Page 89 of Flirting with Darkness

Lying to myself doesn’t work. I am being forced to do this. I did not choose this. I did not choose him. I want out. I need out.

I—

I yelp, suddenly, unexpectedly pulled up from under my arms.

Before I can get any sense as to what happened, something—someone—takes me by the waist and throws me up over a hard surface that hits my stomach as I bend in two.

The disorientation lasts less than ten seconds. Then I realize I’m on someone’s shoulders, thrown like a sack of potatoes.

Very large, very strong shoulders.

My head faces his back, and all I can see is a black velvet jacket and sleek dark hair, falling to his back.

I catch the scent of the woods—pine and musk, and freshly cut grass. It shouldn’t have been appealing, but it is.

“What are you doing?” I ask, surprised by my even tone.

I should be screaming. I should be confused and angry. Instead, for the first time, in two days, I feel all right.

Safe, even, though safety has come in short supply of late.

“Indeed!” Valdred yells as the stranger walks away with great strides.

He buttons his pants and trails after us.

“Is it in the wild ways, to steal women like a brute?”

The stranger remains silent and keeps walking. Valdred has to jog to catch up with us.

“Aedron, what’s the meaning of this?”

Aedron.

I don’t know that name, but the fact that he saved me from being forced to give head to a total stranger—pretty as he is—instantly endears it to me.

At least until he stops and pulls me down from my perch, carrying me by the waist again.

I only have time for a glimpse, but Aedron is absurd. No man should have a mouth as sensual as his, and dark lashes so thick and long. Silver-gray eyes shine in the moonlight.

I thought Valdred handsome. And Eochan, Jaynus, as well as many men before. I was wrong. All pale to this stranger, and his sensual, masculine lure.

I’m lost in the silver eyes, that seem to hold an entire constellation of stars in their depth, when he throws me back in the air.

I scream at the top of my voice.

“You can’t do this! She’ll die!” Valdred screams.

I wasn’t saved, then. The stranger is murdering me.

My instincts are all wrong.

Nothing prepares me for the terror when I fall into ice-cold depths. In my panic, I breathe, and inhale water through my nose and eyes, instantly flooding my lungs.

I’m in a pool of sorts, deep under the surface.

I try to master my fear. I’m not dead. I’m not dying. No one’s holding me down. I can just swim to shore.

In the distance, I see the light of the moon shining. Who would have thought I could fall so far in mere seconds.

---