Page 55 of Lilies from Hell

“I would have unleashed hell on that place,” he says.

Soon after that the sound of steps reach my ears and silence returns. That’s when the bedroom door closes and I take out my phone, opening the app that allows me access to the security cameras. I click on one of the fifteen in his bedroom and watch the routine she follows almost every night before going to sleep. It includes using soaps that I don’t know what the hell they are for, and putting on creams. She uses a different one for her face, body, hands, and feet. I had never seen so many creams and soaps together until I walked into her bathroom. All of them with a vanilla scent.

I’m about to fall asleep when she gets under the covers after opening the windows. She shouldn’t do it, but I doubt a fucking window is capable of preventing deranged sickos from getting in through it. Good thing I’ll always be here.

I crawl out of the dressing room, staying quiet and blending in with the walls. Seeing her face hits me hard in the chest and squeezes my lungs until oxygen becomes secondary. Her scent is the only thing that matters to me right now. I sit down next to her and bury my head in her neck, inhaling until I can’t hold any more of her fragrance in my system and throw my head back. Then I look at her face and every perfect feature of hers, lingering on the trail of fingernails on her right cheek.

My guts twist together with a rage that brings the trembling back to my hands. Adrenaline clouds my vision and prevents me from thinking clearly. I bite the inside of my lower lip, hoping the pain will be enough to calm me down, but tasting my own blood only fuels my thirst.

“Fuck!” I bark as I get out of bed, instantly regretting it.

I glance at the bed. She is still sleeping. The snores coming from her half-open lips allow me to breathe again without feeling like thousands of ants are crawling down my back with guilt. I run my hands through my buzz-cut hair in exasperation. I didn’t want to leave, but I can’t stand much more without putting my hands on her and tearing her apart.

I press my lips to her face for the fifth time before I notice the diamond on the small pendant I gave her years ago. I was still studying at university by then and we continued with the secret meetings under the stands of her high school that had begun a few weeks after my return. Just when my impatience made me take the step of approaching her after so many years. At that time I had only spoken to her twice, but I was already so obsessed that I was willing to spend half my life trying to understand her body. How it worked. How she tied my oxygen to her lungs that easily every time I breathe. And fuck. Right now I don’t think I’m getting better. I don’t think I ever will.

I was about to put my lips back on her forehead when my phone vibrates in the back of my pants with a new message. I bring my fingers to her hair, unable to stop touching her as I take out my phone and unlock it. It’s a message from Denis letting me know that he is already in the dungeons.

Three hours later, I am turning off the car engine. I see a couple of her hairs on my black tee as I’m about to open the door. I pick them up between my fingers, being very careful not to break them and thinking about putting them next to the others I have there. My body and mind cling to her as if she were the only thing that exists on the planet. I’m desperate to hold on to anything she can give me, no matter how small and insignificant it might be.

Drops of blood fall on my face as the blades continue spinning and slicing up her body hanging from the top. Not to the point of killing her. My gaze is fixed on the perfect machine with awe as it works, watching how her body moves desperately in pain and her lips open to let out painful screams of horror.

Her eyes are about to pop out of their sockets in shock, which makes her look funny. Her face is melted by acid. It covers the wounds my knife has left on her already ugly face. A hoarse laugh escapes my throat as she writhes like a worm again, and a drop of blood falls directly onto my lip. I lick it with a moan of pleasure as I stop the machine pressing the button of the remote control. My stomach soon churns with disgust at the taste of iron left in my mouth. A bittersweet reminder that her blood will never compare to any other in this world.

“Okay. That’s enough,” I say cutting the ropes that have her attached to the ceiling.

Her body immediately falls with a thud. My eyes follow her open chest as I open the wound further with her skin ripping in my fingers. I slide the silicone gel implants out a slimy sound. A trickle of blood and other clear fluids flows from the wound under her breasts and joins the implants. My eyes remain on the gel sacs. I listen to her whimpers in the background as I remember one of the many times that Lena thought to have a similar surgery to enlarge her breasts. She always gave up because of her fear of surgeries.

My little demon can’t understand how fucking perfect she is. She finds it hard to comprehend that something so perfect can exist, and I understand her, because even I am baffled by her existence sometimes. I guess that’s why she develops stupid and meaningless complexes about herself.

A sudden smell of urine coming from her ass makes me wrinkle my nose in disgust.

“You should thank I’m giving you a bit of leniency after all. Just because of your friendship with Denis,” I say with my head tilted to one side, getting a better view of her almost dismembered body on the floor. Dark red is now added to her already dyed hair. “But I know a good way you could thank me.” My lips draw a smile while I run my fingers through her blood-soaked dyed hair.

She doesn’t have enough strength to fight me, let alone escape. I pull her hair hard enough to get her up and walk her to the small surgery bed. Then I place her on it.

“Please…” I stare at her, waiting for her to finish. When she doesn’t I tie her hands to the bed. Her lips part again, forming words I can’t hear.

“If you are not going to speak up, don’t speak at all,” I say as I put on gloves and clean the tools I’ll be using.

Then I start cutting into what's left of her torso. A tremor runs through her body as I start digging the blade into her organs close to her uterus. Her eyelids flutter until she loses consciousness. The blood soaks through my gloves until they are completely drenched in crimson. Then I remove the organs I’m going to need and throw them on the floor. I leave only the liver and the pair of lungs on the metal tray. Then I instruct my men to remove the body from the bed, and turn my head when I hear someone’s footsteps on the stairs. Denis’s gaze falls on the corpse of his friend before approaching Romina and leaving a kiss on her mangled forehead.

“We’ll see each other in hell. Save me a comfortable spot there,” he murmurs with a smile before walking away.

“You should have given her better advice,” I say, tossing the gloves in the trash.

“I never knew what the hell she saw in him. I saw her once—”

“I don’t care,” I cut, moving my tongue piercing with an exasperated look. “So? What happened?” I ask, referring to the last man we had seen loitering near our drug warehouses.

He glances at the heads floating in the liquid inside the transparent display cases on the shelf above a table with different knives. He focuses more on one that had blue highlights in his hair.

“Nothing. That wasn’t the man. He said he was just looking for his damn dog. Do you believe that? Because I don’t. Do you think blue highlights would suit me?” He asks later, looking at me with expectant eyes. I ran my hands over my face with exasperation, ignoring his last question.

“We have to find him once and for all. We’re running out of time.”

Does she really still think I’m a pain in the ass? She can’t possibly prefer hugging that damn fucking teddy bear to being with me.

“How long are these things supposed to last?” I ask again, fixing my eyes on Denis’s with anticipation.