Page 34 of The Harbinger
“Do you understand?”
I rubbed my throat, the tears fixing to tumble as the pit in my stomach deepened. Beads of sweat broke out across my skin when I nodded.
“Yes, Sacha…” He mimicked a nod.
“Yes, Sacha,” I bit out.
“See to it you remember.”
I collapsed to my knees as he exited the room, my hand tucked around my throat as I folded in half, my cries silent to the world.
Sacha was the horrible monster fueled by women’s nightmares, but instead of hiding in the darkness, he’d paraded around in the light. He’d stolen me away to his giant castle in the woods, and not out of the kindness of his cold, blackened heart.
Chapter 8
Mia
Sweatrandownmyback in rivulets as I leaned over the toilet. It was the same position I’d been in since the nausea and cramps woke me in the night. Tears streaked down my cheeks, and my stomach purged one more time, my throat raw.
Chills swept over my damp flesh, the ice pick in my head mulling around, turning my brain to mush.
I pulled away from the toilet with a grunt and wiped my mouth with my damp T-shirt. Lowering myself onto the floor, I pressed my sweaty cheek to the cool marble.
A pair of polished black dress shoes appeared just outside the toilet room door, and I groaned.
It wasn’t the first time he’d checked on me like a doting partner, but the illusion his presence created never stuck around. He’d stand over me without speaking a word, then wander off. He was a ghost in the night, a shadow on my walls, the figment of my fractured imagination.
He flushed the toilet, pulled his slacks up his thighs, and hunched over, balancing on his heels. “I’ll have the physician come look in on you today.”
I rolled my forehead back and forth over the floor, my stomach popping and groaning. “I don’t need a doctor.” My teeth chattered together as the lies slipped between them. “I need something to take the edge off.”
My skin ached as an unseen force stretched it, creating a licking burn everywhere.
“I doubt you’ll leave your room much today, but if you do, remember your boundaries.” He reached down and, with gentle fingers, brushed my bangs from my temples. “I’ll have Francesco heat you some soup.”
I groaned. “Sacha.” The thought of food swirling around my tongue brought bile up my throat, making my molars throb. I couldn’t eat even if I wanted to. “Just give me something to ease my pain.” I closed my eyes as his warm touch left my skin. “It’ll make all of this go away.”
“Those days are over.”
Another sob flew through my cracked lips. “Please. Make it stop.”
I hated begging. Since myawakening, I’d had to beg for everything—a place to sleep, drugs, and food. Jenny had even stopped me from getting into a car with a strange man because he had promised me all the pills I wanted.Too good to be true,she said.
“It’ll stop when the drugs are through your system.”
I grabbed his ankles as he stood, and my walls tumbled down. “Don’t leave me.Please.I don’t want to be alone.”
Sacha shook my weak grasp off his leg, discarding my vulnerable cries.
His rejection boiled inside of me. “I hate you,” I screamed after him, slamming my fist onto the unforgiving floor. “I hate you.” A gut-wrenching sob filled the space around me as I wrapped my arms around my twisting stomach and pulled my knees to my chest.
He bent over and wrapped my hair around his hand, the strands straining against my pained skin. “I’m not asking for your love and affection. The more you hate me, the more I get off.”
Sacha released my hair and stood, then walked away, his expensive shoes clicking against the floor as I sobbed.
Water dripped down the cement walls, creating a steady echo through the room, distracting me from the faint, cool fingers dragging across my cheeks.
I jerked from the touch, snorting air in while I swiped at the alien feeling, the walls shifting to plastered creamy yellow when I squinted. The muscles in my body convulsed, shaking the bed beneath me as an old man stood above me, his features vaguely familiar.