Page 54 of Monstrous Travels as Wicked as Sin

So long he lay that way, waiting for more cries of death. He thought he heard the wet sloshing of the heinous meal. He wondered if Joe’s body would return once the thing was done eating…

Then, finally, the door of the pub.

The slow step on the stairs, one after another, approaching…

Approaching…

He relaxed his eyes to closed, trying to block out the bloody vision that replayed itself endlessly before them.

He counted seven seconds of slow breath in, seven seconds of slow breath out.

The door opened. Joe’s hands closed it gently. The soft sweep of bare feet on carpet came closer, closer, until the presence stood over him. Stood there. Watching. Studying. Waiting. He heard the breath in and out of Joe’s lungs, the presence so thick and malicious and watching.

Seven seconds in.

Seven seconds out.

“I know you’re awake.”

Seven seconds in.

Seven seconds out.

A pulse that raced so fast he felt he might faint, because if that thing went for his throat… Would he have the heart to do it? To drench those sheets in the blood of the man he loved? Or would he let it tear him apart?

Seven seconds in.

Seven seconds out.

If only the shaking would stop.

The bed shifted. The depression of a weight on the other side. The heat of Joe’s body.

He dare not open his eyes.

Seven seconds in.

Seven seconds out.

He laid there for hours. What felt like endless hours that stretched on and on as if it were a lifetime. Just as long as he could stand it, too terrified to open his eyes, fully expecting the thing to be quietly watching him the entire time. Waiting.

But some time around five, Percy forced himself to flutter one eyelid, just a little.

The back of Joe. He was turned away.

The first hint of a hope of survival bloomed in Percy’s heart, and softly, softly, he shifted onto his back and listened. Joe’s breath was just as even as he had forced his own to be all those long, desperate hours.

He completed his move to the edge of the bed, and sat up, the blade hidden beneath the sheets, but totally unrestricted, free for him to wrench forth any second.

He barely felt the once-comforting carpet underfoot as he gradually shifted his weight from the mattress.

The springs gave a creak, and he froze.

Joe’s breath hitched—paused… and recommenced just as regularly as before.

In the slow agony of fear, Percy made his way to the door. He traversed the doorway with the same hideous burden of care he’d used to survive thus far, and called on every last gasp of self restraint to not sprint down the stairs.

When he finally made it to the kitchen, he closed that door just as carefully as he’d opened the one above, then dashed for the phone.

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