Page 54 of Lost in the Dark

I’m back on my throne, brooding. Various demons keep wandering through, trying to cheer me up or invite me into a particularly delicious nightmare, but for once I’m not interested.

I thought Libra and I were both getting something out of our relationship, such as it was, but perhaps I was selfish. I didn’t really tell her what she was getting into, that her body would be left sleeping in her own realm for days on end, only waking when she absolutely had to eat or drink. That she was helping to sustain my court. I fed on the fear she helped create, but ultimately, the satisfaction she got out of it was empty.

Even the sex wasn’t real for her, not the way it was for me. It was all a hollow experience in her subconscious, something that left her feeling hurt and used. Something that made her correlate me with Evan Adler.

None of that is what I wanted for her, but I can see how it’s my fault. By not taking the time to ask her how she felt or tell her what was really happening, she thinks I used her, that I only wanted her for my own ends. Even when she woke up, I tried to bring her right back here.

From a human perspective, I behaved terribly. I see that now.

“Sire?” someone says. “We must speak with you—”

“BEGONE!” I bellow, standing up from my throne and clearing the room with a single glare. I never yell at my demons, but at the moment, I need to think. And not about nightmares.

Was she right? Was I simply using her? I suppose it’s possible; I don’t have a great understanding of humans. But I don’t think that’s all it was. I feel something for her that I’ve never felt before, for anyone or anything. Something that has nothing to do with how delicious her fear is.

When she compared me to Evan, said we were the same, something inside me hurt deeply. I think it may have been my heart. I saw many of the things he did to her, and they enraged me. To think that I harmed her in the same way…I must atone for this. Somehow. But she no longer wishes to see me, so what can I do? I can protect her from further nightmares, but I already intended to do that. Was already doing that.

I need to speak with her, find a way to apologize for what happened and learn exactly what went wrong. How to not do it again. But she said she doesn’t want to see me, and I have to respect that. No more selfishly taking what I want from her.

I owe her that much.

LIBRA

There’s another knock at the door, and I sigh, wondering what Haven wants now. I open it without thinking, expecting my friend to be standing there. Instead, it’s Evan Adler in all his menacing glory.

“Hey, Eliza,” he says in a low voice.

I swing the door shut, but he blocks it and forces his way in, sending me backpedaling into the cabin’s living room.

“How did you find me?”

“It wasn’t hard. You don’t have many friends. All I had to do was watch them until one of them led me to you.”

Fuck. Haven had no idea what was happening when she came here, no idea that she needed to be sure she wasn’t followed.

“What do you want?” I ask.

He smiles a slow, evil smile that holds no humor. “I told you, time’s up. You took my life from me, Eliza. It’s time to repay the favor.”

I still feel numb and shell-shocked from my time in Callister’s court, and fighting Evan seems hopeless. He’s always held power over me, been stronger than me.

And we both know it.

He grabs my arm and for just a second, I go with it. I remember everything he did to me: drugging me, giving me to his friends for sex, forcing me to deliver drugs to creeps. Who am I to fight him? I’m just sad little Eliza Hightower, the girl who constantly attracts the wrong kind of attention from men.

Except I’m not.

I’m not Eliza anymore, and I won’t let him take me down without a fight. I’m older, stronger, tougher. I’m Libra Cartwright, dammit. I’ve tangled with demons, and however evil Evan Adler might be, he’s only a man.

So I wrench away and sock him with a hard right hook, connecting with his jaw and snapping his head back.

“Fuck you,” I say, ignoring the pain in my knuckles.

“Bitch,” he says, slapping me hard across the cheek.

“You better believe it,” I tell him.

I pop him with a jab before he can react and then I’m moving, grabbing the baseball bat from the corner, silently praising this cabin’s former decorator.

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