Total pages in book: 68
Estimated words: 64501 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 323(@200wpm)___ 258(@250wpm)___ 215(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 64501 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 323(@200wpm)___ 258(@250wpm)___ 215(@300wpm)
I twist around to the window behind the bed, only to suck in air from the dizziness created by the rapid action, and with nothing good to show for it. The window is not a window at all. It’s framed concrete, bizarre, and purposeless, which brings my gaze to the nightstand and the low burn of a basic lamp with a white shade. “What is this?” I whisper, terrified, but also thankful I’m still alive. I search for my phone, both on my person and around the bed and then the floor, but it’s not with me. Of course, it’s not with me. My captors would never allow me a form of communication.
My captors.
I let that horrid statement sink in a moment.
I’ve been kidnapped, and there is no doubt in my mind Damion’s father did this to me. No, to him. He’s punishing Damion for daring to love me. For boldly choosing me over him and his agenda for Damion’s life. Anger knots in my belly like a thick rope. I tried to protect Damion by going public, and I know he’s losing his mind right now. I don’t even want to think about what he will do to his father.
I try to stand, only to sway and sit back down, holding my head, a flashback of the man crowding me in the elevator and a needle in my neck, telling me I’ve been drugged. Memories of the things Damion has shared with me break through the fog and land with grotesque clarity. His father has killed before he killed my father. I’d foolishly believed my television persona would allow me to publicly accuse him of killing my father, and remain safe, but I’ve poked a vicious bear.
What was I thinking?
He’ll ensure my disappearance looks random—maybe rape and murder—and the idea crawls through me, insidious, a snake with a venomous bite.
I’m not a weak person, but I start to tremble all over. There’s no way out of this.
I’m going to die.
And Damion will never forgive himself. He’ll kill his father, and he’ll end up in jail.
This is the end of us both.
No. No. No! I scream in my head. No!
I can’t let that happen. I won’t.
Anger explodes inside me, and I push to my feet, only to sway all over again. I pause for a moment, regaining my steadiness, and in the process, my anger simmers and burns. Determination explodes inside me, and I launch myself at the door, pounding on it. “I want to talk to West!” I shout. “I want to talk to West! Tell that bastard to face me himself.”
Abruptly, the room goes black, as in pitch black, to the point I’m not able to see my hand in front of my face. The claustrophobia that’s haunted me much of my life, the beast itself with fangs, sinks into me. Panic rises inside me hard and fast, a sense of suffocation overwhelming me. My hands grip my throat, and I fight the fog of the drugs and remind myself what my therapist taught me. Breathe through my reaction. Breathe…
I force air into my lungs, focusing on the process of doing so, not the darkness, then on the thickness of my lungs and the sensation of the tightness in my chest easing. “Damn it,” I murmur, furious at myself for my reaction to what others would process in a calmer way.
I don’t like the darkness.
I hate the darkness.
I have since that night years ago, when I’d ended up locked in Damion’s family’s wine cellar with the lights out and the door locked. Damion and I were down there talking and flirting, when our pizza had arrived. He’d gone upstairs to grab it when the storm battering the house had killed the lights and the electronic door. We should have never been down there in the first place, but our parents were on a date night, and he’d talked me into it. It would be our secret, he’d promised. Damion had tried to free me, but I’d ended up down there for hours, alone, suffocating in pitch black. It had been West Senior who’d called the fire department to get me out.
Afterward, I’d developed this stupid phobia I’ve sworn will never defeat me or own me. It doesn’t own me. Just as Damion’s father doesn’t own me or him.
Of course, he knows damn well I didn’t come out of that wine cellar unscathed, and the idea that I’m weak enough for him to torment me infuriates me. He doesn’t get to hold that kind of power over me. He does not. I clamp down on any reaction that will please that man.
I will not scream.
I will not give him that satisfaction.
My hands flatten on the wall, and I slowly lower myself until I’m kneeling, willing my racing heart to calm. For long seconds, I hold my position, counting: one, two, three, four—another technique I was taught years ago by my therapist. It’s a way to distract myself and control my mind. It’s not actually the darkness that scares me. It’s the way it creates a sense of being in a box that’s unnerving. But the room is not a box. Nothing about darkness has not changed that fact.