Chapter 10 #2
"We kill people," Frenzy said, nose to nose with her as he leaned against the counter with an arm on either side of her. "We. Kill. People. That's the job, baby. It ain't negotiable."
Clara squeezed her eyes shut. "I'm not your baby."
Frenzy grinned again, stroking his fingers along the side of her neck.
"But you're his?" He asked. "Mm? You let that big brute take whatever he wanted from your poor, frail little human body?"
Frenzy made a "tsk tsk tsk" sound, just barely shaking his head as he leaned down to brush his lips against the side of her neck while he spoke.
"What a shame," he said, whispering now. Seven hells, her skin was so warm. And she smelled delicious. Like baking bread, rosemary, and the sun. Had he ever been able to get warm since dropping Below? "I can do that too, you know, Miss Bailey. Far better, in fact. Ask me how."
"Don't you dare," Clara tried to make her voice sound firm, but fear and illness made it come out weak, shaky, breathless.
"Don't tell me you don't like it. Lying is a sin," he said, flicking his tongue out to taste her skin and nearly climaxing right there. "Fuck, girl, you taste like sunshine."
Clara brought up her hands to shove against his chest, but Frenzy caught each wrist, bringing one up to his lips.
"I've fucked my way through Hell a thousand times over, Miss Bailey," he growled, keeping her wrists in his hands. "But I've never been able to get warm. I've never really felt sated."
He flicked his eyes up to hers—narrowed and practically glowing with fury—and what was left of his heart struggled like a lion in its cage.
"I don't believe I'll have such a problem with you."
Clara fought his grip, struggled to punch, slap, and kick, but he clasped her tightly to himself with the strength of shackles. He darted forward to kiss her, holding her still against him and growling in the back of his throat.
And then—he was gone. Clara looked up, and her breath froze in her throat. Shiver was there—looking far bigger than usual, and so well defined that she could see every feature on his furious face, see a mess of curls shifting around his horns as he slammed the other demon to the opposing wall.
"Shiver!" Frenzy cried out in pain, even in fear. His smirk was gone, replaced by a clawing desperation like a man whose last cigarette has fallen down the drain. “Please, you don't understand—I need this, I need her! I'm not like you, I can still remember what it was like—"
Shiver had already sliced open his palm with the tip of one horn, ignoring Frenzy's pleading as he furiously painted a sigil on the wall in his blood.
Frenzy stopped, gaping at the red blood—red!—dripping down Shiver's wrist. Since when did demons bleed real blood? It was such a shock that it took him a moment to recognize the bind and torment signs being smeared onto the wall.
"Shiver wait, don't—just let me—just one night and I'll—"
Shiver slapped his mess of a palm to the center of his scrawling, and in a flash of light, Frenzy was gone.
Clara was frozen to the spot.
"What did you—"
He had her in a crushing embrace before she had even seen him cross the room. The moment he allowed her a breath, he was cupping her face in his huge hands, turning her to inspect her for injuries.
"Are you hurt? What did he do? He is not dead yet, but I will remedy that shortly if he so much as breathed too heavily on you."
"He said you're supposed to kill me."
Shiver froze. His eyes, which had been focused on one of her wrists, slightly red where the demon had gripped her, seemed to focus on nothing. Clara waited for him to look her in the eyes, and he did not.
"Well?"
"Honey, Frenzy is a vile, evil…"
"Is he lying?"
Shiver waited a bit too long to answer, and by the time a sound came out of his mouth, Clara had already shoved him away.
"You were going to kill me?!"
"Not anymore!" Shiver said, hands up as if he could push away her fury.
"WHAT DOES THAT MEAN?!" Clara backed away, ducking down to grab for her iron skillet once more. She felt like throwing up, and not because of her illness. She had actually begun to trust Shiver. More than trust.
"I was supposed to, yes, that was my assignment!" said Shiver, heartbroken to see the fear in her eyes directed at him. "I'm a fever demon. I am supposed to drain your energy until the fever takes you. Only then can I move on to the next."
Clara felt her mind spinning and rattling, struggling to make sense of it all and shove her emotions to the side.
"But you said… you said when I recovered, you would just leave," she said, remembering that conversation vividly. It was the first time she had imagined her new companion leaving her, the first time she realized she would be shattered if he were gone.
"I will leave," Shiver shrugged his mountainous shoulders. "Back Below… to die."
"You kill me, or you die?!" Clara held the skillet between them with hands that shook, even though she knew she couldn't bring herself to hurt him.
Shiver cast her a furtive look. Well, it was all on the table now.
"If I can't feed, I starve. And I will not be assigned another fever. I have been… terribly good at my work," he growled at the floor before looking up at Clara again and crumbling inside. "Until now."
Clara's heart was hammering so hard in her throat, she could feel it in her eyes. There were a hundred things to say, but with every word in the English language at hand, she couldn't find a single one to help her now.
"I am going to save you," said Shiver, walking slowly toward her, heedless of her skillet. "Whatever it takes, whatever happens to me, I need you alive and safe in this world, and all the better without me to tarnish you, because Clara—Clara, don't you understand how much I—"
Shiver had only just grabbed her shoulders when he felt something… off. Something off with Clara.
He met her eyes—wide and confused, but no longer burning bright and red at the edges. At the same time, he felt a flicker, a familiar tugging from his ribcage.
"Your fever broke," he said, feeling numb.
"My… my fever broke?" She felt just as numb, reeling from too many gigantic feelings all crashing into each other at once.
Shiver opened his mouth to say something, but before the words could come out, Clara realized she could see straight through him, and then he was gone.
She dropped the skillet, grasping the air around her where he had been, desperately snatching at anything that looked like a shadow.
“No…NO!” She looked around in vain—all that was left of him was the bloody sigil on her kitchen wall. "I AM sick! I still am! Come back!"
She sank to her knees, pressing her palms to the floor as if she could raise him from Below, and whispered, "I love you too."