Dark Desires (Dark Romance Boxed Set)

by Cerys du Lys

  I smile but I also cry, and it is the only time I can remember feeling happy and sad together. I do not know if that is correct or if it is even possible. I do not know if I am lying to myself about one thing or the other. I do not want to lie to myself.

  “Noah, I love--” I say, but I do not get to say more.

  He jumps on me and slams me to the bed. His fingers are around my throat and he squeezes hard. I cannot breathe. I blink back tears and I stare at him and I try to smile but I cannot. It hurts. This hurts. I do not care about his fingers on my throat. I care about the look of intense hatred in his eyes, like the remnants of a smoldering red star. He hates me. Noah hates me, he does not love me.

  I reach up and I try to touch his cheek softly. I do. He cannot stop me because his hands are busy choking me. I touch him gently and caress his cheek with my fingertips. I hope I look beautiful to him like this. I hope he will enjoy killing me as much as the thought of killing him makes me anxious with excitement. I love you, Noah. I know that I do not know how to show it, but I do. I love you and you loved me. I think you did. I do not know if you did. As you say, perhaps it is a lie. Perhaps love is make believe and pretend and it does not exist for anyone.

  He looks at my hand. His eyes stare at it, and then they cool down. They stop. His fingers stop squeezing, but he does not let me go. One of his hands stays on my throat, but the other grabs my hand and he stares at it. His eyes remain transfixed on my smallest finger. I try to pull my hand away, but he grabs my wrist and refuses to let me go.

  I can stop him, but I do not want to. If he hates me, then I wish to die. I wish for Noah to kill me. I will understand it. I hope it makes him happy, as watching him die would make me happy. That is not normal, and I know that, but I understand it still.

  “What the fuck is this?” he asks.

  I blink at him, confused. “I do not know what you mean,” I say.

  I do know, though. I do not know if I want to tell him, but I know.

  “Your finger,” he says. “Your fucking pinky finger. What the fuck, Angeline? What the fuck happened to it?”

  I pull my hand away and he lets me take it from him. I hide my finger, holding one hand with the other. He refuses to stop staring at me. No, do not do this, Noah. I did not mean for this to happen. Please, stop? You are hurting me. You promised never to hurt me. You promised... you lied...

  “Tell me, love,” he says. His voice is rough and coarse, but curiously soft.

  Fine. If that is what he wishes... but I do not believe he will like it.

  I take his left hand, the one with the broken finger, and I hold it up to mine. It is the hand I used to caress his cheek, my right hand. They match up together, though my hand is smaller than his. His smallest finger is broken, and mine is broken, too. Mine is broken in a different way, though.

  He straddles me still, but now he brings his other hand close to mine. He inspects his own finger, then mine, and I know he sees what I think he does. They are not exactly the same, but his finger is like mine. His fingers are like mine used to be.

  “Where’s your fingernail?” he asks.

  “Noah, please get off of me,” I say. “Please?”

  He does, but our hands remain touching for a moment longer than that. His palm touches mine and his fingers curl around mine slowly, as if we are holding hands. I break free from him and move to get off of the bed.

  “I will show you,” I say. “Stay here.”

  He stays. I go. I do not want to go, but I do. I step lightly towards my cosmetics desk and I take the two boxes off of it. I keep them closed and hold them tight in my arms, clutched against my chest. I hurry back to the bed and I sit next to Noah. He looks at me. I try to smile at him, but I do not know if smiling is what I should do.

  I open one of the boxes and show him the contents. “These are yours,” I say.

  His fingernails, all six of them, lay in the box on a soft fluffy cushion. They are filed and cleaned and neat. I offer him the box and he takes it. He looks inside, then pulls one of his fingernails from it. He turns the small, polished and beautiful scale of a fingernail around in his fingers, looking at it as if he has never seen anything like it before. They look very different when they are not a part of us.

  “Noah,” I say. “Will you close your eyes?”

  I ask him this instead of telling him, because this is a special moment. It is a scary moment. I fear for what will happen. I am afraid. I do not usually become afraid, but now I am. I do not know how to do this. I do not know how to be afraid any longer. I do not know how to be happy or sad or afraid or any of the other known emotions. I do not know how to be anything because I am nothing.

  Noah closes his eyes for me. I reach out and touch his closed eyelids with my fingertips. He lifts his hand up to touch mine. He is very gentle and nice.

  “Noah, you are so sweet,” I say. “Please hold on for a moment. I will show you if you will please wait.”

  I count the time by listening to Noah’s soft breaths. I open the other box and take out the special bracelet. I fit all of the nails into their appropriate indents along the links of the bracelet and fix them in with their hooked latches. Each nail fits perfectly and together they form a round picture continuing forever. There is a night sky with stars, and a sun, and also stained glass and a picture of an angel.

  Once I am done, I cup the bracelet carefully in my hands.

  “You may open your eyes,” I say.

  He does. His eyes flutter open and he looks at me, then he looks at my hands. He is still holding the box with his fingernails in one hand, but he closes it and puts it off to the side on the bed.

  “Give me your hand,” I say.

  He does. His hand moves towards me, bridging the distance between us halfway. I unclasp the bracelet and then fit it around his wrist effortlessly. It fits perfectly. It fits this way because I have made it for him.

  “What’s this?” he asks.

  “Those are mine,” I say. I place my finger on each of the nails as I spin the bracelet around his wrist. “Those are mine, but now this is yours,” I say.

  “What the fuck is going on?” he asks.

  I tell him and I want him to remember. I do not know if he will, but it is the only thing I have left now.

  “A long time ago, I did not have fingernails. I lost them like you did. I did not tell you that, though. You saw. You would scratch my nose or my face or my arm if I had an itch. Do you remember? You asked why I did not have fingernails, but I did not tell you. I think you may have known, but you did not say so. You told me that if you could, you would give your fingernails to me.”

  He stares at me and his eyes begin to water. I see him and I do not know if Noah is sad or if he is happy. I do not know if he is angry. I do not know if he hates me. Please do not hate me, Noah. I wanted to tell you all of this, but I did not know how and I am not a good person anymore. I do not think I was ever a good person. That is what they told me. I am bad. I am wrong. I hurt people. I hurt them. They are dead. They are dead because of me. They are...

  “Angel?” he asks. That is a name they used to call me, but it is not my real name. He says my real name after, though. He says it to me. He says it and he remembers. He knows.

  *** Noah

  I pull her into my fucking arms, because I don’t know what the fuck is going on. Fuck, I’m crying. Shit, she’s crying, too. What the fuck is wrong with us? A whole lot of fucking shit, that’s for sure.

  What the fuck, Angel? Angeline? Shit. God, I don’t even know what the fuck to think about that. I left her, I promised her. How the fuck did this happen? She wasn’t supposed to be like this. I wasn’t supposed to be like this, either. Shit. She knows what I’ve done. Is she mad? Fuck.

  Godfuckingdamnit, I can’t fucking believe half the shit I said to her. She’s so fucking... fucking perfect, though. I guess if I’d spent half a second thinking about it, it would have made sense. I always thought she was perfect. Even when... fuck. Those are some
dark fucking memories. I thought that was done. I wanted it to be done.

  I never fucking thought I’d see her again. If I did, I didn’t know how I’d face her. What the fuck do I do? How the fuck do I talk to her?

  Hey, Angel, they call me Noah now.

  I kidnap women, I hold them against their wills, I break them down, I hurt them mentally and physically. Occasionally, I hurt them emotionally, too. I cause them pain. I give them a reason to hate me, but I force them to love me.

  You know? All the fucking shit that happened to you? I do that shit now. I’ve got a fucking reason for it, but half the time I think it’s bullshit. Half the time I think I’m fucking worthless.

  She’s fucking here now, though. She knows. God. Fuck. This is the stupidest fucking shit, but I love her. Fucking hell. Fuck. I love her. Fucking fuck. I don’t know how to love. I can’t love her. She can’t be like this. Why the fuck is she like this? She was supposed to stay and live and be happy. She was supposed to grow up and be safe forever and find some nice fucking guy to settle down with and marry and grow fucking old with. She wasn’t supposed to become like this. She wasn’t supposed to be a fucking soulless psychotic bitch.

  She’s not, though. Fuck. No, she’s not. I grab the boxes she brought. These boxes are fucking important. Shit. I need to be careful. I ease away from her and put the boxes on the bedside table, then I rush the fuck back to her. I don’t want to fucking leave her. There’s too much shit going on in my head right now. I don’t know how the fuck to process it. It’s just fucking there. It exists, but I can’t fucking think straight. I don’t know if I’m fucking pissed at her or if I’m elated. I don’t know if I want to kill her or get on my knees and fucking propose.

  I kiss her. Fuck. I want to kiss her. I want to fucking kiss her so bad. I always have. I remember the first time we kissed. I was nervous as fuck that I’d hurt her. I asked her if I could, but then I changed my mind. I told her no, that it didn’t matter. Why the fuck would she want to kiss me? Just to set this straight, it wasn’t some sweet fucking schoolyard crush bullshit.

  Angeline was fucking trapped. She was stolen and used and abused by some sick motherfucker who passed her around to a bunch of other sick fucks and let them do whatever the fuck they wanted. The unfortunate part about all of that was they were my fucking age. They were never like that before. I thought I knew these fucking people, and I did. I’d grown up with them, they’d been around my entire goddamn life. I didn’t know how fucking sick and depraved they could be, though.

  Most of us weren’t that old. Some were older, but most of us weren’t. Sixteen, seventeen, eighteen? You’re supposed to be a fucking teenager and have fun and screw off, but that’s not how it worked back then. That’s how it’s supposed to be, but there’s fucking monsters everywhere. They live down the street from you. You see them every day. They fucking smile at you and say hello and act like everything’s normal and like they’re good fucking people, but they aren’t. They are sick and twisted and I want to murder every fucking one of them.

  That’s what I do. That’s what I’ve been doing. I’ve been doing it for her. Yeah, fuck, shit, I kidnap women now, too, but I do it because I want to get close to the sick fucks who would kidnap them, too. I need to know where the monsters who fucking buy them and abuse them are. I need to know everything, the whole fucking system.

  They call me Noah because they think it’s fucking cute. Laugh it up, everyone. This guy’s an excellent fucking asshole who can scour the earth for any specimen of a woman you want. He fucking takes them, trains them, and then they enter a new world.

  Fuck you, asshole. You know why I like the name Noah? Because I’m going to fucking annihilate every fucking person who thinks shit like that isn’t the worst fucking thing you can do to someone. I will end you and your entire world with the motherfucking Wrath of God. I will drown you in a flood of your own fucking blood and I’ll enjoy every minute of it.

  *** Noah

  A long fucking time ago, I lived in some shitty little village in the middle of nowhere. I’m talking about maybe fifty houses and a couple hundred people. All in the middle of the woods, near a lake, with some mountains on the other side. Small as fuck and not worth shit, but people lived there. I lived there. Angeline lived there. That’s all you need to know.

  We weren’t near anything useful. Just some small as fuck village in the middle of the woods. Had some local business and a bait shop that doubled as a convenience store and a market. The store was basically everything, because it was the only fucking store. Some shitty restaurant, too. Doesn’t matter how shitty a place is if it’s the only one, though. Everyone goes to the shitty restaurant because where the fuck else are they going to go? There were a couple farms, too. Cows and corn or something. How the fuck should I know? I never went back there and I never plan to. They could grow fucking gold for all I care. It’s still a shithole.

  There was a church, too. Not the kind of church you’re thinking of. This isn’t anything religious. Yeah, it’s a church, so it’s kind of religious, but this was one of those fucked up nondenominational places, where they didn’t follow anything in particular. It was more like, “Oh, well, shit, the Bible says not to kill people, and that’s a pretty fucking good rule for everyone to follow, so don’t do that.” Preaching and shit, but not necessarily praying to anything in particular.

  Be kind to others, asshole. You believe in God? God wants you to be kind. You believe in Buddha? Yeah, he wants you to be kind, too. You believe in the goddamn power of the sun? The sun wants you to be kind. Even if you don’t believe in any of that shit, it’s a good fucking thing to be kind to other people. It’s called common fucking decency.

  They weren’t as vulgar as that. I wasn’t as vulgar as that back then, either. Sorry to fucking disappoint you. I used to be that kid who was pretty fucking kind to everyone. I thought I was, at least.

  Anyways, this church was run by this guy. He seemed nice. Wore a fucking religious habit. Looked the part. Who the fuck knew he was actually a sick fuck? No one or everyone. I still don’t fucking know the truth. Pisses me off to this day. Was the whole fucking village in on it? Did I grow up in the middle of some fucking woodland cult?

  Angeline’s parents died in a car accident after some drunk fucking tourist smashed into their car. It was a direct head on collision. They were driving one way and he was driving the other, except he was in the wrong lane and they didn’t have a chance to get out of the way.

  Angeline was in the back seat. Her parents and the asshole died pretty much immediately on impact. Angeline was injured, but not too badly. She recovered quickly. Cuts and bruises and shit, but that’s it. She was lucky

  That’s it except both her fucking parents were dead and who the fuck was going to take care of her? Not so fucking lucky now.

  Anyways, guess. Guess who fucking took her in? I am fucking seething mad just thinking about it. I want to slit the fucking bastards throat again for what he did. You only get to kill someone once, though. As soon as they’re dead, that’s it. That should be enough, but sometimes it’s not. Sometimes you want to fucking piss on their corpse and rip off their fucking cock and shove it in their mouth, and...

  I can’t fucking do this shit anymore. I just fucking can’t.

  Long story short, Angeline was orphaned and became a “Ward of the Church.” Doesn’t sound so bad, right? Like a nun or some shit? No. Fuck. You couldn’t be more wrong.

  That sick fucking head of the church of nothing made it seem fine and regular on the outside, but on the inside he was doing some bad shit. He told her she was responsible for her parents dying. He said the only reason she lived was because she was supposed to atone for that shit. In his eyes, she was already dead, and so anything he did to her wasn’t sinful or wicked or wrong. According to him, she deserved to be abused.

  Not only that, but he told others the same things about her. Privately, though. This was kept quiet. I doubt any of the older folk knew. Maybe som
e of them did. I don’t fucking know. It was seriously fucked up. We had some small fucking school we went to during the day, but after that it was either play in the woods or figure out something else to do. Lots of parents sent their kids to the church to work and learn values or some shit. Become a better person by surrounding yourself with morality and virtue.

  Yeah, no. It sounds good but it didn’t fucking work that way. According to this guy, you don’t need to repent your sinful thoughts if you can get rid of them. That’s how that fucking worked. You’re thinking of sex or masturbation or some shit? Cut that shit out! Go fuck Angeline. It’s not a sin, because she’s already dead. She doesn’t exist in the eyes of a higher power. She might as well be a fucking ghost, so anything you do to her is fine. It’s not bad or immoral or whatever the fuck anyone else tells you. Don’t do this shit to regular people, but it’s fine to do it to Angeline.

  They raped her. They tortured her. They fucking hurt her more than I have ever seen anyone be hurt. I saw the bright fucking beautiful girl who I’d never really spoken to before turn into a shell of a human being filled with void and fucking nothingness. I didn’t understand at first because I’m not a social person and I used to fuck off in the woods on my own and go fishing or whatever else the fuck I wanted to do.

  I went to church on the weekends, but that was it. She was there. She was always there. She used to scramble through the church aisles with a tiny collection tin in order to get donations from people. I didn’t have much to donate, but I did anyways because she looked so fucking timid and small and I don’t know what the fuck I was thinking. I thought it was because of her parents. That shit would traumatize anyone. I didn’t know there was more.

  I started hanging around the church after school because of that. I didn’t know what the fuck I could do, but I thought I could help her. Maybe. If she even needed my help. Who the fuck was I to think that she’d need my help? If she asked me, I’d give it, though. If I saw something I could help her with, I would have fucking done it.