Page 8 of Haunted Nightmares
Maggie rolls her eyes with a smile. “Alan, god you’re ridiculous. We can’t do it here.”
“Why not? We’re alone, and I missed you. It’s been a week, Maggie, and I know you had a bunch of shit to do before we moved in together, but I don’t want to be away from you like that again.”
My heart squeezes, tightens in the most painful way and I know without even being in my solid form, the rot in the middle of my chest expanded another fraction of an inch.
“Alan,” the girl says with a sigh between peppered kisses. “I missed you, too, but we shouldn’t, not here.”
“Give me one good reason and I’ll stop,” he says as he backs her toward the bed.
She won’t, and neither will he.
These two young humans will fornicate on the bed in my spare room regardless of the horrible odor filling my house, and in another life, I would have let them.
Before my world came to an abrupt halt, before I began to decompose from the inside out, I would have turned a blind eye and allowed them to use this room for what they saw fit because even though I experienced it with no one but her, I washappyin our mating and wouldn’t have cared to disrupt others in their meager attempts to have what my gentle breeze and I shared.
But that male is long gone.
The male who was slowly changing his ways behind closed doors, the male who was still ruthless but had softened a touch. The male who would have listened as his mate saidlet them behappy, too,even if he still loathed everyone but her and didn’t give a shite who was blissful or not becausehe had her.
Once upon a time I would have let them be, would have overlooked all of this at one simple word from my mate, but she is not here, and I am now more of a monster than I ever was before.
And that is why, as Alan playfully pushes Maggie onto the bed, I dart toward the dresser, ghosting up the side before rushing through the trinkets on top, quickly knocking them off one by one.
The girl’s giggling stops abruptly as both of their heads whip to the right but I’m already on the other side of the room, rattling the lamp and pushing the clock from the nightstand.
“Alan,” Maggie gasps in fear. “Alan, what?—“
“It’s nothing,” he says as he watches a painting of my former home tilt on the wall before crashing to the floor. “Shit, maybe we should…”
Slowly, and with much strain, I force myself to materialize once again, my bare feet crunching over the broken glass of the window as I emerge from the shadows. Both teens go stark white as I stalk toward them, my lips tipped up in a malicious grin, my fangs fully elongated and exposed through the crazed expression.
My chest heaves as their scent hits me, the fear so strong I start to salivate, and as I inch closer to them the sound of their racing hearts make my empty gut rumble and twist with a hunger I refuse to satisfy.
The two are frozen in terror, their wide eyes not blinking, their bodies motionless save for the rapid rise and fall of their chests, and for a split second the thought of draining them both dry flickers in my mind.
“Do it,”Zenlothanai hisses.“Drain them, drink them, feed on their blood and fear.”
“No,”I huff, annoyed that this is what’s running through my head.
“Do it, our king. You need to give in, give in to the bloodlust, give in to us. Nourish yourself, take them to give you life.”
“They’re children.”But I’m still walking toward them, still stalking them as if they’re my prey.“For all that I’ve done, for everything I am, a murderer of children I am not.”
Zenlothanai laughs, low and cruel.“No, you keep to murdering your blooded kin. And your mate. Why have standards now?”
I shake my head and growl as I stop less than a foot from the teens, only now realizing I’m holding them in place with nothing but my mind and am so far gone I don’t know if I can let them go.“Shut up. Shut up, you stupid, horrible creature.”
“We are never going away, our king.”
“Shut up! Stop this. Let them go!”
“We cannot.”Their laugh turns maniacal.“We can do nothing but watch, for it is you who?—“
“Shut. Up!”I shout in my head as a guttural, terrifying roar leaves my lips, my body folding from the energy it uses, my hands curling into fists over the amount of willpower I have to force upon myself in order to free the teens from my mental grip.
And the second I do, the moment my roar of frustration turns to one of pure, agonizing pain, Alan and Maggie spring into action, jumping from the bed and running toward the hall.
I follow quickly, the desire to hunt and feed still so strong, but as I watch them clear the stairs and fly past Declan and the others toward the door, narrowly missing fucking Lorna and Edith as they enter, I blow out a breath and almost collapse against the banister.
