Page 34 of Circus From Hell

“Yes, exactly.” I stand and take a key off the hook. “I don’t think she’ll eat us. And that guy was looking for her. I’ve been worried.”

“You are worried about her?” he asks dumbfoundedly, and I turn before I open the door.

“What is your issue, Micha? You talk like she’s some kind of monster, but then you’re holding her face as she sucks my cock?”

“She is a monster. You’ve seen her. She isn’t human.”

“So what?”

“So what?” He laughs, stepping back and rubbing a hand over his face. He does that when he gets frustrated; he’s never been good at expressing his emotions. “We saw her eat a person, Arlo. You were terrified of her despite your hard cock.”

He’s not wrong. I was—am—incredibly scared. But she’s different. In a way that I can’t quite comprehend. Sure, she looks drastically unlike most people, but it suits her so well. And yes, she eats people, but everyone’s got their flaws, don’t they?

Well, maybe not eating humans for dinner. I’m not sure how to wrap my head around that.

“Are you telling me you’re not the slightest bit curious about her?”

Micha turns his head to the curtained window. He looks deep in thought.

I sigh. “You were wrong about me. Maybe you’re wrong about her too.”

“How was I wrong about you?”

“You didn’t think I’d be able to handle you. You thought you would hurt me beyond repair.”

“Arlo, if she gets her teeth in you, you will be hurt beyond repair.”

I shrug and open the door. “Maybe. But if I can let my scary security guard stepbrother tug me off in an alleyway, then I can see what my sexy circus stalker wants. Join me if you’d like. I’m not forcing you.”

I walk out of the apartment without looking back, but there’s no doubt in my mind that Micha is following. He’s my protector before anything.

There is a semblance of truth in his warning. I am nervous. Karma usually waits for us to find her in the shadows, not the other way around, and it’s still morning. We haven’t seen her if it’s not nighttime.

When I’m on the roadside, looking at her from across the street, my nervousness starts to increase. My fear is what makes her hungry, so I take a deep breath and remember the feeling of her mouth around my cock. That immediately helps calm me down.

As soon as my foot steps onto the tarmac of the road, she takes a step back, like a challenge. She’s asking if we’ll follow her into the shadows.

The answer is obvious.

We keep walking, and we very well could be heading to our demise, but that doesn’t stop us.

“Karma?” I whisper-shout, turning the corner into the alley behind the apartment opposite ours.

For once, she isn’t hidden, crouched and assessing. She stands beside the wall, her lips pulled into that constant smile with little stitches, but the rest of her face doesn’t reflect happiness.

“Arlo. Micha,” she greets matter-of-factly.

“What do you want?” he asks as we stop in front of her, and I elbow his side.

“You are rude, Sssoul Guardian.”

“Soul Guardian?”

She nods. “You guard the sssouls in the gravesss.”

I bite back a laugh. “She means your security guard job.”

He stands frozen, mouth agape. “You actually think I guard souls?”