Page 120 of Emperor of Lust

My head snaps up, my breath coming sharp and fast, filling my lungs with the bitter taste of smoke. There’s a sharp chemical taste on my tongue, and something burning at the edges of my mind.

Darkness surrounds me, thick and oppressive. I try to move, but ropes dig into my skin, holding me secure.

I’m tied up.

Raw panic lances into me, sending my pulse spiking as the familiar crashes back—in my veins, my throat, with every thud of my heart in my chest.

I can’t move.

It’s dark. It’s happening again.

And I can’t fucking move.

The panic morphs into a vicious black weight, pushing down on every thought and breath until it feels like I’m suffocating in the darkness.

My shoulders ache as I twist my hands against the restraints, trying to find even the smallest bit of give. Nothing. The ropes are unyielding. I try to lurch forward, and then my heart stops when the groundmovesbeneath me.

Tipping. Dropping. Then…lifting slightly, as if I’m perched on something unstable.

My entire reality blurs at the edges as naked fear grips me. I twist again, screaming, desperate to escape this hellish nightmare before it claws me back to that night. But then the ground shifts again.

A sharp, loud whistle pierces the darkness.

My head jerks in the direction of the sound, and my heart stutters when I realizeI’m not alone.

The girl looks a little younger than me, maybe twenty-ish, with long, coppery-blonde hair cascading down her shoulders and wide, gray eyes that meet mine in the shadows. Like me, she’s tied to a chair, arms and legs bound, about twenty feet to my left.

When our eyes lock, she quickly shakes her head side-to-side.

I’m about to open my mouth when she looks down significantly into the darkness below. I frown as I follow her gaze to the floor beneath me.

Holy fucking God.

Cold, sharp horror sinks into me. We’re perched on a massive wooden plank that stretches like a see-saw across a blackened, charred steel beam.

I’m on one side of the fucked-up see-saw, and she’s on the other.

We look to be about the same size. The same height. And critically, the sameweight.

Balanced.

As my eyes adjust to the darkness, my throat closes off and my blood turns to ice.

The abyss drops beneath our little see-saw into inky black nothingness, endless and empty, waiting to swallow us both, maybe a hundred feet below.

Panic surges up, my breathing quickens, and I start to jerk and yank at my ropes again as fear wraps its bony claws around my throat.

The floor rocks again. Instantly, three sharp, loud whistles ring out in the murky darkness. I shudder as I clamp my mouth shut and go still, turning slowly to look at her.

Again, the girl shakes her head side-to-side, pleading with me to stay still.

If I don’t, the board we’re on will rock, pick up momentum, and eventually tip to one side.

Sending us both plunging to our deaths into the darkness.

The girl’s eyes are locked on mine, intense, wide with her own fear.

“Who are you?” I whisper, my voice as raw as my nerves.

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