by C L Walker
I felt nothing as he squeezed my breasts hard. I was glad he was being rough because if he were gentle, I didn’t think I could have handled it.
He moved to the side and ran a hand down my stomach and when the tips of his fingers found their way beneath the band of my leggings, I could do nothing but wait for it. I told myself the sooner he did it the sooner it’d be over.
But his fingers never got any further, in fact, they froze in place as he made a strangled sound that made the hair on the back of my neck stand up.
When something wet and warm sprayed across my face I opened my eyes to see his hovering above me covered in blood. The life was draining from his eyes as a hand with sharp nails dug into his forehead and cupped the top of his head from behind.
I looked behind him and met Micah’s eyes that looked nothing like they should have as they were blacked out entirely.
My confusion had me frozen in place. Everything seemed to be quiet once more as if even the night dared not make a sound as Micah stood eerily still while black glittering smoke tendrils swirled around his hand.
He held my gaze as he pulled back his other arm swiftly and I watched as blood went flying up into the air behind him from the heart that he clutched in his hand that he had pulled straight out of Jack’s chest.
He stood motionless once more as blood dripped down his forearm and he watched me as my brain searched for a logical explanation for what I was seeing. But there wasn’t one, and I didn’t understand.
He looked down at Jack whose body hung limply from his other hand and his eyebrows drew low at the same time a crooked smile I had seen in many of my dreams appeared on his face.
He was terrifying.
He dropped Jack as if he were a bag of trash rather than a corpse and took a step towards me but paused as he seemed to be weighing his options.
I used my feet to push myself back as I cried hysterically even though it was futile. I knew then without a doubt that Micah truly outclassed me in every regard and putting a few feet between us wouldn’t save me. I couldn’t outrun him, and there was no way I could overpower him.
“Don’t scream, Sky.” He reached for the duct tape and I flinched away from him. He reached for me again, quicker that time but stopped once he had a corner of the tape between his fingers. “I’m not going to hurt you.”
I simpered and nodded my head, so he pulled the tape off quickly.
I took a deep breath, and my eyes never left his.
After he stuffed the tape in his pocket, he moved towards me again and I pinned myself against the truck.
“I said I’m not going to hurt you so stop,” he said again with an impatient tone.
“You would be an asshole right now.” I realized that my fear was easing more with every moment that passed even though it shouldn’t have.
“Come here,” he said instead of acknowledging what I said.
When I shook my head, he grabbed my hips. “Fine, have it your way.” He pulled me towards him with ease.
He stopped with his hands on my body as he stared into my eyes as if he were trying to tell me something without using words. As I met his stare, the black in his eyes began to fade away to white and soon the color returned to his irises as well.
Brown eyes, I never knew I liked them so much until I saw yours…
He squeezed my hips gently. “You know I will not hurt you.”
The weight of his words hit me like a ton of bricks. He was right, call me stupid for trusting such a being but I knew he wouldn’t hurt me.
When I said nothing else, he nodded his head once and flipped me over onto my stomach with the same ease I might flip a book, his strength was unfathomable.
“Not a word, I’m just getting this off you.” He bent over and bit through the zip tie and once I was free of it, he flipped me back over.
I rubbed my wrists and watched him as he stood straight once more and surveyed the area and swore before he kicked the truck. “Shit, there is blood everywhere. What a fucking mess.”
As I also looked around the bed of the truck, I too realized just how much blood there was.
“He’s dead,” I said in disbelief as I looked at Jack’s body.
“Yes.” He knelt before me. “He is.”
“He’s dead, because you…killed him.” I stared into his eyes and let the reality of the situation sink in. “Shit, we need to hide the body!”
“What?”
“We need to hide the fucking body, Micah, what do you mean ‘what?’”
He stared at me and started to reply several times but couldn’t articulate his thoughts.
Then he grabbed my arms, shook me, and didn’t get the desired effect when I took the opportunity to examine his hands rather than allow him to shake some sense into me.
His arms were fascinating, smoke seemed to unfurl from his palms that were solid black, and the black ended somewhere on his forearm, but I couldn’t see where because he was wearing a hoodie.
His nails were sharp, and the image of them digging into Jack’s forehead persisted and gave me pause. But not enough pause to fear him because even if I tried to use reason, I couldn’t look at him differently.
I really am screwed up.
Fourteen
Skylar
Great, I’ve lost my mind and even the creature beside me knows it.
“I just ripped a man’s heart out and the only thing you have to say is that we need to hide the body?” It was the first time I had ever surprised him, and I liked the way it felt to not be predictable to the all-knowing Micah.
I had to admit there were better ways he could have handled the situation that didn’t require taking someone’s life. But given what he was, something that was predatorial in nature, I understood that he had done the only thing that had seemed natural to him in that moment.
“What’s wrong with you?” He stared at me in wonder.
I brushed him off and said, “Me? You killed someone, and you’re clearly not human. So, the better question is, what’s wrong with you?”
“Right,” he said. “Look, just so we are clear I’m not a murderer, this is not a habit of mine, in fact I have never killed someone before. But I’m also not going to apologize for what I did either because I would do it a thousand times over to keep him from hurting anyone else.”
I nodded my head as if it were a perfectly reasonable statement to make.
“Also,” he began, and his tone caught my full attention. “I will never hurt you, but if you freak out, or open your mouth about this to anyone you will regret it, do you understand?”
“Yes.” I wasn’t dumb, there was no way I was going to tell a soul and piss off someone who had the strength to rip people apart.
Besides, they wouldn’t even believe me when I told them my mother beat me, so why in the hell would they believe that a man ripped out the heart of my would-be rapist to save me?
As far as I was concerned Micah was the only one who had ever done a thing to protect me since my dad had died, and he did so without even liking me.
“Good. Now I need you to get out, walk up towards the main road and stay hidden but keep an eye out, okay?”
“Okay.” I hopped out of the truck on wobbly legs that gave out as soon as my feet hit the ground but thankfully, he was by my side in an instant to help me up.
“I’m sorry, I know I’m asking a lot of you right now,” he said softly.
“It’s okay.” I gripped his forearm for a few seconds while I straightened my legs and willed them to be strong because I needed them. “Hurry up and do what you need to do.”
I ran up the hill side and found a place behind a tree where I could watch the road and Micah at the same time.
He stood behind the truck motionless, but I could faintly hear him saying something as a blue fire ignited in the bed of the truck seemingly of its own will. I got distracted by the beautiful aqua color of the flames until he snapped around to look at me and I jumped before I remembered to watch the
road.
The wind blew in my direction and it brought with it the smell of burning flesh, and it was not a smell I would soon forget. Nothing about that night would be forgettable.
I grew more nervous with every second that ticked by because a fire was bound to draw attention, especially one that was the wrong color, but given that Jack’s heart had been ripped out, I understood the necessity of burning his body.
I couldn’t let Micah get caught for protecting me, he would end up being a science experiment and I would probably get a bullet to the brain for knowing too much. We would be a part of a government conspiracy that no one would believe.
Before I let my thoughts get the best of me, I brushed them aside and focused once more.
I watched the road closely and five minutes later I saw headlights in the distance, so I turned around to warn Micah when the car got close enough for me to make out what it was.
A freaking patrol car, why did it have to be a cop?!
They must have seen the smoke coming from the lake because they slowed down before the turn that led down the hill to the docks.
I wasn’t sure they even made the turn because I took off running down the hill side, but it was unlikely that they hadn’t.
As I ran down, I called to him and he seemed to understand because he blurred before my eyes as he went to the front of the truck and put it in neutral before he went behind it and pushed it into the water.
I shook with worry as I watched the truck sink knowing that the waters weren’t going to calm before the patrol car arrived.
Before I realized what he meant to do as he ran towards me, I was scooped up into his arms and set behind a tree seconds later. I leaned against it and he pressed his body against mine as I peered up at him.
He mumbled something I didn’t understand under his breath, and seconds later rain began to pour like nothing I had seen before.
“Did you do that?” I asked.
“Yes, it will wash away the blood and make it harder for the cop to notice the disturbance in the water while the truck sinks to the bottom.”
“You can do magic?”
“Not exactly, I can control natural elements, thus the fire and the rain but I can’t use them as weapons or anything.” He gave me a nervous look. “And I have my limits because I can’t undermine mother nature, but she won’t mind a half hour of this.”
“Mother nature… right, it’s not as if she hasn’t been talked about so it shouldn’t be surprising that she is real.” I turned around to look at the spot in the lake where the truck had gone down. “Who am I kidding, this is crazy. Everything about tonight is off, this has to be another one of my crazy dreams.”
He ran his hands down my arms. “I’m sorry, but it’s not a dream.”
I sighed as I knew it was too much to hope for.
The patrol car came into sight just as the truck fully submerged. By another stroke of luck, the car turned towards the right of the docks and parked in the parking lot rather than by the boat docking area where Jack’s truck had been.
The cop got out of the vehicle and pointed a flashlight at the sky, and I imagined she was surprised by the sudden aggressive rainfall. She looked around, no doubt searching for the source of the smoke but there was no longer any to be seen.
The water was still rippling as she made her way down the dock, but it was growing more still by the second and the rain was doing well as a distraction.
“There is no way his body burnt up that quickly,” I said, “and even if it has, what about the bones?”
He chuckled behind me. “That was no run of the mill fire, it was hell fire, so trust me when I say there is nothing left of him.”
“So, what you said about Hell… you’ve been there?”
“I was kidding, I’ve never been there and no, I’m not destined to go there either.”
“So, the fire?”
“It’s just another element I can tap into,” he said casually as if being able to control the elements was a natural thing to do.
Pfft, maybe for supernatural Native Americans, but where’s my white girl powers?
I turned around and looked up at him, his eyes were black once more and up close I was able to fully take in his otherworldly appearance.
He was beautiful in a dark yet enchanting sort of way. He was a prince of darkness, who had the power to rip out the hearts of men and my own if I were to be so unlucky.
Jack’s dead and you aren’t human… but you saved me…
“What are you?” I asked.
I was curious about what I was seeing but I was also scared to hear his answer because no matter what he said, it wouldn’t make sense. Beings such as him simply didn’t exist, but there he was, talking about the fires of hell as if they were real and he had the power to wield them.
Because they are, and he can!
Madness.
His eyes snapped to attention and he picked me up once more and took off running through the trees, he moved so quickly the terrain blurred before my eyes and the wind whipped harshly against my face.
A minute later it was a wonder how suddenly we became still after moving that quickly, there was no slowing down and easing to a stop for him. One second, he was running full speed ahead and then just like that he was still, impossibly still even as the leaves and dirt still settled around us.
He set me down and took a step back and I looked around and realized we were in the woods behind the trailer. The tv was on in the living room, so the windows lit up and dimmed according to the light that was given off by it.
It felt surreal, life was going on as it always had all around me except nothing would ever be the same.
I was almost raped; I witnessed a murder, and I was standing next to a man that I wasn’t sure was man at all.
I should have felt so many things I just couldn’t bring myself to feel as I watched with amazement as the smoke evaporated, the black receded until it was gone, and his eyes looked normal once more.
Normal?
I wasn’t sure what normal looked like anymore.
He was covered in blood which made me realize that I too had Jack’s blood splattered across my body and I looked down and wondered what I should do about it.
“Shit,” he said as he looked me over. “I forgot about our clothes; I have to burn them as well.”
He looked around and once his eyes were on the creek, he nodded his head to himself. “Let’s go.”
I followed slowly behind him and watched his hair billow in the wind until he stopped and looked back at me.
“Are you going to be okay?” His continued softness surprised me.
I smiled to reassure him even though I couldn’t sort out how I felt. Jack almost raped me so of course I felt violated, but he was gone so I also felt relieved. He was one thing I was never going to have to worry about ever again and even though it was wrong, I couldn’t bring myself to feel bad for him or look at Micah differently for ending his life.
“I’m a survivor remember?” I asked with a hint of humor he didn’t seem to find amusing.
I followed him the rest of the way and when we got to the water, he turned towards me expectantly.
“What?” I asked when I didn’t understand what he wanted me to do.
“I need your clothes,” he said pointedly.
I shook my head and took a step back. “And you can have them, after I change.”
“No, you can’t crawl through that window with those clothes on. They will not leave this spot unless they are in my hands because I am not trying to get put away for murder after saving your ass.”
“I didn’t ask you to kill him! You could have pulled him off me and beat him up like a normal human being!”
When the words came out of my mouth, he looked at me like I was an idiot because I had naively compared him to a ‘normal’ human being when he was so obviously anything but. I didn’t even know if there was anything human about him outside of his everyday appearance.
He laughed at me and matched my step with one of his own. “You’re finally scared aren’t you, babe?”
“Shut up, not now, Micah.”
He lunged for me and I squeaked in protest before his hand covered my mouth and he pinned me up against a tree. “You will take these clothes off and you will do it now.”
I shook my head.
“How is it you’re going to look a demon in the face and deny his request, but you can’t stand up to one weak decrepit woman?”
I shrugged my shoulders because I couldn’t speak with his hand over my mouth.
He pulled it away slowly but kept me between the tree and himself.
“You’re a demon?” I asked in shock. “Doesn’t that make you evil?”
He looked at me incredulously as he pushed away from the tree. “Do I seem evil to you?”
I considered him and what he had done and even though his appearance at first glance looked evil the answer was no. “No, Jack was evil.”
His eyebrow quirked but he didn’t question what I had said.
“My tribe was cursed over five thousand years ago with something akin to vampirism, so that is what you would refer to me as, a vampire, but where supernatural beings are concerned, they consider me a demon.”
Vampire? That means he drinks… BLOOD!
I gulped and my hands went to my neck of their own accord, I didn’t want to survive Jack just to end up being Micah’s snack.
“Calm down.” He rolled his eyes and stuffed his hands in the pockets of his jeans. “I need blood like you need water and I still eat normal food, so I don’t suffer some insatiable blood lust as long as I stay hydrated, and I don’t take it from those who are not willing. Besides, blood banks are all the rage now.”
“Living but dead…” I trailed off as I tried to understand what he was telling me.
“No, I’m not dead, I was born like this. Think human but cursed. I have warm flesh, and blood pumping through my veins just as you do.” He smiled wickedly. “You’ve felt my touch, Sky, you know well that it is warm and very much alive.”