Page 18 of I Hope This Email Finds You in Hell

My ex-fiancé and his flurry of unanswered texts come to mind, a flash of a life I once thought would be my forever. I broke things off after being together for nearly six years. He wasn’t just angry—he was furious. In his words, I wasted both of our time.

Despite that, I know he’s not behind this.

I open my mouth to say so, but a knock on the door cuts me off.

“Are you expecting someone?” he asks.

“No. But sometimes my neighbor locks himself out and needs to use my phone to call his partner to come home and let him in.”

I make my way to the door and undo the chain before reaching for the dead bolt.

“Wait,” Luke says, standing in the doorway to my room. “I don’t think—”

“Brie? Are you there?”

My blood turns to ice at the voice coming from the other side of the door. Luke’s voice.

“Do not open that door.”

My gaze snaps to the Luke standing in my living room. His eyes are wide and his hands are up in a universal Don’t shoot gesture.

“You got here very fast.” I thought he was racing because he was worried about me, but now I realize how ridiculous that is.

“I like to speed. It’s a problem.”

“Brie?” Luke’s voice comes from the other side of the door. “Let me in!”

“I guess greater demons can also shapeshift, huh?” I shakily ask the Luke in front of me.

“Many demons can,” he replies, keeping a careful distance between us. “I swear—”

“You know what should have been the biggest flag?” The door at my back starts shaking from a fist pounding against the other side. I keep my eyes on the Luke in my living room. “You knew exactly what fire escape led to my bedroom window. Almost like you’ve been here before.”

Luke’s shaking his head. “I—”

“Save it, Beliar,” I snarl, unlocking the dead bolt and ripping the door open.

Seven

Suddenly my living room has two Lukes as Hallway Luke barges in.

Everything about them is identical: blackish-brown hair accompanied by matching dark eyes, noses with bumps like they’ve been broken, shadows of stubble along their jaws, the faint white throat scars. The outfits might as well have been ripped from the same rack, and even the grim set of their mouths is like someone pressed copy + paste. I thought having them in the same room would prove my assumption correct, but all it does is make confusion and fear twist inside of me.

Beliar Luke pulls something shiny from behind his back. It’s a dagger, its blade as black as the clothes he wears and coming to a lethal point. He wields it like someone who’s been around the knife-fight block a time or two.

My feet are rooted to the floor, only the expanse of my clearance-sale couch separating me from them. I glance between the two Lukes.

“Get behind me, Brie,” Real Luke says, still hovering in the doorway. “Better yet, get out of here. Leave me to send him back where he belongs.”

“No!” Beliar Luke barks. Or maybe he’s Real Luke. I’ve never been less sure in my life. “You run and he’ll chase you. All it takes is a touch for him to bring you out of this world and into his.”

“Into yours,” Real Luke corrects. Hallway Luke? “Brie, you need to trust me.”

“Shut the fuck up,” Bedroom Luke snarls, lunging for Hallway Luke. They meet in a clash of limbs, and the force of their bodies slams the door shut. Neither Luke goes down, and instead they grapple for the upper hand. They bump into the T.J. Maxx lamp on my side table, and it teeters, crashing to the floor in an explosion of porcelain smithereens.

I try to keep the couch between me and them. If I can get to my room, I can flee through the window and down the fire escape. The air is filled with their grunts and the occasional flash of the dagger slashing through it, though it has yet to hit its mark. Real Luke dodges every attempt, throwing responding jabs that make Beliar Luke groan and growl. They’re wrapped up in the fight, stepping into the narrow space behind the couch where my shoe mat and coat hooks are.

Mirroring their movements, I round the couch, putting myself closer to my bedroom. Before I can make the dash, Real Luke hauls Beliar Luke over the back of the couch, dropping him onto the cushion. Beliar Luke tumbles off it and onto the glass coffee table I stand beside.