Page 58 of Fear No Hell

Sam

“No! No, please, no!”

I blink my eyes open to the sound of a man begging. “What the fuck?” I mumble as I reach blindly for the nightstand, my fingers tapdancing across its top as I search for my phone. Another squealed set of pleas drown out the sound of something crashing to the ground. “What time is it?”

The only hint I have until I can find my phone is the sunlight pouring into the room.

Over the last few weeks, Lila has taken to waking me up by opening the blackout curtains whenever she gets out of bed and letting the day wake me up naturally.

While I snooze, she putters around, usually by reading, making breakfast, or, apparently today, torturing a big-mouthed asshole.

Open curtains means it’s at least 8:00. Given how bright the room is, though, I’m willing to bet it’s significantly later than that.

My fingers touch my phone as another round of pleading breaks the silence.

I lift it and tap the screen until it lights up.

11:00. Jesus, I’ve only got another week or so until I’m back at work.

I need to get my sleep schedule in order, or I may actually die during those first couple of days.

With a groan, I dump my cell on the bed next to me and press my palms against my eyes.

“Oh good, you’re up!”

I tug my hands free, blinking the sparkles filling my vision away until I can take in Lila.

She’s leaning against the door, her hair pulled into two braids and dressed in her favorite pair of jean shorts and one of my old shirts cut into a crop top that hangs drunkenly off one of her shoulders.

She’s a vision, which has nothing to do with the mystical aura she gives off now that her irises are perpetually scarlet and her tattoos are always glowing.

The magic of Lila is in her just being Lila.

“Yeah, something, something, a man begging for his life in our basement,” I tease, sliding to the edge of the bed and removing my shrinker.

“Only the best eerie torture soundtracks for you, my love.”

“You think of everything.” Snickering, I grab my liner and sock from the nightstand and roll them up over my stump before snagging my prosthesis and working it on, adjusting the sleeve gently until all of the air is expelled.

“The plant have anything interesting to say today?” I ask as I stand and stride to the dresser.

“More of the same. ‘Your mother was a whore who fucked around with the occult and got knocked up by some weird hippies.’ Nothing too original. Then a lot of begging for a piece of paper to write his ideas on.”

“Anything I need to clean up?” I grab the first t-shirt I can find and drag it over my head.

“Nope, they were shallow cuts, and I already gave him his early morning nutrients and fluids.”

With a smile, I dart over and drag her into a hug. “You didn’t have to do that, sweetness. I could have taken care of it. I know it’s hard for you to keep him alive.”

“You looked too peaceful to wake up.” She goes to her tiptoes and presses a slow, drugging kiss to my mouth. It only takes a second for her to wrap herself around me and turn it into something filthy, full of tongues and teeth and broken noises.

Dropping my hands to her ass, I grip tight and lift her until she wraps her legs around my waist, never once pulling my mouth away from hers.

With Lila wanting to wait for us to get answers so she can take my virginity “the right way” and me wanting to wait until she tells me she’s ready, we’re a sexual time bomb waiting to go off.

Every time we’re intimate, it gets closer to the point of no return.

We’ve done everything short of her going down on me—something I’m not sure she’ll ever be prepared for, and I’ll never push—and having sex.

At this point, the need for me to be inside of her is killing both of us.

“Take it off.” Lila tugs at the neck of the shirt I just put on. “Now.”

She gives me an order; I obey. I would never think of doing otherwise.

Balancing her by way of one palm gripping her ass and her legs cinched tightly around me, I rip the shirt off one-handed and dump it on the ground next to us.

Her claws rake over my exposed chest while I stumble towards the bed I rolled out of only minutes ago. The touch is hard enough for me to feel the sharpened points, gentle enough not to break the skin, and, in every other way, more than sufficient to drive me fucking crazy.

“Lila,” I gasp as I drop to the bed, the springs creaking under our combined weight collapsing onto the mattress. Her legs frame my hips, her fangs nipping my neck as she writhes on my lap.

“Precious pet.” Her hand slides into my hair, claws gripping at my skull to tug my head back. She dips her head down and nips at my throat.

“Oh fuck, sweetness.” The moan rips uncontrolled from my mouth when I feel a sharp prick followed by a slow slick of liquid down the fragile skin.

“You taste so good,” she growls as she laps at the blood gathering on my neck. “Magical.”

Without any thought, I’m grinding my cock against her, the only thing separating us a few layers of thin fabric.

Some rips and pulls, and I could be balls deep inside my goddess.

The thought has me shaking, trailing my fingers along the waistband of her shorts, slipping them underneath the material, so I can touch her soft, golden skin.

“Lila, sweetness, I need you so fucking bad.”

“My sweet boy.” Her finger trails over my jawbone, mere inches above where her tongue still laps over my skin, tonguing the small bite she made. “So very, very needy.”

Another whine. Another thrust. The world narrows to a pinprick of white as I rut against Lila, wanting nothing more than to sink into her. “Please—”

Zzzz.

I shake away the sudden sound. Can’t bring myself to care, not when Lila’s hands just made their way down my pants. Her thumb rolls along the thick head of my shaft; my eyes roll back into my head as my dick jerks in her palm so intensely I’m concerned I might have come already.

Zzzz. Zzzz.

“What the fuck?” I gasp as the third set of vibrations sounds.

“Don’t you dare look away from me, pet,” Lila hisses. Her order has me forgetting there was ever a sound, much less a world, outside of her. “Your attention is for me alone.”

I scoop my hand through her hair, letting it flow through my fingers like a raven-colored waterfall. “Always.”

Lila lifts away from my throat with one final, longing lap at the skin, her scarlet irises finding mine as the vibrating noise breaks the quiet once more. The corners of her lips turn down.

Zzzz.

With a shake of her head, Lila glances around the room. “What—”

Zzzz.

“What is that noise?” she asks as it happens again. Her attention drops to the bed and, as the buzzing sounds once more, she lunges to my left. She emerges from the wrinkled covers seconds later with a shout of victory, my phone clutched in her hand.

“It’s your mom,” she says as she passes me my phone.

I scramble for my phone, unrelenting erection and cockblocking phone ringing immediately forgotten. My hands are shaking when I stab the green call button to answer and lift the cell to my face. “Mom?”

There’s a second of silence before she says in a disbelieving voice, “Sammy?”

Disbelief. Like I’m the one who ghosted her for four-and-a-half fucking months. “Mom, what the actual fuck?”

Lila shoots me an amused glance from her position on my lap.

Guess the civil approach is out the window.

From the other side of the phone comes a shaky breath. “Sammy, I’m so sorry.”

“I don’t get it, Mom, what the fuck happened? You vanished into thin air! I’ve been calling and texting you for months. You don't get to swing by my house unannounced, drop a bombshell—”

“Could you come over?”

“What? I don’t-what?”

“Could you come over today? Right now? I wanted to talk to you about some things. I can make lunch!”

Like it’s the lack of lunch that has her worried I’ll say no. Jesus fucking Christ.

“I-I-I—” I can’t think coherently enough to respond. I have, at best guess, sixteen thousand things I want to say; no matter how hard I try, my mouth can’t seem to force a single one of them out.

Lila slides the phone out of my hand and raises it to her ear. “Hi, Michelle, it’s Lila. Sam’s—” She smothers a chuckle. “Well, I think he’s recalibrating right now. What time would you like us over?”

I don’t hear my mother answer over the blood rushing in my ears, but I see Lila’s lips form the word, “now.” At least I think I do. After that, I lose track of what little of their conversation I was grasping, half locked in my head in a weird fugue state.

I might finally get an answer to who my real father is.

Lila drops the phone on the bed by my left hip and runs a soothing hand down my arm. “Sam, my love, you with me?"

“Um.”

“Okay. Well, get dressed because we’re going to your mother’s now.

She’s making… well, honestly, I’m not entirely certain what she’s making for lunch because she threw out six different options.

But we’re going to go and eat whatever food she has prepared and find out about your father.

” Lila’s mouth twists into a ferocious frown.

“And she promised me she wouldn’t spring any more unexpected news on you.

One life-changing revelation is enough for most people, and between my existence and your paternity, you’re already well past that. ”

“I’m… I’m not sure I can do this.” The reality of finding out who I am, where I come from, is hitting hard, turning my blood to ice and freezing me in place. “I don’t know if I’m ready.”

“For what, my love?”

“To find out who my father is.” I tug at the waistband of her shorts as I try to figure out how to say the worst of my fears. “What if he’s worse than Arthur?”