Free The Devil's Masquerade: The Poison by Jennifer Loren Page A

up.”
    She pushes me out the door with a forceful shove, but I don’t go far. I stand outside, waiting until she walks out to meet the car that pulls up. “Franky. Franky. Franky!” I yell over and over until she finally turns. It is like she doesn’t even know her own name. Maybe she doesn’t. Maybe the life change has taken away every part of the Franky I knew, including her name. Franky shoves her chin in the air at me and gets in the car, despite my attempt to get her to come to me. Before she can shut the car door, I take a second to look in at the man in the driver’s seat as he admires himself in his rearview mirror. I step towards them. “I want to talk to you!” I say to the man, racing towards them. He looks at me and laughs. “Don’t be scared asshole. I won’t hurt you. I just want to talk.” He stares directly into my eyes, and I feel my body tighten and my veins begin to heat up as my eyes begin to swirl with control. “Get out of the car,” I say, forcefully. His eyes turn black as coal with bright anger shining from the center. The man boldly denies my request, and I step back with a better understanding of Franky’s odd behavior. She must be under another demon’s dark spell. I need to free her somehow. But I don’t get a chance to say or do anything before the man turns away and Franky slams the door shut. They speed off, and I can clearly see the plate on the back, the same one I saw before. I assume she met this guy wherever she was hiding out at, but why are they both here, now? No man follows a woman that he is in an open relationship with unless he wants something, and seeing now that he is no ordinary man, he obviously wants something. I hate to admit it, but I think Kayla is right.
    Returning home, I ignore Kayla while I look in on the boys and figure out what to say to her. I can’t seem to come up with anything by the time I walk into our bedroom, but surprisingly, she rushes to me and wraps her arms around me. Not a typical response from my stubborn wife, but it makes it much easier for me to tell her she is right.
    “Nick, I am so sorry. I should have trusted you and left it alone. It doesn’t matter who she is or what she is doing, all that matters …”
    I stop her, holding her out in front of me. “You were right, Kayla.” She is shocked at first, but it doesn’t take long before her cocky smile forms. “Before you glow with pride, it was still wrong what you did. You should have talked to me about it first. That said, I asked Franky, and she doesn’t seem to have any answers for me, not yet anyway. On top of that, that boyfriend of hers is similar to me, and I don’t mean related. He has a power similar to mine, but he doesn’t seem to be nearly as powerful, thankfully. We shouldn’t have to worry about him at least.”
    “How do you know that?”
    “Because the coward ran away when I told him to face me. Clearly, if he had an ego, if he thought he could hurt me, he would have stayed and challenged me.”
    “You challenged someone without knowing who they are? Are you crazy?” She yells at me.
    “Calm down. I only wanted to find out who he was, but now, I know that Franky is under this guy’s spell. She was easily susceptible to mine, so it would make sense that she would fall for another and explains why she is acting so odd.” Kayla rolls her eyes. “What now?”
    “I don’t think she is under any spell, and besides, spell or no spell, it doesn’t explain why she is here.”
    “No, but I will find out soon. I promise.” Kayla paces away from me, and I can already see the wheels spinning in her head. “Kayla, stop. Don’t you dare do anything else. You let me handle Franky.” She is resistant; I can tell by the way she avoids looking at me. “Kayla.”
    “Nick, you have so many things to worry about. Why don’t you let me handle … her?”
    “ Her name is Franky, and she was an important part of my life. You don’t know her. She was very shy