Total pages in book: 94
Estimated words: 91164 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 456(@200wpm)___ 365(@250wpm)___ 304(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 91164 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 456(@200wpm)___ 365(@250wpm)___ 304(@300wpm)
Nothing matchy-matchy there.
I set my hands on either side of my head. “I can’t make it stop,” I say.
“Shit. Allegra,” Cassian starts, his hands on my shoulders.
No. No. I shake my head hard to clear the visions. To stop the whispering voices. Stalking the rest of the way across the room to the desk, I reach to scoop up the ring, but Jet grabs my wrist stopping me.
I meet his eyes, a forest to Cassian’s ocean. I try to pull free but only manage to stumble backward. Cassian catches me and holds me in his arms while Jet keeps my wrist in his and in that moment, I’m caught between both men. Just for a moment we all stand trapped in time the silence too heavy around us.
Jet’s eyes shift to Cassian and Cassian’s grip on me tightens. Jet’s eyes narrow. They’re communicating something in their silence. There’s something between them, these men, something old, something that belongs only to them. Jet clears his throat, shifts his gaze to me and I think he might say something, but he changes his mind or maybe I was wrong. Maybe he wasn’t going to say anything. He releases me and stalks out of the study. He slams the door so hard behind him that I feel the rattle of it in my bones.
“Let me take you to bed,” Cassian says gently, but I whirl on him, reaching for that ring. He stops me before I get it and pulls me to him. I shove him away, struggling to free myself. “Stop. Allegra. Stop.”
I don’t stop. I fight him, pounding my fists against his chest, my damaged hand aching, red creeping along the white bandage. He’s gentle with me, holding me, taking the beating while holding back the wrist of my bandaged hand.
“You promised.” I hear myself saying over and over again. The room is a blur around him, blood pounding in my ears, my head. “You promised to keep me safe! You promised. You promised.” My voice breaks, my throat hoarse, my body tired, so tired. It must be the drugs.
He lifts me off the ground at the moment my knees give way, and I struggle against him twisting and turning and screaming bloody murder as he carries me back to his bedroom, back to his bed.
The woman, the nurse who’d been asleep earlier is on her feet the instant we’re back. She scrubs her face, mutters apologies. Cassian curses her.
“Get a sedative,” he commands, furious as he lays me down.
“No. No. I don’t want that. I don’t want it!” I shake my head.
“Shh, Allegra. It’s okay. I’m going to stay with you. I’m going to be right here with you when you wake up. I promise.”
“Liar! Liar!” I scream through tears as he holds me down and I feel the prick of the needle. “You promised and you broke your promise!” The effects are almost immediate, a sensation of cold, a relaxing of muscle. It starts at my toes and my fingertips and works its way inward. I would welcome it, the loss of control, but I know what’s coming when I close my eyes. I know and I’m terrified.
I shake my head as Cassian lays me on the pillow. “Shh, babygirl. Shh. I’m not going to leave you alone.”
“I’m scared,” I say, clutching his shirt. My voice is quieter because the drug is working. I’m going back into that darkness, those whispers louder, my mother trembling in my arms. “I’m so scared.”
He unravels my hand from his shirt.
“I’m here. I’m not leaving you. I won’t leave you alone ever again. I swear it. I fucking swear it.”
“I don’t know what’s real anymore,” I say as my eyes close, unsure who I say it to. It’s so quiet a whisper I don’t know if anyone hears.
“I’m real,” Cassian says as darkness closes in on me. “I’m real.”
11
CASSIAN
Ifire that damned nurse. Send her out of the house in the middle of the night. Fuck her. Fuck her! I could fucking kill her.
Allegra lies on her back on the bed, just how I laid her down. The fingers of her good hand are twitching, though, her face tightening, lips moving soundlessly. I trapped here inside her nightmare. Another nightmare. This one may not leave her missing a finger, but it will leave scars all the same.
Fuck.
I shouldn’t have sedated her. I broke my promise again. I failed her again.
Fuck!
I pull her to me for the hundredth time. I whisper to her that I’m here. That she’s not alone. She’s unresponsive though. He body limp in my arms. Does she hear my words? Feel my embrace? I hold her tight to me. Maybe she can hear me in there. Maybe she can know she’s not alone.
Hours pass, each minute feeling like an eternity. I don’t sleep. I won’t. I won’t break another promise. I hold her until the light changes from purple to yellow and the sun feels warm on my skin.