Page 99 of Reckless Seduction
I didn’t hear the door.
Didn’t hear footsteps.
My breath catches, a sharp inhale that burns my lungs as panic surges back with renewed force. I scramble backward, myhands slipping against the thin sheet as I push myself toward the wall, heart hammering wildly in my chest.
“Hey… hey.”
The voice is low, careful, as though it’s trying not to startle me further.
Still, I flinch.
My gaze darts toward the source, straining against the dimness of the room. The shapes are indistinct at first, shadows layered against deeper shadows, but I can make out the outline of broad shoulders, the subtle shift of movement as someone adjusts their stance.
“It’s just us,” Yelena’s voice adds, quieter, closer.
Us.
The word doesn’t bring comfort. It shouldn’t. Not here.
“Don’t come closer,” I manage, my voice raw and unsteady as I press myself harder against the wall, as though I could disappear into it.
They stop immediately.
No hesitation. No argument.
Just stillness.
“Okay,” the first voice, Miranda, replies, gentle in a way that feels almost foreign in this place. “We won’t.”
The silence that follows is different. Not as suffocating. Heavy, but no longer crushing.
These women have been my anchor since I arrived. They aren’t catty or bitter. At least, not all of them. My chores have barely given me time to talk to them, and I’ve spent more than my share of the last however long I’ve been here in isolation, but they’ve still shown me kindness at every turn.
“We have to stick together,” they told me the first time they introduced themselves.
I drag in a shaky breath, then another, trying to steady the erratic rhythm of my lungs. My fingers curl tightly into the fabric of my shirt, grounding myself in the sensation.
“I thought…” My voice falters, the words catching somewhere between my chest and my throat. “I thought someone?—”
“Bad dream,” Yelena’s voice says softly.
I hesitate, then nod before I can stop myself.
Something shifts in the air between us, making it steadier.
“We heard you,” Miranda murmurs. “Didn’t sound like nothing.”
I wipe at my face with the back of my hand, frustrated by the dampness there, by the weakness it represents.
“I’m fine,” I say automatically, though the words lack conviction even to my own ears.
A quiet breath of sound follows, something that might have been a sigh or the faintest hint of disbelief.
“No, you’re not.”
There’s no cruelty in it. No judgment. Just a simple truth laid bare.
It twists something deep in my chest.
