Chapter 58 - Blast From The Past

[The first, the last and the only warning: gore.]

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After how well everything went, I was beyond unprepared for what had happened. Though I doubt it would've been any less traumatic if I had been.

I didn't even have time to gasp, much less react. As the room—as Sergey—exploded in front of me, I was already flying through a door in JJ's tight and cool, despite all the heat around, embrace.

Everything happened so fast that my brain processed it with a delay. I found myself standing on weak legs, supported only by JJ's grasp on me, back in the restaurant's main hall, and couldn't tell how much I stood like that.

I realised JJ must have used some vampire power to protect me from the blast. Despite the fire engulfing everything, I didn't feel in pain at all. It was either some strong shock, or strong magic, and I knew I will soon learn which.

Still feeling like my consciousness was a little dislocated from my body, I lifted my eyes towards JJ's face. Probably to ask something—my thoughts were so muddled I wasn't sure about it myself—only to recoil with a wordless exclamation of horror.

Whatever JJ did to protect me, it did nothing for him. To say that he looked awful would be saying nothing. After a single glance, the Italian dinner I had eaten began to try to escape my stomach, the acidic bile burning at the back of my throat and not spilling over only by a sheer miracle of my willpower.

Almost a half of his face was charred black, his once luxurious golden locks mostly burned off, and whatever left of them looked melted together. There was no blood or any other liquid, but I could see his cheekbone peeking through the peeled skin, could see black, crusted bits crack when JJ's expression twitched. A part of his lip was so deformed by the heat that I could see whites of the teeth shining through even though JJ's mouth was closed.

It was almost like looking at real-life Two-Face, except where Two-Face had both eyes working, JJ's left—burned—eye was nowhere to be seen. Only black of his singed eyelid was visible, blending with the rest of the well-done bits.

After seeing this, I was afraid to lower my eyes to his torso, and even more afraid to imagine how his back must've looked.

Despite how horribly painful his wounds must have been, JJ's expression showed none of it when he met my eyes. Instead, I could only see the anger in his bare-fanged smile… and a silent apology in a one-eyed glance he threw at me before continuing to stare at something behind my back.

"Don't mind my current state, Diana. Now go and hide," he whispered. His voice sounded a little raspy. There was also a new lisp to it, no doubt from the state of his lips.

He dropped his hands from me, and when I didn't move, too stupefied by what was happening, gently pushed me away. I stumbled a step and finally registered my surroundings fully.

The restaurant's hall was devoid of people except for a single person standing next to the entrance. I had to take a double take at her. Maybe I was just not in a state to register things from the first try, or maybe it was because of what a bombshell she was.

As tall as me, she had a perfect hourglass figure, further stressed by her knee-length black lace dress. It hugged her curves above the waist, only to burst into lush layers of skirts below it. Her vampire-pale skin contrasted with the rich red of her plump lips and the endless airy curls of her copper brown hair that fell to her shoulders.

But it was the expression in her striking pale blue eyes that hit me the most. There was so much joy in there and in the woman's expression as she gazed into JJ's icy eye.

The woman wore high heels, but they produced no noise as she glided towards JJ with outstretched hands, ignoring me like I was the one with a power of invisibility. I made several more steps away from the weird scene, stopping only when I hit a table.

The woman agitatedly spoke something in French. The only words I caught were "mon amour"—"my love". It fit with her expression, but not with JJ's.

She finally stopped a step away and clasped her hands at her chest. Her face fell, as if she just realised that she wasn't welcome.

"Christina. We meet again. A pity." JJ's words seeped with bitter anger. His entire body was tense with it, a juxtaposition to his normally relaxed attitude.

With this and his terrible burns, I could barely recognise him. Oh, these burns. I just knew they will haunt me later. Just as the fact that a man had exploded in front of me today.

"Please, my love, don't be so cold!" Christina pleaded, now in Russian. She didn't have an accent, though, speaking as proficiently as any native. She clasped her hands near her chest. "I don't understand. You liked our games in the past. What had changed? I will do anything you want, just don't leave me again!"

I didn't understand what was going on. I glanced at JJ, only to find him entirely unaffected by Christina's pleas. Who was that woman? What was she doing here? Why did Sergey explode? My head swam.

"No. I had been much more indulging with you than I should have been for the wellbeing of the both of us. I have no patience left for you anymore. We were nothing more but enemies ever since you dismissed my last refusal," JJ said.

In a blink, Christina's entire countenance shifted. Where sorrow and hope were a moment before, now was only murderous rage. She raised her hands, and I watched with wide eyes as her nails lengthened into dagger-like claws.

An animalistic hiss left her lips that curled to show her needle-like fangs. "I will have you, my love, I will! Even if I will have to cut off your arms and legs first!"