Page 22 of Devious Delusions

“We’ll go back to the hospital and get them to adjust your meds,” he says, blowing my intentions to shit.

I have to fight with the stupid blanket to get off him and my voice raises from the frustration of my life. “Fuck you, I don’t need to go to the hospital, I’m not crazy.”

Being locked away again isn’t an option. Not after everything that happened the first time and being left for months tied to a bed. I won’t—can’t—do that again. Being tied up isn’t something that’s acceptable for animals, and I’m no longer at the whims of my parents’ wealth and influence.

There’s nowhere for me to go, so I run up the stairs, ignoring Asher calling me back to him.

“Delilah, baby, I didn’t mean it like that.”

I’m going to force the freak to come back again. Maybe then, he’ll believe me. Yeah, he’ll have to when he can see the weirdo himself and I’ll be vindicated.

Locking myself in the studio he created for me, I pace, trying to plot a way to get the freak to come back. If Asher needs something to know what isn’t normal, it’s my current thoughts. But it’s his fault for lying and saying he believes me when he clearly fucking doesn’t.

A loud thud hits the door and I stand in front of the piano as he shouts, “Delilah, open the door.”

“I would, but I don’t know if the door is real. I might just be imagining it,” I fire back.

Humor fills his voice as he jostles the handle. “Yeah, why don’t you try and see if it is.”

He continues calling my name as I back away from the door and look for another route to escape. The floor-to-ceiling windows opposite the piano don’t have any openings and there are no other windows in this stupid room. The walls on either side of the piano are lined with books. I take the hidden steps behind the bookcase up to the mezzanine floor as he continues banging on the door. It’s not in a repetition of two, which settles me.

The only thing in front of me is an unstretched canvas. Like everything else around it, it’s untouched but the items are placed exactly like I would have them before I’d get lost in painting something. I sit on the floor with my back against the wall and stretch my legs out in front of me. The metal railing allows me to see out to the rest of the room but I’m as hidden as I’m going to be in this glass house. I watch the trees in the distance through the windows, but there’s no peace when I want the freak to come back and show himself in front of other people. He has to be real.He has to be.

Another thud hits the door and I block it out as I watch the blue sky. Bending my legs, I bring my knees up and hug them, still waiting for anything to pop out of the tree line. If I was following someone, breaking into their home and chasing them, I’d watch the outcome. Otherwise, it would be a pointless, wasted effort. But nothing moves other than small birds taking flight from their nests.

Wood splinters and I keep ignoring it as rushed steps move through the room. They thunder up the staircase and Asher reaches for me as he falls to his knees.

Pulling me into his chest, he kisses any part of me he can reach while wrapping his arms around me so tightly that it’s difficult to draw in a breath.

“Fuck, don’t scare me again,” he says breathlessly.

He cups my face with both hands and looks between each of my eyes as though he’s trying to convince himself I’m in front of him as he asks, “You’re okay?”

I nod weakly.

There’s so much care on his features and I don’t want doubts over my sanity to overshadow the time I thought I’d lost with him. I’ve spent years thinking he was dead and in the two days he wasn’t here, that grief creeped back in.

“I missed you,” I whisper up at him.

A slow smile lifts his lips as he whispers back, “I missed you too.”

I have three very different words on the tip of my tongue. Words that I haven’t uttered to a living soul since I was eighteen years old and stood in the rain hiding my tears. They’re too heavy under his gaze and I push them back down before they can leave.

Like this, with Asher directly in front of me blocking sight of everything else, I’m normal. I don’t have to question anything or worry about reality. This is enough and I never want to leave. When he’s with me I don’t think about who I thought he was, there’s only who he is now as he holds me together.

I need more though. For something to convince those lingering thoughts in the moments he isn’t there that this is it. This is real and it’s my life.

11

ASHER

My wife is exhausted and lays in a little ball on the sofa when I finish working. She hasn’t had any other outbursts through the day and the house has been filled with the sound of her playing the piano.

She’s beautiful with her hands pushed under her cheek in the small amount of light from a lamp in the corner of the room, and she’s still only dressed in one of my t-shirts. I never want her to wear anything else.

Her lashes flutter as I lift her from the sofa, and she wakes with a fright. Wide eyes stare up at me and I soften my voice to keep her relaxed. “I’m taking you up, go back to sleep.”

She nods and smiles as her lashes droop. Cute as fuck. I’ve always loved the way she becomes a cuddler in sleep and it hasn’t changed now as she wraps her arms around my neck and whispers two words that have my heart ready to give out.

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