Page 92 of Demons & Damnation

Tony wriggled and squirmed, his cheeks turning red as he fought against his restraints. Every move he made squirted more blood from between his legs, the coat hanger knife still in place.

Kyla knew the human body shut down in cases of trauma but in this instance, neither of them deserved that respite, especially when she had the means to take it from them. Plus they couldn’t miss out on such a fantastic climax. Passing away with this as their last memory would be the cherry on the cake.

With Anna-Rose’s chest now wide open like something from a butcher’s shop, her beating heart elevated a few inches above where it should be, Kyla turned her attention back to the task in hand.

Moving her left hand closer to the heart, she slowly drew it away from Anna-Rose’s body, the smile on her face only growing bigger as the veins and arteries stretched with it, fighting not to let go. Seeing the tiny, intricate veins clinging on to the heart reminded her of how she’d felt so many times over the last decade, like she’d been dangling from a cliff, clinging onto the edge of sanity with her fingertips, desperate for someone, her mother over all others, to put their hand over for her to grab on to and never let go.

Kyla reached out and took the heart in her hand. The warm throbs drove home how callous this woman actually was. There was no emotion in that organ—it was nothing but a blood pump. She squeezed her hand, digging her fingernails into the pulsing muscle, scoring blood from it.

Looking over at Tony, burning her glare into him, Kyla asked, “Are you ready to see your heartless cow?”

The muffled shout grating through his voice box turned into a scream.

Treating her hand like a vice, Kyla closed her hand harder around her mother’s heart. With her right hand, she took Anna-Rose’s face between her thumb and forefinger, forcing her eyes to stay locked on Kyla’s as she took every last bit of life from her.

When she felt her fingernails scraping against her palm, she knew it was only a matter of seconds. With one final push, the heart finally exploded, signalling the end of Anna-Rose’s existence.

Shaking the remnants of mangled organ from her left hand, Kyla tapped her mother’s forehead, flooding her brain with a last bout of adrenaline, just to keep her awake for as long as possible as her oxygenated cells slowly gave out all of their life.

Anna-Rose choked, blood spurting from her mouth, the gargling noise in her throat like music to Kyla’s ears. Kyla kept her eyes on her, refusing to drop her eye contact until she’d taken her last breath.

“I’ll see you in hell,” Kyla whispered.

Anna-Rose gasped, then her eyes shuttered as her head fell backwards.

She was gone.

Kyla’s heart sped up as she soaked in her new reality. She’d killed her mother. The woman that had given her life was gone, existed no more. A sense of relief hit her, freeing her soul. She felt...light.

Just as she turned to her left, about to drop Anna-Rose’s lifeless body on the floor, a wave of tiredness washed over her, turning her limbs to lead. She felt as if a pin had just been stuck in her body, instantly deflating her.

Then she saw it.

The twinkle in her mother’s eyes shining back at her. Except the way her lips twisted in a sardonic smile resembled nothing of her cowardly mother. Her mind flooded with power, raw power—her own power—washing away her mental defences like they were nothing but sandcastles under a tsunami.

Kyla collapsed, her mother’s body hitting the floor only a second before Kyla fell on top of her. The body was dead, not responsive, but her eyes were very much full of life.

A brief flicker from a Chucky movie pinged through the chaos in her mind as she watched those eyes focus intently on her like they were trying to suck the very soul out of her.

Then it came.

With her mental barriers gone, Kyla was wide open and susceptible to anything supernatural heading her way. When the image of a pleasant old maid filled her mind, she frowned. The maid did nothing but stare back at her, cackling like the wicked witch of the west. In her mind’s eye, Kyla watched as the maid grew bigger, like someone had pressed the zoom button a million times, but at the same time, she felt herself shrinking in comparison. It felt as if the maid was filling Kyla with herself, pushing her way into Kyla’s body.

“No!” Kyla screamed, clutching at her head.

Feeling the weight of the maid pushing her down, squashing her into the blackness yawning beneath her, Kyla had not an ounce of energy to fight back, to stop herself from drowning in the nothingness waiting for her.

As her eyes closed, her mind filled with images of swirling jade green eyes comforting her as she fell into the darkness.

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