My eyes widen and he rips the knife out of his arm with a grunt, blood spurting and landing onto the wood floor below. Hell storms toward me, anger raging through him, and I back myself against a wall, my eyes squeezed shut until he stops in front of me, grabbing my throat with both of his gloved hands.
He lifts me, slamming me against the wall in an act of frustration before his lips collide with mine. Although he isstrangling the fucking life out of me, I allow his tongue to enter my mouth, wrapping my legs around his waist.
He presses his big body against mine, releasing my neck and lifting me higher by my ass. I place my hands on the side of his neck, my head tilted to the side, our kiss frantic and heated. I feel the loss between us pouring from our souls and the time lost pulls us tighter together. When we break apart, our breathing is frantic and the back of his fingers slide over my cheek, his forehead resting against mine.
“I might never fucking forgive you for doing something so fucking stupid,” he growls.
“Yes, you will,” I whisper in response.
“Why, Noir, why the fuck did you do that? I thought…”
Tears well in my eyes as he lowers his gaze, and his vulnerability hurts me. “I’m sorry, I just wanted to give you breathing space. If he thought I was dead, I knew he would be careless.”
His hand slips to the back of my neck, where he pushes on it, tilting my head back. He breathes heavily over my lips, “You could have fucking died, silly little fucking Dolly.”
I try not to smile as I lift my hand to his face. “I wasn’t going out like that, Hell. I was always coming back to you, and I always will.” He presses his forehead against mine again, and I continue. “Have you got him?”
His one eye lifts to mine and I notice he hasn’t got his contacts in, probably to be less detectable. After a brief silence and him sliding his thumb down my jaw, he gives a small headshake.
“So what are you doing here?” I ask, and he arches his brow. “The question is, what the fuck are you doing here?”
I take a deep breath, my voice steady despite the pounding of my heart. “I’m here to find Arabella. I need answers, and I need to know if she’s still alive.”
“Dolly…” He says before lowering me to my feet and he shows his back to me, rubbing his mouth with his hand.
“What is it, Hell?”
He pauses at my question before he turns to face me, “I’m not sure if she is real.” He says with honesty and my brows pinch, “What?”
He steps toward me. “I’ve tried to find anything I can about her, and no one knows who the fuck she is, Noir. She is non-existent.” I shake my head once and he continues, lowering himself to my height. “Are you sure you weren’t just imagining things because you were so fucking traumatized? There’s always that possibility…”
“No.” I declare through tight teeth with tears brimming. “I know she is real.”
He sighs, stroking my hair, “Did you actually ever see her? Touch her?”
I just stare at him blankly as I think about it. How I only heard her voice close to my ear or far away, only ever seeing her fully when it’s in a blur of madness or in the mirror. But it felt so real, she felt so real. She got me out of there, I am sure she did. I might not have touched her, but it felt like she was there to me. The only thing that makes me doubt it is when I saw her in the death rooms, and she almost got me killed with a trap.
“I was thinking maybe you have an altar, or you were hallucinating, but…”
“Like you?” I question.
He shakes his head once, “Hellion is merely my character, Dolly. He isn’t inside my head, and I cannot hear him. He is just a part of me that I let loose on Dark Night. Parts of myself that I suppress. He is not a disorder, and he cannot control me in anyway. It’s not the fucking same.” He admits honestly. I continue silence as he carries on. “I’m no fucking doctor though.”
I nod and lower my head. “Which room, pretty girl?” he asks while standing upright.
With a sniffle, I wipe the tears off my face and pass him, taking his warm gloved hand in mine. Leading Hell through the dimly lit mansion, his words and doubts linger in my mind. Every creak of the floorboards and every whisper of the wind outside seem to boom the uncertainty churning within me.
We reach the door to the room where I heard Arabella, where I believed she was. Beside mine. I take a glance at my door, a shiver running through me as each memory floods through my mind until I feel Hell’s hands on my shoulders and his kiss on the top of my head. When I am ready, I turn the door knob and we enter.
I glance around the dark empty space, noticing there is absolutely nothing in here but a fireplace. There’s no bed. No window. No anything. My gaze roams around the walls, trying to see if there are any chains or brackets where they would have been attached like mine were, but again, there is nothing.
Sadness washes over me, the reality hitting me like a ton of bricks. Is it true? Could she really be only an altar or a figure of my imagination? Do I officially have no family at all?
Hell’s big arms wrap around my midsection from behind as tears fall from my eyes and he draws me in closer. We stay in silence for a while, until I move forward, and he releases me.I stroll around his tall frame, heading for the door and once I am outside of mine, I rest my head against it, trying to breathe through the anxiety until finally, I turn the knob.
As soon as I walk in, my watery, wide eyes dart around, noticing the makeshift bed in the corner, the bucket, the boarded-up window, and in the corner, the bracket to my chain lying on the floor. I slap my hands over my face, all of it becoming too much and I weep. When Hell enters, I hear him place something down onto the floor before he cloaks his arm around my shoulders, drawing me into his chest.
“Is this where he kept you?” He asks while looking around.
