14. Jessica

Jessica

I open my eyes and blink a couple of times. Slowly, my surroundings come into focus. I'm lying on a bed in a large, dimly lit room with opulent furniture and a bright fire burning in the hearth. Everything is pleasantly warm and toasty, the mattress blissfully soft and comfortable. For a few heartbeats, I'm confused and disoriented, with no idea where I am. Where is this place? Nothing seems familiar. My head hurts like hell and my entire body aches as if I'm on the verge of getting a fever.

Lifting the bed covers, I find that I'm wearing a black silk nightie, but have no recollection of how I came to be in it. Who dressed me? Come to that, who brought me here? If this isn't my bedroom, then who's is it? Where are my Spice Girls posters?

Drifting in and out of consciousness, I can just make out a dark shape sitting beside the bed. As my eyes grow accustomed to the gloom, I realise it is Alex Kingswood, sprawled in a high-backed armchair, his face shrouded in shadow. At first my mind can't comprehend the scenario unfolding before me and I'm lost in a daze of incoherence.

"What time is it?" I mumble.

"Nearly four in the morning," he replies. "You've been out cold for a good couple of hours."

"Seriously?"

"Yes."

Snuggling under the duvet covers, I return to a state of semi-consciousness, still not able to fully process what is happening around me. Suddenly, I sit up sharply, and it all comes back to me. This is Claremont Hall. This is Alex's bed I'm lying in. Oh my God…Horrific memories from what happened earlier in the alley hit me like a ton of bricks. Blood, tentacles, severed appendages flit through my mind and I fight the urge to be sick again.

For a long time, I can't speak, can't move, all I can do is stare at him, fear robbing me of my faculties. I notice Alex's appearance has returned to normal. There are no tentacled creatures coming out of his back and his face has resumed some semblance of humanity. But I'm not a fool. What I saw in that alley was real, I'm sure of it. I didn't imagine it. He really did transform into a demon.

"How are you feeling?" he asks gently. "You were talking a lot in your sleep. It sounded as if you were having lots of bad dreams and you kept calling out for your mother." He reaches for my hand, but I jolt back violently, crossing my arms as if to block a punch.

"Stay away from me! Don't come anywhere near me!"

"Now Jessica, you need to calm down. I'll be taking you home to London in less than an hour, so there's no point getting hysterical. You've been through a terrible ordeal tonight, and you need to stay calm and focus on keeping your strength up for the drive back." He reaches out again to touch my hand, but once more I recoil in horror.

"Stay away from me, you monster!"

"No, my beauty," he says. "I think you'll find the true monsters are those vile creatures who tried to rape you. I won't call them animals because that would be an insult to animals. Animals are pure and innocent, they don't inflict insane levels of cruelty on each other the way humans do. At least now thanks to me, that despicable creature you call Jack will be, shall we say, ‘out of action' for good and never again be a danger to women." His voice grows suddenly hard. "I don't mind saying that I took great pleasure in destroying that handsome face of his. Now Jack looks as hideous as his soul and never again will any woman be taken in by him."

At these words, horrific images from earlier in the night hit me like a slap in the face: bloody testicles on the ground, pieces of flesh torn out of Jack's cheek. It was horrible, just horrible. With a shudder, I push the bad memories away.

No, I can't think about that right now, it's too terrible to comprehend.

"What were you even doing in that alley?" I demand. "I thought I told you to stay away from me?"

Alex's eyes widen. "Stay away from you? Are you crazy? As if I could ever stay away from you. No, the minute you told me not to drive down and see you, I instantly made up my mind that I would. I drove to your workplace to surprise you but found you had already left, then I drove along the high street to track you down, and it looks like it was a good thing I did, or else things could have turned out very differently. What those filthy bastards tried to do to you makes me sick to my stomach."

"My God, what are you?" I whisper. "Are you really a demon? Was your mother telling the truth? What the hell was all that crazy shit that happened in the alley with the tentacles?"

There's a long suspenseful silence. Then, with a resolute sigh, Alex runs his fingers through his hair and says, "It's complicated, but the short answer is yes. Yes, when I was ten years old, I messed around with a Ouija board and caused a demonic entity known as Erasmus to enter my subconscious and attempt to take control of me."

"Attempt? What do you mean attempt?"

"My mother thinks Erasmus succeeded in possessing me entirely, but she's wrong. Yes, I'll admit in the beginning, when I was a weak and feeble child, the demon took full control, but as the years went by, my human side grew stronger and stronger and, in the end, it was I, Alexander Kingswood, who won the battle. I made Erasmus my bitch, which means he is now a part of who I am without dominating the side of me that is human. It is I who call the shots. I who says what happens and I am able to harness the demon's powers to do whatever I please. With a snap of my fingers, I can channel the forces of darkness and reap all the benefits of the supernatural without having to forfeit my humanity. And that is what my mother has always failed to understand."

My bottom lip trembles. I can't believe what I am hearing. None of this seems real. It's too shocking, too crazy.

"So did you…did you really kill your father?" I ask breathlessly. "Beatrix said she saw one of your tentacles push him down the stairs."

"Yes and no," Alex replies without missing a beat. "I'll admit I wanted Neville dead. I despised him, especially for the way he treated my mother, and he fucking murdered my kitten Trinity, something I could never forgive him for. But Erasmus had full control of my body at the time of the ‘accident.' I was just a kid back then and still hadn't worked out how to use my powers, so when that tentacle shot out and hit Neville, I was barely even aware of it. But…" he adds softly, "A part of me does believe that I may have in some way ‘willed' Erasmus to do it. The demon knew I hated my dad, so it's possible he acted on my behalf. So, as I said before, the whole situation is…complicated."

For a long time, I don't say anything, the shock of his confession almost too much to bear. Hot tears begin to flow down my cheeks. Once more, Alex tries to take hold of my hand to comfort me, but I coldly brush him off. Jesus, this feels like a never-ending nightmare. My head wants to explode. So, Beatrix was telling the truth after all. Alex is a demon. He isn't human and after the carnage that took place in that alleyway, I am left in no doubt that this relationship cannot continue.

Without a doubt, those sick bastards deserved their comeuppance, but the gruesomeness of what I witnessed has left an indelible mark on my soul which cannot be erased. Just thinking about what those awful tentacles did to Jack and the others makes me want to throw up all over again. I understand why Alex did it—he only wanted to protect me, but that doesn't change the fact that I am now terrified for my own safety. How can I love a demon, a hellish creature that is capable of committing such acts of depravity?

Throwing back the duvet cover, I jump out of bed and try to make a run for it, but Alex is too quick and catches me in his arms before I reach the door.

"Let me go!" I shout. "Get your dirty hands off me!"

But my pleas fall on deaf ears. Dragging me kicking and screaming to the bed, Alex throws me on the mattress and pins me down with such force, it feels as if he could snap every bone in my body. I am absolutely terrified.

"Where do you think you're going?" he whispers, gazing down at me. "How far do you think you're going to get in the middle of the countryside dressed in a nightie, huh?"

"Let go of me! Please Alex, I just want to leave this place. I can't take any more of this madness. Please, I just want to be normal again. I-I don't want any part of this…this insanity."

"I told you, I'm going to drive you home soon. Why can't you wait until then?"

"Because I don't want to be with you anymore, Alex. This relationship ends tonight. What you've just told me, I'm sorry, but I'm not strong enough to cope with it, not when I've got all this other stuff with my mother to think about. There's only so much a person can take before their head completely explodes and I just need to get away. Can't you understand that I just want to be normal? I don't want to be part of this—"

"So even after all I've done for you, you still want to end things with me?" Alex says coldly. "After I saved you from being raped tonight, you still see me as the enemy and not those sick fucks who tried to violate you? My God, Jessica, what will it take to get a little bit of gratitude from you?"

"Of course, I'm grateful!" I fire back. "But can't you see it from my perspective? This is a lot for me to take and my head just can't handle it right now. First those bastards try to rape me, then you come along and transform into something from a horror film, and I am forced to witness the most sickening display of violence I have ever seen. I'm sorry, but it's going to take time for me to get over it. It's just too much to deal with all at once." I pause to catch my breath. "Now please can you let go of my wrists? You're hurting me."

Instantly, Alex loosens his grip but continues to lie on top of me, weighing me down to the bed with no means of escape. When he speaks again his voice is soft and seductive and my body begins to react to him in ways I wish it didn't.

"Baby, can we please just stop fighting? It's been a rough night and all I want is to hold you for a little bit before I take you home. Come on, you know how much I love and worship you, you know I'd never ever harm you. I'll always take care of you. Please don't do this to me. I can't breathe without you and if you try to leave, I'm liable to do something stupid. I need you so much. You know I would do anything, anything for you."

"No, Alex," I breathe. "This ends tonight and I mean it. I don't want to be with you."

"You don't want me, huh? Okay, why don't we check…" Slowly, Alex's hand travels down my thighs and he slips two fingers into my soaking wet knickers. "Mmm. Just as I thought. I think you need to stop lying to yourself, my beauty. You say you don't want me, but your pussy tells a different story. Get this into your head. You and I are going to be together forever, understand? I will never, ever give you up, you belong to me now, every single piece of you, and you're not going anywhere."

My cheeks redden with embarrassment. "I don't want this; I don't want to be with a…with a demon." There. I've said the unsayable. But Alex isn't fazed, not in the least.

"What's so wrong with loving a demon?" he whispers against my ear. "You know, if you give it a chance, you might find it can be extremely enjoyable."

Suddenly, the tentacles are back, writhing and twisting around me, engulfing my limbs like diabolical black vines. But this time, I sense a difference in their movements. Something soft and sensuous. Even so, sheer terror consumes me as I think back to the lethal damage they caused earlier, and I let out a shriek of fright.

"No, don't be afraid. They won't hurt you; I promise. Now just stay calm and let me show you what they can do." Gently, Alex presses his knee between my thighs to part them, and then one of the tentacles works its way up my leg and slides inside my knickers. Slowly, the creature's hot tongue begins stroking my clit, licking, lapping, sending heavenly vibrations through me. I gasp with delight.

That feels so damn good it's unreal. So wrong and yet so right.

"You like that, don't you? It feels nice, doesn't it?"

"Yes."

"Now listen very closely," he says, his lips teasing the corners of my mouth. "This is what's going to happen. We're going to drive back to London now and I will allow you to spend the next couple of days with Cynthia before her trip, so that the two of you can spend some final quality time together. I promise you won't hear from me throughout the whole entire time. But as soon as she leaves for Germany, I will return to claim you."

I barely hear a word. Closing my eyes, I gasp again as the intense motion on my crotch brings me to the precipice of an almighty orgasm. "Shit…"

"Tell me you love me," Alex breathes. "Tell me that you still want me in spite of everything, that you will accept me as I truly am. Human or demon, you will accept both parts of me unconditionally."

"Please…don't stop. That feels too good."

"Say it! Say it now or I'll stop pleasuring you."

"All right, I love you. I fucking love you." My body goes limp as I reach a splintering climax.

"That felt good, didn't it?" When I don't respond, he adds softly, "And that's just a little taste of the delights that are to come."

Abruptly, the tentacled creature stops sucking my clit and slithers down towards my anus. With deliberate slowness, the thing starts to lick my tight virgin butthole, stimulating me to breaking point. I moan softly, wishing for it to go deeper and fully penetrate.

"Can you imagine what else I can do with these?" Alex says seductively. "I know what kind of filthy thoughts are in your mind, my sweet, and I promise to fulfil every last one of them. Tell me, would you like that?"

"God, yes!" I shudder as the blissful caressing combined with the sexiness of his voice gives me yet another orgasm. Rapidly, the sea of tentacles retracts and very soon vanish back from whence they came.

Lowering his head, Alex devours my lips with a kiss that makes my heart pound. I respond ferociously. What the hell am I doing? This is sweet, beautiful insanity. I shouldn't be doing this, it feels so wrong and yet so right, but I just can't help myself. He turns me on like no one else and when he holds me, I'm like putty in his hands.

"Now as I was saying," he continues after he's quite finished gorging. "You will spend the next few days with your mother and then I want you and Freddie to come and live with me."

My muscles stiffen. "What?"

"I want you both to stay in Claremont Hall for the month that Cynthia is away in Germany. I can't be without you, Jessica, I must have you with me every single day. Don't worry, I will take good care of you both. I told you, I want to look after you and your family, and I meant it."

"But we can't," I protest feebly. "I've got work and Freddie has school. I can't just pull him out for a month to come and live with you. What will the teachers say?"

"Tell them you're both travelling abroad for a month. During that time, Freddie can be home schooled by me. I'm an excellent teacher. I promise he won't miss out on any of his curriculum and as for your job at Sloppy Joe's, well, after what took place tonight, I think it's time to hand in your notice. It just isn't safe for you to be working late shifts at a place where those sorts of people come. If you quit your job, I promise to take care of you financially, you won't want for anything. What do you say?"

I hesitate, my mind racing with possible hindrances to the plan. "But what about your mum? Surely Beatrix wouldn't be happy for us to come and stay here?"

"Beatrix's opinion doesn't count because she doesn't live here anymore. I sent her away to Oxfordshire. She has interfered in my life once too often and I will no longer stand for it. I told you Jessica, nobody gets in the way of us and now that she's gone, I'll need you more than ever. It's so lonely here with just me and Hobbs, I need joy and laughter to liven up the place. Please say yes."

"I-I don't know what to say."

Bring my brother to come and live here with a demon? What could possibly go wrong?

No, I won't do it. I can't bring Freddie to stay here. This is complete and utter madness. I mean, what will he say when he sees Alex's face? How will he react? Will he be frightened and more to the point, will Freddie pick up on all the supernatural stuff as he's so sensitive about things?

I shake my head. No, bringing my brother here would not be a good idea at all and might even be opening Pandora's Box. But as juices continue to flow down my legs and a fever of sexual longing overtakes me, I find it difficult to think straight. I am no longer being rational and find myself wanting to agree to anything Alex says. Worse still, all I can think about is how I need to feel his lips on mine again and, oh my gosh, I need to know what else those tentacles can do…

Jessica Gardner, you are one sick puppy.

"I won't take no for an answer," Alex rasps, his tongue tracing the delicate shell of my ear. "You're coming to live here with me whether you like it or not and when you're here I will treat you like a queen. Every night, I'm going to fuck you so many times you won't know what day of the week it is. I'm going to make you come again and again and again. I have so many secrets I want to share with you, so many doors I want to unlock, but I can only do that if you are open to being adventurous. If you'll let me, I promise to show you pleasures beyond your wildest dreams and let you experience sexual thrills you didn't think were possible. All I need is for you to say yes."

"Yes," I whisper. "I'll come and live with you, if that's what you want."

"Good girl, I knew you'd make the right decision. Now come, show me some love…"

We kiss again and then, sweeping me into his arms, he carries me to the bathroom where I take a quick shower and dress in preparation for our drive back. The jets of hot water are just what I need to wash away the bad memories of the night from Hell. After I've finished dressing, Alex takes me down to the library and lifts the candelabra off the wall to reveal the secret glass elevator.

"What are we doing here again?" I ask.

"I want to show you something before you go." Pressing the call button, he summons the lift and we briefly step inside. "Do you see these?" he says, pointing to the metal panel showing the basement floors that go to B1, B2, B3 and B4. "Each of these are doorways to secret special places that I will share with you one day."

My pulse quickens. "What sort of places do they go to?"

"It wouldn't be a secret if I told you, now would it. But when the time is right, I will reveal all to you and I know you're going to love it."

I'd like to know more, but right now I'm too weak, too exhausted to articulate more than a passing curiosity. In time, I'm sure all will be revealed, but I admit to feeling a little apprehensive. When Alex says ‘the doorway to secret places' what exactly does that mean? Other worlds, other dimensions? It's all too much for my head to take right now and I push the thought to the back of my mind to revisit at a later date.

"Come on," Alex smiles, closing the doors to the lift. "It's time for me to take you home before Cynthia and Freddie wake up and wonder where you are."

"Okay. Let's go."

We head outside to the car and by the time we arrive back on my street at just gone half six, the sky is light and you can hear the birds singing in the trees. For a moment, we sit in semi-darkness, our faces illuminated by the green light from the dashboard. Tenderly, Alex strokes my cheek with his thumb, his gaze so penetrating I'm forced to avert my eyes.

"Remember, I'll be coming back for you and Freddie in a couple of days," he whispers. "Don't forget."

"I-I won't," I stammer, reaching out for the door.

"Hey, don't I get a hug?" Before I can speak, I'm in his arms again and he's holding me tightly. The truth is, a warm, loving hug is precisely what I need after the nightmarish night I've had. Encased in his big strong arms, I feel so secure, so protected and I know I'm going to miss him like mad.

The feelings I have for Alex are such a paradox. He simultaneously delights and terrifies me but no matter what happens, I could never be without him. He is now vital to my very existence, as organic to me as breathing and it's at this moment I realise I honestly do love him. I don't care what he is, demon or human, he's everything I could ever want in a man.

After what seems forever, Alex releases me and gently kisses my forehead. "Now go inside before anyone notices you're missing."

"Okay," I say, attempting to push open the car door a second time. "Oh, and Alex?"

"Yes?"

"Thank you for what you did tonight. For saving me from those bastards, I mean. If you hadn't come along when you did, it doesn't bear thinking about. And I just want to say that I love you."

"You don't need to tell me, my sweet; I already know what's in your heart. You know I am yours forever. Now hurry on inside."

With a small, weak smile, I step out the car and head towards the entrance to my flats.