Hal screwed his eyes shut and tried to pretend the monsters weren’t there. He didn’t know what they really were, but “monster” seemed the most apt word. They were like nothing he’d seen before, not even in his worst nightmares. They couldn’t be real. Nothing so horrible could be real. He was hallucinating. So he figured they’d just go away if he could keep his eyes shut long enough.

Then something snaked slowly around his leg, coiling like a cold, slippery vine. The way it felt on his flesh-so alien, so wrong-made him want to scream, but Jolene had gagged him with a pair of her soiled panties, sealing them in with a length of duct tape (and she took such evil pleasure in ripping the tape from his face when she wanted to talk with him). He whimpered instead, fresh tears leaking from the corners of his eyes. The slithering thing wrapped itself around a flabby thigh before probing at his crotch. It pushed at his balls, but they didn’t budge-Jolene had cemented them to the slick vinyl seat of the wheelchair with superglue. The thing gave up and shifted its attention to his beach ball-sized beer belly.

Hal was having a hard time breathing through his nose. He longed to open his mouth wide and draw in great lungfuls of air. Thinking about it brought on another attack of claustrophobia. His soul screamed for release, for deliverance from this dark, scary place. He yearned to be out in the open world again, with nothing around him but nature and the sky above. If he survived this nightmare, he would become an outdoorsman. It was one of the things he fantasized about during the long, empty hours when Jolene was away. He imagined camping out for weeks at a time up in the mountains, enjoying the solitude and achieving a real peace for the first time in his miserable existence.

The tendril curled around his throat, triggering a gag reflex that rendered the already difficult act of breathing almost impossible for several agonizing moments. But the monster’s touch was actually very light. It wasn’t squeezing him. At least not yet. His mind reeled with horror at the prospect of slow asphyxiation by this…this thing.

Hal had other fantasies, too. Extremely vivid revenge scenarios. These usually came on the strongest right after one of Jolene’s torture sessions, and mostly he imagined doing some of the same things to Jolene that she’d done to him. The bitch. He’d cut off her fucking toes and fingers. See how she liked that shit!

But he knew the fantasies were doomed to forever remain fantasies, and so they were often followed by long stretches of utter despair. And in those moments he often thought back to the day before Jolene snapped and marched him out to the shed at gunpoint. He’d come home early from work that day to find her sitting on the mailman’s face in the living room. Hal knew his wife was a slut, and most of the time he didn’t give a shit, but coming home to that kind of thing wasn’t acceptable. So he kicked the mailman out and went to work on Jolene, determined to whip her into place with his fists. Hal firmly believed any man who caught his wife in the act had the right to do this. But he’d gone overboard, battering her harder than a prizefighter taking out his aggressions on a punching bag, keeping at it until his clothes were drenched with sweat and his muscles ached from the strain.

In Hal’s bleakest, blackest moments, he’d revisit those moments again and again.

And he’d think, I deserve this.

He felt something on his face, something so essentially different in texture he knew it was a different creature. It felt almost like a human hand. But not quite. Its flesh felt too rough, almost scaly. Fingers tugged at the length of duct tape, pulling it with surprising gentleness from his flesh. Hal spit out Jolene’s panties and sucked in air, and he mumbled a thank-you to his unknown benefactor.

His gratitude was short-lived, however.

The tendril pushed through Hal’s lips and entered his mouth. Its strange flesh was the most vile thing he’d ever tasted, like something awful from the darkest depths of the ocean. It moved to the back of his mouth and began to slide down his throat. Hal’s eyes came open at last as panic engulfed him. There was something standing in front of him. One of the monsters. It stood on two legs and had shimmery, sluglike skin. It had a curved spine that lent it a hunchbacked appearance, a long, ridged tail as thick as a python’s, lampreylike mouth, bulging black eyes, and a single tendril between its legs. When Hal’s mind made the obvious association, he tried to bite down on the appendage invading his mouth. It went rigid inside him and he felt a sudden warmth in his chest, as if something had been expelled from the tip of the tendril. It retracted rapidly, uncoiling itself from his body and shrinking to a length a fraction of its fully extended reach.

Hal’s mind reeled at the awful thing that had just happened. That goddamn thing had raped him! The sense of violation eclipsed anything he’d experienced in terms of sheer obscenity, and that was saying something. Jesus, this must be how that lady hitchhiker he’d picked up so many years must have felt when he-

His train of thought was derailed when the first monster, the one that had removed his gag, stepped into view. Hal’s eyes widened and he opened his mouth to scream, but the lizard-woman clapped a scaly hand over his mouth and made a shushing sound.

Hal couldn’t take any more of this. He’d been through a lot, but enough was just fucking enough. He prayed for a heart attack. Or a stroke. Some sort of natural end to this horror and suffering.

But that didn’t happen.

What did happen was more surprising, and perhaps more frightening, than anything he could’ve imagined.

The lizard-woman began to work at his bonds.

Rage consumed Bridget, her blood boiling as she vented her frustration by screaming threats at Jordan and banging on her door. This rejection was unacceptable. Bridget had never been spurned by anyone. It made no sense at all. She took great pride in being able to wrap sensitive little things like Jordan around her finger. Nothing gave her greater pleasure than playing with another person’s emotions until she’d broken them, and this turn of events left her feeling cheated.

Her fury didn’t begin to level off until a calm voice spoke inside her head: You will have your fun with her yet. Be patient.

Bridget gasped. The voice of the Dark Mother was clear and lovely, like a soothing spiritual caress. This communication was a privilege, a blessing bestowed. The promise in the Dark Mother’s words erased Bridget’s fury. Anger gave way to delight. She stopped banging on the door and threw her head back and laughed.

She laid a hand against Jordan’s door.

“Soon.” Her voice was a whisper, a subtle insinuation of future pain she hoped Jordan’s subconscious would perceive. She pressed a cheek to the door. “Soon. I can’t wait to hear you cry again.”

Then she giggled.

A door opened to her right and one of Jordan’s neighbors, a scrawny young man with shaggy brown hair, poked his head out to see what was going on. He gasped at the sight of Bridget’s trim, tawny, naked body. Bridget saw him and smiled. “Hi there.”

The man blushed. “Uh…is there a…problem?”

Bridget stepped away from the door and leaned against the wrought-iron railing that wrapped around the outer edge of the landing, displaying her body in its full glory. “Oh, just a little lover’s spat.”

She laughed when the man’s mouth dropped open. Men were so easy to manipulate. Put an image of two women going at it in a guy’s head and, presto, instant lust zombie.