“Say, do you want me to sleep over? I could do a night-time stakeout and see if I can see your astral self leaving your body. I don’t mind.”
I balk in my seat. There’s no way I can have Una watch me orgasm in my sleep.
“Thanks for the offer, but it’s fine,” I say quickly.
She doesn’t look convinced.
“I can’t put you out like that,” I demur, hoping to mollify her, “but you have given me an idea. I have a security camera I can set up. It’s an old one from when I shared a flat with some fellow students and was convinced one of them was stealing my food. Idon’t know if it’ll pick anything up, but it’s worth a try. I might see a hazy mist coming in from under my door or the sandman in my room.” I laugh, trying to lighten the atmosphere.
“Just as long as you share your findings. I want to know what’s going on,” Una says.
You and me both,I want to say.
Every night this week,the dream has followed its usual course.
It begins in the maze and ends in the pool.
I dug out the security camera and set it up on the tall drawers opposite my bed, but all it’s shown is me sleeping, nothing more, until I wake once I’ve cried out Valdemar’s name in the dream.
There’s no sandman, no shimmering mirage of astral projection.
And I’ve given up fighting the dreams, fighting Valdemar. There’s no point, as no matter how much my waking self despises the man, my nocturnal self can’t get enough of him.
On Wednesday night, the dream unfolds like it has every night this week.
I run through the maze until I reach the fountain, where Valdemar guides me into the water and his embrace. I spread my legs, and he holds me under the thrashing of my tears as I gaze at the stars and lose myself in the abyss of bliss.
“There’s nothing more beautiful than the sight of you laid bare for me, angel.” His words cut through the drumming of the water, working their way to my centre and the mounting orgasm about to rip through me. “I love to watch you come undone, to feel you writhe under me.” His hand tightens aroundmy throat, and my head falls to the side as pleasure devours me, clawing away at my insides and crying to be let out.
I whimper and moan as Valdemar holds me until my climax snowballs and hits me in my core, my orgasm ravaging me.
“Say my name, angel. I want my name on your lips as you come.”
And as his name is carried on my breath, his feather-soft kisses along my collar transform into a hot burst of pain.
His teeth sink into my neck, the bite hard and bloodthirsty.
Waking with a start, I sit up, the throbbing down my shoulder burning through my T-shirt. I leap out of bed and make my way to the bathroom, where I pull the neck of my T-shirt to the side—and there they are.
Teeth marks.
Perfectly formed, red teeth marks embedded into the crook of my neck.
“What the fuck?”
No one answers me as I stare into the mirror. But even as I ask the question, an answer is forming, one that makes me want to vomit, one I can’t believe I didn’t think of before. And now that it’s here, I can’t believe how stupid I’ve been.
Returning to my bedroom, I check the time, working out how many hours there are before I’ll be sitting in front of Valdemar Montresor, asking him what the fuck is going on.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
It’sa stormy crossing to the prison, which has nothing to do with the weather and everything to do with the bite mark now decorating my skin.
After a brisk search by a new guard, I take my usual seat and wait for Valdemar to be brought in.
I’ve toyed with ideas of how I’m going to confront him, whether to draw the truth from him slowly or try to catch him out, but as soon as he arrives in the room with a smirk on his face, I know I’m going to blow.
He knows what he’s done. I can see it in his eyes.
