Transcending Nirvana (Dark Evoke #3) (8 page)

After everything which happened that day, the threats…she was going to risk going home alone? My stomach dropped. “Take the lift, Laur. Please,” I muttered amongst her hair.

“I’ll be fine, you two enjoy your night,” she replied with a reassuring rub over my back.

“I’ll ring you in the morning,” I told her as she pulled away. Flashing a smile, she nodded her head and left the kitchen with Walker in tow as I returned back to my flower arranging with a huge sphere of foreboding nestled in my gut.

We were sitting on the old couch digging into the chicken and onion pizza with extra garlic as the blue lighting flashed from the portable TV at the very end of the room. The result of the girlie distraction Laurie and I set out on was nonexistent anymore. The mentioning of his name alone in the kitchen had sent me on another downward spiral. His face, the sanctimonious smirks, his taxing hands alongside the malice dripping from his voice, was repeating itself over and over, like I was in the heart of a whirlwind. Regardless of whichever direction I turned, something would be there, right in front of my face mocking me––reminding me.

For years I had kept secrets from the outside world, and I wanted nothing more than to keep them hidden, yet at that point, the secret which I was carrying was like a gigantic boulder, one which I wanted nothing more than to unburden myself of. Yet, I couldn’t because, unlike fearing the repercussions for myself, I feared them for the people around me.

“Did you hear me, darlin’?” I was beckoned back to reality by the familiar, accented voice.

“Hmm,” I blinked.

Dropping the pizza in the box, he pushed himself back into the couch, his right arm outstretched across the back. “Never mind. You’re quiet tonight, darlin’. What’s going on in that head of yours?”

It was still rather early in the evening, yet I felt so drained, physically and emotionally. “It’s been a busy day. I’m just tired.”

“Want to turn in?”

“I just want a cuddle.”

The springs made their famous groaning sound as Walker shifted and gestured for me to snuggle under his arm. I did so. With his fingers stroking through my hair, his gloriously masculine scent, and the steady rise and fall of his chest, I was soon falling into slumber, feeling warm and protected in his arms as darkness overtook.

The chair which I was left sitting in, in the doctor’s office wasn’t as comfortable as what I remembered. The padding that my lower body was sinking into was replaced with hard, cold plastic. The remembered wooden arms were now wrought-iron and the bright light that seemed to have made the space bigger, slowly began to darken.

“Kady, you can tell me, you’re safe, no one can hurt you. Tell me what happened.”

My body became rigid when I felt his hand on my leg. I peeked down at the physical contact, his nails slowly digging into my flesh with white knuckle force, the intense pressure behind his grip paling my flesh.

On a gasp, I looked up at the man to my left, his eyes glazed, his mouth twitched as the pressure increased. “Tell me if it hurts. That’s all you have to do. Tell me, and I’ll stop.” A sudden fire and piercing took form where his fingers lingered. I looked down again.

Where his hand once lay now rested two wooden blocks, my knee nestled between them. I watched as the rusted iron spikes slowly bored into my flesh as the screws either side of the device turned and tightened by an invisible force. The squealing and grating of old metal echoed as the bolts twisted. I looked up but Leviton was no longer there with us. It was just me, Liam and the immobilizing device on my knee.

A row of corroded spears impaled the back of the joint, while another row impaled from the front. I opened my mouth to scream, to tell him to stop when blood spat up from the filling punctures, the tip of each spike splintering my bone.

“Tell me if it hurts,” he repeated.

I tried to open my mouth, but I couldn’t. Tears welled at the agony inflicted. I lifted my hand to my mouth, but my lips weren’t there. Only flesh. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t free myself. Not with actions, and certainly not with words.

The evil, bloodcurdling chuckle from beside me faded as quickly as it began as the man disappeared into oblivion. Suddenly, the chair disappeared from beneath me, the room lengthened into a barren, asylum corridor, filled with rusted doors with small grated windows. I stood in its center, listening as a persistent pounding echoed throughout the hallway.

“Kady––” the sudden, rapid whisper of my name in my ear had me turning promptly. There he was again, Liam, standing in front of me with what looked like a meat cleaver in his one hand, covered in blood, the other, a box.

My breathing was rapid; I heard my heart thumping a merciless beat. An unexpected coldness spread through my chest as though someone licked my flesh then lightly blew cooling air. I felt empty.

Glancing down, the sound of my beating heart quickened as my vision rested on the steel parting my chest, the cavity exposed and empty. “I own you. I will always own you,” he sneered as my terrified heart attempted to thump its way free from inside his box.

A hair-raising scream, emanating from one of the rooms, drew my attention from the man. My knee was burning and throbbing, with each step I forced myself to take.

A familiar voice called, “Kady,” the ‘D’ replaced for a ‘T’, as I approached the source of the screams. “Kady,’” he called again. I looked toward him as he repeatedly pounded on the door he was held behind. Through the metal bars, I saw the panic in his eyes before turning to the grate where the screams derived. “Liam,” he screamed. “Liam, let them go, let them fuckin’ go!” The door may have been made from steel, yet I could still see the impact of each forceful blow of his fist.

Peering through the door, Laurie screamed again, her head tipped back as her naked body tensed and writhed against the leather restraints holding her to the gurney. What looked like a rusted ladle with holes was being held above her. The faceless person flicked his wrist, the scalding oil distributed over her flesh causing instant blistering. There he was once again. At her side, he watched me with a sickening grin, the knife in his possession slowly slicing through her flesh, tearing scream after scream from her throat.

As the blood flowed from her wounds, tears flowed from my eyes.

“Kady, darlin’ look at me,” Walker called from behind the door; his hands clung around the bars. “Look at me, Kady.” Tearing my focus from the torturous scene in the room, I looked at Walker. His eyes hunted my own. It was as though he was giving up. As though he knew all too well what was going to happen, yet in a twisted way, he was embracing it. “Run.”

My head shook as more tears came. I wanted to leave more than anything, but I couldn’t. I couldn’t leave him there, knowing that I was the one who put him there in the first place.

“Go.
RUN
!”

I woke with a start. Tears and sweat melded on my face, a gasp expelled, as though I had been holding my breath for hours.

I couldn’t breathe. For a moment, I couldn’t move. Mustering my strength, I finally shuffled myself up in the bed, the springs moaning beneath me. I fisted my hands through my sweaty locks, while unremitting tears fell due to the screams echoing, and the visions replaying in my mind.

I had no idea how I got into the bed. Hell, I had no idea how come I was in just my panties. The last thing I remembered was snuggling on the sofa.

Walker was lying beside me. The drapes were open so the streetlamps and the glow from the moon penetrated the room. He looked so peaceful with the sheet bound around his hips, his torso on full display, and his eyelashes sweeping the arch of his cheek. Nevertheless, all I could see when I looked at him, was him being held helpless behind the door, his fingers straining as they coiled around the iron bars. The combined fire and defeat in his eyes when he told me to run…

I felt sick to my stomach, and although I was awake, it was as though the darkest shadows in the room were the ones whispering my name in that certain terrifying and bone chilling pitch.

Careful not to disturb him, I brushed the sheet from my body and draped my legs over the edge of the mattress. It was 3:54a.m. The sun would rise soon and take with it the menacing shadows, which I was convinced held the voice of the one man in this world that scared me. Despite that fact, I couldn’t force myself to stay in the room where those visuals had visited.

The floorboards were cold as I found my feet. From off the iron footboard, I seized Walker’s red and black plaid shirt he wore the day before, and shrugged it on before quietly stepping out of the room, closing the door behind me.

The lamp to my right was switched on promptly. The ability to see clearly and know that you’re not being hunted by the terrors in the darkness always makes you feel better after a nightmare to that extent. It reminds you that this is reality. Again, it’s the fear of the unknown that sends your heart and mind into overdrive.

On a defeated sigh, I lowered myself onto the couch. The situation as it stood was so confusing. How could I feel angry yet empowered by the memories in which I had lost as I sought to remember them, yet since remembering, I found the anger and the degree of empowerment––of resolve and determination I felt at that time––was being cast aside and once again, fear took its hold on me. I literally felt as though I had been there and back, traveled this journey time and time again and still I couldn’t break the cycle. The only way to break it was if I took Liam’s power away from him. Nevertheless, I had no idea of how, and worse of all, I was scared shitless of what would happen if I did.

The blanket folded over the back of the couch was drawn from its position. With a pillow resting against the arm, I fell back. Using the golden glow of the lamp at my feet as verification that nothing could harm me, I felt my eyelids become heavy. A few times they fluttered closed only to spring back open as another torturous, gruesome image filtered into my mind.

Eventually, the only image to grace behind my eyelids––the one which sent me back into slumber––was that of strength, of power. Of freedom.

Something was crawling over my brow. I lifted my hand to swat it away, only to have it return seconds later. When I heard the soft sounds of shushing, I opened my eyes.

Walker was on his knees in front of me, watching me while his hand gently stroked across my hairline. He looked deep in thought, studying the way his fingers moved over and through my hair.

“What time is it?” I asked sleepily.

“Just after eight.”

I licked my lips with a groan and stretched out my cramping legs. I’d never get used to that damn sofa.

“Another nightmare?” he asked somewhat distracted, his focus remaining on his weaving fingers.

All I could do was nod. I was too tired to do or say anything else.

“I wish you would just wake me up instead of coming out here all the time. You don’t have to go through this on your own.”

“I’ve told you before; I don’t want to burden you.”

“Burden me?” he smiled, disbelieving. “Darlin’, you could never burden me. I panic when I wake up without you there,” he frowned before setting about changing the topic. “I brought you coffee.”

Walker shifted once I reared up from the couch, handing me a mug of coffee from the table behind him. I smiled my gratitude and took a welcomed sip.

“Do you want to talk about it?” he asked when I lowered the mug from my lips and rested the bottom of the ceramic on my knees.

“No.”

“Kady, it would help if you did.” He shuffled to my left and set an encouraging hand on my knee. I winced at the tenderness of the forming bruise, but thankfully, my reaction went unnoticed. “We can work together and try…”

His words went interrupted. “I said no.”

He sighed. “Darlin’ please, let me help you.” In that moment, I felt cornered and provoked. Why couldn’t he just back the fuck off? It was an image in my head that I would gladly give my life to forget.

An adrenaline surge had me standing my ground. “I said,
NO
!” I shouted and before I could register what was happening, the mug of steaming coffee was being hurled down the room, shattering against the cracked plaster of the wall. My body was shaking, my breathing labored.

When I looked back at him, he was simply staring at me. Silently counting to three as I sucked in a breath, and exhaling to the count of five, I closed my eyes, feeling tears rising. “I didn’t mean…I’m sorry,” I murmured with a shake of my head.

His entire expression altered before me. Concern was no longer apparent in his gaze. They were defiant, they were surprised, almost pleased, although I had no idea why. When his jaw tightened a tiny twitch of his mouth broke free, he hoisted me up by my arms so I was standing in front of him. Towering above me, the matted, blond locks from my face were brushed away. “Don’t you dare apologize,” he rasped. The way his lips formed the words with power and emphasis made me tingle. Words, as he tipped my head back, ended, and my mouth was devoured.

His muscular arms, although so substantial in their diameter that my hands could barely cover them, were still being clawed at by my desperate fingers. Even as adrenaline fueled whimpers and groans escaped me, the lasting and uninterrupted sweeping of his tongue through my mouth, fueled and bred yet more carnal sounds.

Frantic hands searched my body, down my neck, breasts, waist, around my back and to the curve of my ass. With a gasp of air between kisses, I was pulled up the length of his body, my legs instinctively binding around his hips while I fisted through his hair, our lips unbroken. I didn’t  know what it was: the fear behind the nightmare I had earlier that night, the freedom I dreamed about as I fell back into slumber, the anger I felt as he pushed and provoked me, the buildup of adrenaline…so many factors to play on, but this was needy, it was erotic…it was a release.

Falling unceremoniously onto the couch, I straddled his hips. My body was unconsciously grinding against the prominent evidence of his early morning arousal, through his boxers, while my lips embarked on the journey down his neck. When the snaps of the shirt I was sporting, were pulled apart, he made short work of stripping the material from my body, my nipples growing taut against the warmth of his flesh.

“Don’t,” he grated, his hands catching my face once my lips began their descent down his chest. He was only just feeling comfortable with my hands touching his scars; my lips however, were a completely different story.

The upwelling of adrenaline had my body physically shaking. I was certain I could run a marathon, either that or beat the living shit out of someone, or take the living shit being beaten out of me. Those feelings roused a degree of alarm for me. So I took my anger, pent-up frustration and determination out on the man lying on the couch, restrained between my legs.

He pushed me back and I shrieked, landing with a thud against the rusted, aged springs. But that lasted for all of a moment. Once coherent thoughts were torn from my mind, never to be formed, and my panties were torn from my body, I pushed myself up, pinning him beneath my body again. His warmth, girth and the feel of his veins as my hands slipped over him, once he was freed of his boxers, was something I needed to get used to. This was mine. He was mine. And that was something I had to continually remind myself of.

Down my golden flesh, his rough, dry hands skated and were soon parked on my thighs, his thumbs making work of massaging the summit between my legs. I knew his intention and I hated it. The desired spot that needed massaging was right there, just a hairsbreadth away, yet his deliberate avoidance and the wicked glint in his eyes simply goaded me.