Free Dead Night by Tim O'Rourke Page B

a gentle moan, and this just made my heart race faster still.
    “I love you, Sophie,” he whispered in my ear. Now I could feel his heart racing. He ran his mouth over my neck, and I felt his teeth nip at the skin. His whole body seemed to tense up.
    We had made love many times before, but there was an intensity about him tonight that I hadn’t felt before. He pressed me flat against the bed and I writhed beneath him. I gasped, but not out of fear. Not yet.
    “I want you, Sophie,” he groaned. “I want all of you.”
    “Then take me,” I whispered against his chest, and I thought my heart was going to explode.
    I felt his whole body shudder, and my back arched again as he moved over me. Then, he twisted as if his spine was stretching out of shape. I opened my eyes a fraction and looked into his face. His jaw looked as if it was locked tight and he gripped the bed sheets with his fists. Throwing my arms around his neck and wrapping my legs about him, I pulled him close; I couldn’t fight it anymore.
    Then, like crying out in pain, his back made a cracking sound as if every one of his ribs were breaking. He lunged backwards and sat kneeling at the foot of my bed. He threw his head back and I screamed as what looked like a pair of fangs cut their way through his gums.
    A jet of blood shot out and covered my breasts and face.
    He clutched at the air with his hands and I watched in horror as his hands transformed into a set of razor-sharp claws.
    Smearing his blood from my face, I shook with fright as his ears grew into points. Then, his whole face began to change shape. His nose contorted into something similar to a snout and lengths of wiry, black hair bristled from every part of his naked body. Then there was a sound, like a beating heart – and it was loud and filled the room. It was then that I saw two giant black wings flapping behind him.
    It wasn’t that I found him hideous; it was the thought that just moments ago I had been making love with this black-haired creature who was now perched at the end of my bed. All I could do was scream and pull the bed clothes up around me. I couldn’t believe that it was him, that he had hidden this from me. I felt cheated and betrayed – not scared.
    Tears ran down my face as I looked at the beautiful creature before me.
    “Sophie!” he said, but his voice had changed. It was deeper and had a booming quality.
    I didn’t know what to think or how to feel. I loved him – more than I had loved anyone before. He had meant everything to me.
    But he had cheated me – fooled me, and that made me angry. Covering my face with my hands, I sobbed uncontrollably and turned away from him.
    “Sophie,” he tried again, “You don’t have to be scared.”
    “Get away from me!” I shrieked, kicking out with my feet.
    “Sophie, let me explain,” his voice boomed. “I love you!”
    I peered back at him over the top of the sheet. Part of me wanted to go to him. I loved him, and even as he sat like a giant bat at the end of my bed, a part of me still wanted him.
    He had a look of brutality about him that I knew had always been there – and that’s what had turned me on about him. He wasn’t like other guys – he didn’t make love to me like other guys had. But to know that I still wanted him now, that I was aroused by this beast, scared me – I felt ashamed and repulsed by myself – not him.
    So, staring at him over the top of the blankets, I screamed, “Get away from me! You freak – you animal! Get out!”
    “I love -” he begged.
    “GET OUT!”
    He jumped from the bed, where only moments before we had been making love, and went to the windows. Throwing them open, he climbed onto the ledge. He looked back at me with his dead, black eyes, and to know that I still loved him and always would, broke my heart.
    “I’m so sorry,” he growled.
    Then, leaping from the window, he spread his wings and shot into the night sky.
    Throwing back the bed covers, I raced to the