Page 40 of Demon with Benefits (Hell Bent #3)

SKELETON IN THE CLOSET

I ’ M SORRY , I RIS .”

Not long ago, Iris had been intensely curious to find out what Meph would shift into. Now, she would have given anything to ensure she never found out.

“No!” she shouted into the disgusting rag in her mouth. It came out like a muffled shriek, like every other sound she’d made.

It had been so easy for Valefor to grab her. She hadn’t been able to fight him. She hadn’t even come close.

He’d grabbed her by the arm and dragged her into the next-door apartment, where he’d bound and gagged her and taken her through a hellgate in the living room.

She’d known immediately the musty castle on the other side was in Hell, and she’d struggled futilely as he’d carried her past groveling demons she assumed were his subjects and down a staircase to a seemingly deserted floor.

There, he’d brought her into this low-ceilinged chamber where she’d found Meph lying unconscious in a sigil.

No wonder her mother had forced that blood vow on her all those years ago. Her mam had known Valefor was coming, and she’d known Iris wouldn’t stand a chance against him.

By doing so, her mother had saved her life. Iris fully accepted it now. Had he found her then, Valefor would have taken her as easily as he’d killed her parents. There wouldn’t have been anything she could do to stop him, just like there wasn’t anything she could do now to save Meph.

The shadows seemed to darken in the room, the torchlight faded to a candle’s faint glow.

And then Meph shifted.

His body was subsumed by impenetrable shadows, and then the darkness stretched, growing taller and taller, until it loomed into the shape of a monster over seven feet tall.

His fingers were long, spindly and spiderlike, with an extra knuckle joint and knifelike claws.

They flexed into a grotesque position, like the mutated hands of a skeleton.

He wore a cloak, the dark hood hiding his face. Whether it was an actual fabric cloak that appeared with this form or a cloak made of the shadows pouring off him like fog from dry ice, she couldn’t tell. Its gaping sleeves hung open at the wrists, so all she could see were those bony hands.

He was huge, long and slender like a towering tree in a haunted forest, and his presence sucked the oxygen from the room. The complex sigil on the stone floor no longer seemed like enough to contain him. Cold malevolence radiated outward from the center of his being.

Iris shrank back against the stone wall, clutching at her chest with her bound hands. She was suddenly ice-cold, but she was too fixated on the monster before her to care about her chattering teeth.

“There you are.” Valefor’s voice was low. “My precious, deadly thing.”

His words jarred her out of the frozen terror slightly. She’d been so transfixed by the sight of the shadowy monster, she’d forgotten Valefor was there at all. She’d forgotten where she was. She’d forgotten that the creature before her was Meph.

Laughing, teasing Meph, with his crooked smile and red eyes that crinkled up in the corners. Meph, who’d gasped for breath because he didn’t understand his feelings. Meph, who’d looked at her with such hurt in his gaze when she’d told him their friendship was over.

All that seemed miles away now, like it had happened months ago instead of only a day.

But it didn’t lessen the heartbreak Iris felt as she tried to reconcile this demon with the man she knew.

It didn’t make it any easier for her to accept that he was gone.

He’d made a deal to save her life, and she didn’t know how to get him back.

Valefor stepped toward the sigil and, astonishingly, stretched out a foot and smudged the line. As if he was less afraid of Meph now that he’d shifted into this reaper-like creature. Iris couldn’t help but shudder at the prospect of him being free to roam about.

The monster’s head turned, and she knew he was looking at her. She couldn’t see his face beneath his hood, but she could feel his attention crawling over her skin.

And then... he approached her.

He either floated on the shadows pouring off him, or he scuttled on the ends of a million spider legs.

She didn’t know where she got the idea that he had spider legs, since she could see nothing but blackness around the base of his flowing cloak, but she couldn’t shake it. There was something about his movement—smooth and graceful and silently dreadful—that just screamed arachnid.

He drew nearer, and she couldn’t fight her fear. She shrank further into the corner until she was pressed against it as close as she could. As if she was hoping to sink into the stone and disappear.

Those skeletal hands reached toward her as he leaned down from his towering height like a willow folding in the wind.

Closer and closer he came, until the tips of those deadly claws brushed her face. She would have screamed, but terror had frozen her in place. She wasn’t breathing; she wasn’t even sure her heart was beating.

One claw caught against the gag on her cheek, and with one swipe, it tore the cloth. The fabric dropped into her lap, taking the rag in her mouth with it. Far from reassuring, it only proved how deadly sharp those weapons were.

It was then she finally glimpsed what was beneath his hood.

Sunken red eyes glowed from the empty sockets of a skull-like face. No, not actual eyes, just eerie lights that cast a faint sheen on his hollow cheekbones. His nose was flat and snakelike, and his mouth...

God, she wanted to scream so badly.

His mouth was a slash from ear to ear, all the way across his face. No lips. It was parted to reveal teeth. So many teeth. And she was certain that when he opened his mouth all the way, his jaw would keep stretching and stretching into a yawning pit wide enough to consume anything.

As she continued to stare at that horrifying face, something happened. A vision. Or maybe it was real life.

But... she was suddenly staring at her twin sister. The rest of the world faded to nothing, and there was only Lily before her.

“You’re weak,” Lily said in that disappointed voice she only used when Iris had really screwed up. “I’ve always looked up to you, but I can see now that you’ve always been weak.”

“No, that’s not true—” Iris fumbled to validate herself. “I’m only waiting for my powers to awaken like yours—”

“My powers were awake all along. I just chose to ignore them. Yours have never manifested, and they’re never going to.”

“No, they will. When I need them, they’ll come.” But she wasn’t sure she believed it either.

“It doesn’t matter anyway,” Lily said, shaking her head. “I’ll never forgive you.”

“F-for what?”

“It was your fault Mam and Dad died. You should have saved them.”

“No! Mam made me vow—”

“You should have been strong enough to fight it when the time came. You should have been strong enough to stop the fire.”

“I tried! I swear, I gave it everything I—”

“And worse,” Lily continued in that toneless voice, “you lied about it. You kept your shame from me for nearly ten years because you couldn’t bear the thought that I would see you for the failure you are.”

“N-no, that’s not—”

“Well, I’m seeing it now. I’m finally seeing that you’re nothing but weak and scared and alone. You’ll always be alone.”

Fire. There was suddenly fire everywhere. Iris spun around, trying to escape it, but it surrounded her on all sides.

“No!” she cried. “Please don’t leave me!”

“You failed us, Iris,” her mother said, her face emerging from the flames. Burning—she was burning. “I was counting on you to save us, and you didn’t.”

“No!” Iris rushed at the fire, trying to reach her, but the heat singed her skin. “I tried to fight—”

“Your mother believed in you,” her father said, his face appearing next to her mam’s. “But I always knew you were weak.”

“No!”

“Weak and a liar,” Suyin said. Iris spun around to find her friend behind her. “A filthy, dirty liar.”

“W-what?”

“You think I wouldn’t find out? I thought you were a true witch, but apparently, you’d rather be a demon whore than stand up for what you believe in.”

“No! It’s not like that. Lily—I had to for Lily—”

“I don’t want your excuses. You were always weak. I’ve never seen you earn the title of blood-born with your feeble powers.”

“Stop it!” Iris shouted. “Don’t throw your fucking judgments at me!”

“Leave Meph alone,” Raum said. Iris spun around again—he was behind her. “He’s better off without you. He doesn’t need you anyway.”

“But I don’t want to—”

“He’s a brilliant artist,” Jacqui said from beside him, her lip curling, “and what are you?”

“I just—”

And then, suddenly, she was looking at Meph. Human Meph.

“You were never good enough for me.” His eyes were cold. “I suffered for centuries, I learned to overcome my pain, but you? What have you done besides cast judgments and try to make me feel weak?”

“I know,” she whispered, the denial draining from her. “I know, and I’m sorry.”

“It was all a lie anyway,” he sneered. “The feelings I said I had for you were a li—”

He stopped.

And suddenly, they were back in the dungeon.

The vision, hallucination, whatever the fuck that was, faded, and Iris blinked through the tears obscuring her vision.

She was shaking from head to foot, her heart racing so fast she couldn’t catch her breath.

She could still feel the heat of the flames licking at her skin.

The monster peered at her through sunken red eyes.

Valefor’s voice echoed across the dungeon. “That’s enough.”

Meph twisted his head, slowly and fluidly, to stare at the other demon over his shoulder.

“I don’t want you to drain her to death. I still have uses for her. You can feed more later. Come away, now.”

Understanding dawned. Whatever Iris had seen was some kind of hallucination of her fears and shame. It had shown her all her worst nightmares, and she’d been lost in the vision.