I pause, turning to glance at her over my shoulder. To be fair, she looks truly broken and seriously shaken up. There’s bags under her eyes and a haggard, weary look on her face.
“Am I supposed to feel sorry for you?”
Her throat bobs, and she shakes her head. “N-no. I just…” She looks away. “I left him. I…” She shakes her head helplessly. “I always knew he was dangerous. I guess that’s probably why I went out with him. But that?” She shakes her head again. “I know when I’m in over my head. What he did was really fucked up, Bianca.”
Yeah, I know, Alicia. I was THERE.
“Anyway, I just wanted you to know,” she says quietly. “And I’m truly sorry for what happened, and for dragging you into it. You didn’t deserve any of that.”
I give her a curt nod. “Thanks.”
After Alicia leaves, I finish packing up my stuff, swing my bag onto my shoulder, and turn off the lights on my way out. The back door creaks as I swing it open, and the shadows in the alley behind the theater claw and creep their way up the brick walls as I step out into the night.
I yank my hood up over my head and grip my bag a little tighter. For a minute, I flash back to how I felt with him in the church: raw, primal danger coupled with a needy, aching desire to be caught.
Fear and lust. Panic and excitement.
A push-pull sensation I cannot get out of my head.
I make sure the theater door is shut and securely locked behind me. I take a shaky breath, side-eying the creepy shadows reaching for me with their imaginary claws as a shiver ripples up my spine. Then I shake it away, shoulder my bag, and head toward the mouth of the alley to find a cab.
This time, the shadows really do grab me.
A hand slams over my mouth. A bag is yanked over my head.
My heart lurches into my throat, and I’m dragged into the darkness.
My breath catches as the bag is yanked off my head.
I’m back in the church. This time, things are…different.
Darker.
More terrifying, and more real.
The candles aren’t lit. And even though there’s some light creeping through the cracks in the stained-glass windows, the crumbling old church is largely bathed in darkness and gloom. Haunting shadows pulse and ooze in the corners and the arched stone rafters.
And I’m alone.
Someone pulled the bag off my head. But when I glance around behind me, all I see are more shadows, darkness, and silence.
A small noise near the front of the nave whips my gaze back forward. My pulse races, and my skin tingles with fear and forbidden excitement, remembering last time. I frown, peering into the gloom, trying to figure out if the shadows up there really are moving, or if I’m imagining things.
Is it him? Or is it actually a ghost or an apparition that’s pulled me back into this place—
Suddenly, as if my question had been asked out loud, I get my response in the form of two glowing X’s and a leering, neon smile illuminating the darkness up where the throne was before.
My pulse skips. My throat tightens around my windpipe as a spike of something vicious and heated stabs through my chest.
The church is still utterly silent. But slowly, the glowing mask tilts eerily to the side. Something glints; a second later, I realize it’s a blade. A huge hunting knife, twisting slowly in his hand with the neon of his mask bouncing off its lethal edge.
You crossed a line, babygirl. So now I’m going to eradicate yours.
My entire chest constricts. My face caves, and whatever deranged excitement I felt before shatters like glass into pure fear.
“What the fuck is this?” I whisper in a choked, hoarse voice.
The mask tilts to the other side, leering at a creepy angle.
“This is what you signed up for…Bianca,” Kratos growls quietly. The rough, whiskey-and-leather timbre of his voice rumbles through the echoing old space. In here, it almost sounds like stone grating against stone.
“I’d say this is your last chance to walk away…”
He utters a rough, rasping, mirthless chuckle.
“…But we’re well past that now, aren’t we?”
I swallow the lump in my throat. My heart flip-flops as the mask rises when he stands from his throne hidden in the dark. The mask moves nearer to me, like he’s stepping over the rubble and the broken old pews, coming closer. And closer.
“The time to run away from this is long past, princess.”
My chest tightens, a cold shiver jerking my spine upright as he leers down into my face.
“But the time to run from me is right the fuck now.”
“I—” My eyes are wide as I stare up into the twin neon X’s. “It was an accident. The car…”
