“Finally showing your true colors, are we?” I ask. I whip him to the side, jerk the knife back, and slam it into his torso.
The look of shock before he disappears is well worth being stabbed in the side.
He reappears a few feet from me, looking absolutely enraged. “How’d you know?” he demands.
“Well… I kind of feel like Ellison wouldn’t have stabbed me during a kiss, but who am I to judge? Maybe he likes a bit of blood with his sexy time.”
“You knew before I stabbed you,” he snarls.
I grin at the man as I start toward him. Honestly, I don’t have a damn idea how to stop a man who isn’t exactly human… one who can disappear and manifest with ease. He is… what exactly? A piece of Ellison? I haven’t gotten that part figured out. But what I do like is that I have him flustered.
“Get away from him!” Ellison yells.
The illusion looks smug and I try not to give away my irritation over Ellison’s arrival. The reason I brought him out here was in the hope that I wouldn’t get anyone else involved, especially Ellison.
The illusion appears in front of Ellison and grabs him by the throat. Ellison tries to fight against him, but it’s apparent that nothing he does can stop the illusion.
“Come here, Asmodeus, let me slit your fucking throat or I’ll slit his,” the monster of a man says.
Ellison immediately shakes his head. “Asmodeus, don’t listen to him. If he kills me, he’ll be gone too. He won’t hurt me.”
“Won’t I?” he asks as he jerks his arm back, and he might have hurt Ellison if Pocket Lint hadn’t chosen that very moment to chomp down on his heel.
I’m not quite sure the illusion feels pain, but it’s the distraction I need to drive my fist into his face and tug Ellison to me. A group of illusions forms around us, and I grow uneasy, unsure if I can trust anything that’s happening.
The illusion gives me a cruel smile as he holds both hands up. “I have all the fucking time in the world to destroy you piece by fucking piece.”
He appears inches from me, and I narrowly avoid him cutting my cheek open with the knife he’d taken from me. “I can’t wait to enjoy it,” he whispers in my ear before disappearing.
Ellison and I stand there for a minute while I wait for the man to return, but he doesn’t appear to be planning on doing so.
“He… he should be gone. He can’t remain separated from me for long,” he whispers.
“Oh, that’s fun. Husband, I really feel like maybe you should have mentioned that there’s a serial killer living inside of you.”
Ellison is quiet, not acknowledging the joke I’d tossed out to lighten the mood, and I question if there will be no repair for this.
That’s when I see he’s shaking as he reaches out to me. “You were stabbed.”
“Trust me, I didn’t let him stab me too hard. More of a light prick. I just wanted to verify my hypothesis, and damn, were the demons with me tonight. I was right.”
“You… you put yourself in dangeron purpose?” Ellison asks in disbelief.
I hesitate as I realize that I’m walking a very fine line here. Ellison’s eyes are boring into me while I debate what answer I want to give him.
“It’s hard for me to involve others,” I finally say. “Not only was I trained to handle everything myself, but just like last night… once others became involved, I… I nearly killed August. So I thought… if I took him far away from others, I could… I could figure out how he worked and I could stop him. I know you will disagree with me, but I happen to feel that you are over here doing the same thing.”
It’s like Ellison’s legs go out as he slides down my body and hits on his knees.
“I’m a horrible person. I couldn’t bring myself to tell any of you. I knew if I told you, I’d be putting you all in danger, and it’d be best for me to leave all of you… I felt like you guys would pull away from me if you knew. Who the hell wouldn’t pull away from a man whose power is trying to kill others?” Ellison asks.
“I… I’m confused. Have you met me? I feel like you have and still… you felt like I would leave you?”
“Any reasonable man would.”
“Good thing I’m not, then,” I say as I kneel down to be at eye level with him. He picks at my shirt where the blood has dotted through, but it’s really not that bad. “I don’t deserve you. I don’tdeserve anyone in my life. I’m a greedy man who never knew what it felt like to be cared about until I met this group. To have someone care if I got hurt, to have someone happy to see me, to have someone notice if I was still alive. Last night, as you guys looked for me… as I convinced myself that I didn’t deserve any of you… I discovered how greedy I am. But… doesn’t that make me more human?”
Ellison frowns. “Look at how hurt you’ve already gotten because of me.”
