Page 30 of Madness Behind the Mask
I’ve been rescued from Antonio’s sick, twisted desires, and Istillcan’t escape the gold eyes glaring down at me in the darkness of my bedroom. They loom over every aspect of my reality, painting it all in red even though I’m now home.
I’m now safe.
My throat tightens as I recall the man I woke up to. Another witch like me. Not a monstrous werewolf who uses his claws to dig holes into me so he and his pack can fuck me in all the wrong places.
A whimper claws its way past my clamped throat as pain explodes below my belly button, phantom pain from his cock ramming down a hole that is no longer there. I place a hand over the front of my pussy, my bony fingers skittering across the fabric as I convince myself the pain isn’t real.
But tears glisten in my eyes as my nails dig through my nightgown and into my flesh.
Because the pain is all too real.
I lost thirtyyearsbecause of him. I missed my father’spassing. My mother’s and cousins’ and brothers’. I missed seeing Luther one last time because I woke uptwohourstoo late. I’ve missed thirty years of mourning, and it is hitting me all at once.
Pulling my knees up to my chest, I wrap exhausted arms around them, hating how fragile I am even though I’m now an adult. I’m older thanDadwas when he died. When Antonio killed him for protecting me. And yet, I still feel like a child, wishing to hide in his arms until the darkness fades to light.
Until the werewolves are dead and it is finally safe to come out from under the covers.
A tear tracks slowly downthe side of my faceas I accept that I will never feel his arms again, never feel that safety I so desperately want. I am awake, alone in a dark room, with nearly everyone I know already gone. All I have left now is Caden and Uncle David.
But even they don’t feel real – just two ghosts that’ve yet to realize they’re already translucent. And when they do, theywill pass overto theunderworld they worship. I don’t even know where they will go. If either of them will meet up with the dead members of my family. And for somereason, that hurts the most – the knowledge that I know nothing about them anymore. Is Uncle David still as kind? Is Caden still mine or has he taken another?
That boy…Leon, he looks too much like Caden to be anyone’s other than his. Perhaps that boy is Jade’s son or Mama’s before Antonio killed themall. When a husband dies, the woman is passed along to his brother or cousin or uncle or nephew or some other male relative of theirs. Perhaps the same is for when a wife is stuck in a coma forthirty years. Maybe my cousin, Jade, got her wish after all and filled his bed and birthed his children.
Rolling over onto my side, I push my pillow to my face and scream. Mymuscle-starved shoulders jerk back and forth beside my ears. I suck in another breath and let loose a sob that damn near breaks me.
Thirty years.
He took from me thirty years.
But worse…
Worse thing is I let him.
I was too much of a coward to wake up. I was too weak to face what he’d done to me. I wanted it to be a dream. I wanted it to be a dream so much that I stayed stuck in them while my family died all around me.
Tears blistering my heart, I sob long and hard.
Alone.
In the dark.
With nothing but my guilt and grief to consume me.
“I’m so sorry,” I rasp into my pillow, clutching it tight. “I’m so sorry.”
For everyone I’ve failed.
For soiling the Shadow name with my cowardice.
For not being the perfect gift to Caden like I was meant to be.
And I’m sorry…
I’m sorry I survived. Sorry someone had to take care of me for thirty years while I wasted away in this bed.
I think about biting out my tongue and just ending it –the grief and shame– in a desperate need to stop feeling. I can either choke on my severed tongue then or die from bleeding out; it matters not as long as I’m gone. As long as everything stops.
My body shaking, I open my mouth and stick out my tongue between my teeth. My heart pounds inside my skull, making my jaw jerk with every pulse. My teeth skitteralong the bottom of my tongue, and I whimper in fear at the scrape of death lingering at the edges of my decision.
