🔥 But don't play with me, 

'cause you're playing with fire 🔥

--- *** ---

The suddenness of the much older woman whose age approximately emulated to the early seventies rippled forcibly potent its painfully sore goosebumps of Jude's overall delicate epidermis of her arms and legs. Stinging searingly fiery her hazelish-brown cabochons at the embarrassing prospect of the stranger lady exquisitely matched with the profusely luxurious powder of cherry hue decorating uniquely her porcelain, elderly appealing complexion.

The older lady's unhealthily unimpressive skin tone emulated to the achromatic shades of the paleness. Furthermore, she stood solely 5'1 before the taller figure of the former pious sister of the church whose very presence could be interpeted as a fully uninvited guest. Her big, roundish silver brown bijous elegantly matched with her balding, femininely thin eyebrows and her subtly thin, brim mouth. Notwithstanding her elderly physique, a halo ringlet of greasy hoary tresses cascaded her mid-back fashionably as a fistful of her fringe curtained incredible her porcelain façade. Her body structure etched its prominent muscles and curves averagely even though her critically unhealthy skin tone.

In spite of the foreign older lady's presence granting its stormy tempest of discomfort innundating the Bostonian's pit of her stomach with unnatural glacial coherent waves trashing unceasingly, a wryly welcoming, jovial smirk wickedly tugged at the corner of her chapped mouth. Wry mirth authentically majestic inscribed the curves hypodermically of her heavy wrinkles. Her attires were a humble knee length old-fashioned rosewood dress with boat neckline and long sleeves bonded with embroidered showy cashmere belt binding her waist, paired with thick, rigidly woolen jet-black pantyhose guarding her bony legs and modest violet slippers shoeing her brittle, petite feet that weren't ideally matching with her outfit adequately.

Last but not least, incredulous stringency twisted past her round, slender profile as well. Her name was eventually Jane Daisy Martinez.

"G-Good day, ma'am!" At the moment, a sheepishly demure stutter almost died on the younger woman's fat of her tongue, boring her honey brown cabochons into Jane Daisy's grayish, sluggishly buffing a coyly formidable, gracious smile upon her roseate, insatiably cherub lips. Her jet-black gloved fingers childishly unnerving fidgeted the winter ebony pantaletot swathing her torso as its hem perkily vibrant flared across her hips. "Are ya actually having some sort of associations with the ex-Monsignor Timothy Howard?" The sheer awkwardness even more intensified forcefully fierce its tension of the platonic pairing that maintained an appropriate distance.

"No, ma'am!" Maneuvering a shake of her head in solemn disagreement, consequently the huskily high-pitched, rusty undertones of the pensioner's polite address reined the blonde to quirk quizzically a dark, thin eyebrow at the response. "There isn't such a person living in this apartment."

"Oh!" A heavy, rusty sigh bubbled up from the former devotional member of the clergy's brittle chest, whereas Jane Daisy knitted her balding eyebrows to the bridge of her delicate nose as her dimples ruefully cheerful creased her façade. "I didn't mean to disturb, but I am so oblivious to that place." Panting severely while one of her elvish gloved hands amenably formidable pawed the very wall of the corridor, channelizing to timidly poise her body posture and attempting to find its comfort, factly, the angles truly computed as well. "I thought he was living with a familiar girl whose name is Y/N L/N!" Under the woefully ironically inviting gaze of the Mexican compatriot, yet Judy felt so compact, so vulnerable and so weak after her roseate, scrumptiously plump lips curled at the reticently enigmatic stutter.

"I am dearly sorry, ma'am, but I am afraid to admit that I don't know either of them at all." The purely biddable unfamiliarity of Jude with the Mexican compatriot eerily paradoxal spellbinded its eerily shamefaced paradox of the shyness ruffle of the younger woman's facial expression, abiding discreetly untouchable and stubbornly emotionless to maintain an appropriate proximity that could be gauged within a handful of inches solely. "I didn't mean to be brash, howsoever, I doubt you found the correct address of the person you are really looking for!"

"Per se," A severely rusty, infernal snort emerged from the former religious holy woman's nose whilst trying to sort her train of thoughts neatly without an ado and dragging her paw out of the wall promptly. "I am sincerely sorry for disturbing ya, ma'am! Have a nice day!"

"It is okay. Don't be sorry!" At the moment, the senior lady ushered to flex her throat shortly after the bitter lump's thickness profusely trashed to coat hypodermically, squinting up at every motion the former nun convulsed efficiently. "Farewell and have a splendid day!"

--- *** ---
--- Flashback ---
--- Earlier Today ---

"Mr.Howard, for how long have you had those injuries?" Shortly after the studiously professional examination of the bloodthirstily brass, infernally cardinal claws jettisoning its tracks on his former prey of spiritual possession, you and Timothy's childlikely innoconuous discomfort leaked ethereally timeless under the male doctor's leery gawk and managing to narrow his pools of profoundly glossy, glassy apple green. A straight line insecurely wore thousand patterns of nonchalance across the senior male doctor's pleasantly tanned profile.

Just an hour after the breakfast you both shared with the British compatriot and getting ready for the current day especially due to the exceeding visit in the hospital, consequently a big mass of agitatedly anticipating patients whose ages varied from children to seniors. The unnerving tick of the elapsing seconds smacked their diabolically agitated impatience to function frequently through the recurring twitch of the clock arrows, indicating the real time.

Just almost a half an hour after anticipating for your turn at last, thus you and the former holy priest set food inside the doctor office. The destination to the hospital endured approximately a half an hour or rather equating to the sheerly impatient anticipation in the grandiose façade's dully lifeless, ironically securely coherent walls' sanctum. The pungnent reek of devilishly contagious of nausea severe medicaments, human sweat, human flesh and stiffness suffusing broadly in the site and pronging the flexible, tiny nostrils. The dim sun streamed its surreptitiously vindictive waterfall to submerge the very site's space in the wee hours of the morning.

In the meanwhile, the British aristocrat's virginally alabaster, orthodoxy creamy fingers meagerly cradled the thin fabric of his lavender shirt as it was fully unbuttoned and greet your twains of depths with its entincingly toned, muscly torso glazing them fiercely savage. The hem of the undone shirt gauchingly fleet, uneven flared past his pelvis.

"I guess earlier this morning since they haven't found their feet yet on my abdomen the day prior." The haphazardness of the hoarsely graceful British lilt's adjustment of its stance emphatically didn't vanish into the thin air, boring his chocolate brown gems into Doctor Royale's glassy apple green. Unlike Timothy whose larger frame stationarily posed before the pinewood bureau, professionally neat embellished with smartly sorted a pile of varying files from the thinnest to the thickest in their one of a kind dimension escorting a sheerly lily-white blank accompanying its fountain pen, a pair of eyeglasses and a retro charcoal gray phone, you were currently seating on one of the baby blue parsonas, darting your E/C gems at either of them once it was their turn to formulate their positions on the utmost issue.

The aftermaths of the vile essence's tentative harbor underneath his tender, fleshy muscles guarding and contouring his frail skeleton's anatomy roused the effects of that couldn't be just solely mental and conducting its thickly sable, hideously humid blotches of shadows and demons tinting his vision and vortex of thoughts, besides physically in the form of the invincibly unhallowed devil's meaningfully unique, nevertheless, sorely painful tokens emulating to unnatural scratches as if they didn't belong to a lecherously disastrous wolf or a bear. The anatomy of the starkly abnormal streaks of fingernails dragging its flimsy tissues to format its categorical territory nowhere else than the abdomen. It couldn't be much eerier than an unsolved mystery in a thriller movie just a half the movie's time has advanced in the patchy idleness of scarcely obtaining even modicum of evidence about the crypticism sustaining the storyline's genuine concept to be shared with the audience. Tougher than an unsolved crime investigation of a grisly homicide over a couple of decades rousing the brief life of galore of questions without any real and efficacious answers.

Yet Doctor Royale has never encountered different patients complaining about unnatural injuries emanating from the wickedly unthinkable monsters or rather demons that have once resided spiritually the very bodies of their former preys. It seemed peculiarly bizarre to maintain an adequately formal communication with somebody that has not only witnessed the staged vile essence's cardinal command of its person's figure to accommodate to the countless unspeakable deeds and infernal language with its abysmally blood-curdling accent, but also contemplating through the fatly rigid unfolded-curtains-clad scenario of the graphical conjurations.

"That's peculiarly odd, Mr. Howard!" Muffling a dry cough managing to clear the thickness coating his throat rowdily blatant at the twitch of his bottom lip, throughout the older gentleman's meaty, potent fingers registered to yank his pair of copper Garamond eyeglasses poised smartly to cling to the bridge of his nose during the brief pause. "But since you are the first patient and Miss L/N to know it that I have never accepted any patients that complain about injuries from supernatural creatures like demons or witnessing exorcisms at least." The unevenly icy, sluggish pants pumping the British aristocrat's ribcage at every expelled breathy contraction's remnants, sharp incredulity puckered across the older gentleman's facial features and crinkling his heavy wrinkles at the discrete revelation about his rich experience with the thousands of patients who have set foot inside his office and seeked his council or aid as well. Timothy's heart sunk far-reachingly intensifying in the pit of his stomach and effortlessly blending its fantastic salty swamp of trustlessness at the revelation's pale exposure.

"I can't believe my eyes you have never had cases of patients that used to be possessed or witnessing one exorcism at least in their lives!" All of a sudden, your Maryland fashionable lilt's extraordinarily authentic emphasis bashed your frigidly neutral doldrum abruptly, whereas your gaze landed on the doctor as you maintained an intensifyingly promising, prominent eye contact and bonding the diverse nuances of your bijous.

"I'm deadly serious, Miss L/N and Mister Howard! Even if I am trying my best to help you, well, I am not a demonologist or a priest at all!"

"He used to be a priest and confronting the face of evil not all alone as I was midst the fewest close people of his circle of small friends to the best of my knowledge. I and my friends also were the essential organisators of the initiative to banish the demon out of his body."

"I see!" Meantime, Richard Royale's masculinely potent, marbled fingers ushered to snatch the fountain pen to jot down on the oyster-white blank a handful of prominently eminent notes about the recent visitants in his office especially the former ambitious Monsignor as the mumble almost died on his tongue. "Does his family know about the exorcism and that wound?"

"Not at all! They aren't even that close and they haven't spoken to each other for years." During your half-hearted declaim and opting to stabilize the luxuriously official maintenance of eye contact with Richard, he shot quick glances spearing you and the former ambitious Monsignor as his utter focus was darted to the sheet of paper and the freshly scribbled a couple of notes, the jet-black ink glimmering past his eyesight shortly after its permanent's etch of the warily illustrated letters forming words that were individually separated and numbered as paragraphs.

"Oh! I thought Mister Howard or at least you were keeping in touch with his family, howsoever, sometimes the circumstances cannot unite us with the most precious people ever in our lives." Honing up obdurately ominous your ears to be all ears to each pelt word sloppily foaming Richard's chapped, glossy mouth, whereas you and the British compatriot manifested to exchange a mutually piercing, down-to-earth glances, great bewilderment fusing brilliantly its overwhelemedness winkling your indiscernible pitch-black pupils for a split second as you ushered to quirk quizzically mischievous, questionable your eyebrows. "Since I can't aid you all alone, you have to consult with a priest or somebody who has a brilliant knowledge of the demons and exorcisms, besides the priests, themselves."

"Is it possible to cure the wounds just like the ordinary method with the scratches from any wild beasts?"

"It's left hanging in the air, if you are asking me to give you a real opinion on the demons and those spiritual baloneys some people are confessing to have met in face-to-face."

--- *** ---

--- Flashback ---

--- An Hour Later or So ---

"Miss Y/N L/N?" In the interim, one of your petite, femininely creamy hands' spidery fingers shyly cradled the doorknob of your manager's office just moments after your arrival in the cafeteria with great deal of delay articulating the real time that is slowly but surely progressing and descending to its twilight. In a single swift motion the door was elegantly shut, whereas the middle-aged gentleman ushered you to take a seat against his bureau, boring his coffee brown cabochons into yours and escorting sinisterly stringent each motion of your muscles and facial expressions' anomalies accompanying the quivers. "You may take a seat!"

"Mister Kasman!" A sardonically wry, cold-blooded chuckle emerged from your throat healthily inviting, approaching the bureau promptly in series of strides murmuring against the carpeted floor, offering him a woefully guiltless smile sluggishly elaborating at the very thought of the stringently raw colloquy's agitated anticipation, whereas the middle-aged man quirked ironically joyous an eyebrow at the formally professional address."You wanted to see me urgently."

"Yes and that is why you are here!" The suddenness of readjusting his seating posture, the manager's flaccidly bulky arms impaled to proper on the armrests, whereas his naturally baby-pinkish, thin lips struggled to craft the mere curves of a sardonically austere smirk, donned up in its candidly vibrant shades of his very nature once one of the coworkers' goose was cooked altered his stance immediately. The heart pulses amplified megawattly utmost even when your fairly poor attempts to sort your mind and assimilate the aftermaths of your late arrival at the workplace could somehow rumble up to peter out your high spirits, whereas purely relentless rabidly rapid hammers into your chest synced the inebriatingly shameless sore throbs in your ears, almost outnumbering your manager's austerely crude, sarcastic ode's chant. "You were very close to losen your position due to your imprecision!"

"E-Excuse me?"

"You know that you used to be one of the most diligent employees in that site? Your diligence and sheer seriousness truly heartened your colleagues and me to be touched by your hardwork and maturity."

"Y-Yes?"

"It is a shame I don't see the same person in my office even if it has the same name." At the moment, Connor Kasman manifested one of his colossal, masculinely calloused hands' meaty, strong fingers to reach for his mug of freshly brewed, steamy coffee as his nude pink lips wedged to wrap around the rim when the dark liquid slithered sleekly to hydrate his organs and berry-coloured tongue. You managed to grapple your thighs uneasily at the hem of your conveniently ordinary emerald green woolen dress as it chaotically perky flared slightly above your knees, struggling to elaborate the vehement swig of the thickness swaddling uncomfortably your feminine Adam's apple during the seethe of your delicate throat muscles. "I cannot force you to change even if I would like to behold the drastically changed person to have one ounce of decency."

"I didn't mean to overcome my delay with excuses, nevertheless, the real reason behind my late arrival than the usual was that I needed to escort my friend to the hospital due to the gravely severe injury on his abdomen-"

"I don't care anymore, Miss Y/N L/N," A mild pause stung the intensifying escalation of the atmosphere when the Bostonian registered to clear his throat after muffling with the palm of his colossal, veiny hand the mewl of the blatantly dry, cold-hearted cough. "Your friend could be anything else even the stray cat on the street you wanted to pet or bring it to the vet clinic for sterilization."

"It's not my first time to be late for work, but there are circumstances that postpone my presence to be right on time."

"It could be your last time also. Don't think there is always no last time for anything! There were hundreds of children that have passed through similar path of yours and didn't succeed at all!"

"What's happened? Are they okay?"

"You don't have the right to ask me that question! And let's keep true to our word. From today you are no longer even an employee in this business and having the ultimate right to step in my office."

Author's Note: Two flashbacks and a sequel to the cliffhanger from the previous chapter! Initially, I was thinking one scenario for the sold apartment by the reader to have a new owner and to embrace with its eerie emptiness Jude once she ventured up inside, nevertheless, I altered my mind quite quicker than the expected. 

Yet Timothy hasn't recovered from the demon claws' injury on his abdomen as we shall see if according to Doctor Royale if the encounter with a priest and a doctor along with the patient would solve the unsolved mystery. Let's not forget the female reader loses her position as waitress in the cafeteria, due to the fact, she was late more than the usual even though the manager is astoundingly strict.

What are your thoughts all prominent moments that loomed in the chapter? Do you think the final scene is an easter egg which will aid the reader and Timothy's relationship to stregthen rabidly rapid in a jiff? 

I hope you liked and enjoyed this chapter! Furthermore, don't forget to leave a feedback if you have candidly enjoyed it!