Page 104 of The Monster of Hotel No. 7
“Don’t make the mistake of thinking this is real, Karia.” He still keeps his gaze on my nails, his grip tight on the base of my hand. “You will crave your old life soon. But don’t blame me for it when it happens. It’s like you said to me before. There was no decision to be made. I was always going to follow you.” He flicks his tongue out along the crusted blood of my ring finger, lifting his gaze to me as he does, the warmth of him causing me to shiver. “But the only way I can keep you is through your death.” His teeth scrape against my finger, and he glides his canine up to my middle knuckle, never looking away. “And maybe the threats feel like love to me. Maybe that’s why I give them to you. I know you will eventually fight me off, you won’t like what’s underneath everything you want to strip away.” He bites at my finger and I stiffen, refusing to make a sound. His teeth dig deeper, canine against bone, but I still don’t pull back.
I can take it.
I can take worse.
He smiles, but it isn’t nice, and it doesn’t meet those dark eyes as he pulls back, huffing a small laugh. There are indents from his teeth in my skin, deep and red. “You will want to run when you know everything. But remember what I said?” He throws my hand back at me, turning his gaze to the window as we pass through the never-ending forest. “I don’t give a fuck what you want.”
I stare at his reflection in the window, his pupils distorted by the tinted glass. They seem inhumanly large, black edging out any brown. My mind flickers back to two years ago. The hotel in October, just before Sullen Rule went missing. The eye under the doorway.And how I ran.
Chapter38
Sullen
“You’re drunk. You have to eat. We’re not leaving here until you do.”
She tilts her head, her fingers laced together under her chin as she bats her lashes while we sit at a secluded bench in a desolate park.
The princess of Writhe went with me into the drug store I had the cabbie drop us off at and securedpoundsof makeup and “self-care” products instead of the food I told her we needed. Scooped it all up in her arms and tossed it into the store’s red basket I carried, jostling my shoulder with the weight of everything she got while I browsed the snack aisle, our clothes and her Jameson in the heavy duffle on my other arm.
“These are necessities. Don’t look at me like that.”
I roll my eyes now as I did then, an hour or so ago before we walked from the shopping center to this location under a cluster of thick, looming trees.
“Eat it.” I glance down at the lemon-flavored protein bar in her lap. It isn’t much in the way of food, but we cannot risk going into a restaurant and we have nowhere to cook anything. As it is, I’ve already consumed six protein bars, so I’ve done my share of suffering. My jaw hurts from chewing it all, and I don’t have all my teeth.
It’s her turn now.
She sighs but picks up the shiny yellow package and begins to tear it open, a small smile on her lips as she lifts her gorgeous eyes to mine.
I turn away from her before she sees too much of what I’m thinking.
The sky is still gray from the morning storm, and I glance up at the stern bruise-colored clouds, marveling for one moment over what my life has become. I am sitting on an iron bench with a girl I have watched for decades,yearned for,believed to be so far out of reach I was disgusting for ever hoping.
And she has left a trail of pain behind her; hurting Cosmo, Maude,Stein.All for me.
It is unbelievable.
It is unfortunate, knowing what comes next.
The wind sweeps through our sanctuary, and I shiver. I am grateful for the cooler temperature today—I always am with all of my excess clothing—and even more so for the bite of the breeze.
I’m not so sure that’s the only reason I am trembling, though.
“What’s your favorite color?” she asks me while chewing her food.
I dart out a hand and grab onto the large reusable shopping tote beside me as the wind picks up again, putting it in my lap and glancing inside to see the bananas and Band-Aids, topical ointment and rubbing alcohol on top. I got those things so I can clean her wounds. She let me apply one of the bandages to her palm outside of the store, but she said my tongue probably had healing properties so nothing else was necessary.
I didn’t miss the mischievous smile on her face with that quip, or the way it made lust well up inside of me, so hard to control now around her.
I push those thoughts aside and turn away from the sky, the forest littered with yellow, red, and orange leaves, North Carolina coming alive in the dying season. Her eyes connect with mine as she pops the last bite of the protein bar into her mouth and chews with her lips closed, crinkling the wrapper in her fist.
I don’t answer her question as she stares at me expectantly.
Then she swallows, throws up her hand in impatience, but slides closer to me on the bench. I smell the lemon of the bar and the Jameson, too, but I don’t think much about any of it as she slowly rests her head against my arm.
I am completely still, lest I scare her or ruin this.
I don’t know how to do any of these things she seems to want from me. I don’t know how to handle the jealousy I feel whenanyoneelse captures her attention—Cosmo I loathe of course, but even Fleet or Elliot orMaudetouching her or talking to her… Where we are going now, I never want us to leave, and yet even then, I’m not so sure I’ll learn how to do anything right.
