Alise groaned, blinking the sleep away from her eyes. The sunlight streamed through her window and nearly blinded her when she tried to roll over. Key word here is tried.
Narrowing her eyes at the thing holding her down, she soon realized they were a pair of arms. Her breath caught in her throat. Following the bony limbs up to the person’s body , she almost screamed.
Jeff was there, his face buried in her pillow. “Jeff,” she hissed, trying to nudge him awake. “Jeff!” she grunted, shoving him harder. She only succeeded in making him pull her tighter to him. She groaned under the extra pressure, trying to writhe her way out of his grip. “You’re hurting me,” she muttered more to herself than to him, knowing he was likely not awake.
“You’ll be fine,” he grunted. His husky voice was even scratchier than usual, sending chills down her spine. Trying to fight the feeling working its way into her stomach, she wriggled again, trying her damndest to get away. “Don’t move,” he moaned, dipping his head closer to hers. Who knew Jeff the Killer was a cuddler?
“I have to get up,” she muttered, placing both hands on his chest. Alise wanted to shove him away to prove her point, but she just didn’t have it in her after last night. The thought of the men who almost raped her made her clench her fists, scratching his bare chest in the process. Jeff grunted again, shifting closer to her.
“Don’t do that,” he growled close to her ear, making her shiver involuntarily.
“Sorry,” she mumbled, hiding her face. After a few moments of sitting in silence, only the sound of Jeff’s breathing and heartbeat to keep her company, she tried to wiggle free again. Jeff groaned, tightening his arms around her.
“Will you stop that?” he hissed, moving them to a comfortable position again. Alise groaned.
“I want to get up, you ass!” she snarled, digging her nails into his arm. She was kind of afraid to dig them into his chest again—the voice he used when he told her to stop both frightened and exhilarated her. He sighed, rubbing his face against her neck. She froze at the unwanted contact.
“Do you trust me?” he whispered close to her face, his nose just brushing her jaw line. She shivered under the light touch, mentally fighting away any form of attraction.
“Not as far as I could throw you,” she muttered, pulling her head away from his. His eyes darkened considerably and he pulled her back.
“Why not?” he muttered, his face close to hers. She could feel his breath on her nose, and she almost shuddered at their proximity to each other. She scowled at him, giving another determined push to his chest, but to no avail.
“Because you tried to kill me,” she stated like it was obvious. It actually was. She should never have let him in her house, much less her bed. I should call the cops, she thought. But she had been thinking that a lot lately… she had just never acted on it. The one time she tried, Jeff stood in her way. And she hadn’t stopped him.
“I’m not now,” he pointed out, drawing circles lazily on her skin with the tip of his finger. Alise sighed, letting her head fall back onto her pillow. The crusted blood from the night before crackled as she moved her head, and the throbbing returned tenfold. She grunted, putting a hand to her temple and rubbing soothing circles there. Jeff frowned.
“Does your head hurt?”
“Like a bitch.”
His arms loosened on her and he went to sit up, giving Alise the perfect moment to roll off the bed ungracefully. She landed with an ‘oomph’ before standing up and jogging to the bathroom, making sure to avoid Jeff as he jumped off the bed.
“Hah,” she murmured to herself as she locked the door and quickly went about fixing her face. When she looked in the mirror, she visibly cringed. Blood was caked on the side of her cheek, and a long scratch adorned her forehead, looking almost black against her pale skin. The blood was dried to a crusty maroon and bled into a pinkish color as she washed it away. She flinched as the blood stuck to her wounds.
“I look like crap,” she complained to herself. Pulling her hair into a ponytail, she walked out of the bathroom to face an annoyed Jeff. “What?”
“What were you doing in the slums last night?” he snarled, grabbing her upper arm. Grunting, she smacked his hand away, moving to living room with him right on her tail. Alise snarled, whirling on her heel to push him. He put one foot behind him, barely flinching. He giggled a bit, his maniacal grin widening. “You’re funny.”
Alise frowned, her eyes widening slightly in fear, and backed away. She knew he was a killer, someone to be afraid of, but she couldn’t help but trust him to protect her after the night before. But seeing him act like this was throwing her for a loop; she backed up until she hit the counter, and immediately she cursed under her breath. Jeff advanced on her, picking up his knife and dragging the flat of the blade against her cheek.
“You know why I care, Alise?” he purred, drawing his nose across her jaw line until his lips were even with her ear. She shuddered, biting her lip to keep from crying out as the knife cut her cheek. She turned her head away from his prying gaze, squeezing her eyes shut. She could feel him lean into her, his cool breath ghosting across her skin and making goose bumps arise. “I care about last night, because no one can hurt you but me,” he breathed, turning the blade in a sudden move and slicing lengthwise down her shoulder.
Alise yelped, trying to jerk her body away but only succeeding in slamming her hip painfully against the granite counter. “It would do you best to remember, kitten,” he purred, twisting the knife in a circle. Alise coughed; the pain was making her dizzy. “I’m a killer. I don’t care about your feelings or your problems,” the knife dipped deeper into her flesh, “I only care about sating my hunger for death.”
Alise groaned, her body shuddering under the force of the blade. Gathering whatever courage she had left, she hissed, bringing her face closer to his. “I think you’re just trying to remind yourself, Jeff,” she gripped the hand that was holding the knife, digging her nails into the fragile skin around his wrist. He didn’t even flinch.
“You couldn’t kill me,” she hissed as he drove the knife deeper, eyes narrowing, “You had all the chances in the world to do it. But you couldn’t do it!” At her last words, Jeff drove the knife deeper, making her groan in pain. “Coward,” she coughed, grabbing his wrist tighter. “Do it!”
Jeff snarled, ripping the blade out of her skin with a wet squish. Alise’s eyes widened, and her mouth popped open at the pain. Before she could groan, Jeff was on her, forcing her harder into the granite. He was breathing hard, the knife still held tight in his hand that was forced on one side of her hip, effectively caging her in with his body. “I’m the coward?” he breathed out, his face transformed into a malicious snarl. “You’re the one who is asking for death.”
“That makes me cowardly?” she hissed. One of her hands was placed at his neck, her thumb digging into the hollow of his throat. She could feel his pulse raging beneath her fingertips, and it only made her squeeze tighter. Jeff smirked briefly at her momentary show of bravery, dropping the knife to cradle her face with his hand.
“Yes,” he whispered. “You should fight me. Fight me with everything you have,” he leaned in, lips ghosting over hers. “It’s no fun if you don’t.”
Alise jerked her head back, not liking the feel of his words across her mouth. “Then I won’t fight you,” she said at once.
Jeff’s face darkened. “And why not, kitten?” he breathed out, sounding in control of his emotions though she knew that he was not.
“Because if it brings you joy, then I’m not doing it.”
Jeff growled, dragging her back from the counter and slinging her to the floor. She yelped when her bad shoulder smacked the ground, and she turned on her back to glare at the man standing over her. She remembered what he said about wanting her to fight, so she laid as still as possible. He growled louder than before, reaching down to slam his palm onto her new wound. She hissed.
“You do this to all your victims, or am I just special?” she panted out, instinctively moving to grasp at his hand. He smirked and bent over her, pinning her to the floor.
“You’re special all right,” he muttered dryly. Without warning, his head moved down to her throat, and he bit her at the junction of her neck and shoulder. With a yelp, she began to thrash in his grip, and eventually elbowed him in the stomach. Jeff grunted and rolled off, a satisfied smile on his face when she tottered away, hands clasping at her throat.
“What the hell?” She shrieked, fingers covering the bleeding wound. When she had shoved him off, his teeth had ripped some of the skin, leaving crimson blood to drip down her clavicle. Tenderly prodding the wound, she glared at her tormentor as she backed away like a caged animal. Jeff just grinned, steadily walking forwards.
“Are you ready to fight me now?” he murmured just loud enough for her to hear. Alise froze, eyes locking with his. Seeing he was still moving, she swiftly jumped around the coffee table. It felt better to her having something in between them.
“Jeff, stop,” she pleaded, grasping behind her for some kind of weapon. Jeff laughed.
“Don’t you remember? I’m a killer. I don’t care about your feelings,” he scoffed. “I just care about making you scream.”
“You know that can be taken two ways, right?” she laughed a bit, trying to make light of the very dangerous situation she had gotten herself into. Jeff raised an eyebrow, his grin growing larger. “N-not like that! I mean, I meant it like that, but that wasn’t an offer. So, back off?” she squeaked. After getting to know Jeff on a slightly different level – as a savior – she wasn’t used to being thrown right back into the thick of fighting for her life.
“Oh?” he questioned, agilely leaping over the table in one fluid move. Springing into action, Alise jumped onto the couch and tried to hop across the springy surface and away from him. He quickly followed, and as soon as her legs got ready to make the final leap to the floor, he wrapped his arms around her waist and fell with her.
Jeff landed half on his side, half under Alise. Alise groaned as – for the second time that day – her shoulder was bruised by the unforgiving floor. Stunned by the pain, she didn’t notice that Jeff had flipped them yet again, with her on the bottom. He sighed.
“You’re not very good at this,” he smirked. Her hair had fallen over her face when she fell, and Jeff moved it aside with one finger to see her enraged eyes. He opened his mouth to say something else, but he was cut off.
She lashed outwards, her nails dragging four identical slits on his cheek as she followed through with the blow. The wounds carried from directly under his eyes to the tip of his chin, where her nails slanted off, leaving a deeper cut.
In his shock, she managed to wiggle out from under him, dashing into her room and slamming the door. Jeff smirked, still lying on the ground, and with a weary sigh, he placed a hand under his chin.
“We’re going to have so much fun together, kitten.”
I'm not very happy with this one. I don't know what it is, I kinda feel like it was rushed... but eh. Comments and votes make Crow a happy author <3