Ollie choked on the air in his lungs. Air. He’d been dying for air, choking on his own blood. How was he not dead?
Or was he?
Ollie looked closer at Dante. He had dark-gray wings protruding from his back and silver-gray horns sticking out of his hair. Ollie trembled. The other man had wings and horns too. The man who’d killed him.
“Ollie, talk to me,” Dante begged, his face twisted in a way that hurt to look at.
“B-blood,” Ollie managed.
He looked down at himself. He was covered. So was Dante. Wait, was he on a couch? Did the afterlife have couches? Why wasn’t the blood gone if his neck was put back together?
“I’m so sorry, Ollie.” Dante choked out a sob, squeezing Ollie’s hand. “I’m sorry I let him hurt you.”
“I…I died.” Ollie pulled his hand away, sitting up and rubbing his throat. “W-what are you?”
Dante shifted until he was as close to Ollie as he could be without touching him. “You didn’t die, Ollie. I saved you?—”
“How?” Ollie asked before Dante finished. His clothes were heavy with blood, sticking to his skin in challenge to Dante’s statement. “There’s no way I… Not with… This is my blood.” His stomach turned and he gagged, doubling over, head between blood-soaked knees.
“Let’s clean you up, and I’ll explain.”
“No, explain now.” Ollie’s hands shook as he straightened. They were sticky. Fuck, the smell of copper was everywhere. “Why do you have wings? What the fuck, Dante? I know I’m dead. Just admit it.” Ollie buried his head in his hands as a sob tore from his abused throat.
Dante pulled Ollie’s hands from his face, encasing them in his. “You aren’t dead. We’re still on Earth. I saved you with magic. I’ve always had wings, but I kept them hidden before. I’m sorry. I tried to put them away so it wouldn’t alarm you when you woke, but I’m too worked up. I was too worried about you. Here, let me try again.”
Ollie stared transfixed as the dark-gray feathers at Dante’s back ruffled, then disappeared, his horns along with them. It didn’t convince Ollie he wasn’t dead. Maybe this was some strange misfire in his brain, happening as everything shut down.
“See?” Dante twisted to show his back, where a large tattoo of folded wings covered his smooth brown skin. “You’ve seen my tattoos before. That first time at your apartment with Harper, remember?”
“When you didn’t have a shirt.” Ollie hadn’t thought about the tattoos since, but the memory must be where this hallucination had come from. “Why weren’t you and Ash dressed that day?”
Dante turned back around. “We’d been flying and didn’t have shirts with us.”
“You expect me to believe Ash has wings too? You’re like angels or something?” Ollie wasn’t that gullible. But if this wasn’t real, what did it matter? Or if it was real, he was one hundred percent dead. Either way, nothing mattered.
Dante ran a dirty hand through his hair. “We aren’t angels. I’m a demon, Ollie, but it’s not what you think.”
Well, that made no sense, but for some reason, Dante looked deathly serious. What the fuck? Dante was an agent of Hell?
Ollie shivered, suddenly freezing. Was this shock? Could he be in shock if he was dead?
Could this be real?
Dante cupped Ollie’s cheeks, wiping away tears Ollie hadn’t felt fall. “Come, let’s clean you up. You’ll feel better, and then we can talk.”
Ollie allowed Dante to pull him from the couch and guide him through the large modern house. It felt like a dream, floaty and distorted. Even the proportions of the hallway and doors weren’t right. Ollie’s whole body felt wrong, like he’d lost more than blood. He was fading away and weighed down at the same time, and something deep in his chest clawed at him.
He had to put himself right—get rid of this feeling—but he didn’t know what was happening. Was this what being dead felt like?
Dante led him to an enormous bathroom with the largest tiled shower Ollie had ever seen. They both fit with room for several more people. Something had to be wrong with Ollie’s brain. It was like he’d forgotten what normal houses looked like and instead was imaginingthis.
He stood shivering as Dante turned on all three rainfall-style showerheads. The water heated quickly, steam hitting Ollie’s face. He stepped under the spray and pulled off his ruined shirt.
Ollie glanced down to undo his shorts, finding dark-red water circling the drain. It swirled around his toes, but no matter how much water drained, it didn’t run clear.
The heat of the shower disappeared. Ollie shook, his hands numb. He couldn’t get the button undone. He couldn’t get his shorts off. They were soaked with so much blood the water couldn’t wash it away.
Ollie was bleeding again. He had to be. This was his blood, and it was supposed to be inside him. He was dying. Dead.
