Page 48 of Sanctuary After Dark

The illogical part of my brain screaming at me to run. To look away. But I couldn’t look away.

It wasn’t that one. I knew that. Different room. Different place. Different life. Different people. Logically, I knew this one was different. But my body didn’t care about logic. My body remembered angles.

Arms pulled wide, wrists burning from the way the barbed wire cut into my skin, the way my shoulders screamed long before I did. Long before I felt the white-hot pain of whatever implement was used on me that time.

I took a step back. Then another. I had to get away. I couldn’t be here. My breaths started coming in short bursts as my chest began to burn.

“Breathe, little bunny. In. Out.”

I wanted to obey him; I did, but the air felt thick, like trying to breathe through a thick cloth. My fingers curled, nails digging into my palms as if I could anchor myself there, in the sting, in something I controlled. I shook my head as a whimper escaped from between my lips.

My eyes still couldn’t look away from it.

“You’re okay,” Lincoln’s voice filtered through the panic. His strong hand on the back of my neck was like an anchor. “Just breathe with me, mo laoch.”

The cross blurred, sharpened, blurred again. For a second, I swore I could hear it. The echo of a voice I didn’t want to remember, his voice, calm and pleased and utterly certain I wasn’t going anywhere.

My heart beat harder, and my lungs burned from lack of air as I saw images of the last time they had strapped me to the cross. The blinding pain that radiated through my body when they struck me. The cruel laughter that filtered through my ears.

Feeling fingers lacing with mine and giving a soft squeeze, I knew Lucas had stepped closer. His cologne wafted through my senses. A shiver raced through me as I felt lips brush my temple and the heat of his body against my side.

“We’re here. You don’t have to carry this alone, Elias. You’re not back there. This isn’t the same cross. Now breathe. Please.”

No.

No, I wasn’t there.

I wasn’t.

I was here.

With them.

Lincoln and Lucas.

Two men I was falling in love with. Two men who weren’t disgusted by my scars. Who didn’t think that I was too much. Who helped me face my fears, but never alone.

My Daddies.

Lincoln’s hand on my neck was still there, grounding me. Lucas’s lips still on my temple as his warm breath fanned over my skin. Their cologne filled my senses as I sucked in a much-needed breath and my lungs expanded.

“That’s it. Good boy. You’re doing so well, and we’re so proud of you.”

Lincoln moved closer and wrapped his arm around my waist.

I blinked hard, forcing the room back into focus.

The lights.

The music.

The space between me and it.

Letting Lincoln and Lucas surround me, I squeezed my eyes shut for a moment. Counting silently.

One. Two. Three.

Opening them, I looked across the room.