Page 111 of Dirty Pleasures
Sickening dread washed over me.
What are they doing to her?!
Their forked tongues flicked at her exposed flesh with a sadistic hunger. Those scales glistened in the candlelight as they moved with a sinister grace, winding around her limbs, across her abdomen, and her breasts.
And worst of all, one slid across her face, obscuring her features with its scaly form.
I picked up my pace.
The masked figures snapped their views my way.
The air grew even colder, seeping into my bones and numbing me from within.
And then I just couldn’t move anymore.
I wasn’t frozen in fear.
I very much wanted to fucking get to her, but I couldn’t.
The power to move, to breathe, to even blink, had been cruelly stripped away from me.
Come on!
This sinister energy sparked on my skin.
Move! Move!
A force, invisible yet unyielding, had seized me, pinning my body in place. My arms were locked at my sides, my legs rooted.
What is this? Am I that high? Or is this really happening?
I strained against whatever it was, muscles corded with effort as I attempted to push forward. But it was like trying to move through a wall of dense, solid cemented-air.
Only my heart continued to pound.
I stood there, frozen and choking.
Powerless.
A mere pawn in a twisted game of torment.
Oxygen whooshed back into my lungs, allowing me to breathe.
I gasped on air.
My chest rose and fell, but that was all that moved.
Although my vision was blurred, I could make out another masked figure emerging from the darkness.
It was a small-framed, short person wearing a mask that was a grotesque parody of an evil elephant. Jagged menacing tusks protruded from its large snarling mouth. The eyes were black holes, hollow and dark.
The person raised a bone in the air that was slick with crimson stains and patches of red flesh.
Is that a. . .human bone?
Then, Delphine’s voice sounded from the elephant mask. “Calm yourself, lion.”
I couldn’t open my mouth to speak. I tried to will my legs into action, but they remained as immovable as stone.
