Page 46 of When Death Whispers

The air thickens, crackling with his energy. He’s here. Watching. Waiting. Always waiting.

“My sweet Snow Pea,”he rasps against my ear, impossibly close.

I spin, stumbling back. My heel catches on the edge of the rug, and I stagger until the backs of my knees hit the mattress. I reach behind me for balance—fingers clutching the sheets—just as something brushes against my thigh.

Not harsh. Not painful. Just deliberate.

I gasp.

A shadow coils around my calf, slowly, like it’s tasting me. Another tendril slips beneath the hem of my pajama pants, spiraling up, curious. Possessive.

I fall onto the bed, heart crashing in my chest. The darkness gathers around me—thick, alive—curling around my legs, slinking up my sides.

It doesn’t hurt. It lingers. It learns.

The tendrils spiral along my hips and thighs. Cold, then warm. Barely there, then all-consuming. The sensation is impossible to describe—like it’s bypassing my skin entirely and feeding straight into my nervous system.

My breath shudders out of me, and I know I should scream. I know I should fight.

But I don’t.

Because a sick, twisted, fucked up part of me wants to know what happens if I don’t.

A teasing stroke glides over the inside of my thigh. I feel it through my clothes like the fabric isn’t even there. My head falls back as a shiver races through me, and a whimper—traitorous, soft, hungry—escapes.

The shadows pause as if they’re listening.

The air trembles, like they’re waiting for permission.

Then they press in again—hungrier now. Bolder. The darkness slides along my ribs, my waist, curling around my neck like a hand. I clutch the edge of the mattress, hips arching forward like my body’s been waiting for this specific sensation. Like it knows exactly where I need to be touched.

My knees part. My hips rock, chasing the sensation I shouldn’t want but do anyway.

And that’s what ruins me. The honesty of it. The sheer, helpless need.

I hate how good it feels.

I hate that I don’t want it to stop.

A pulse ripples through the air, and something inside me pulls. Not just physical—but soul deep. Like a string tethered to something ancient and dangerous is being drawn taut, stretched until it hurts.

And just before it can snap?—

An explosion of light.

My bedside lamp flares to life, bright and sudden and wrong, like the room is trying to pretend it was never dark at all. The shadows vanish so fast it sucks the air out of the room with them.

I stand up too fast and immediately crumple forward onto my hands and knees, gasping. My skin still tingles where he touched me. Phantom pressure lingers across my thighs, between my legs, along my throat. I can still feel the outline of where the shadows had wrapped around me. Owned me.

My body hums. Not just with fear.

With want.

That’s the most terrifying part. The need that coils tighter with every beat of my racing heart.

I’m still on the floor—knees pressed into the rug, fingers curled into the carpet like it’s the only thing anchoring me to this reality. My body hums with aftershocks. The shadows. The touch. The ache that refuses to leave.

And then?—

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