I should run.
I should scream.
I should disappear.
Instead, I skitter backward, trembling and slick, caught between fear and desperate need.
“Ten,” he growls. Something in his voice tells me he isn’t playing.
Fuck.
I turn around and bolt out of Edward’s office.
My feet slap against the cold marble floor, breath tearing from my throat. I race through the hallway, past oil paintings of dead aristocrats who stare down like they know exactly what I’ve just unleashed.
“Nine.”
His voice follows me, and there’s something wrong with the tone. It’s far too calm, like he’s done this before.
I round the corner, my feet skidding on a pile of dust I must have missed while cleaning. My lungs burn. My legs scream with each step. The hallway stretches endlessly ahead, lined with locked doors that hide god knows what horrors.
“Eight.”
Shit. I sprint past the dining room, past the drawing room door and into the kitchen, my breasts bouncing with every stride. The back door crashes open under my hands, along with a gust of wind. Gritting my teeth, I burst out into the cold morning.
“Seven.”
I knock over a discarded wine bottle, but I don’t stop. Can’t stop. Gravel crunches underfoot. I’m panting harder than a racehorse. Every instinct warns that if I slow down, it’ll mean something terrible. Sweat beads on my forehead despite the chill. Blood tinges the back of my throat from breathing so hard.
“Six.”
My heart somersaults. I push harder, legs pumping. Each breath burns hot and raw. I glance over my shoulder. The garden blurs past. The house grows smaller, but I can feel him watching in the windows. Tracking my movement with deadly precision.
“Five.”
The orchard looms ahead, its trees heavy with red apples. I crash through tangled limbs, branches clawing at my skin. Rotting fruit litters the ground, sticky and sweet. The air reeks of decay and something older.
Cool wind blows in from the sea, chilling the outerlayer of my skin. My body becomes slick with sweat and fear and the cum still leaking from my pussy. The trees close in behind me, swallowing the path. Everything smells overripe. Like things left to rot in the sun.
“Four.”
Oh shit.
What the hell?
I trip over a root, scrape my palm on rough bark, but I don’t stop. Not with a potential maniac at my back. Not when he’s threatening to tear me to shreds. I push harder, my lungs gasping for air. The orchard seems to stretch forever, its branches reaching like skeletal fingers trying to drag me back.
My legs shake from the sprint. Every muscle burns with each step. Copper floods my mouth, and my pulse roars at me to go faster. I can’t hear him. Can’t see him. But I feel him on every hair on my body standing on end. My skin buzzes with electricity, like he’s already here. The silence is worse than his voice. But then most predators hunt without sound.
I sprint toward a row of tall trees looming at the orchard’s edge. My chest heaves and the blood pounding in my ears drowns out all sound. Every vein feels ready to rupture, and my heart beats like it might burst free.
“One,” says a cool voice from deep within the forest.
My heart stutters. What the hell happened to two and three? I whirl around, scanning the trees for movement. For a glimpse of his scarred flesh or wild hair. Everything’s so tightly packed that all I see are crawling shadows.
“Rowland?” I whisper.
No answer. Just rustling wind through the leaves andmy own ragged gasps. Is he toying with me? Or am I going crazy?
