Total pages in book: 129
Estimated words: 130048 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 650(@200wpm)___ 520(@250wpm)___ 433(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 130048 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 650(@200wpm)___ 520(@250wpm)___ 433(@300wpm)
Another foggy haze clouded my head, tugging me down, down—
No.
I clung to the connection between us.
I braided a rope of all our secrets and all his confessions, lassoing myself to him so I didn’t fail when it came time to act out our scene.
You both can’t be compromised.
You understand that, right?
One of us under the influence would be a disaster, but both?
We’d fail.
We’ll forget our lines and—
Rainbows suddenly glittered off prancing zebras.
Waterfalls sounded in the towering potted ferns.
The clicks, chirps, and scurries of jewel-coloured beetles added to the percussion where hooves thundered from herds of wildebeest and the lamenting calls of mated swans above echoed like a sad orchestra.
No.
Please no.
Hunching into myself, I fought the ever-deafening sounds coming from delusion.
A loud knock sounded on the door, ripping through me like cannon fire.
I flinched and ducked over my knees, only for Henri to suck in a worried breath and Peter to nudge my shoulder with his.
The pressure of his body against mine felt wrong, unwanted.
I inched away, wincing at the scratchiness of the carpet against my bare skin.
“Just put it there, please,” Victor murmured, waving at a shell-inlaid backgammon table nestled beside a cage holding a thousand dead hummingbirds all contorted and wired to look as if they flew in an emerald, sapphire, and amethyst hurricane.
“Yes, Sir V.” Two men in black suits placed a large platter on the table before ripping off silver domes and vanishing out the door. The scents of decadent morsels shot up my nose.
I gnashed my teeth together, forcing myself not to be violently sick.
“You said you needed to eat?” Victor smirked at Henri swallowing hard on the floor. “So…eat.”
“Yeah, I’m good.” Henri groaned. “If I eat, I’ll shurl.”
Oh no.
Tears pricked my eyes.
He’s slurring already.
I shifted beside Peter, trying to get Henri’s attention.
Eat!
Please eat!
Soak up the liquor.
Don’t let him win.
A gust of icy paranoia clawed at my spine.
What if he wants to be drunk so he can finally be free?
What if he planned this, and he’s been lying this entire time?
No.
He wouldn’t.
He—
Memories of him chasing me outside the castle came fast. Bruises on my spine as he shoved me down. Flames on my lips as he kissed me. He’d held nothing back out there. I’d seen the truth.
He wants this…
A vision of myself strung up and bleeding corrupted my mind. Droplets of blood dripping out of me, one red bead at a time, falling onto Henri’s tongue, him lapping up my lifeforce just like he lapped up my tears.
He’ll eat me alive.
That’s not true—
A loud, delusional laugh echoed in madness. Laughter as he cut me, then mounted me. His savage grunts as he took me, all while bleeding me dry.
My grasp on reality unravelled, faster and faster, crazier and crazier.
The clock on the wall ticked louder, louder. Things came alive all around me. Animals stared. Birds fluttered. Spiders skittered down the wall.
I tripped into mad hallucinations.
I saw things I knew weren’t real, but I couldn’t stop them. Couldn’t stop seeing hunters with khaki camouflage, cocking their rifles, and slaughtering every miserable creature in this place.
My ears rang with gunshots and death calls.
The screech of a deer.
The bellow of a rhino.
So, so much death.
All around me, above me, below me.
It crushed me into a grave made of bloodstained carpet and misery.
The white and red carpet suddenly transformed into tiny nasty mites, burrowing into my flesh and devouring me.
I heard them inside.
The loud scritch, scritch, scritch as their gnawing little teeth devoured me cell by cell.
I scratched my arms again, deeper this time, harder.
I tried to reach into my veins and pluck their nasty carcasses free.
Peter shot me a concerned look as I raked sharp nails over my hot, hot skin.
This was worse.
So much worse than what I’d suffered when I’d reluctantly puffed some weed with a friend from school. That had only granted crushing anxiety and heart palpitations.
But this?
This darkened my mind with all kinds of horrors.
One moment, my breasts swelled with need. The next, I wanted to throw myself out the window. One breath, I was wet. The next, I couldn’t even touch myself without being utterly repulsed. Polar opposites—love and hate, bliss and despair. A never-ending merry-go-round of yes and no and life and death and louder, louder, louder!
Clamping my hands over my ears, I tried to block out the cacophony of animals. Barks and trills, snorts and whistles.
Too much.
Too much!
“Ily…” Peter hesitantly stroked my thigh. “It’s okay—”
I had no control over my reaction.
“Don’t touch me!” I yelped, skittering away and curling into a ball.
Make it stop.
Please, please make it stop.
Footfalls thudded on the carpet.
The presence of someone’s energy prickled my hypersensitive skin.
I huddled tighter.
I fell and fell, tumbling and tripping into madness.
Heavy, large hands landed on my shoulders, pulling me upright.
I did my best to cling to sanity.
I froze as my gaze met Henri’s.
And in that crystal clarity as our eyes touched and our spirits forged, I saw him.