Page 10 of Haunt

“Tools.”

It’s loud in the small space of the room, despite the ceiling being so high, it feels cramped. And with this large man inside of it now. It is suffocating.

I swallow, glance at the bag, the sheets covering what’s hiding beneath the bed. And then him. Vision dragged back like my eyeballs are on strings and Billy is the puppet master. I stare at him.

Waiting.

For instruction.

I am submissive.

As though my insides know this is their God.

I feel dizzy as he steps back into me, his eyes on mine, so light, almost hollow, his skeleton shadowed face, all of it frightening and uncomfortable. It all makes me feel safe.

It is a vile deception.

He has to crane down, spine curving, knees bending, head canting, to become level with me. His face before mine, his breath on my lips. He reaches up, looping a thick tendril of hair behind my ear, the pad of his finger catching on the gold post of my earring. He drags his nail down the length of my neck behind my lobe, snagging my flesh just a little with the pressure.

Breath hitching, my lips part, chest rapidly rising and falling, I cannot blink. I don’t think I have since he appeared before me this morning…

“You were there,” I swallow. “In the hall.” His long curl of lashes bats slowly, just once, dusting his high cheekbones. “That was real?”

It’s a question as much as a statement. One that doesn’t really require an answer, because if this is all inside my head, that surely would have been too.

“If you are asking me if this is real or not, then the answer I would give you could be one of your own making, could it not? So it isn’t really worth anything,” he says it all a little too quickly for my brain to finally realise he is teasing me, trying to noose the fragile threads of insanity tighter around my neck.

But then he frowns, a deep crevice cleaving between his thick dark brows.

“I am real. This is real.” It feels like truth, but he was always such a very pretty liar. “I have been haunting you. Watching you tonight, from the rafters.”

He lifts a hand, index finger pointed up towards the ceiling, but I do not follow it, and neither does he, our eyes still locked together.

“Desperate to get this close to you,” the words are hushed over my mouth, and I suck them in with my sharp intake of breath. “And now you question it?” he swallows, I see his Adam’s apple bob, but I don’t drop my gaze to his throat.“Me?”he whispers that last part sweetly, it is a lie, the sweetness, Billy Blackwell is as rotten as I, and my heart batters the inside of my chest.

Instantly, I shake my head, knowing how this game, once upon a time, used to end. My tongue flicks over my cupid’s bow, I shake my head once more, gaze still tethered to his. Even as children, I followed his lead, his instruction.

Billy’s word was law.

“No,” it is whispered too, this quiet tension we have built up between us feels like it’s tightening to snap. “No, Billy.”

He smiles then, index finger curling down the drop of my jawbone, knuckle hooking beneath my chin, he arches my neck, slowly, slowly, until my throat is stretched so taut it feels hard to breathe. He is towering over me, his face hovering above mine. He brushes his lips delectably across the bone of my brow, my eyes fluttering closed. I exhale deeply, refill my lungs with his scent. Warming my insides with the familiarity of him. Something past now present.

“I missed you,” I profess, differently to the way he spoke the same words, I did not respond to, just a short while ago. “I hated you.” The confession is heavy in my heart, light on my tongue. “You promised to come for me.” I don’t open my eyes now, I fear I cannot. “You devastated me.”

The way his grip tightens on the length of my jaw at that has me wanting to wince, but I keep my expression relaxed. A short huff of breath escapes my nostrils as he pinches my chin,hard, a tear squeezing from the corner of my eye. This is how he has always been, brutal, demanding, ruthless, consuming, and yet, I am gone for him regardless.

His nose glides up the length of my own, inhaling deeply, he runs it across my forehead, down my temple. His breath is a warm tickle. Goosebumps raze across my flesh, a tremor grating its way slowly down my spine. My knees feel weak, my head spinning. His mouth is aligned with mine again, his lips moving with unspoken words. I am glad he does not say them, whatever they are, something meant to cut.

Another tear squeezes free, and I am trembling in his hold now, my eyes still squeezed shut. His breath is hot against my skin and then the flat of his tongue is lapping upwards of my cheek, my tears on his tongue, the tip of it catching on my lashes. He groans as he pulls back, no more than an inch of space between us, and I know his lips are over mine once again. His breath on my mouth. Fear is like a knife in my gut, but there is a sickening devotion in my heart. And I know it will destroy me.

It is a foreboding, this omen that could possibly be our love.

His hands clamp over my shoulders. Suddenly. Sharply. Catching me by surprise, my eyes snap open like a bullet went off, immediately re-finding his. My hands flying up to close over his muscular forearms. The weight of his fists, their size, smothering the entire space between my neck and shoulder. He drags his thumbs along my collarbones. It is rough and hard, the pressure making my knees want to buckle, the way he is so heavy handed. It has something inside of me desperately thrumming to life.

“Take this off,” he demands, voice loud and throaty.

My body snaps to attention, fingers moving of their own accord, I am ensnared in his gaze, his compulsion. My hands drop from his arms, his hands falling from my shoulders. A bruising pain is present in my collarbones, the tendons in my throat, from straining against the pressure. He steps back, just enough for my elbows to bend as I lift my nightdress over my head, let it drop to the floor at my feet.

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