Page 10 of Cerberus's Branding

“Gotta admit, brought you in here thinking you’d break easy. Many times, I’ve brought someone in here and they’ve broken. Just from sitting in the electric chair. You, though, you haven’t even spoken since I took you from your car.” Without touching me, he stands from his squat and leans in a bit. “I admire this about you, Ember. You refuse to allow yourself to break. Tell me, does anyone else know about your scars?”

I don’t answer, but that doesn’t mean I don’t jerk my head to the side, breaking eye contact with him.

Samir chuckles and steps away. “Interesting.” Moving around me, I feel his hand glide along the wood of the chair, but he doesn’t touch me. “I’ll explain why you’re here, Ember, then I’m going to do something I’ve never done before,” he says from behind me, his head lowering to speak at my ear. “I’m going to let you go, and you’ll deliver a message to your club for me. I’d thought to use your dead body as thatmessage, but I like you.” His fingers then move behind me to run along my upper arms. “You have spirit in a way that I find intriguing. So, you’ll live to deliver this message.”

“I’m sure I’ll be seeing you again real soon, Ember. Think of my leniency when I do.”

Bolting upright, my breathing heaving, nausea coils in my stomach like a python squeezing its prey.

“Easy, baby, breathe.”

I hear his voice, but I don’t all the same.

The throes of the dream still held me in its clutches.

Will I ever be rid of the dreams of that Halloween night?

This time it was worse, though. So, so, so much worse.

“Breathe, baby, breathe. You gotta get control of your breathing.”

Blinking, I stare at the man sitting next to me.

“Cerberus,” I whisper, my breath hitching. “What are you doing in here?”

“Heard your screams, came to check on you,” Cerberus explains, hand coming up to cup the side of my face.

“I’m okay now, just a dream,” I tell him, looking anywhere but at Cerberus.

Talk about embarrassing. He got to witness me in the midst of a nightmare. One I can’t seem to get rid of. One that seems to be worse than ever.

“That wasn’t just a dream,” Cerberus remarks calmly. “Don’t even think it was a nightmare,” he utters far too quietly. His fingers trail down my cheek, and he grips my chin between his thumb and finger. By doing this, he forces me to meet his gaze as he asks, “You talk to anyone about thosenightmares?”

“I don’t need to talk to anyone about them,” I tell him tersely and yank my head away from him.

Pulling my covers up higher on my body, shielding myself from his view. “You can leave. I’m good. Promise.”

Cerberus sits next to me for another long moment before getting to his feet. “You need anything, come find me. You don’t have to talk if you don’t want, but I’ll listen if you do. Doesn’t even have to be anything heavy.”

He starts for the door, his words swirl around in my head, and I surprise myself by whispering, “Thank you.”

“Not a problem, Em,” he murmurs and closes the door, leaving me alone once again.

Thankfully, there was a soft glow of the bedsidelamp, taking away some of the shadows in the night. I fall back into my bed, curling my knees up to my chest and wrapping my arms around them.

The nightmare is still so fresh in my head. His words . . . distorting, changing to that of Samir’s. Never before had it been like that.

Maybe I should talk to someone about the dreams and what happened. Unfortunately, it’s not like I could go to a therapist about it, they’d be compelled to report the latest to the authorities. Though I think there are a couple rules or such about it, but HIPAA only goes so far. With my latest incident, I can’t go in there talking about it. Not if it were going to cause waves for the club.

I learned a long time ago, the club comes first. That’s what my uncles always said, at least.

The only ones it leaves for talking to are those who would look at me with pity in their eyes or baby me. I didn’t want to be placed on some mantle like a porcelain doll. I wanted to be me.

How I was going to do that and fight back these nightmares is what I don’t understand.

Sighing, I lower my knees, my thoughts drifting to the man in the room next to mine. The one who’d come in here after hearing my screams.

Cerberus.

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