Page 118 of Safe Word

Sunlight stabbed through the blinds, carving across my lids like blades dipped in fire. My mouth tasted like cotton, a sour trace clinging to the back of my throat. The taste curdled into something metallic as my stomach twisted. The air felt wrong, heavy and syrupy, as though the world lagged half a second behind.

I tried to lift my arm, and the motion dragged, my muscles refusing to obey. A cold shiver crawled up my spine despite the summer heat.

Not again – the thought flared through the fog, searing enough to break through the headache. The weight in my limbs, the crawling pulse beneath my skin – it was the same. The same chemical sleep I’d fought before.

My heart punched through my chest.

I pushed up on my elbows, searching the room. The sunlit lines on the walls blurred, doubling at the edges, and I blinked hard to clear my vision.

Then it hit me – the full truth of what had really happened.

He couldn’t have found me. He couldn’t have—

Every sound became suspect: the air conditioner, the creak of the floorboards, my own breathing. I clutched the sheet to my chest as if it could protect me, whispering his name under my breath.

I fumbled for my phone, blinking against the glare on the display as I checked the time. 11:07 a.m. Shit.

I almost sprang up like I’d been burned – until relief hit me a second later: it was Saturday. No work. No bookings. No pretending I had my life together for the sake of my job.

But then the reprieve cracked, a gnawing unease creeping into my chest at the blank hole in my memory. How did I get to my bed?

I looked down – the dress was intact.

I flung my legs off the side of the bedframe as I tried to piece together the night before.

I remembered going to the club. Cain had been there and so had Vinnie. The memory of Ghost surfaced with all the heat it deserved. There were drinks, too many faces, books, too much noise. And then… nothing.

My eyes caught on the camera mounted in the corner.

I opened the security app, fingers trembling as I navigated the cloud-stored footage.

Rubbing at my temples did nothing to clear the fog in my brain, and pain was slowly rising – about to bloom into a full-fledged migraine.

The last thing I could recall was Cain’s concerned face, his voice asking me what was wrong. But after that? Nothing. Just a black void.

My pulse raced, anxiety infecting my chest. Did I say something? Do something? I was still wearing the dress I’d shamelessly bought off that girl in the club. So, nothing serious had happened. Maybe?

The timeline blurred as I opened the app and scrubbed through the footage from last night.

There I was, stumbling into the flat, Cain’s arm wrapped firmly around my waist. His face was tight with concern, his mouth moving, saying something I couldn’t hear. I fast-forwarded, dread coiling tighter with every frame.

Then—

I froze. The image jerked to a stop.

Me. My hand. The gun. Pressed into Cain’s jaw.

I recoiled from the screen as if it had burned me, my chest locking up, air refusing to flow.

‘Oh no,’ I whispered, the words raw in my throat, shaking with the sting of shame. ‘Oh… no…’

What the hell had I been thinking?

What the hell kind of person points a gun at someone who was trying to help? Who was I last night?

Maybe I wasn’t just drunk… or drugged. Maybe… Scarlett had taken over me – slipping through the cracks, seeping into the hollow places within me. She didn’t second-guess. She acted before I even felt the blow. And now I was left with the mess. With the bloodless aftermath and the pounding question I didn’t want to answer.

Was I losing myself?