The Forsaken (31 page)

Jude softly slid his fingers over her leg then kissed her once more. “It’s not a mistake. Just relax.”

He felt a sudden change in the way his body fit around his skeleton. His skin heavier. His organs jumbling. Sweat beaded off his chest and pooled on top of her stomach. Her subtle fight made him crave the pleasure even more.

“Jude, what are we doing?”

No answer.

“I said, what are we doing?” she repeated, her hands lost in his hair. “We shouldn’t be here like this. It’s unprofessional.” She swallowed nervously. “Do you even care about me? I’m not some tap-and-go slut, you know.”

Then something cold slipped from his eyes. He had believed he could keep it caged, or did he? Had he ever been strong enough to beat it? Had he ever been ready enough to take it on?

No. Never. We came here together, sonny. We handled her together.

The red dripped down her neck.

“Jude? What’s going on? Is that…blood?”

“Ease up, baby.”

“Stop calling me
baby
! It sounds weird when you say it.” She suddenly turned cruel. Using her elbows, Rachel pushed him off again. “You’re scaring me. What is this?” She watched him until he returned to eye level.

He could feel her watching too, seeing the change in him. “Jude, just tell me what’s happening to you?”

“What’s all the fuss, precious? We thought you liked it rough. Sonny here is a bit…complicated to pilot sometimes. He can be such a softy when he sets his mind to it.”

A dark red glare invaded her. A glare surrounded by black lines and a pale human mask.

Jude gripped her back, rubbing his torso against hers, nails seemingly sharper than before. “You see, I could only work with so much. A shame, really, for an artist to be so confined. He’s got the goods, I know. But he’s afraid to let ’em out. Figured you could help loosen the noose a little.”

Rachel snarled.

Jude’s lips slid back, showing teeth, but it didn’t sound like him talking, not now. “I think he likes you, precious. Secret’s out.”

“Why are you talking like that? In that voice?” Rachel felt tears coming on but wiped them away before they had a chance to fall.

He reached for her squirming hips again and licked her stomach. Remaining drops of blood soaked the sheets as she fought to break free. Some of it already began to dry. Some of it mixed with the fear and the sweat. “That’s…blood,” she said, staring oddly at it. “Let me go. Get off me!”

“Don’t like games you can’t win, do you? Stop fighting us. We’ll be done soon.”

“
We
? Jude, stop it right now! Let me go.” The ferocity in her words was splintering. She swallowed hard, terrified.

A horrible flavor hovered above her face. His breath reeked of something used and dead. A black, mask-like aura engulfed Jude’s countenance like a swarm.

“You’re being disgusting,” she fidgeted. “I’m not enjoying this.”

“Resistance…is…futile,” he said with a grunt. “Always loved that line.”

“Jude, I’m scared. Please…stop.”

“Ah-ah-ah. You keep calling me Jude, but that’s not my name. Your kind call me Azrael.” A sick cackle split the air.

He nibbled the fleshy part of her ear, licking it as a finish. A vile stench soaked into her taste buds. The sadist began to revel as he defiled her with his touch.

“Is this how it happened the first time? Was he on top of you like this? Or was it the other way around? I can never remember how girls like it these days. Tell me, baby, were you a squealer?”

She fumed and clawed at his chest until he smacked her hard. The blow to the head made her like putty in his hands.

“Oh my, I didn’t mean to swing so hard. Please forgive me. Didn’t mean nothing by it. Come now, don’t fall asleep before it gets good.” Half slits showcased her dizzy eyes as he continued. “A gentleman does get curious, you know…Did you like it…even if just a little?” His laugh drilled into her exposed body. Tears swelled.

“Our bodies are a temple, you know. In this scene, you’re the priestess. Purify me some, won’t you? Thus from my lips, by yours, our sin is purged.” He bit her mouth.

“Please, don’t do this. God, please don’t do this.”

“Now, there you go again, getting my name all tangled. Azrael. Say it with me, darling. Come on, say it. I love it when they say it.”

After the silence, she gave in. And with one whisper, it flowed. “Azrael.”

“That’s it,” he gasped, satisfied.

“Jude, can you hear me?” she asked, desperate.

Their bodies shook. Jude blinked. Vision still blanketed red.

“Are you in there? Do you care at all?”

The creature dropped toward her again and forced himself upon her. “We can move a little slower, sonny, if that’s how she likes it.”

Then a scream shattered the room.

Rachel grabbed the landline phone and bashed his jaw. With her legs, she thrust Jude off the mattress, and he smacked hard when his back hit the floor. She reached over the bed to find her jacket and, inside, her gun. Once retrieved, Rachel took aim. She cocked it before her next blink.

Jude froze. Through the crimson blur, he stared at her. How she trembled. Her beautiful skin, so vulnerable. She couldn’t breathe slowly to save her life. The gun wouldn’t stop jittering inside that nervous grip. Still, he was dead certain she would fire the moment she saw need to.

Jude ran his palms down his face. His cheeks were blotchy with red tears. “Rachel?” he murmured. “It’s...me. I won’t—”

“Shut up, Jude! Just shut the hell up!” She bit down hard, clearly wanting to empty the entire clip into his gut. But what kept her from it?

“Rachel, what happened?”

“I screwed up. But I swear it won’t happen again. Just stay back. Don’t you dare take another step, or I’ll send you to kingdom come.” She wiped her cheeks. “I trusted you. With my life…with…my body.”

“Put down the gun. You don’t need it.”

“Like hell I don’t. Don’t even think for a second that you’re coming any closer.” Shaking, she pulled the comforter across her chest.

“You have to believe me,” Jude begged. “I wouldn’t hurt you.”

She glanced down at the bruises on her legs, her stomach, her arms.

“You think
I
did that to you?” he asked, nearly shuddering. He
was
still human, wasn’t he? He stood to his feet, rigid, glimpsing the terrible sight of his own reflection in the mirror. A man—a creature—he now despised.

Rachel started counting. Her lids twitched, but her aim never wavered.

“Oh no, what have I done?” He wiped away his stains, and he watched the blood that had once stained the sheets start to evaporate. “Rachel. I swear…Whatever happened…It wasn’t me.”

It is you.
The whisper stumbled in. He couldn’t be apart from it, not for longer than a moment.
Believe it, sonny. I just gave you a little nudge.

Jude took one step, and immediately Rachel’s lip quivered. “Go!”

“But I—”

She blinked. “Get away from me. I don’t want to look at you. I don’t want to talk to you. I don’t want to smell you. I. Hate. You!”

“Look into my eyes, Rachel. Something changed in those moments. I don’t understand it. But something happened…to me. Just let me talk to you, please. I couldn’t hurt you. Don’t you see that?”

“I want you to leave. One…” she began again. “I want you and your lies gone. Two…”

In the following silence, all he could hear was her shivering. Teeth-chattering, skull-numbing shivering. The sticking of that skin to metal grip, the stuttering of her breath as it escaped those frightened, worn-out lips. He wanted to kiss them, for real. Not with the demon’s lips; with
his
lips. He wanted to touch her with his hands, again.

But he couldn’t.

After Jude slipped back into his shirt and his shoes, he stumbled out of the motel room, leaving her alone and in tears.

41

THE FOUR WALLS TAUNTED
him again.

He’s not coming for you
,
don’t you know that? You’re a fool to think he would. The world has chewed you up and spit you out, and he’ll do the same.

“Stop it,” Kevin meekly whispered, scratching his scalp like a lunatic. “No more.”

You were the reason he left.

How did the walls know? How could they speak in tongues of misery? His misery. Every crack. Every flaw exposed to him now, with water bleeding through. He was the same. He
was
the cracks, living within, bleeding.

His ears absorbed the horrible sounds of torment, the things his thoughts seemed to echo without contest.

Big bro is hard enough.

“I’m not even listening.”

But you can’t just shut it up. We’re the voices in your head. We’re you. We’re everything you can’t be.

“Stop,” he begged, dragging his fingernails into his eardrums, until blood painted the edge of the nails.

He doesn’t need a wart like you on his hands, does he? You’re just an addict, jittery as the day you crawled hopelessly out of the womb. Should’ve died in there. This world don’t need you. Crystal didn’t even need you.

“The sickest part is that it’s true,” Kevin wept.

But his voice was young and weak. No limbs, no hands. Indecipherable speech. It climbed the walls on its belly, like a snake. He imagined its tail twisting along the cracked, slick concrete. How it begged to be heard above the taunts, above the demonic shrill born inside his head.

“I’m still lost,” he murmured.

The voices were right. He was just a jittery addict. The jitters were planning a hostile takeover, even now. The shakes made his hands creak. His legs came alive with spasms.

“Gotta get out. Gotta get help. Get help. Big bro. Get out. Get out. Jude. Get out! Help. Out. Here. Now.”

Kevin rushed to the stairs and leaped over the broken boards. He didn’t care what might happen to him if Morgan discovered he was trying to escape. It didn’t matter. He had to be free. He needed the fix to pump salvation into his blood.

He lost his footing and tripped, his ankle twisting into a hole and cutting up his shin. He toiled, hoping to get loose. His hollow pleas sought freedom. Sweating. Panting. He prayed to his god. The only god his mind could fathom.

The god refused him peace.

Left you here to die, he did.

“Morgan!” he shouted. “Morgan!” He prayed the sounds could make it farther than he did, prayed they’d make it to his new master. Louder and hoarser the groans turned, desperate. Almost rabid.

And out of the eventual dark came a stitch of light. It was almost piercing. Out of the light walked a ghost.

“They are so lost…” the voice spoke, “like sheep without a shepherd.”

“Morgan, I-I-I n-need-need…I…need…” Kevin trailed off in a dizzy spell. The light was crushing him, the light that had breathed a wretched voice. “I’m so weak,” he managed. “I’m nothing without it. Give it to me. I have nothing else. Give-G-Give it to…me.”

Morgan reached down, releasing Kevin’s leg from the clenched jaws of the dusty step and wiping the blood on his pants. “You cut up your leg pretty good, didn’t you? Tsk-tsk. You shouldn’t have tried to get out. Bad boy. Come now, don’t you like it here? You’re safe from the mind-twisting freaks outside these walls, rat. Like your brother. He tried to come and kill
me
once. Thought I was sadistic and evil. But he was a bad
rat
too.”

Kevin nodded, shaking and sweating, unquiet. “He probably isn’t even looking for me. For-f-forgot about me.”

“Yeah. They all will forget about you.”

“Help me…I need—”

“Yes, of course.” Morgan fed his arm down his shirt and reached for a thin tube and unscrewed the mouth, pouring a sliver of powder onto his fingertip.

Kevin greedily inhaled the dust.

“All better now?” Morgan asked.

“More…more,” he cried, and Morgan let him consume the remainder.

Heartbreak. Loss. The inescapable and the inevitable. Reality. Playing rhythms with no music. Horror in black and white. He was consumed. Regret. Remorse. They were the children playing in the sandbox at the back of his mind. They were the unfound choruses of hope trapped beneath the sand. Not breathing. Never breathing.

The craving suddenly deserted him.

Morgan whispered then into his ear, “You…belong…to us.” But the words did not come out human. They were mutilated, disguised, tormented.

Kevin’s heart sank then drowned, his pulse blistering and alive again. Lost and alive.

Morgan grabbed him and threw him down the last steps. But he didn’t care. He knew the dark as home. He knew the doorman as master. He knew the light would fade to the inevitable cold, drab walls and weak pillars of this underground chamber.

Kevin’s vision spiraled until he shut his eyes. The light had finally forsaken him, and it took the devil with it.