Page 46 of The Nightmare's Kiss

Then the director’s attention shifts to the door. I follow a moment later—to see it opening again. A sound splits the air, a high ringing, much louder than the one already playing over the speakers. I wince, clapping a hand over my ear, more annoyed than anything…but the Nightmareshrieks, a horrible sound, and recoils into a thin haze around my neck, burrowing against me as if trying to hide.

I look up and see Ethan standing in the doorway, a radio gripped in his shaking hand. He steps toward us, kicking the door shut behind him.

“Ethan,stop!” I scream at him as the Nightmare shudders and twitches against the back of my neck. Not even my shout can drown the noise out now. It’s so loud it hurtsmyears, reverberates in my bones. Somnus slowly slips away from my neck, and when I try to catch him, he slides through my fingers like water to pool on the floor. He was barely strong enough to hold himself together with my help before. Now, with this double assault on his senses, he is hardly a wisp of smoke and still fading in front of my eyes. He retracts into a tiny ball of shadow and begins to turn hard and brittle again. Solid, unable to shift—vulnerable. This must be what the director wanted, a way to keep him solid and dissect him.

“Mara, sweetie.” Ethan has to raise his voice to be heard above that god-awful screeching from the radio, yet still he manages that voice of dripping condescension. “You don’t know what you’re doing. I’m sorry I helped set you up, but trust me, it’s for your own good.”

I grit my teeth. I hate that even now, those words in that tone wring an automatic reaction out of me: tears pricking the backs of my eyes, doubt curdling in my heart.I’m just trying to protect you, Mara. I know what’s best for you, Mara. Oh, Mara, you can’t do anything on your own, can you?

All of these fucking men. They love to treat me like I don’t know any better. Like I’m just some poor, misguided little girl who can’tpossiblyknow something that they don’t. Surely I need a firm hand and a superior hand to guide me. If they hurt me, it’s only for my own good.

After his condescending dismissal, Ethan doesn’t spare me a glance. All of his attention is focused on the Nightmare shuddering in pain on the floor. Like I’m not a threat.

Which means he doesn’t notice as I bend down and pick up the director’s fallen gun. Or even when I aim in his direction.

“Ethan,” I say. “Shut the radio off. Now.”

Then, finally, he looks at me. His eyes widen, but his expression is more incredulous than scared.

“What do you think you’re going to do with that?” he asks, in the tone of someone speaking to a child. “Put it down before someone gets hurt.”

“Shut. Off. The sound,” I grit out, the gun steady in my hands even as my pulse pounds in my ears.

I’ve only shot a gun a few times before, and certainly not at another person, or under such stress. But honestly? It’d be hard to miss at this range. I just hope Ethan doesn’t force me to kill him. He may be a huge fucking asshole, but that doesn’t mean I want a dead body on my conscience.

“You don’t understand the situation,” he says slowly, taking a small step toward me and away from the Nightmare. With the radio angled away, the Nightmare seems to recover slightly. Good. But the director is pulling himself together, too, reaching into his pocket, likely for another weapon.

“I understand much more than you do,” I snarl at Ethan. “I don’t have time for this. Last warning.Shut it off.”

“You know I can’t—”

I fire before he finishes the sentence. For a moment, there’s only a dull ringing in my ears, muffling any other sounds, while Ethan stares at me in shock. I stare back, surprised myself, even though I knew exactly what I was doing when I pulled that trigger.

Then both of our gazes shift to the bloody ruin of his hand. The radio clatters to the tile, and Ethan lets out a strangled groan and clutches his mangled fingers to his chest with an expression of disbelief. I dart forward and stomp on the radio—once, twice, until the metal crunches and the sound dies off with a last crackle of static. When I turn around, breathing hard, I realize I’m only a few steps away from Ethan. His face is drained of color and twisted in fury.

“You bitch,” he says, tottering forward a step. “You stupid goddamn whore. I’m going to—”

Then his eyes roll back, and he faints. I take a step back and watch as he collapses to the floor in a heap, his head thumping against the tile and his limp, wounded hand flopping to one side.

“Huh,” I mutter, shrugging, and then step over him and to the side of the Nightmare. He is still in the form of an orb, shivering as he recovers. I reach down, extending a hand. The orb melts into long, clawed fingers, which reach up to tangle with mine. Shadows wind slowly around my hand and up my arm with the sinuous movements of a snake. “You’re all right now,” I murmur. “No one’s going to hurt you.”

I turn to the director, who is pressed back against the wall and staring at me with bulging eyes.

“You,” he rasps, glancing from Ethan’s fallen form to my face. “You are…utterly insane. You deserve to be locked up like these fucking monsters. And when all of this is over—when we catch you—you will be.” His expression darkens, his eyebrows drawing together and his lip curling. “I will make sure of it personally. No matter where you run, I will find you.”

I look down at the gun still in my hand but then toss it aside. Instead, I idly stroke the Nightmare’s skin, which is turning warm and velvety. A hand reaches out of the shadows pooling on my arm, and then a body, and a face, his expression icy and determined as he peels off my side in his own humanoid form. I smile at him and then look over and meet the director’s eyes.

“You’re the one who’s going to be running,” I say. I slowly walk over to him, enjoying the feeling of standing over him. Somnus hovers at my back, his eyes on me. He could be tearing the director apart right now, but instead he waits to see what I say. Part of me, admittedly, wants to watch Somnus tear this man apart. But maybe it would be just as good to prove to him that Somnus isn’t, and never was, the monster he thought. “We’re going to give you one chance—”

With a shout, the director pulls a scalpel out of his pocket and lunges at me on his hands and knees. I throw out a hand, stumbling back, and the blade slashes a shallow cut across my palm. Somnus lunges forward, snapping his teeth, and the director scuttles back against the wall again.

I stare down at the blood dripping from my hand and then look at Somnus. He stands poised over the director, huge hands braced on the wall, his teeth bared. Still, he waits. I know, in this moment, that what I’ve argued so many times is true: the Nightmare is not some monstrous killer by nature. Even with this man, who hurt him so badly and tried to kill me, he is holding back.

But in this case, to be honest, I’m not so sure he should.

“Well,” I say. “That was your one chance.” I clench my hand despite the throb of pain. “Go on, Somnus.”

Director Ramsey opens his mouth to say something. But before he can get a word out, the Nightmare opens his jaws. Stretching his mouth inhumanly wide, like a snake, he bites his head right off.

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