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My brows furrow. "Leave?"
"Yeah. Go home."
I crawl across the bed, climbing off the other side. One step closer to him. "I am home."
"No." He whips around, his eyes on mine for the first time. They’re back to being brown. He's completely himself again, except he’s not. His eyes are empty. Not even hateful. Not vicious. Just empty. Like everything has drained from him. The only thing left is his shell of a body. One that I've never known. "Leave my house. Leave Castle Pointe."
My mouth falls open, my jaw unhinged. Leave?
"I can't leave. You know I can't," I whine. I can't help it. He wants me to leave? After everything? It feels like he reaches into my chest and squeezes my heart with all his strength. It feels like my blood stops pumping through my body, and everything grows cold.
"Yes, you can."
"How?" I shout. "How can I leave? You know I can't! This place is cursed, Malik! I'll be here forever. What kind of sick fucking game are you playing with me?"
He shakes his head, boredom dripping into his eyes. "You can leave."
My breath leaves me. "How?" I whisper. And more than anything, why am I in pain? Why do I suddenly not want to leave? Why does it hurt when he tells me to?
"This… demon that was in me.Asmodeus. He was the demon that possessed the witch of Castle Pointe. The woman that you saw in the mausoleum?" My eyes widen. "Yeah, that was her. She was possessed by Asmodeus. The witch was evil, studying black magic and opening a massive portal in Castle Pointe for demons and spirits to come and go as they please. Asmodeus was one of the most sadistic demons to roam Castle Pointe. When Father Moran cast him from my body, the witch was also cast. It's like… they were connected in some way. I don't completely know how, but it's like they've stayed tethered to each other after all these years. Once Asmodeus was sent back to hell, the witch was cast with him."
My eyes are wide as I take in the immense amount of information.
“How did she come back after all this time?” I ask, my voice barely a whisper.
His eyes shutter, his lips tightening around his teeth. “The mausoleum.”
My eyes close in sadness. This could have all been avoided if he never wanted to play his sick pranks. But would it have been, really? Or maybe it was inevitable all along. Maybe this was the path we were meant to take.
Maybe we were always supposed to be standing here right now.
In shambles.
"How do you know all this?" I whisper. I can't imagine he would understand everything that's happened. How could he? It's almost like he took a portal to the past. "Does this mean Castle Pointe is no longer haunted?"
He laughs at this. "Castle Pointe will always be haunted, Vera. The number of spirits roaming around the living is not something that can be stopped. It will never be stopped. But the curse… being stuck in this town, that's done." He takes a deep breath, turning around to give me his stiff back. I can't see his face, but his body screams unease. "And now I think it's time you go home. Go back to where you belong, and don't come back here."
Tears flood my eyes this time, and I can't wipe them away fast enough. My chest fills and my body aches. "Malik… what? I don't… I can't…"
He whips around, his fists clenched at his sides. “Do you know what else I learned, Vera? I learned how fucking sick this place is. Did you ever hear the evil of Castle Pointe? The curse?”
“Yes,” I whisper.
“I found out something interesting the last couple weeks. Did you ever hear the part of the curse where the couple not only had the son who was hit by train tracks, but also a baby girl? Only an infant.”
My eyes widen, and I let out a gasp. “Oh my God.”
He stares at me blankly, not a lick of emotion on his face. No sadness, or shock. No happiness or sadness. It’s like he’s reading from a transcript. Straight to the point. “That baby was my grandmother. That grandmother gave birth to four sons. Samuel Myers, Oliver Port, Michael Berlin, and Jack Sloan.”
I feel like everything I’ve known has been ripped from beneath me. “How… how is that possible? How did you not know any of this?”
This time he cracks a smile, though it’s not at all full of humor. It’s full of malice. “Maybe because my grandmother was the daughter of a horrible witch that cast a curse on this entire town. My grandmother ended up being a whore and a witch, too, and I’m glad she fell into an early grave. People always comment on me and the boys’ similarities in looks, but I’ve never even blinked about it. Never even felt like drawing the connection. This town is fucked up, so why even look into it? But come to find out she gave birth to four different sons with four different men, each taking their own last names. Why my father and my uncles never knew or never talked about their relationship is unbeknownst to me. I don’t fucking care, really. My dad is dead, and the shit him and his friends did over the years is fucked up.”
“What did they do?”
His eyes darken to black pools, and goosebumps break out along my arms. “They preyed on the weak. Weak businesses, weak women, weak men. Anyone who was below them succumbed in one way or another. Corrupt, powerful men who tortured and killed their victims just for fun.”
Tears spring to my eyes. “What?”
