The Waiting: A Supernatural Thriller(76)

Evan moved backward until his legs met the bed. He sat on it and momentarily parted from Selena before she straddled him, climbing onto his lap. She guided his shaking hands beneath the bottom of her blouse, onto the warm, smooth skin of her stomach. He wanted to tear her shirt off, to hear the buttons pop free as he exposed her, but he stopped, a sick ball of guilt burning in his stomach. It churned there, with thoughts of Elle in the same position as Selena so many times before. How she’d come to him in the shower sometimes, nude and smiling, washing him off before kneeling before him. The lace she’d worn on their first night together, and how he hadn’t lasted more than a few seconds. But he’d recuperated quickly, and she’d cried his name over and over again until they were both breathless.

Selena reached down between them and rubbed him through his jeans, but he was already softening. She kissed him again, but he sat back, withdrawing his hands from beneath her shirt.

“What’s wrong?” she asked, her eyes wide in the low light, her pupils huge with arousal.

“I can’t,” Evan said, not believing he’d spoken the words. “I want to, but I can’t, not now.”

She tried to read his expression in the falling dark—he assumed to see if he was bluffing, if there was something else there. She slowly slid off him, the sweetness of her heat leaving him, a pang of regret taking its place. He wanted to know her warmth, to slide into it, to bury his face in her cherry-blossom hair and feel himself release inside her.

Evan blinked, feeling himself rise again, desire coming over him in a new wave. He reached out and held her hand.

“I’m sorry, it’s not that I don’t want you. I do, very, very much. But it’s still too soon. Do you understand?”

Selena let a long breath out and nodded. “Yes, of course I do.” She smoothed out her blouse and ran a quick hand through her hair. “I suppose I should go, it’s getting late.”

“Stay with me,” he said, holding on to her hand a little tighter. “Stay here tonight.”

He waited for her to pull away or shake her head, but she did neither.

“Okay.”

Evan guided her around to the other side of the bed, and she lay down on top of the blankets. He did the same, and after a bit of arranging, she scooted close to him, tucking her head against his chest, hugging his stomach with one arm. He put his hand on her waist and pulled her nearer. She sighed, and he could feel her breath, warm through his T-shirt.

The fatigue he’d battled all day collapsed on him at once, a gutted building falling in, piling in with the undeniable promise of rest. He tried to say good night but drifted off before he could form the words.

~

Evan awoke sometime in the night, his eyes coming open like shutters thrown wide. He’d been dreaming of something—darkness so black it was solid. He’d tried to walk through it and felt things touching him, quick, intimate caresses that chilled and made him sick with fear. That’s when he’d realized the darkness was alive and nothing but its cold embrace, like a long-dead lover, was there.

He blinked and rolled over, suddenly afraid that Selena would be gone, but she wasn’t. She lay on her back beside him, breathing softly. He moved closer to her form, feeling her warmth again, and reached out, searching for her hand in the darkness. He found it resting on her stomach and slid his palm into hers, remembering how he would do the same thing with Elle on nights when sleep eluded him. The comfort of holding her hand, even while she slept, helped send him back into a serene rest. Selena clasped his hand tighter, and he scooted closer to her, the smell of her perfume not as vivid as before but still there, somehow even more enticing as it mellowed. Another scent met his nostrils, and Evan opened his eyes, sleep leaving him fully.

Decay.

There was no mistaking the stink. It was the same as the smell from the closet, as heavy and cloying as an open grave. He raised his head a few inches off his pillow and looked at Selena’s profile, her lips parted, her eyelashes long against the top of her cheeks. Evan sat up a little more, and Selena shifted, her elbow bumping his shoulder.

His eyes traveled up and saw that both her arms were above her head, hands splayed out on her pillow.

The hand he held squeezed once. Evan tried to rip his arm back, but the fingers gripped him tighter as he opened his mouth to cry out. His eyes shot to the hand holding his, the rotting flesh almost black in the dim starlight that shone through the window, the arm attached to it snaking into the darkness beside the bed.

“Uhh!” he grunted, and managed to break his hand free.

The other hand slid away, and a quiet scuffling sound came from the other side of the bed. A shape rose and stood over them, hunched and broken, its face turned toward him, its outline reminiscent of something ancient, curled in on itself by time. The figure limped across the room, not thin and ephemeral but solid and real. With a turn of its stunted head, it went through the open door toward Shaun’s room.

“No! No!”

Evan sprang from the bed, his yells and the commotion waking Selena.

“What?”

He flicked on the light, drawing back a fist, ready to throw it.

The hall was empty.

Shaun’s door was in the same position as earlier, or so it looked. Evan rushed into the room, his fist still held high. The light flooded the space enough for Evan to see it was empty except for the boy and his bed. He slept on, not moving but for the rise and fall of his chest.