Chapter 35 The Scapegoat Never Makes Bail
The Scapegoat Never Makes Bail
Shadow holds me, impaled on his cock, my body trembling around him, his tentacles coiled possessively at my thighs and breasts.
I blink through the haze of mind-bending pleasure, pain, and something deeper —something triumphant. I feel free.
Through the roar in my ears, I hear Shadow’s growl—low, ragged, full of a dark satisfaction. The shadows surge and tighten, a ripple of silent violence in the air.
"That’s my good little monster." Shadows slows his pace to a steady, lazy pump.
The tentacle around Elijah’s throat coils once more, and there’s a sharp, ugly snap.
His body crumples, sagging lifeless to the floor.
Caroline’s feet scramble helplessly in the air for a beat longer, her muffled screams hitting a higher, frantic pitch—until another her head twists with the same unnatural violence. The sound she makes is little more than a choked gasp before she falls still, dangling limp in Shadow’s grasp.
I gasp for breath, my body still clenching around Shadow’s monstrous cock as he grinds deep inside me, slow and heavy, dragging out every last quake of my shattering orgasm.
I wait for the crash. For the horror, the shame. For the flood of regret that should drown me whole.
But it never comes.
It’s gone—burned away, beaten out of me by a lifetime of surviving monsters worse than me.
All that’s left is the creature who shivers and twitches with pleasure as the room fills with the iron stench of blood and death.
I collapse against Shadow, trembling, spent. He strokes my sweat-soaked hair, talons lightly scraping my scalp, causing pleasant tingles to wash over me. The other curls possessively around my throat.
"Now," His voice is a low, vibrating growl at my ear, "you are a monster."
I’m not sure if it’s two minutes or two hours before I regain my senses and ability to stand on my own.
The room. The bodies. Everything felt like it was held in a blood-soaked haze.
"You killed them." The words come out numb.
"You killed them, my little monster."
It’s true. I wanted it. I asked for it. But it was his tendrils that wrapped and ripped them apart. Just like he did all those years ago to David. He went to prison for doing this very thing then.
"I would kill them a hundred times more for what they did to you and relish every scream of terror." Shadow stands back as if giving me room to process.
I feel relief at their deaths just like I did with David’s. Like a weight has been removed from my chest and shoulders.
I close the distance Shadow put between us and stare up at him. "I am a monster, like you. We belong together."
"We cannot, Evie." His voice is a low rumble of gravel churning.
It’s like being hit with a slap of cold water. I can’t believe what I’m hearing.
"I’m a monster, like you."
"A monster, yes." He pauses. "But not like me. You’ve transformed and I know now I could never have stopped it. But you, me? This is not to be, Evie."
If I wasn’t completely wrung out of all energy I would lose it. He’s stubborn, unrelenting, always trying to keep us apart. I’m beyond sick of it.
"You keep losing control around me. I know you want me."
His eyes flash red. "Stop it, Evie."
"If we were together, these things wouldn’t happen. I’d be safe. You’d be loved."
"Stop it, Evie. You don’t understand. It is forbidden." He’s speaking so calmly.
"Killing humans is forbidden," I point out. "We are way past the boundaries of what’s forbidden. Stop trying to keep us apart. It’s too late."
"I won’t hurt you, not like the rest have." There is a mournful darkness to his tone.
"Then don’t," I claw at his shoulders. "Be with me."
Let me love you.
I don’t say the words out loud because I know how they drive him away.
"I want you. I want you inside me," I plead, pushing at his weak point. I’m not above manipulation to get what I want. I’ll make him mine even if I have to trap him inside my needy cunt to do it.
I stroke his still rigid member, wet from both our pleasure. I could make him come again. Hard enough that he realizes what we have. That he needs me.
He stiffens at my touch before pushing me away. "The blood lust and violence took over. I won’t let it happen again."
"Please," I practically scream. I try to get at him again, but he pushes me back again. Not hard enough to hurt me, but he easily keeps me at bay.
Will I ever stop begging? Will I ever stop needing to be loved? To belong? The screams of loneliness, pain, and love for him wail like starving banshees. I know the truth. I’ll never stop.
"I can’t have you, Evie, don’t you understand?" he snarls, angry, but not at me.
"No." I don’t. My fingers dig into his wrist, needing to hold tight to whatever part I can reach.
Shadow closes his eyes, breathing in deeply. "I must go. They will be coming for me."
My body goes cold as I step back, releasing him from my grasp. The pinch on my insides hurts as much as it ever has.
The rejection, the denial. He keeps taking everything from me, while giving me only glimpses of his desire, never fully surrendering.
But he’ll be back. He always comes back.
Though he keeps bringing me to orgasm, I somehow feel used. Or like he’s placating me.
Give the crazy girl an orgasm to shut her up so she’ll leave me alone.
But it only brings me to the edge of hysteria of my need.
Shadow disappears under my bed, dragging the corpses of my neighbors with him.
Despite him leaving me yet again, I am different now.
My humanity has burned away and I’m new. Different. Monstrous.
Soon enough he’ll see we are the same, and we are inevitable.
2 Days Later
The insistent knocking on my door jolts me from my thoughts of my now empty food cabinet as I clean up from breakfast. Each thud against the wood feels like a drumbeat, echoing the hammering in my chest.
I open the door to find two police officers, their faces stern masks of authority. "Evangeline Smith?" one of them asks.
"Yes," I reply, my voice a thread of sound in the heavy air.
"Do you know why we are here?"
My heart thuds painfully against my ribs.
They know about Elijah and Caroline.
It’s been two days, but the police somehow found out that they are dead and I’m the reason why.
My brain races hotly, trying to figure out how they know. Shadow took their bodies with him. Did someone hear something?
After all, the reason Elijah and Caroline snapped and came for me was because I was too loud. It’s not hard to believe someone else in the complex had come to the door to tell me to shut the fuck up before hearing the massacre inside and backing away to call the police.
But then why would it take so many days for the cops to come?
"We need you to come with us for questioning regarding the incident at the restaurant with Mr. Miguel Acevedo," the officer states, his hand resting on the handcuffs at his belt—a silent threat of what's to come.
The bile that had been creeping up my throat calms back down, only to be replaced with the heavy weighted rocks of guilt whenever I think of Miguel lying in that hospital bed.
The world beyond my apartment has been creeping closer, a tightening noose of suspicion and fear, and now it seems it has finally arrived on my doorstep.
My heart plummets.
The stale air of the precinct clings to me like a second skin, cold and unyielding. I sit at an interrogation table for the third time in my life, a harsh light overhead casting stark shadows across the room. The walls seem to close in with every passing second, the clock on the wall ticking away.
Detective Larson sits across from me, his expression a mix of professional skepticism and reluctant duty. "Ms. Smith," he begins, folding his hands on the table, "do you understand why you're here?"
"Because of what happened at the restaurant?" I say, my voice steady despite the dread pooling in my stomach. It tells me something bad is coming. Though I’m not sure what or why.
The other witnesses corroborated what I saw and there’s no way I could have done the damage by myself, knocking down walls and destroying a whole business.
"Is Miguel okay?" I ask, my fingers digging into the table.
Larson doesn’t answer for a moment. He studies me with bloodshot, watery eyes that likely come from a combination of not enough sleep, too many after-work beers, and bad cholesterol.
"Mr. Acevedo remains stable but unresponsive."
I blow out a sigh of relief and scrub a hand over my face, trying to release the tension that has ratcheted up into my shoulders.
If anything happened to him...
"Right," Detective Larson says gruffly, steamrolling over my emotions.
"Now, we've got a situation where multiple witnesses reported seeing.
.. monsters, which frankly, sounds like mass hysteria.
But here's the thing—when our officers arrived, there was evidence of.
.. something. Guts, for lack of a better term.
Then it was reported they disintegrated before the forensic team could properly analyze them. "
My mind races. Shadow's words echo in my head—the atmosphere is toxic to their kind. Of course there wouldn't be any evidence left behind.
"Does any of this sound likely to you, Ms. Smith?" Larson asks, squinting one eye at me.
Can I explain the physics of monsters and our world to the detective without sounding insane?
Yeah, there’s no way to do that. So I keep my mouth shut and wait.
"Yeah, none of that sounds likely to me either." Larson leans forward, his bulgy, watery eyes intent on mine. "What does sound more likely is someone pumping drugs into the restaurant's ventilation system. Hallucinogens strong enough to make everyone ride the same brain cell killing trip."
I still don’t know what I’m doing here, so I remain quiet, lips sealed.
"And what’s notable, Ms. Smith, is you have a history with these... occurrences."
There it is. The reason I’m here. Someone he can pin the blame on.
He leans back, setting a hand on his large stomach. "It's not much of a leap to think you're involved."