Chapter 16
Holly
The blood is the first thing I notice. Wet. Violent. Maroon. Smeared all over the bed, the pillows, the floor. His face.
The metallic scent hangs in the air, making my toes tingle.
He’s looking at me, his eyes gleaming with a dark possessiveness.
A single flickering bulb casts long, menacing shadows on the grimy walls.
There’s blood on the walls too. I’m not sure who it belongs to, but that stops mattering when his hand, rough and calloused, finds my bare skin, sending a jolt of heat through me.
It dips beneath the hem of my shirt, sending goosebumps prickling across my skin.
I say his name. Once. Twice. Begging, pleading, wanting more. My eyes flutter shut. Adrenaline thrums throughout my veins, beneath the urgency of his touch. A thrilling current.
He puts a hand against my neck, sliding it through my hair. He kisses my throat, my collarbone, then rips my tight, sticky tee off my body. His damp hair tingles against my breasts as he unhooks my bra and presses his hot mouth to my skin. Every string in me pulls taut.
My fingers dig into his back. Theo.
A guttural groan escapes him, vibrating against my nipples and sending shivers down my spine. Oh god, yes.
I say his name again. I run my fingers through his hair, gripping tighter and pulling him closer. His teeth scrape against my skin. I can hardly breathe. I can hardly think.
His fingers dip down and trail across the thick viscous liquid, then back to me, a hint of crimson staining his fingertips.
He smears blood across my chest. Hot and wet.
A gasp escapes my lips. He doesn't stop there.
He smears it over my nipples, tweaking and pinching them.
A moan settles at the back of my throat.
He takes some more blood and puts it over my neck, my lips, my cheek, mirroring the mark on his own. I can feel my arousal pooling at my center.
He places his thumb on my bottom lip and drops his voice to a husky whisper in the dim room, “Open.”
Not a question, but an order laced with something primal.
Something feral spirals inside of me. I’m out of control.
My body moves on its own accord. My lips part open, hesitantly at first, then wider as a strange sense of surrender washes over me.
Theo smiles. His thumb grazes the soft skin under my lip, then dips back down, tracing a line down my jaw. “You want a taste, love?”
I nod vigorously. Yes.
He pushes his thumb inside my mouth, and I lick the blood off his skin, the metallic tang exploding on my tongue. It’s a bizarre flavor. Acrid yet strangely sweet too. Arousing. Forbidden.
He runs his hand through my hair again, coating my sweaty strands with the blood on his fingers, and tugs hard, tilting my face up.
My heart hammers against my ribs, a frantic drumbeat echoing in my ears.
I want to feel those lips on mine. I need to.
Somehow reading my mind, Theo leans in. His lips pry mine open with gentle persuasion.
Warm and sweet. I groan and shift back, letting him edge my mouth open.
A soft noise catches in the back of my throat.
His arms wrap around my waist. Heat courses through my veins.
His tongue touches mine. My whole body is on fire.
My hands bunch up in his hair. He kisses me so hard; my lips feel raw.
Bruised. I can’t get enough. I want more.
More. All my stewing feelings come boiling to the surface.
Without breaking the kiss, he walks us to the edge.
I grasp his face, making him look at me.
But it’s not Theo anymore.
It’s Aanya.
Her face, once beautiful, is now something grotesque.
Her choppy brown hair hangs limp, matted with grime.
Tears, thick and black, carve rivers through the caked-on dirt.
But it's the wrists that truly send a spike of ice through me.
Her wrists. They're…not wrists. They're mangled things…bones protruding from a sea of raw flesh. Deep, jagged gashes gape open, pulsating with an unnatural rhythm. A metallic tang fills my mouth, thick and sweet. It’s blood. Her blood.
Tears sting my eyes, and I try breaking away. Her grip tightens, the skeletal fingers digging into my waist. Her white eyes stare into mine, a silent plea for something, some unknown horror, reflected in their depths.
A scream tears from my throat. Let me go! I shout. LET ME GO!
She doesn’t. Her grip tightens around my waist, a vice digging into my ribs. I scream louder. But Aanya doesn't budge.
Through the haze of terror, I see her face contorting.
Her jaw seems to unhinge, stretching wider than seems possible.
Her once familiar eyes bulge from their sockets, the whites turning a sickly yellow.
A single tear, thick and black as oil, rolls down her cheek.
Her whole face seems to vibrate. She screams. But no sound escapes.
It’s like watching a horror movie on mute.
Terror floods my veins. I feel an intense pain, as if someone’s sliding a razor blade along my guts. I scream for help. I scream for Theo. But there’s no response.
I look down. A scalpel, cold and sterile, rests in my hand.
My grip tightens on it, but not by my own will.
A primal fear, a desperate urge to break free, courses through me.
Before I can even comprehend the action, the scalpel plunges down.
A sickening squelch of flesh parting echoes in the silence.
Aanya’s eyes widen. Raw pain flickers through them. She smiles. Then the world explodes into color.
My eyes shoot open. I jolt upright, drenched in sweat.
The room spins. My entire body feels like it's been tossed in a dryer on high heat. I release a hard breath through my nose, then drive my hand through my hair. What the fuck was that? Hot shame pricks at me. Slowly, everything starts coming into focus. My room is still dark, with just a little sliver of light creeping in from underneath the curtains. There’s a throbbing ache in my arms and legs.
Last night’s clothes cling uncomfortably to my cold, sweaty skin.
My hair is a greasy disaster, and even my mouth feels like it's been lined with cotton.
“Theo?”
No response.
I peep down to see if he’s still asleep on the floor.
He isn’t.
My eyes land on the digital clock on my nightstand. 6:32 a.m. Shit. My shift starts in an hour. I need to shower. Rubbing my face, I fling my covers back to get out of bed, when something falls to the floor. A sharp clattering sound. I look down and see a photo frame.
Bits and pieces from last night come back to me and every muscle in my body feels coiled tight. The building. The graves. The text. Theo. Aanya.
Aanya.
The ache from my limbs spreads to my chest, threatening to crush me from within.
I’m unable to stop staring at the picture.
I remember this day. It’s us at a park. Unruly windblown hair getting in each other’s mouths.
Her arm over my shoulders, mine on her waist. Faces frozen in timeless joy.
I can almost feel her. I can almost hear her voice.
A pressure builds behind my eyes until it literally stings. My phone buzzes, snapping me back to reality. I grab it from my nightstand, and the brightness of the screen stings my sleep-blurred eyes even more. Two texts. Unfortunately, none are from Theo.
April: Come over by 6. We’ll get ready together. Love you! xx
And another from Camille.
Cami: update on the theo situation?
My fingers hover over the keyboard and I type out a response to Cami.
Holly: Same as last night.
Gray typing dots appear and disappear on my phone screen, then two seconds later Cami’s face pops on my screen. She’s calling me. I immediately disconnect it. She’ll just ask me about Theo again and I’m not awake enough to lie right now.
I’m not sure how she’ll react when she finds out that he stayed the night any more than I’m sure why I even lied to her about it in the first place.
It wasn't possessiveness exactly. It was just me being protective about my own sanity. I don’t want her to give me shit for something I had no control over.
What’s infuriating is that I didn’t even want Theo to stay the night. Of course, not —
My phone stops ringing and buzzes with a new text.
Cami: pick up!!!
Putting my phone on silent, I flip it face down on my lap.
I shouldn’t have let Theo stay the night. Not with such heart-stopping ease. But it was like trying to think my way free of gravity, or to stand unmoving in the swell of a tsunami. I was paralyzed. By his touch. By his words. By all that talk about Aanya and Nate and just…
Has he really been released?
There’s a burning in my nose. A lump in my throat.
My fingernails dig into my bedspread, and I get a sudden urge to scream.
I can see myself doing it, screaming so loudly that the glass over the frame goes flying around the room.
My throat constricts. I clench my jaw, willing the feeling away.
A single, hot tear traces a path down my cheek.
The mere feeling of it, so pathetically weak, only intensifies my frustration.
I pick up the frame and fling it across at the wall.
The glass shatters and the frame falls to the ground.
A sharp sting goes up my palm. I look down.
A crimson stain blooms on my skin just below my thumb where one of the glass shards has pierced me.
Plucking it out, I grab my phone and stumble out of bed, wrapping my blanket around my cold shoulders.
“Theo?” I call out again, dragging my feet towards the living room only to find that he isn’t on the couch either. He’s actually gone.