All the Lies (Lies & Truths Duet #1)(28)

I slowly open my eyes, and the darkness grips me by the throat again. Like a savage animal, it claws at my skin and crunches my bones.

The ground is so far away. If the ropes fail, my skull will be crushed to pieces. There are no people in sight.

I’m going to fall.

I’m going to die.

No.

Not now. I didn’t survive this long to die now.

Panic won’t help me. Not at all. I grip the rope with both hands and drag my unsteady leg on the solid edge.

The pole creaks behind me. The ropes loosen, moving me farther out.

I lose my footing and scream. My nails dig into the rope and I hold on to it with all my might.

My fingers scrape, and a hot liquid trickles from underneath my nails.

Air suffocates me and I can’t breathe. For a moment, I let that gloomy cloud take over my mind.

Why don’t you let the rope drop you?

Why don’t you die?

I shake my head furiously, inhaling shaky breaths.

In my dream, I made a promise to that female voice not to die.

Slowly, I inch my leg to the edge, clenching the rope in a death grip. The material scratches against my bloody nails.

My senses heighten and every little sound registers in my ears: the squeaking of the shaky pole, the desperate drag of my leg to the solid edge, the roaring pulse of my heartbeat.

I attempt to sit down. My leg nearly slips, and the ropes tighten around my wrists. I stop, sucking in a shaky breath.

Carefully, I stand back up with one of my legs suspended in the air.

This is it. I have to rip it off like a Band-Aid.

Inhaling deeply, I claw at the rope with my nails and push myself back.

The loud squeak of the pole registers first.

Then the loosening of the rope.

Tears fill my eyes as my entire body leans downward, toward my imminent fall.

I’m so sorry I couldn’t keep my promise.

I’m so sorry.

A brute force pulls me back by the rope. My body jerks to the edge and the bindings tighten around my wrists due to the power.

I topple over and fall into a solid embrace.

Cold, but also warm.

Hard, but also safe.

My heart, which was ready to die a second ago, resurrects back to life with a shocking force.

I gasp for air as if I haven’t been breathing for days or months.

The need to cry hits me like a hurricane. I’m caught in the eye of the storm, begging for some sort of release.

Blinking away the tears, I stare up at my savior, the one whose arms surround me like a cage.

He has the most beautiful eyes, my savior. Green like a dark forest, but also like a tropical sea during a storm.

He’s a dream and a nightmare, my savior, like darkness and light.

He’s Asher.





She looks her best when she’s hanging by a rope. Bound and exposed.

Stripped bare.

I admire my handiwork: the knot around her wrists, the duct tape on her mouth.

My dick becomes hard thinking about fucking her in that position.

Will she cry? Will she beg?

My dick has to wait, though.

Reina Ellis’ nightmare is far from over.





The following day, I don’t go to class.

I don’t know how I got back to the house last night. I vaguely remember Asher carrying me, and that’s it.

He asked me who did it, but I found no words. If I’d said anything, I would’ve let the tears loose. I chose silence instead.

Silence is safe sometimes.

Silence is also when the gloomy cloud strikes. You can feel it, you know, those thoughts occupying your mind and refusing to come out.

Thoughts like last night’s.

I felt that yearning to fall and end it all—but Asher stopped it. He…breathed life into me again—against my will.

I didn’t know how much I needed life until my heart kicked into gear, its beat filling my whole being.

It was almost as if it screamed at me to stay alive.

To ignore the gloomy cloud.

So today, I decided to do just that. The pull to remain in bed all day grips me like a vengeful ghost, but I manage to push the covers off and stand, to shower and freshen up.

The only thing I can’t do is look at myself in the mirror.

Baby steps.

I come down the stairs around ten. I stop in the vast living area with all its flawless marble and sweeping staircase. For some reason, it feels vacant and so…wrong.

Wrong place. Wrong life.

Those thoughts from when I first woke up at the hospital assault me again.

I flop down on a chesterfield sofa. The need to lie down and sleep surrounds me like a lullaby, but I don’t surrender to it.

A disaster happened the last time I did that.

Who would do that to me and why?

If I want to find answers, I need to know more about myself.

I pull out my phone and google my name. Several pictures come up, in cheerleading uniforms, at fundraisers alongside Alex, and at parties.

The smile on my face is so sickening and fake. I hate that smile. It’s not me.

There are a few articles about my disappearance for a month when I was twelve, some speculate there was a kidnapping. Others say, it was a runaway case. The picture where I was shot as Dad held me showed me in dirty clothes, my hair in a disarray and my face blank –so blank it’s frightening.