Page 97 of Deviant Illusions

I look down as I cut through my skin.

There, your leg is broken. You can’t feel their hands now, can you?

I’ve done coke, ket, synthetic drugs, smoked weed, been drunk, yet nothing compares to the high of causing pain. It’s euphoric and controllable in a way that any chemical intoxicant fails to replicate. This. Is. Peace. My dad always said that bloodshed comes before peace. It’s how countries have excused their wars by masking suffering as the payment for survival. If only he knew that same war exists within me.

A soft tap hits the bathroom door, accompanied by a softer voice, “Kane?”

The door handle rattles, along with my heart rate at the thought of being found.

I quickly pull my sweats up, relishing in the sting as my boxers make contact with the cuts. I carefully collect the shards of glass, so Delilah doesn’t know what I’m doing.

“Kane?” she asks again as she steps into the bathroom, closing the door behind her. “Are you okay?”

“Stay the fuck away from me.”

I dump the glass in the sink, keeping the larger pieces free from the drain, then wash the blood off my hands. She stays there, watching me and fucking waiting for an answer when I can’t do shit. I’m stuck. I was born to be thisthingthat’ssurrounded by vile acts and even viler people. No, I was born to be less. Always in Asher’s shadow, always a tool for other people to fucking use.

I should have killed her. She’d be free then. Free from her parents, free from Helene, free from Rowan. Free from me.

My palm stings from the water pushing into the cut so I savor it, stretching my fingers out to allow more water into it as I ask, “How did you get out of the fire?”

“You carried me out and left me outside,” she whispers, taking a step closer. “Let me check your hand.”

“No, the fire in your apartment. How did you get out?”

A deep crease forms between her brows as she repeats, “You carried me out.”

Am I the crazy one?

I remember leaving her there.

I know I did because I kept checking news sources and every email that came into the holding company that manages the apartment building for me to see if she’d died. None of them mentioned a casualty. I wouldn’t have checked if I knew she was alive. I would have fucked with her. Or just fucked her. Fifteen fucking years of forced celibacy means she owes me that.

Delilah gently moves me back to stand in front of me. Her eyes are the most open they’ve ever been as she hooks her arms up and over my biceps, careful not to touch my back, and she whispers, “It wasn’t you, it was him. Just like at the club.”

Her hair will cause more pain. The strands will get caught in the cut on my palm so I thread my fingers through her hair and pull her head back. Helene’s voice is in my fucking head, reminding me that she can see us. I can’t speak to my pretty girl how I want to, I can’t hold her, I can’t fucking have her or she’ll be hurt.

So, I become that masked figure again and yank her head back as I grit, “You should have stayed in it.”

She flinches at my tone, blinking back her tears. Tears that I fucking cause when I only want to have her. We managed to get to a good place, an understanding that we’ll always hate the other for ruining shit and we were fucking close, so fucking close, but it’s been taken away again.

I can’t have love, so I settle for hate. I’ll be the thing Delilah hates the most in existence, that way she can never forget me. Her eyes won’t look at me lovingly, but they’ll burn at the sound of my name. She won’t long to hold my hand, but mine will be around her fucking neck. There won’t be peace, warmth, fucking care. But hate, that I can have.

I drag her with me as I leave the bathroom, building more hate as she punches into my ribs. “Get the fuck off me.”

I haven’t worked out where the camera is to be able to determine if there’s a blind spot, so I hook my foot over her ankle, tripping her and forcing her to knees. Dipping my head so we’re eye to eye, I watch the one emotion I’m allowed darken her features as I battle her glare. “Crawl. You enjoyed it last time.”

Hate me. Hate me. Hate me.

Helene will be watching. She’ll see that I don’t feel anything for Delilah, and she wanted it to be entertaining. Delilah crawling for me, only me, should stop her from being taken by that cunt. I slap her cheek with the backs of my fingers, giving in to the craving to touch her. Light pink strips show that she’s mine as she spits, “Fuck. You.”

“Crawl, you little fucking whore.” I slap her again, harder this time. Her nostrils flare as I lean closer, dropping my voice. “Or do you only act like a desperate slut when I’m wearing a mask?”

Hate me. Hate me. Hate me.

“Fuc—”

I slap her again, bastardizing another thing I once loved. It stops her arguing though. Is she thinking the same thing as me? Remembering how she would beg me to slap her while I fuckedher ass and how hard she would bite her bottom lip to stop anyone else hearing her screams when I’d sneak into her room. Or is she remembering how she would fucking ignore me the next day as soon as Asher had his arm around her shoulders?

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