Page 43

Theo

When I kiss Annie, something changes. First, I feel it in my chest, like a bubble expanding, or a fist clenching my heart.

I want to be closer to her, to feel every beat of her heart from the inside, to let myself drown in her shadows.

I know this feeling. I think I love you, Annie.

I can’t bring myself to say it out loud.

It’s too raw, too new, and I’m too afraid.

Then the hand around my heart twists, painfully.

“No,” Annie whispers, and I open my eyes to see that hers are black again. Not a deep, soft, velvet black like they were in the car, but a black tinged with red—a furious, terrifying, raging black.

“What’s wrong, sweetheart?” I ask, and glance at Ben, who is lying on the other side of the couch with his eyes closed.

He snaps up and looks between us. There’s a new heat rushing under her skin, and her breathing quickens, her arms suddenly and violently trembling, her barbed tail whipping back and forth above us.

“No!” She moves away from me. “No, please, do not hurt him! Theo…no…”

“Ben!” I cry, and grab onto her. “Ben, something’s wrong!”

He launches himself across the couch and puts an arm around her shoulders, but Annie holds my face tenderly as her expression twists from fear, to hurt, to love, and finally…into something malevolent.

“Please forgive me,” she says softly, and then her hands move from my cheeks to my throat. She slams me back against the arm of the couch and shadows pour f rom her mouth, surrounding all of us with a sickening darkness.

“Annie, no!” Ben yells, and he tries to move around to her side, but her tail lashes out and wraps around his neck, the barb cutting into his cheek. She’s strangling both of us, and the shadows flying from her mouth swarm around my face.

“Please…Annie, don’t do this,” I beg, but I can see the darkness seeping through her veins, pushing out the sweet, gentle warmth and love.

She’s going to take me now, because I let her in.

I let this happen. I was so desperate for company, for kindness, that now the two people I care about most are at Annoth’s mercy.

The sight of Ben struggling in her grip is too much, and I jerk my knee up hard, hitting her in the stomach.

She hisses in pain, and he manages to rip the tail away from his throat, then tries to come to my aid.

But a pair of enormous, dark, leathery wings explode from her back in a flurry of new shadows and one of them strikes him in the chest. He topples over the coffee table and lies prone on the floor.

The other wing leaves a long gouge in the wall, ripping and tearing as she uses it to get leverage while I thrash beneath her.

“Annie, it’s me! It’s Theo!” I cry, praying I can reach through the demon somehow and find the woman.

The one I care about. The one who loves Star Wars and ate French toast with me and met my family.

But there’s no recognition in her eyes—no love, no joy.

Only violence and rage. She bares her deadly fangs and lets out a horrific screech that tears through my body, leaving me even weaker as her hands tighten around my throat and her shadows force their way deeper into my body.

Ben struggles to his feet and staggers over to us, then falls to his knees and grabs her arm.

“Annie, mi amor , look at me! It’s me! Not him!

Remember our deal, Annie? You can have me!

Please let him go!” She doesn’t stop, and he switches to a language that might be Latin.

The edges of my vision blur as her shadows pour into me and her claws come close to puncturing my skin.

I can’t stay conscious much longer. Ben’s panicked eyes meet mine as he whispers prayer after prayer, trying to call her back, trying to banish Annoth, trying to save us both.

“I’m sorry,” I try to tell him, then I slip beneath the dark waves.

When I wake up, I’m warm, but I can’t open my eyes for fear of what I might see.

Ben, dead or bleeding out on my floor? My neighbors?

My family? Who did she get her claws on?

What did she make me do? I sprawl my hands beside me, expecting to feel them soaked in blood, but instead it’s just the soft fabric of my sheets.

I’m covered in a blanket, and I’m wearing a pair of athletic shorts now.

The memory of the three of us on the couch springs back into my head and I groan.

I’ve never felt like that in my life–never felt like this for anyone, and now what am I going to find, except the ruins of that relationship?

I open my eyes slowly. It looks like dusk outside the window.

My body is achy, and I have a headache from Hell…

literally, but there’s a glass of water on the nightstand that wasn’t there before. Ben.

I launch myself out of bed and race down the hall to find him in the living room, which looks like it was hit by a tornado.

There’s a massive gash in the wall above the couch, which is sprinkled with chunks of drywall and insulation.

Part of the coffee table is shattered, and the arm of the couch is shredded.

Ben sits on one end, looking exhausted and tense, hand in his hair.

He’s wearing sweats, but he’s shirtless.

There’s a massive bruise in the center of his chest, as well as a long cut on his cheek.

“You’re ok,” I sob as he stands up, crosses the room, and wraps me in his arms. “Oh God, Ben. You’re ok.

I thought…” Over his shoulder, I can see what l ooks like a cocoon sitting on the other end of the couch.

It’s made from two enormous, bat-like wings, each capped with a single, lethal talon.

One of the wings shifts slightly, and I think I can just make out Annie’s pale face and dark eyes peering at me from inside, but she closes the gap again without a word.

“How do you feel?” Ben asks, putting a hand on my chest.

“I’m alright. Are you? This looks bad.” I brush my fingers over the injury on his chest.

“It’s not, I promise.”

“Maybe we should take you to the hospital, just to be sure.”

“Do I look like a guy with health insurance?” he says with a strained smile. “Come back here so we can talk.”

He pulls me away from the wing-cocoon and into the bedroom, where I fall onto the edge of the mattress. Ben stands in front of me, and I lean into his chest while he rests his chin on the top of my head.

“I thought you were dead,” I murmur, tears burning my eyes. “I thought she killed you, or that she made me do it. I was so fucking scared.” Before long, I’m crying on him. He just holds me and runs his hand in circles over my back.

“It’s ok, osito ,” he says softly. “I’m so sorry. I had no idea that could happen. I-I should’ve been more careful.”

“What did happen?” I raise my head and wipe my face. “I mean, she had control. The tail and horns and claws seemed fine, but then…”

“She said something took over. Her ‘demon side’–Annoth. She said it felt like she was possessed, that she tried to fight it off, but it was too strong. I managed to talk her down, talk her out of whatever it was, and she finally got it under control. She was so upset, Theo. She didn’t want to hurt either of us. ”

“So she’s…still there?”

“Yes, just very shaken up. She won’t come out of the…wings.” He gestures behind him and a small smile plays on his lips. I rub my forehead, then a memory surfaces of something Ben said before I blacked out.

“What did you mean…about your deal? When you were trying to talk her down, you told her to remember your deal.”

He runs a hand through his hair and over the back of his neck, looking guilty, then sits beside me on the bed. “Theo…I-I made a deal with her. That first night I stayed here. I swear, I was just trying to help you!”

A cold trickle of dread washes over me. What on earth had Ben promised the demon? “Tell me, please.”

“I asked her to back off of you. I made her promise that she wouldn’t try to…take you, and that she would help me get you back on your feet.”

“And…in return?”

“I promised she could have me instead…once we figured out how to separate the two of you.” Ben won’t meet my eyes, and I stand up, then brace myself against the dresser when I feel like I might pass out.

“Why? Why would you do that?” I breathe.

“I was trying to help you, Theo. I cared about you and I couldn’t let–”

“Cared about me? You didn’t know me at all!”

“But I could see you were a good person. You didn’t deserve what she was doing to you, or what she had planned.”

“ You’re a good person, Ben!”

“No, I’m not! Not like you, anyway…” He looks away, and grief crushes my chest. How can he not see what a wonderful man he is? How could he do something like that for me, a complete stranger, and then not even tell me about it? Especially after it became obvious that I had feelings for him?

“You thought you could trust her, but she’s obviously been playing you this whole time,” I spit. “Playing both of us, just waiting for an opportunity.”

“Theo, that’s not true,” Ben insists. “You didn’t see how upset she was once I got her back. I know she can’t cry, but…she was damn close. She hates herself.”

“Once you got her back, or once she decided to come back?”

“She knew what was happening and she couldn’t stop it. She asked you to forgive her when she felt the demon taking over! She had no control!”

“That doesn’t make any sense! How can a demon be possessed by itself?”

“I don’t know!” Ben says, standing up and walking over to me. Gently, he pulls me around to face him and runs his thumb along my jaw. “I don’t know. I just…I just feel it. I trust her, and I need you to trust me, Theo. Please.”