Page 104 of Cruel Cravings

“WHERE IS SHE?!” I roar.

My father remains impassive, nudging his glasses up the bridge of his nose. “Stop this now or security will be called. And I will no longer give you your meds.”

“I DON’T NEED THE MEDS!” I boom, smashing my fist through a window.

Next will be his face. Blood trickles down my knuckles as I round on them and my mother whimpers.

“If I find out it was you,” I growl at him, “I will kill you.”

Days later, the staff at the psychiatric hospital scream when I come storming through. My boots hit the tile in heavy, resounding footsteps as I stride through the area and make everybody go still. It’s not every day they witness a six-foot-seven man in a minotaur mask ready to tear the place down.

I get started, throwing open doors, scanning each room. I flip over desks and knock over supply tables. Patients scream and scramble to get out of my way. The nurses are no different as many recoil and flee in fear.

One nurse attempts to stop me. Nurse Hinkley blocks my path, awareness on her face. As head nurse, as one of my father’s highest-ranking staff members, she’s fully aware of who I am.

“You can’t be here!” she yells.

I shove past her. A second nurse reaches for my arm.

“Sir, you need to calm down?—”

I slam my fist into his face and send him tumbling several feet back. I round the nurse’s station and tear away at the piles of documents like a beast unfamiliar with what paperwork is.

“WHERE?!” I bark. I crush a piece of paper that lists the room numbers of every patient at the hospital. Jael’s nowhere listed. “WHERE IS SHE?”

Nurse Hinkley stumbles over with a phone and canister of bear spray. “Stop this now or I’ll spray you in the face!”

“WHERE?!”

I flip the desk and send the computer, printer, papers, flower vase, and everything else on it crashing to the ground.

More nurses scream in alarm.

But this is only the beginning. I will tear this hospital apart brick by brick if it means finding where she’s gone.

My father insists she left without telling me. She didn’t want me to follow, but that can’t be true. She wouldn’t go where I couldn’t follow.

She never has before…

I storm down another corridor, wrenching door after door open. I’m at an intersection that leads into the high-risk ward, where patients who are considered extremely unstable are kept. A gut-wrenching scream sounds from the end of the corridor.

It belongs to a man. It’s the kind of cry of agony you release when consumed by pain.

My pulse picks up, beating harder in the side of my neck. I grit my teeth and stride forward. Wrapping my fingers around the handle, I let out a roar worthy of a beast as I rip the door wide open, leaving it hanging loose on its hinges.

The room’s empty except for the padding on the walls and a bed in the middle. The scene before me is unexpected and surreal.

My father kneeling on the bed, clutching at his neck as blood gushes out. Underneath him lays a bound Jael whose mouth is painted red from the bite she’s taken out of his jugular.

33.Jael

LET THE WORLD BURN - Chris Grey

My teeth sink deep into Dr. Wolford’s flesh, and for a moment, the coppery tang of blood pours into my mouth like a thick syrup. But I don’t let go, I bite down harder—to his agonized screams.

I can feel the throb of Dr. Wolford’s pulse. The chewy, rubbery texture of flesh between my teeth as I rip it away and then spit it out. His hands fly to his throat to stop me but the damage has already been done.

I’ve torn a piece of his jugular out and he’s losing blood fast. He can do nothing but stay where he is and desperately clutch at the open wound, his eyes larger than I’ve ever seen them behind his wire-framed glasses.

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