Monomaniac

Chapter 21

Ophelia

"WHO ARE YOU TALKING TO?" asks a small, curious voice to my right.

My somber reverie and scattered thoughts dissolve in an instant at the sight of a little girl. She appears to be no older than seven, with a face like a porcelain doll that I've never seen before, but whose soul feels painfully familiar.

Her fascinated sepia eyes gaze at my hands still holding the tarot cards, while hers play with a lock that has fallen from her crown braid. Eyes – talismanic eyes that look nothing like my brother’s russet ones; that look everything like his. Victor?

"Pretty, isn’t it? Marizia taught papa how to do my hair a long time ago. He’s now better than her, but don’t tell on me if she asks," the perceptive little girl says, smoothing her mauve pinafore before sitting down on the floor next to me at the coffee table.

At the mention of Marizia, I stiffen - painful memories of what seems like a lifetime ago resurfacing as I try to find the connection between the two. If she is her daughter, then why did she call her by her name?

"So?" she asks, brimming with curiosity and so much…familiarity.

"I was reading my tarot," I say distractedly, looking back at them and running my fingers over the Moon card. One of my favorites, even if it represents an indication of fog-shrouded secrets and the intangible unknown.

"What’s tarot? Is it a card game?" she asks with wonder, extending her hand towards an unturned one. Just like…

"Don’t touch them," I warn softly, moving the deck closer to me.

"Why?" she asks, widening her eyes.

"Because, as their master, I'm the only one who can use them. It is said that if someone else touches or reads them, they will lose their power and knowledge," I say, giving her a small smile and hoping she won't be saddened by my refusal to indulge her.

But then again, one is never too young to learn about loyalty, even to an inanimate deck of cards.

"Power? What can they do? Can I have one too?" she asks, melting me a little with her fairylike wonder; her innocence reminding me that purity still exists in the marred world outside these thick walls.

"They can reveal the past, present and future for those who can read the symbols found in their drawings. See?" I answer, trying to simplify a practice with a history older than she can grasp at her tender age.

"And you can? Will you teach me, please?" she asks softly yet urgently, coming closer to me and clasping her hands to her mouth in silent pleading. "I can trade half of my hidden stash of macarons. Is it enough?"

"They learn so young," says Dante with a sense of pride in his voice, materializing out of thin air in the archway of the living room, and looking at us with a peaceful expression on his otherwise tired face.

The contrast is jarring compared to the restless energy he's adopted over the past three days since that night in the woods.

He and a handful of his trusted men searched high and low for the sadist who had destroyed so many lives in such a short span of time. But in spite of all the video footage, the tracking dogs and their continuous efforts, he seems to have vanished without a trace.

Which is why, at the moment, I'm devoting myself to a different kind of pursuit – researching every passage in my grimoire, questioning crystals and pendulums, contacting the unknown through oracles and even grounds from finished cups of coffee followed by fistfuls of thrown rice. They all had the same underlying message.

Death is coming, weather the metaphorical or the palpable kind and as a consequence, I haven’t been sleeping for the last two days as I waited anxiously for Dante to come back and tell me it is finally over. But no such luck.

I swallow dryly, feeling Coblina stir to my right, her claws already sinking into my thighs, as if her unrest to have him closer as soon as he enters a room is a sister of mine.

"Uncle Danni!" the little girl calls out excitedly before running towards him. My Dante crouches down before catching her with a lethargic smile on his face. A neglected part of me begins to tear up as he cradles her delicate body in his big arms, looking like the embodiment of the father I always dreamed of having.

At the endearing sight, my heart constricts with a dull ache that I thought I wouldn't have to face so soon. Not like this.

"My Ombra, this is Aurora – the princepessa of the family and Tommy’s daughter. Aurora, this beauty here is –"

"Your favorite in the whole world," she interrupts with knowing eyes that seem much older than her handful of years.

After all, old souls recognize each other; with the same instincts one would detect danger. But in this particular case she reminds me so much of…how could that be possible?

"Precisely," he says, tapping her nose and lowering her to the ground, not taking his eyes off my curled up body lying on the floor.

My beloved circles the table, reaching out and taking my hand in his. He lifts me up like a petal floating in the wind before the storm, holding me still in his eyes and making me a willing captive at the mercy of his deadly magnetism.

How I’ve missed you, my love.

He sits down on the Victorian tufted sofa, pulling me into him and resting my back against the hard planes of his chest; feeling so protected at the way his strong legs surround mine as our breaths become less and less abstinent. Home.

"Is papa here? I have to show him something," she asks calmly yet firmly, demanding our attention. This child will be a force to be reckoned with in a few years.

"He is in the kitchen, making coffee. Go ask him for a double espresso, will you?" he asks as he pulls me closer, my light cashmere robe seeming to overheat my suddenly sensitive skin like thick wool.

"Be back in a second. Can I take Coblina with me? We became friends," Of course they did, just like I recognized her beyond her current body.

Aurora doesn’t wait for an answer, but keeps looking at me as she takes my sphynx in her arms before running to her father.

I close my eyes, already too drunk on Dante for words while he breathes down my neck, rendering me dizzy even though we barely moved an inch. From afar we may look inconspicuously loving, his hand barely touching me but under the surface I feel like I might dissolve.

Silently, he gathers the soft fabric in a loose fist, as if looking for skin, searching, twisting…

"Opium, what are you doing?" I ask on a contained moan, leaning my head on his shoulder. The heated way he touches me, leaving me feeling both exposed and soaked with desire.

A long minute passes, his hand remaining still while our breaths become shallower, the time moving slower as my vision darkens just at the feel of his nose caressing my profile.

"Such a good girl, always giving me what I need without having to ask," he murmurs, licking a clean path from my jaw to my temple.

I whimper, struggling to stay still as he pushes his fingers inside my floor length robe. Once there, he finds the silky lining of my nightgown that barely dips an inch below my hip.

He groans, circling my stiff nipple, before pulling aside both layers at once and exposing me fully to his greedy eyes. God, how I need him.

"Dante, love, what if someone comes?" I breathe in anticipation as he kneads and squeezes my heavy breast, making me want to beg for his tongue with every searing caress of his fingers along the sensitive tip.

Please taste me, just once, please…

"Focus on me, nothing else matters," he whispers heatedly in my ear before he bites it softly between open mouthed kisses, his hand paving its way inside my thong.

I can both feel and hear my blood rushing through me as his fingers gather the satiny wetness dripping down my inner thighs before he glides them inside knuckle deep.

All I can do as he slides maddeningly fast and hard inside my aching core is to bite my lip, close my eyes and attempt the agonizing task of remaining quiet.

"What were the cards telling you?" he asks huskily, as he sucks the exposed side of my neck along with the chain I plan on wearing for the rest of my life.

"Bad omens," I whimper, unable to form another word when he bites into the juncture point at the base of my shoulder and neck, a clandestine cry escaping me like a secret in the vast space of the dark living room.

"Fuck them, together we can overcome anything," he says smooth like untouched hope, dark like a sin yet to be committed.

Making us both shiver and pant, he continues to mark me with his teeth as if I were a fresh, ripe fruit he just picked from a tree he planted a lifetime ago. Succulent and only his, the pomegranate juice of our shared lust morphs into the perfume of blood embedded in our unending love, right before our eyes.

Essence, truth, life – he is everything.

Closer, I will always need you closer, beyond the layers of skin, flesh and bone keeping us at a distance. Soul, give me your soul so mine could rest. Stay.

It is true – nothing matters anymore. All that remains is him and for the first time in my life…I am happy.

"Frà, I can’t find the Brandi for caffè corretto," a robust voice bellows from the hallway followed by a small set of steps close behind.

The spell breaks, thighs quiver, reality swims behind my eyelids. Before I can even come back to myself, Dante has somehow rearranged my robe and hair, making of us the image of decency in less than five seconds. My illusory thief.

"Oh, hello there. Are we interrupting?" a brawny man with a good-natured smile on a devious face, appears with a pot of coffee, along with little Aurora holding a small tray with porcelain cups.

"Not at all, you must be Tommy. I am Ophelia, nice to finally meet you," I say, standing up on weak legs and leaning forward to shake his hand; the very same one who saved my love from the clutches of death more than once. For that, I will forever be in his debt.

"Likewise. I must say, you aren’t as bone chilling as I imagined you to be," he says with a fiendish look in his eyes as he drags a chair next to the table and pours us each a cup of steaming coffee.

"What gave you that idea in the first place?" I ask intrigued, trying to compose myself as I sit back down. Which is no easy feat, considering the source of my heady ruin, now runs his fingers down my wrist.

"Ghost hunting isn’t his cup of tea. He’d rather be the bad guy in a banned slasher movie from the eighties," Dante says with mischief, placing his arm around my shoulder and bringing me closer to him.

"You make it seem as if I were scared of a little spirit action," Tommy laughs with gusto while running his hand through his dark cropped hair. "Although, you have to admit it's kind of creepy. You don't meet a paranormal investigator every day," Tommy says, shrugging with boyish ease.

"Hopefully you won't ever be in the position of looking for one," I say, giving him a small blue smile, knowing well enough that people usually seek me out only as a last resort.

"Papa, look. These are the ones I told you about," Aurora says from his right, pressing her small hands on his forearm.

"The cards?" he asks, raising an eyebrow in my direction.

"I was doing a reading and she was fascinated by what she saw," I reply, taking a sip of the rich, bitter brew.

"Ah, but what if our princepessa here, follows the path of my Ophelia? Imagine the two of you roaming the country looking for apparitions in the basements of abandoned asylums in the dead of night," Dante says, all machiavellic and visibly enjoying the growing discomfort of his best friend.

"Papa, can we go ghost hunting, please? Say yes!" "You make it sound like it’s a bad thing," Aurora and I respond at the same time.

"You two are sick," Tommy looks at me and Dante with feigned dread, but I don't hear him. I'd rather be searching for lost spirits in an attic untouched for decades with the love of my life. The two of us, looking for danger, with me, craving him between my legs when the floor creeks without a reason. What a splendid time to be alive.

"I forsake the cure," I whisper for his ears only as I lean my head on his shoulder. He hums in response as his nails trace a flaming trail down my arm.

"Aunty Ophelia, will you teach me please? Besides macarons, I'll help you mix the potions and all the other magic bits when dad isn't looking," she begs with eyes wide like two full moons the color of pistachios, brimming with hope. Did she just call me her 'auntie' and why does that make me want to cry?

"You told her about the macarons?" Tommy asks incredulously.

"Wait, you knew about my hiding place? Did you steal any? 'Cause the last time I checked, one was missing."

She’s utterly adorable and so much like…

"Sweetie, I am no witch, but I will I teach you whatever you want to know when the right time comes. If your father allows it, of course," I say, needing to evade those painful thoughts.

At my words, her father's eyes, which I know have seen terrible things, grow increasingly disturbed.

"Oh, you don’t need to worry about him," she says smoothly, taking out of her pocket a piece of candy and unwrapping it. "If you’re not a witch, what are you?"

I look at her, seeing my brother, seeing myself. A version that lived and died a long time ago. My young eyes, watching my grandmother with the same wonder and awe, begging the sky or whoever would listen for me to one day have a crumb of her alchemical powers and abilities.

Looking back, we couldn't be more different on the spiritual spectrum, even though we both committed ourselves to helping those in need. I wonder if she is proud, wherever she is.

"I am simply a girl, just like you. The only difference is that my sight reaches a little further than what meets the eye," I say, smiling at the way she hangs on my every word. Perhaps she's gifted, if she reacted so strongly to the mere presence of a deck of cards.

When all is said and done, the call of the void knows no bounds when it comes to age or experience. It chooses you, not the other way around.

"Promise you’ll teach me?" she asks, something in me becoming painfully tender and pliable at her emotional display.

Overcome with heavy emotions of my own, I look at Dante, his eyes already focused on my face – reading me between the lines.

What is this feeling? Can you sense it?

He nods, almost imperceptibly, drinking me in with those bottomless, dark irises.

"I will, sweetie. I will," I assure her, my words sounding like a vow tearing me at the seams, along with a certainty I thought I had sealed not so long ago, through tears as painful as burning wax on dry skin.

* * *

"Are you sure going to this wedding is a good idea?" Dante asks while buttoning his cuffs.

"It still doesn’t sit well with you?" I ask as I fasten my velvet corset and smooth my freshly painted burgundy nails over the heavy train, making sure the thigh-high slit sits just right.

"Come here," he demands in a husky voice as he faces the wide frame of the mirror, his dark reflection peering at me with gripping eyes.

Dressed in an impeccably tailored black suit, with a vest peeking out from the open blazer, he is the personified image of a decadent sin dripping with dark promise.

The sight of his long, strong legs makes me yearn to feel him naked in the early morning, between the seconds I'm still asleep and reality, as he crowds me between his tattooed thighs, pouring ancient symbolism over my bare skin; those simple yet sacred moments are my favorite.

Suddenly, the narrow dressing room appears ten times smaller – a coffin molding around our bodies, whispering of an eternal sleep that seems like a warm embrace rather than an unending condemnation.

I walk towards him with trepidation in my veins, my heart beating an indecent rhythm by the time I reach his back.

Seconds that seem to slow down the arms of the clock keep our eyes locked in the mirror that is our only witness.

"Yes?" I ask for some unknown reason, since words have never been needed between us. We both know what the other is thinking, feeling, needs, and at this moment I sense that something is unsettling him.

"Sometimes I wonder if fate and I have some sort of age-old agreement, given the way you look at me now. A goddess like you should –"

"Live inside your pocket, safely hidden from everything that isn’t touched by you," I whisper still as a statue, waiting with bated breath for him to open his mouth and consume me like an animal, like a mentor.

His gaze turns somber while, with the gifted attention of a sculptor working in wet clay, he rests both hands on my ribs. Gently and carefully, he feels, molds, shapes me into silence.

"What a thing to say, ombra mia. All virtuous yet depraved with the need to be possessed by me," he murmurs, his eyes growing darker with each word.

"Opium…we’re going to be late," I say, biting back a moan when he traces the skeleton of my corset, unfastens it with unhurried hands and cups my breasts.

"Disarming me with just one fleeting glance," he continues, ignoring my weak remark as he pushes them together, making both of us shiver. Never leave.

"Dripping wet, always so ready to let me slip inside of you," he purrs dangerously as he lowers the cup harshly. Your measured ferocity.

"Driving me mad with love just by existing," he continues before his supple mouth latches onto my hardened nipple. I feel the flowing current in my toes, in my stomach, behind my eyes. Stay with me.

I moan his name, mad myself with desire as he turns me around and wraps his hand around my neck. My eyes flutter close at the feel of him pressing me down along his front until my knees reach the floor; both of us now facing the mirror, inches from me.

Famished coal orbs travel over the reflection of my exposed breasts, as he sucks the skin at the base of my neck before grasping my chin and tilting it towards the ceiling.

Something buried in my recesses vibrates like a bell in an abandoned chapel, ringing in my ears as I hear him slowly unbuckling his belt. Methodically, he wraps the leather in a tight fist while I dig my nails inside my skirt with burning anticipation.

My back arches in his firm hold that makes of me a willing captive, as he positions the belt around the column of my neck. For a charged second everything stills, his hypnotic eyes trying to read me.

Dante deciphers something deep within me that dilates his pupils and arrests his breathing before he wraps it fully around my air supply.

How he sees me – my claws, my sharpest teeth.

My searing palms search the cool glass in front of me. There, I meet my reflection as she gazes at his dark silhouette looming behind her as if in prayer, with his large arms supporting her in a rope made of loving sin that cannot be contained in any language, not even dead ones.

"You gave me those sanguine eyes that first night and every one since. Do you know what they do to me?" he asks, slowly pushing two fingers in my open mouth and massaging my tongue.

I whimper, needing this adored man anywhere, everywhere, as long as I can feel him to the point where my vision turns black.

"I want to eat you alive, to have you live inside me forever. This kind of need is not a craving but a primordial necessity that will always hunger for you beyond this life," he says lowly, tightening the leather rope around my neck. "Do you understand, mia cara?"

"Yes. I love when your monomania is showing," I swallow, being acutely aware that the same dark thing has lived inside me long before I was aware of its existence.

"Then you know that I would die for and implicitly without you," he says grimly, his eyes glazed with insatiable desire.

"Dante?" I ask with confusion, not understanding the sudden shift in the energy around us.

"Tell me that we'll never be apart," he demands in a desperate voice, his tongue soothing the bites he left in the wake of open mouthed kisses on my shoulder. That subtle pain – divine.

"I…I love you above and below this world," I swallow, my insides filled with raw emotion. "I can’t ever phantom being parted from you, even for a second. Don’t you know?"

"Mine, for all eternity," he says with finality, exuding an intensity that drowns me back to ether as his thumb grazes my lower lip in a promise of a bleeding reunion with his mouth.

"You're frightening me," I tremble under his undivided attention, my lingerie getting wetter as I rub my thighs together, full of a volatile need begging to be heard.

He licks his lips as he unbuttons his trousers while I burn so hot that I fear I will turn to ash if he doesn't take full dominion over my mind, body and soul in this very moment. All at once, until I forget my name and convert it to his.

"Fear not – it’s you I love," he says, closing his tempestuous eyes and baring his teeth, before everything becomes a blur of limbs and a sin that begs to be swallowed with a clear conscience.

He drops to his knees, parting the back of my thighs roughly with one of them, while his free hand, lifts the heavy skirt separating us.

"Ah!" I cry when he enters me so violently, so completely that I can barely keep my balance as my vision blurs.

"Hands on the mirror, eyes on me," he rules, while his hands latch on both of my breasts, his teeth sinking into the belt and tightening it. I could fall to pieces from the image alone…

"Dante," I sob, resting my palms higher on the glass as my soul leaves my body the second he retracts and enters me again with the ferocity of a thunder splitting the sky in two – making it flood with sensation.

Raptured, he sees through all that I am deep down, further than anyone has ever dared look. He stays there.

"My ruination, my resurrection," he breathes down my neck with his inked mouth wide open in ecstasy as he tightens his arm arounds my chest; the other finding that one sensitive spot that cries out to be possessed by him, and indeed, ruining me.

He’s relentless, fanatical in his every violent thrust, consuming me like a being of the night in need to claim, to conquer, to own as if his life depends on how deep he can enter me; how fast he can build a fire inside my womb. One I will never want to extinguish.

I'm tattering on the edge as he devours me from the inside out, depraved cries and moans coating the room. The notion of time and space becomes abstract as he steals the air out of my lungs when he bites into my shoulder and drives into me with a mad rhythm.

"Look at you – these eyes alone in the dark hours could make me come but this – frantic for me to go deeper, begging for more…fuck me," he says full of devoted passion in my ear before taking it between his teeth.

This is how I become a vessel for his soul and needs. This is how I become whole; one with him, one with my truest self.

"Opium, please…" I plead, shameless in my desire.

"What vita mia?" he breathes, while his fingers rub tight circles over my sensitive flesh, until I can only taste abstract noise and hear the salt of my tears.

"Please…"

"Yes, pleasing you has become a virtue," he says adoringly, and I sink, all mellow and violent.

"Come inside me or I'll fall to pieces!" I cry out, paralyzed while on the brink of ultimate pleasure.

He growls as if in pain, drowning the silent room in our combined wildness for more as our eyes clash – not a drop of us remains sober.

It all becomes a climbing delirium, savage and morbid in its ferocity that could tear the world apart; that could build something better from the echoes of our euphoria.

The mirror shudders with each one of his depraved thrusts making me his while the world shifts on its axis. So very close…

"There is nothing without you," he rasps as I chant his name when I – I finally find it and clutch it with both hands.

A wave of pleasure, vicious as life, spreads throughout my body with the unparalleled force of a cataclysm – dissolving me until there's nothing left to receive but the rapt sedation spreading through my bones.

God, please, never take him from me. I’ll do anything.

Pulsing, he grips me impossibly tighter, his ferocious pace becoming almost brutal in his pursuit to seal me into his being. And how I understand.

"You’re mine, mine, mine…" he whispers with a racing heart, gripping my hips so tightly, I know there will be bruises tomorrow. Good.

"Always," I moan, needing him to taste my truth.

His teeth graze my jaw as he thrusts into me for one last time before I feel him pouring all the unspoken between us.

He falls, I hold him to my chest.

In this moment, suspended in time, I feel complete.

Nothing has ever felt remotely as divine as his wet mouth lingering on my breast, blindly seeking my nipple and sucking softly.

"Did I hurt you, tesoro?" he asks breathlessly as he gathers the hair that fell into my eyes on my right shoulder.

"Your love could never hurt me. Still, what's eating you?" I ask into his palm that ghosts over my mouth; nuzzling further into the only man who could make me feel safe all the way through my unseen wars and famished soul.

"I can’t name it. All I know is that I needed you like air," he breathes through languid, open-mouthed kisses on my neck while holding me close amid the yards of black velvet between us.

And I smile into his shoulder for no particular reason, other than that he exists. However, I can't ignore the flickering light in the bedroom, nor the sound of porcelain hitting the floor.

* * *

"I can't believe you two almost missed the ceremony. You know I've been waiting for this day since I was six. The abandoned graveyard next to the Wilsons' is my witness to the very end, and you Ophi, of all people, know that," Caroline tries to slip a note of reproach into her honeyed voice, but the radiant smile that touches her eyes betrays her.

She simply exudes a profound sense of happiness that, I believe, has little to do with the lavish ceremony, but with the reason behind it - the love she bears for the man she embraced after the claws of death let him go.

"We caught the vows. That's the heart of it, what matters most," I say radiating myself like a full moon as I inhale the bliss of this special night. Still, at the mention of Dante, I need him again.

He has made me selfish, greedy, venal and I'm not ashamed in any way or apologetic about it. Sometimes love is hard to look in the eye, and I believe that is precisely what makes it worth the blood.

"Barely and you know it," she says raising an eyebrow, as if she can somehow guess the depraved reason behind our belated presence at her wedding. When did we become so transparent?

"I am in love," I say with eyes caressing the night sky, no longer hiding what gives me life.

It sounds so simple, even a little childish, because what lies between us could not be more complex. We are bound, enthralled, living for and because of the other, and I prefer it namely so. Our way.

"Ophi, a blind eye could see it. The man looks at you like he can't breathe unless you two are touching skin. Far from healthy, but hot as hell, those tattoos be damned," she winks, finishing the last of her champagne.

"Are you happy? Was the day what you imagined it to be?" I ask, smoothing my dress and remembering the reason why it's now slightly wrinkled, even though I had it ironed.

"Damian is everything I ever wanted. The bond between us runs deeper than today's vows, though I'd empty all my savings for a lifetime supply of that opera cake inside," she teases, smiling dreamily. "I love how imperfect he is. That he's far from being a saint, so I don't have to be one either," she says with crystalline serenity, looking at me as if she knows how deeply I understand her words because I feel them myself.

"The hand of fate," I say quietly, referring to the way our stories unfolded like a silken thread that eventually fell exactly in a direction already written. And somehow, of all things and places, they’ve been woven between the bony fingers of death.

A comfortable silence settles between us, reminding me of the ones we used to share when we were just two little girls braiding each other's hair in the cemetery before a late dinner. How time has passed.

"You know, Ophi, it brings tears to my eyes to see you so at peace and deeply loved. Lord knows you deserve it. I had always known your other half was somewhere out there, roaming the earth in search of you," she says tearfully, gripping my hand tightly and squeezing once.

"Carol, forgive me for being the way I am – so far removed and detached. But this is how I learned to survive, and I don't want to give you the false comfort of a lie. Regardless, know that I love you," I say, battling back tears of my own because life has turned me into a stranger, even if my soul yearns to give more to those who care about me, few as they are.

"Ophelia, stop this nonsense. You will always be my sister and my dearest friend. I know in your heart you love me as I love you. How you express it matters little to me as long as you are here," she says, rubbing my cheek like a big sister would.

"You are the most tolerant friend and a magnificent bride. There are no words for how beautiful you two look together and how flawless this day has been," I say, admiring her once again in the dim light of the low ceiling chandelier hanging from the alcove we had hidden from the guests.

She looks both avant-garde and bohemian, the heavy silk skirt and detachable train, as well as the bodice embroidered with crystal and pearl chains, being mesmerizing from every angle and light.

"Someone is emotional and throwing compliments left and right. And I suspect this black swan had at least half a tray of Corpse Reviver. You're makin' mama proud, darlin'" she laughs with gusto among the happy tears as she hugs me tightly.

"You know I mean every word," I say, slightly dizzy indeed from the cocktail she just mentioned and quite possibly from the need to feel my Dante close to me. Badly.

"All right, we'll cry later in the morning with a Sangria in hand. I think Damian is still with your man and now it's just about time I have a talk with my mother-in-law. The woman just flew in from Venice and I'm dying for her earrings. Do you think I can use my bridal privilege to snatch them?" she asks in between fits of laughter, the cranberry champagne we just shared making itself known.

"You can have anything you desire, all you have to do is wish for it and it will come into being," I tell her, clutching her shoulders in order to emphasize the words and to align myself.

"My fountain of wisdom, go find your man and fill his head with your poetry. I'll do the same for mine after the jewel hunt," she beams as she blows me a kiss, snatching a glass from a waiter and dancing her soul out to the passionate beat of Cuban music. Happiness suits her so well.

Content to simply be, I lean against the railing of the small balcony and admire the moon, which seems far from indifferent these days.

I can’t remember ever having reached this state of inner tranquility. Never imagined that I could have peace before falling asleep and the moment I open my eyes. All because he is there – holding me, breathing down my neck, needing to have me closer even in slumber.

And my hands – these tried hands are no longer mothers and fathers, but partners. Soulful instruments for me to touch him further than skin.

With that in mind, I head for the study where Damian told me he and Dante will be. But first, I really need to relieve myself after the two drinks I had with Caroline and also to loosen my corset that suddenly feels too tight.

My love was nothing but reluctant to leave me alone with my cousin and deprive me of his protective gaze watching my every move. It also didn't help that I just found out he and the groom have a bitter history that neither of them seems to have left behind.

Even so, Damian insisted that the two of them have a talk for old times’ sake over drinks. So, at Caroline's insistence, he grudgingly agreed, not wanting to create a scene. Prior, we discussed that we would not tell anyone about my predicament, since I didn't want to add an air of anxiety to their special day.

Gradually and all at once, the more I walk, all that surrounds me seems to take on a more vibrant and hazy hue, my feet feeling light and slightly numb, while the music grows simultaneously louder and more distant.

I feel drowsy, yet my instincts are wide awake when I feel something crawling down my spine. It holds me, it won't let go. I'm not...safe.

Move Ophelia, you have to keep moving. Find Dante.

I no longer feel my tongue running along my teeth, a strange dryness coating the roof of my mouth; my long nails drag along the paneled walls as I struggle not to trip over the front of my dress. Something's not right.

There is this bizarre sensation as if a jagged knife is trying to cut through the fog of my mind; I hear it in the back of my head and sense it in my numb wrists.

As if I were disembodied, I can see but not feel my feet moving faster, despite the difficulty imposed by my high heels. No matter, my heart shivers in its desperation for safety the closer I get to the slightly ajar door at the end of the narrow corridor.

Just as my fingers wrap around the round knob, I feel a presence behind me. Evil.

No, please no.

The pungent, sweet smell of chloroform hits my nostrils, a damp cloth pressing against my face and cutting off my air supply. An arm seizes me by the waist and pulls me towards the wall, dragging me out of sight and into a corner. I am behind a heavy curtain before I can realize the horror of what is unfolding.

I try with the little strength I have left in me to kick my feet, to scratch him hard enough to loosen his suffocating grip.

All the while, panic settles in my bones, because I know I will soon pass out from the anesthetic. Please…

"Oh, we'll have so much fun together. Stop fighting, there’s no use 'til later," says a man with a sinister voice I had never heard before, carnivorous ants attacking my sides every time he squeezes harder.

"Dan…" is the last sound leaving my tear smeared mouth before the world as I knew it turns to black.

I feel my entire weight plummeting to the cold floor, the sound of something rolling next to my head turning my bones to water.

Death, just once more – please look away.