Page 112 of Lilies from Hell

I trust him blindly, but when I sense that weird change in him, part of me wants to run away and hide somewhere where he can’t find me. Many seconds pass as I reconsider whether he really deserves to end up like this. In the end, he was the first to attempt to take my life, and he is being hunted by the police. If he manages to survive and escape after this, he will most likely be caught and locked up for life.

My gaze goes straight to that man when I hear a slight groan. It seems he has woken up. I pull the gun from Alek's waistband and point it at the man's face, leaning into Alek's lips pressed against the side of my head. Giving me the support and comfort I need to stop thinking about the irreversible change this moment may cause in me. In us.

My hand starts to shake, and not because I’ve never fired a gun before but because I don’t know how I’m going to deal with the consequences afterward.

“You have nothing to fear, my love.” His voice and his caresses manage to relax me, but not enough to calm my heartbeat.

I don’t want to close my eyes when I pull the trigger and the bullet is propelled into his face and chest. His body shakes, causing the intestines that were hanging out to finally fall down next to his arms. All I can focus on is how he slowly loses his life, but that isn’t enough to stop me from firing bullets that his body takes with jolts until I run out.

I open my eyes, feeling him caress my back while we lay down on his bed. My head keeps repeating the image of the bullet hitting his face over and over again.

“Am I a bad person?”

“Of course not. You’re the most wonderful person I know,” he murmurs, kissing my cheeks.

“But I killed him,” I reply in a low whisper.

The strange guilt of feeling nothing doesn’t leave me, for as stupid as it sounds. But perhaps I even did him a favor. Alek would have continued torturing him or killed him in a much more painful way.

“He deserved much more than that, believe me.” His determination somehow helps me make an effort to see the situation differently. But no matter how hard I try, my thoughts keep coming back to the same place.

“I feel strange.” I don’t recognize these unpleasant feelings that are awakening inside me. The horror of discovering the deepest recesses of my mind turns my stomach with revulsion and fear. He brings our lips together in a long, careful kiss.

“I could help you feel better,” he whispers softly, with a brief smile.

“How?” I close my eyes with a pleasurable sigh as I feel his hands slip inside my shirt, brushing against the almost invisible scars from the cuts he made a few days ago. “Are you going to cut me?” I ask, not letting my desire for it to happen again betray me in my tone of voice, and he looks at me with that intense gleam in his eyes.

“Always,” he replies before starting to undress me, covering my body with kisses and soft caresses.

I gasp as I feel the edge of the razor cut into my stomach. The cuts are getting deeper and deeper, and blood is gushing out while he just admires it and cleans it with his tongue.

“I love how red suits you, it makes you look like a true goddess,” he says, his lips on the skin of my bloodied breasts. “My goddess.” The way he looks at me when he says that makes me tremble.

While he sets our places at the round glass table on the terrace, I look around in amazement. It’s starting to get dark, and the sky is turning colours that perfectly match the decaying flowers in the garden. The wind rustles the leaves on the trees with a pleasant sound.

“You have a beautiful view from here,” I murmur, turning around. “What is it?” I ask as I look at the bowls filled with dark purple liquid and a white thing on the middle.

“Borsch.”

“Looks good,” I reply, sitting down next to him. He pulls our chairs together until there is not even the slightest space between us, then places my hand on his lap and begins to caress it. His mind seems to be in any place but here.

“Stay the night.”

“I can’t,” I say with a pout. He presses his lips into a thin line. His tense features are a sign he might snap sooner rather than later, but my mind is quicker in finding the correct words to calm his discontent. “You know my parents would be furious. They wouldn’t let me go out with you.” I’m already taking a big risk by spending so much time alone with him without them knowing. If they find out, they’ll probably tie my waist to Lance for the rest of my life so they wouldn’t lose sight of me for a minute.

“I hate having to share you,” he whispers, almost forcing the words out as his fingers linger a moment above my cheeks. Then he shoves a cigar into his mouth. His dish now being meaningless for him.

“You are not going to eat?” I ask, raising an eyebrow.

“Not hungry.” He turns his head so the smoke pouring out of his mouth won’t reach me before speaking. “Eat.” I fix my gaze back into the soup, taking a spoonful of it despite not being hungry anymore.

After the first bite, my stomach and tongue beg me for more of that delicious purple soup, and so I do, under the smoke that shamelessly covers his face. The cigarette and I are the only two things he focuses on until my plate is empty. Then we head to my house with the thick silence being the only symphony in the car.

“Will we see each other tomorrow?” My voice comes out surprisingly high-pitched.

“I don’t know. But I’ll do my best.” I end any kind of distance by joining our lips until he pulls away, looking slightly uneasy. My eyes fall on a black envelope he hands me. “My offer to live together still stands,” he murmurs slowly, tilting his head, waiting for an answer I don’t give him. “You don’t have to give me an answer now. I just want you to feel that my home is also yours, and that my things, therefore, also belong to you.”

“Thank you,” I murmur, feeling a pleasant warmth envelop my chest. No matter how much I thank him for receiving something as important as his complete trust, it will never be enough. In our world that is something that has led more than one person to their death. He shakes his head.