Page 1 of Ex-Mas
Prologue
The oven dings, barely audible above the Christmas music I’m using as psychological warfare against my neighbors. They’re loudallthe time, and one of them had the audacity to call me a boomer when I complained. I’m twenty-two, I’m not a boomer. I just like to sleep for more than three hours a night. So, fine. They want their kids snug in bed as Santa prepares to suck his fat, fairytale ass through their electric fireplace, I’ll make sure that doesn’t happen.
It’s Mariah Carey on repeat for them.
But after a few hours of hearing the same song over and over again, I’m pretty done with it myself. My tree-shaped chocolate chip cookies are done, it’s nearing midnight, and I need my beauty sleep if I’m going to convince my boyfriend to smile tomorrow.Adrian Graves is hotter than hell with his sharp jaw, dark messy hair, and the tattoos sprawling down his impeccable physique, and he’s perfect in every way — he’s possessive, tall, protective, and still manages to make me laugh even when I want to stab him. His only flaw is that the mere mention of Christmas makes him gag.
Maybe a brand new gaming console and a blowjob under the mistletoe will change his perspective.
So with that in mind, I close up the kitchen, turn the music off, and head to the living room to shut off all the lights. But where I should be hearing nothing but the sweet, sweet sound of silence, I hear... rustling. Bumping. Jiggling. Right outside my kitchen door.
What the fuck?
I know Christmas is a time that makes people desperate and stupid, I just didn’t think someone would be desperate and stupid enough to rob me on Christmas fucking Eve. I might look like an easy target since I’m young, short, and a woman, but this motherfucker is about to learn the hard way that some women simply refuse to be helpless little victims. He can overpower me, I’m sure. Hurt me, kill me. There likely won’tbe anything I can do to stop the outcome and the inevitable headline that follows, but I can and will change the context.
I turn the music back up and grab the biggest, cuntiest knife I own before I creep toward the kitchen door as the idiot struggles to pick the lock. It takes him so long I almost feel bad for him, but when the lock finally gives and a giant, lumbering man steps into the dark doorway, I don’t hesitate. I swing my cunty little knife right at his cunty little neck, drop it, and run as he collapses to the ground.
I make it back into the living room and halfway to my phone to call the cops before I hear him speak.
“Fu-cking hate... Christmas.”
My heart drops out of my ass and lands somewhere on the floor as the adrenaline rush vanishes entirely. I know that voice. I know that giant, lumbering man.
Adrian.
I just murdered the love of my life.
Merry fucking Christmas.
1
“I don’t fucking know Latin,” I mumble to myself, squinting down at the barely-legible instructions. “What if I pronounce something wrong?”
The pages, unhelpfully, don’t answer me.
I’m standing in the middle of the blood-red demonic sigil I painted directly on my hardwood floors, surrounded by candles that are rapidly burning down, and I’m still no closer to summoning this fucking demon. It’s rude of him, really. SurelysomethingI did made his ears burn or his nose itch or whatever the hell people say happens when someone is talking about them. He could make this easier on both of us and just skip the theatrics.
... She?
Again, I don’t fucking know Latin. I could be summoning a goat for all I know, or maybe a sentient lamp. Wouldn’t that just be my luck? I spend four years in federal prison for accidentally manslaughtering the love of my life, get my shit together just to end up working for a gross, rapey bastard, get shunned by the police because apparently convicts are incapable of ever telling the truth, and then when I go to get my grand revenge, I summon a talking light fixture instead of a demon.
I’d read the instructions a little closer, but I’m bored.
“Daemon potentiae et ultionis, veni et ostende te ipsum...what the fuck does that even mean?”
Groaning, I sit down in the middle of the sigil and stare into the burning trash can in front of me. This isn’t fair. I wanted what every girl wants — love, safety, and security. Instead, I found none. I made the biggest mistake of my life eight years ago today, and nothing in my world has been right since. This is the answer, I know it is. I can reset the scales, start over, move on. But Peter Rusnak willnotget away with what he did to me. I’ll suffer for the rest of my life for what I did to Adrian. It’s only fair Peter suffers too.
I can do this.
Exhaling hard, I grab the book and go back to the beginning. I read each step a little closer, use my phone to check pronunciation, and let my chest fill up with desire and the openness to receive the incoming energy. This has to work. It has to.
Please.
Suddenly, all the candles go out. The trash can fills with smoke instead of flame, choking me, and the room is cast into darkness.
“Hello?” I whisper. “Show yourself!”
“You pull me from Hell only to boss me around?” a deep voice growls from the shadows, but no matter how hard I squint, I can’t see anything at all. “Tell me what you want and I’ll consider it.”
