Page 3 of These Monstrous Ties

I start walking.

He takes my hand in his when we’re in the middle of the street.

I try to jerk mine away, but he holds firm.

“Don’t fight me,” he says, voice husky as we reach the other side of the street. He brings the cigarette to his lips and inhales, then exhales as I stare at him, equal parts awe and anger. “I’ll win.”

I try to pull my hand away again, my eyes darting around us. There’s no one out here. This little section of Alexandria is dead. But I have a gun on my thigh. I don’t need anyone to rescue me.

“Who the fuck are you?” I ask.

He winks, one midnight blue eye twinkling for a second. “Lucifer,” he answers coolly. “And you’re my Lilith.”

I’m in shock he knows who I’m supposed to be.

His hand engulfs mine, his fingers calloused. I don’t pull away again as I stare at him.

“You’re in skeleton paint,” I point out. “Where are your horns?” I glance at his all-black outfit. That could pass, I guess.

“Lucifer doesn’t have horns,” he says, eyes finding my own horns. “That’s for his lover to do.”

I frown. “Do?” I repeat.

“Yeah,” he says with a throaty laugh, taking another drag on his cigarette. I take in his sharp cheekbones, the vein visible on his neck beneath his hoodie. He exhales, his beautiful face momentarily obscured by a cloud of smoke. “To stab anyone who gets too close to me.”

I sigh and shake my head, but don’t bother pulling away again. What’s a little more fun before I die? “I’m going to Raven Park,” I state. “Either you can follow me there, or you can let go of me. My plans can’t change.”

It isn’t my imagination that see his eyes flick to the gun. He furrows his brow, white and black paint smudging a little.

Finally, he nods. “Raven Park it is,” he says with a smile. “But I’m warning you…” Another drag on his cigarette. Another cloud of smoke. “You might die there.”

I laugh.

If he only knew.

Chapter Three

Present

I never havea problem with the blood. We’re made of the stuff, after all. When Jeremiah first started torturing me, he thought I might faint over the sight of it. He thought, scared girl that I was, it would be the blood that made me run.

Of course, it’s not like I can run very far. Jeremiah isn’t letting me get away again.

But it isn’t the blood.

It’s his eyes on mine.

He watches me, and I can feel him waiting for me. Waiting for me to cry. To hurl accusations his way. To run away. Or try to.

But I stare at the corpse at our feet, and I don’t move an inch. I’m still not sure, even close to a year after he started bringing me to these viewings, what it is I’m supposed to do here. I’ve tried everything.

The first time, a man’s severed head in a warehouse, I had puked. I had fallen to my knees and vomited, and he had had to drag me away with the help of his men, back to the Rain mansion. He’d tormented me once we got back there, too. Hurling insults, screaming in my face, shaking me by the arms.

The next time, it was just a gunshot wound to the dead man’s chest. I had just stood there, waiting for it to be over. I stood there for fifteen minutes. Then I couldn’t take it anymore. I’d screamed at him. He’d let me.

Then he’d taken me back to the mansion. More screaming. More grabbing.

Every time, I’ve gotten it wrong. I know this time will be no different. It’s strange. I can still feel him pressed against me, like he was an hour ago at the merry-go-round at Raven Park, even though he’s standing by my side. I feel the weight of him. I always feel the weight of him. Right now, he’s got one hand propped under one elbow, and it takes everything in me to keep looking at the ruined body.