Page 18 of Demonic Delights

His lips stretch in wry amusement. He rises from the bed, grabs the glass and walks away to the bathroom.

I sink deeper into the pillows and close my eyes. Completely spent, my heartbeat still rapid and my breathing still a little shallow, I become aware of a stinging sensation between my legs.

“Can you bring me some toilet paper, too? It’s leaking out of me,” I shout to Silas.

He mumbles something in reply, which I can’t hear.

I reach down and wipe off some of the mixture of his cum and my arousal. Bringing it closer to my face, I gasp, and no sooner do I process what it is I’m seeing than I’m throwing my legs over the edge of the bed and rushing after him.

The bathroom door swings open just as I reach it, and I barely manage to raise my arms to protect my face before I collide with the bulk of Silas’s chest. And as I do, my fingers brush against my nose and my mouth.

“There’s blood in it, I think!” I say to Silas, backing him into the bathroom.

I run my tongue over my lips, and my eyes nearly pop out of my eye sockets.

“What the fuck did you eat today?” I ask, my mouth instantly watering to fight off the inferno raging inside it. “This tastes like pure chilli!”

Pushing the polka dot shower curtain aside, Silas sits down on the rim of the bathtub, not unlike my vision of him often did during my solitary moments in here. He crosses his arms over his chest and only regards me with an amused smile instead of replying. And for a moment, I let myself be distracted, not just by that faint smirk, vaguely mocking in nature—as if hinting at a secret I’m not privy to—but also by how firmer and leaner Silas’s body looks, his muscles bulging, dark veins popping, and his skin stretching tightly around his form.

Combined with everything else, though, I’m more unsettled than turned on, and I quickly return to the topic—quite literally—at hand: “See the red streaks?”

I bring my fingers close to his face, and as I do, I realise that those streaks aren’t fusing with the white liquid the way blood would be. Rather, the two substances are heterogeneous, the red swirling through and around the white like ... trails of crimson smoke.

“What the fuck is that?” I gasp, my stomach turning. “Silas, what is this?”

Silas’s eerie calm in the face of my findings downright terrifies me. My husband, Mr I-sneezed-once-so-time-to-go-to-the-hospital, would never, ever remain so unfazed at a sign that there may be something wrong with him physically. Until now, even during his mood shifts, there remained something familiar about him, some basic essence of him. But right now, in this precise moment, he is a complete stranger.

With my heart hammering painfully in my chest, I raise my eyes to meet his.

But the eyes I’m met with aren’t my husband’s.

They’re Andrew Wilson’s, as they were on that last night of November.

Those red-rimmed irises, dark and large ...

My chest constricts so tightly that it feels like my ribcage crumpled onto itself, crushing my lungs in the process. My head swims, my fingertips tingle, and everything goes dark.

8

ROXANA

November 30, the previous year

It is a testament to how vile Willow Baker’s breath is that even with a shooter on the loose in the building, I’d rather come face-to-face with him than be face-to-face with her for another minute.

“Willow, let fucking go of me!” I snarl at her, but it’s no use.

Holding me by both my arms, she keeps trying to pull me out of the door, her hair frizzy and wild around her swollen, beet-red face.

“We have to go, we have to go!” she screeches, and a fresh waft of rot and watermelon gum assaults my nostrils. “There’s only one exit here, we can’t stay here, if he finds us, we’ll have nowhere to run⁠—”

My stomach turns unpleasantly, though it’s hard to tell whether it’s in reaction to her words or just her in general.

“If he finds us, he’ll shoot us on sight. What we have to do is hide, you dumb twat!” I hiss at her, not bothering to mince my words.

First of all, we’ll be dead in an hour, and second of all, judging by her wildly panicked, bulging eyes, she won’t remember a thing even if we do by some miracle survive. Despite the gravity of the situation, despite my own terror shrouding me in ice, there is something very liberating about the freedom to say whatever to her face without consequences. And, oh boy, do I intend to enjoy that freedom if it is the last one I’ll ever have. Especially if it is the last one I’ll ever have.

Willow continues tugging at me, making noises not unlike a donkey’s braying.