Friday Flash - Hide and Seek

Martin was drunk.  He stumbled on the door mat outside my apartment and turned to me with a laughing smile.  I grinned back and before I knew it we were in a hot and steamy embrace.  His breath tasted like whiskey and his tongue was hot against mine.  He shoved me against the door and slid one hand beneath my mini skirt. When he encountered my bare thighs and slid his hand up, I hissed in anticipation.  It had been so long since I’d had sex, this was fantastic.

“Let’s go inside,” he said, never taking his mouth away from mine.  I fumbled for the doorknob which was digging into my back.  

We all but fell into the foyer and once inside he scooped me up in his arms and I kicked the door shut with one high heeled gladiator sandal.  Should I kick them off?  No. I’d wear them to bed.  Sexy.

“Well, this is interesting.”  The familiar voice insinuated itself beneath my skin and I went cold. Brendan. Shit. He’d found me again. No matter how times I escaped him, he always tracked me down. Jealous husbands are like homing pigeons, damn it.

“What the fuck?” Martin staggered with me in his arms and would have dropped me if I hadn't grabbed the back of the sofa.  He dumped me unceremoniously and brought his fists up, his face flushed with whiskey and wrath. “Who the hell is that, Deirdre?”

“Deidre, I might ask you the same question,” drawled the man slouched in my favorite armchair by the window. He had a glass of red wine at his elbow.  Bastard. My forty dollar Merlot. It figured. 

“Martin, you’d better go,” I said.

Martin’s mouth dropped open.  He looked foolish and not very hot anymore.  Anger swirled around him in a palpable mist.

“Are you shitting me?” He took a step toward me and Brendan came to immediate alert. To most people he would have looked relaxed and amused, but I knew him intimately. If the situation warranted, he’d be across the room in a flash and Martin would be toast. Just what I didn't need.  My carpet was off white.  Blood would never, ever come out.

“I’ll explain later. Just go, okay?” Martin didn't seem to hear me; his attention was focused on Brendan. Oh, yeah, there’d be a fight.  Damn it.

“Who. The hell. Are you?” Martin stabbed a finger in Brendan’s direction and Brendan grinned. An ice cold shiver ran down my spine. When Brendan grinned like that, it was best to run.  I calculated the distance between the sofa and my bedroom and didn't like the odds.  I might be able to duck behind the granite counter in the kitchen, but I doubted it. 

“The nightmare you wish you could wake up from,” said Brendan. He relied heavily on clichés and movie lines when he went homicidal and before I could open my mouth to call him off, he’d already come over the back of the sofa.

Martin went down without a sound. He didn't have a chance. Blood spattered over me and my sofa and for a moment all I could hear was the gurgling of Martin’s severed windpipe as he aspirated the last of the breath in his lungs.  He was dead before Brendan began to feed thankfully.  The tearing and chewing made my blood heat and I tried really hard but I couldn't resist the pull.

My hands turned to claws, leathery wings sprouted painfully from my back and my favorite little black dress ripped to shreds.  This was one expensive evening in more ways than one.

Horns burst from my forehead and my mouth wrenched into a beak.

By the time my transformation was complete, that fucker, Brendan, had nearly consumed all of Martin’s intestines. 

With an outraged squawk, I caught the end of one slippery, pink entrail in my beak and pulled.  Brendan had a mouthful of wicked razor sharp teeth and he clamped down and wouldn't let go.

Hoarse growls burst from his throat. I flapped my wings at him and gave one last pull before he abruptly let go.  If not for my wings, I would have somersaulted backwards.  Instead, I snapped up the intestine and gulped it down. Delicious.  Better than sex, but not what I’d intended for Martin.  Poor bastard.  Oh, well.  That’s the way the cookie crumbles sometimes.