Page 41 of Monsters of Desire and Nightmares of Passion

“I can carry her,” Khal jumps in.

“I know, each of us can. That’s not the point. We need to look like caregivers taking a patient for tests and not like crazies who kidnapped a girl.”

“You know, Mrez, I liked you better mute.”

“Fuck you too, Khal.”

“Anytime,” he replied with a smirk

“Hey, Khal. What about your girl, Lisa?” asked Draw. “We can’t just leave her here. She won’t be safe.”

“Oh, fuck. I forgot about her.”

Draw flashes me a look. I know he doesn’t care about that girl and, to be honest, I don’t either. However, she’ll be killed by those crazies if we leave her behind.

“I’ll go get her.” Khal rushes off.

Khal

Was it horrible of me that I forgot about Lisa? She gave me energy when I needed it the most. But as soon as Ivy came back in my life, I didn’t care about anyone else anymore. I’m selfish like that. I’m a monster. As soon as Ivy filled my senses again, I stopped caring about anything else. I want to be with Ivy, Draw, and Mrez. I have no serious intention to start a new bond. However, now that Lisa is in mortal danger, I can’t leave her to my enemies.

There are so many Shadows starving for connection who are in dire need of an anchor. Lisa isn’t a born anchor but, in the hands of a Shadow who will take his time and teach her, she could develop some tremendous powers.

I make my way down the hall, listening to the choir of madness surrounding me. So much madness. They can feel me, sense me. We monsters love the mad, the outcast, the lost. They can see us because they allow themselves to believe in us. They see what so-called sane people cannot even imagine. The most intelligent people are the crazy ones who know how to present a mask of sanity to the world, the ones who can navigate the thin line between genius and madness.

So many people are calling out, begging to be freed from their suffering.

So much terror abounds, so much food that has been wasted because no one can absorb it. At least, Shadows can’t. Other monsters thrive on pure terror. However, food can change you, can turn you into something that is too dark and horrible even for us to consider. Still, they feel me. Their rage fuels my darkness. I can taste each and every emotion they release. Nothing is as horrible as being locked inside a prison your own mind created for you. Is this the way the Shadows who live in the Valley feel, waiting for the Nothingness to come and free them from their suffering, when pain is the only thing that they have left?

I pass through the door into Lisa’s room only to find an image that fills me with rage. I sense it before I see it.

Ivy, we are coming for you

The words are written in blood on the wall. Lisa’s wrists are slit. She lies on her bed, a small puddle of blood forming on the linoleum hospital floor. Her lips look as white as the walls around us. Her eyes, glassy and dead, watch me from beyond her long lashes.

“Lisa.”

Guilt and rage fill my chest. I roar in anger. Lisa should not have died. She was an innocent who had no idea of her power. She was a child. A child who lived a tormented life and who now found a way out of a nightmare she had no control over.

My tongue flicks out of my mouth so I can taste her blood, a sign of respect among Shadows. This way her essence will forever be trapped inside me. I press her small hand in mine and kiss her forehead.

Just as I’m about to leave, I feel something, a strange energy vibrating through my entire body. I turn my head and scan the room, but there’s nothing. I need to find the guys and get the Hell out of here. Ivy is in greater danger than we could have imagined, and I’ll be damned if I allow anything to happen to her.

Draw is right. The lake house is the safest place for us to go. Before we do, we must get Ivy’s cat from her apartment. That thing loves to hiss at me every time it senses my presence.

Great.

I return to Ivy’s room filled with hate. Draw senses my emotions the moment he sees me. He doesn’t have to ask. He detects the stench of blood and death all over me.

“They killed her,” he says without emotion, stating what I already know.

“We’ll revenge her,” I reply. “And our friends. We’ll rip open their bellies and feast on their entrails.”

“So be it, my brother.”

Draw bites down on his wrist and offers his blood to me. I lick it before the wound closes. This promise is now bound by blood.

A sound from behind me, followed by the scent of Mrez, disturbs my rage and my thirst for revenge. He walks down the hall pushing an empty chair in front of him and enters the room.

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