagle ready to tear out Arnie’s liver like he’s some wicked Prometheus. I topple through the mirror in a nest of eight-foot-long tentacles and vicious hands, reaching for the one who hurt my empress.
“You poisoned her!” I scream. “You’ve been tampering with her pills whenever she was getting better!
She knew it! She knew it, and you made it so hard to find, so impossible to trace, especially while she lived under your roof,” I crow, snatching at him, pouring out all my strength to grab the human and wrap him in a stranglehold.
It’s gratifying to see Arnie panic, to watch him struggle and fail as I smother him. Even Berry emerges and goes for his balding head as I wrestle him to the ground. Her little claws make bloody work of his rapidly graying face.
“What are you?” he gasps.
“Her protector!” I spit. “And you are her captor!”
“No! She’s ill. She’s not right. She was trying to do too much, had to move back home after college. I kept an eye—”
“On her? And once she was home, you thought, ‘Ah, here is a vulnerable young woman. A beautiful young woman. I’ll mess with her medications and keep her unbalanced so she leans on me—and soon, I’ll make my move.
’ Isn’t that it? Isn’t it?” I demand, hoisting him up in the air and shaking him wildly (much to Berry’s dismay).
The kitten falls off, and I hear bones snap in the man’s rib cage.
I don’t care.
I don’t care if I kill him. But I care if Agatha is punished for my crimes.
And I care that I’m getting weaker the longer I fight him—and that he’s in just the right position to launch his legs out together and kick me in the eyes.
Blind, I grope and hiss, holding onto him as he gasps and gurgles up blood.
“She’s a slut. A demon-worshiping slut. What are you? Some twisted thing she turned real with her whoring?”
“What whoring? Never mind. Don’t talk. I should have shattered your windpipe instead of your ribs.”
“You won’t always be around to protect her. She’s mine. She’s always been mine. I get what I want, and I—”
Thoughts fly faster than reason. He’s right.
After less than an hour of intense fighting, I’m worn out.
My tentacles are already turning from solid to shadow as he struggles and screams. The leg I managed to wrap flies free as another part of me fades, and his foot hits me in the chin.
My teeth snap shut on my tongue, making shadowy black blood flow down my face.
Blinded and fading—I have to get back to my mirror or I’ll die.
But if I leave Arnie out here, Aggie could die. Maybe not tonight, but soon. Or maybe... Maybe it would be tonight.
“You’re right,” I say, opening my swollen eyes. I was a soldier. I’ve had worse. “I won’t always be around. Neither will you—but at least I’ll get to say goodbye.”
With the last bit of strength I have, I throw Arnie into the mirror—and he sinks through it.
“HEY, GUYS! I’M HOME early. Can you believe I left the book for tonight on the kitchen counter? If I— Lucius!”
Lucius is lying in the living room, pale and almost entirely see-through.
“My empress. I’m so glad you’re here.”
“Honey! Babe, why are you out of the mirror? What happened to you?” I demand, slamming the door shut and dropping to my knees.
Lucius is about to reply, opening his bloodied lips and peering at me through swollen, slitted eyes that are almost entirely puffed shut when I hear the screaming.
Hoarse shouts, angry curses. Unhinged pleading and wailing.
“Arnie?” I gasp.
“He came. With pills. So many pills. You’re right. He was mixing your medications all along. For all I know, he’s been slipping your poor mother pills as well to keep her docile and unaware of what a conniving evil piece of shit he is,” Lucius wheezes. “I was fading fast—”
“When did he get here?” I try to cup his face, but my hand slides right through, and it feels like ice plunges into my heart.
“Not long ago. Made up a story about losing the key you gave. Someone let him in. I couldn’t fight him as long as—”
“You put him in the mirror.”
“He said I wouldn’t always be around to protect you. He was right. But in there... You smash the mirror, and he’s gone forever.”