Once Upon A Lie 2

A/N: This chapter gets a little creepy so, um, just be warned. Gross-out warning, I guess? 

Twenty-two:

Alina woke up in the middle of the night to the sound of her bedroom door opening. She jumped, and looked over to see Aleksander coming in. "Aleks!" she got up, and ran over to him, kissing him desperately, pulling at his shirt.

He laughed, and kissed her back. "Did you miss me, Princess?"

"Yes," she whispered, "tell me that they cleared you."

Aleksander pulled away from her. "Cleared me of what?"

Alina frowned. "Aleks, you were pulled in for questioning about the murder of Nikolai. They wouldn't have let you out if you weren't cleared, right?"

He chuckled. "Oh, you foolish little thing. You thought that they let me out?" He shook his head. "No, I escaped."

"Escaped?" Alina furrowed her brows together. "Why would you have to escape? You're innocent. I know that you didn't kill Nikolai."

His eyes darkened. "Are you sure, Alina? The guy that I used to call my best friend tried to steal the woman that I loved from me. How do you know that didn't make me slightly unhinged. And Zoya. That accident with the plane? Maybe I caused it. Maybe I wanted to kill her, all so I could be with you. The same way that I killed Nikolai, so that no one could get in the way of me having you."

Alina flinched. "Aleksander, please stop. This isn't funny. You don't know what you're saying."

He gripped her shoulders tightly. "I do know what I'm saying, Alina. I would do whatever it takes to be with you. You're fucking mine, and nobody is going to take you away from me. In fact, the next person on my list I'm going to kill is that damn Mal Oretsev. Because I KNOW that you had feelings for him and he had feelings for you. And I'm not going to let some poor kid nobody take my girl from me."

"Aleks, you're hurting me," Alina whispered, "please, let me go. Please, stop saying such horrible things."

He chuckled, and let her go. "I'm saying these things, Alina, so that you understand the situation. You are my wife. No one else is going to have you. No one else is going to get in the way of us being together. Do I make myself clear?"

She cowered from him, not sure what to do. She had seen possessive Aleksander before, but this was a whole different thing entirely. "Aleks, please...."

"Don't worry, Alina. Everything's going to be fine. I'm not the bad guy here. It's everyone else that's trying to take you from me. You know the truth, don't you?" She watched, horrified, as Aleksander started to pull his skin from his neck.

"Aleks, what are you doing?" she asked. "Aleks, you're hurting yourself. Please. Stop. Please, please, please."

He peeled his skin back, pulling a layer of it completely off. The skin dropped to the floor, and she was staring not at Aleksander, but at Nikolai.

Nikolai grinned at her. "Hello, Lina." Then, the phone on her alarm went off, and she woke up screaming bloody murder.