Beloved Beast

Chapter Twenty-Seven

As much as he yearned to be that man she needed, deserved – he couldn't. He had too much working against him. He hadn't the ability to give her the world, much less his damaged heart, assuming she would even have it.

In short, he was of two minds where Elle was concerned. A part of him resigned to forget her, even the parts he marveled most, whereas the other refused to let her go. Elle was better off without him, he gathered firmly, but that enlightened truth didn't make it any easier to accept.

There was a reserved pit of fire and ash for him in the afterlife. Hell was a befitting and inevitable destination for one grotesque and incorrigible beast. Given that he had perpetrated far more evil than good, eternal damnation was forthcoming. Albeit, it bears questioning, did the netherworld really differentiate from hell here on earth? Could the suffering to be had in the everlasting fire eclipse the suffering endured in the flesh?

Don would go so far as to refute it. Hell was mockery and contempt found on barbed tongues. It was devastation and loss. Innocent lives cruelly stamped out. It was loneliness, and above all else, it was a woebegone heart.

This. Was. Hell.

"Alas, he grieves for his maiden."

Don stiffened, crushing an expletive.

And she was the devil incarnate. That sweetened voice, disguising its nether hostility, crawled across his skin in prickling awareness, much like sharpened talons scraping flesh.

It fanned the fires of hatred in his heart. Hatred was a practical emotion; one he could easily indulge and utilize to incinerate all of the exaggerated sentiments that left his skin feeling flushed against his bones.

"In order to grieve," Don seethed, grudgingly turning away from the window and channeling all of that heated emotion into a cutting glare. "It requires one to possess a heart, and we've already established that I haven't one. Otherwise, you wouldn't be here."

With an artful grin, Sera sauntered into the bowels of his chambers. The shadows seemed to cradle her as she crept towards him. Emerald eyes reached from the dark, missing nothing, sweeping over his emptied tankard. Then, appraising the length of him, that beguiling green ignited with carnal hunger as it perused his stalwart frame, coming to rest on his hooded face. "You need not wear your cloak around me. Remove it."

His mouth thinned with disdain, the scar there pulling tight, thwarting a would-be sneer as he muttered, "Why? So that you may admire your creation fully?"

As she drew opposite of him, Don was taken aback by the alarming changes in her appearance. Gone was the deceiving elegance and grace of a statuesque beauty. In its place, were cruel, sharp angles that met beneath the volleying firelight, harshened by the shadows that had favored her a moment ago. In lieu of her lustrous, auburn tresses, earlier adorned with hints of red and gold, was now a mass of dry, brittle hair streaked with wisps of white. Ivory skin formerly dusted with freckles emerged gray and paper-thin, emphasizing the weary lines that bracketed her dulling eyes and strained mouth. Hunched shoulders and a shockingly skeletal frame were a sharp delineation against the glowing backdrop of lambent light.

At such an alarming rate, her lifespan had aged dramatically overnight.

"Does this body fail you, Sera?" Don queried in a mocking tone.

Green eyes narrowed to horizontal slits at him, "I am moved by your concern, or the lack thereof. I'm sure it gives you immense pleasure to know that this pathetic bag of bones is wasting away. Indeed, it won't be long before it deteriorates entirely."