The Bloodied Rose Novels & Stories

I sighed, putting on the safety of the weapon and tucking it into my waistband. "Let's go boys, the fun is over" I ordered and turned to leave with my men sauntering behind me. ROSELLE'S POV. I heard the pistol go off twice before feeling the bullets pierce my body. Everything came to a stop as I fell hard to the ground. I laid still, feeling the rain drops beat down harshly on my body and listening to the sound of retracting footsteps. I could feel my life crawling gradually out of my body and to be honest, being shot in the stomach and left to bleed out on a cold wet pavement in a dark alley, was certainly not one of the ways I wanted to die.

Marybeth nodded, biting her lower lip, "Camille Something." "Yep, that's her," Elijah said, pointing at the first photo of a lifeless woman slumped against a Bridgewater couch. If it wasn't for the glimpses of white in her sleep set, it would have been hard to tell what colour it was before the gruesome attack. Like her blonde hair, it was soaked with blood. It was the black rose at her feet that caught Marybeth's eye, though. She'd seen black roses before. On P*******t. But she never thought they were actually real—

They came far after Erebus began to feed the rose by dropping blood on its petals, and the rose grew more and more of a bloodred scarlet, somehow looking enticing and delicious. Suddenly, Erebus stopped where he was, looking horrified.

A tiny crimson bead of blood welled up on my skin. "Careful," Greg murmured. He had been standing a few feet away, but at the sight of the blood, he stepped closer, his presence immediately grounding. I reached back in, more cautiously this time, and gently lifted the object out by the stem. It was a freshly cut, incredibly thorny rose. The petals, which must have originally been a dark, velvety red, had been carefully spray-painted pitch black. The edge of every single petal had been meticulously lined with a border of sparkling silver glitter.

Samson nervously hugged Summer and looked at Rose warily. “What could I possibly do to her?” Rose sneered, stood up, and looked down at Summer. “Since you can’t get her, I will destroy her for you.” Summer felt that the buzzing by her ears was very loud, and there was a pool of heat at her lower body. “Blood...” Her snow-white dress was dyed red with blood. Summer looked at the blood stain on her dress in alarm. “How could this be?” Not far away, Adrian leaned against the wall and chatted with a beautiful woman.

As I put one of my feet inside of the warm and welcoming water filled with the petals of the beloved and most beautiful rose. I sometimes wonder why it has so much love being given to it. It is so imperfect, yet that is its perfection just like all of us--We are perfect and one because of the imperfections of us. I also wonder why a rose just steals my heart every time I look at it--it's just so magnificent. Is it because of the color that it possesses or because of the way it possesses the frail heart of mine? So melted in my thoughts that I was, I didn't realize that I had to get out of the bath to get ready.

He carried a large bouquet of roses and looked at me with a mix of regret and longing. "I was blind, Rosie. It felt like I was living in a dream before. Now that I've woken up, I realize I can't live without you." The set fell silent as everyone turned to watch. Allen had no shame declaring this in front of so many people. I felt thankful for having eaten lightly that morning; at least I had not thrown up yet. Allen continued his self-absorbed speech, "Can you give me another chance? Let's start over. We were engaged after all—"

His gaze fell on me—disheveled, my body covered in the marks of another man. In an instant, his eyes turned blood-red.

He clenched his fists as he stared out the window of his penthouse, the city sprawling below him like a maze. "You lied to me, Matteo," he murmured to himself. "You think you can hide her from me?" A sharp knock interrupted his thoughts. Rafael turned, narrowing his eyes at his trembling informant. "You said you found something," Rafael said, voice like silk wrapped around a blade. The man nodded, sweating through his shirt. "In Matteo’s jacket... sir. We found... this." He handed Rafael a small, dried rose, stained dark red. Blood roses.

But he had brought her scent with him. I walked to the edge of the cliff. The sea crashed below, a roar of white and azure, hungry and indifferent. I extended my hand, the one holding the rose, and opened my fist. The flower fell. It tumbled through the air, spinning, shedding petals like drops of blood, until it vanished into the foam.