Page 212 of Somno Slave

My mouth opens before I fully think. “Deogal—”

Nothing happens. There’s no flicker of recognition or shift in his eyes. No secret softness hidden underneath the mask.

Nothing.

The absence is violent. Because this man has had his hands inside every part of me. He has watched me cry and shake and come apart for him in the dark. He has touched me slowly enough to make my own body betray me. He has looked at me like I was something holy to ruin.

And now he looks at me like I am nothing.

“Patient continues displaying fixation,” Peter says evenly from behind the glass. “Persistent delusional attachment to lead investigator.”

Lead investigator.

The words hit me sideways.

My head jerks violently toward Peter.

“What?” The word breaks apart immediately. “No. No, Peter, that’s not—”

“Welcome back, Miss Ainsley.” Deogal’s voice slides through me like a blade. It’s calm, smooth. Practiced.

I choke on the breath.

My entire body reacts before my mind does. Pulse detonating. Heat flashing low through my stomach so fast it feels humiliating. Terror following immediately after, cold enough to make my hands shake against the restraints.

His eyes stay fixed on me with detached clinical patience, like he’s waiting for symptoms rather than recognising a person. He lowers himself slowly intomychair, one ankle crossing over the other, fingers resting against the arm like he has never been held down by anything in his life.

I stare at him and feel my mind try to reject the shape of him.

My breathing starts turning uneven again. “No, stop. Stop fucking doing this.”

He doesn’t react at all and it fucking knives me.

This is a man who ruined me completely, sitting three feet away and looking at me like I was never special to him at all.

“What are you doing, Deogal?” My heart slams. “Why are you doing this?”

A sob catches in the back of my throat. It claws up like it has talons.

“No,” I choke. “This isn’t real. This can’t be real.”

His eyes hold mine. “You keep saying that to things you don’t want to believe.”

My wrists ache beneath the restraints. The skin there is damp, sore, already swelling where I fought too hard against leather and metal. I do not look down, because if I do, I will see orange again, and if I see orange again, I will remember that my badge is gone.

I try to sit straighter. The band at my throat forces the movement small.

“I’m a doctor.” I say like it helps.

“Yes,” he says. The agreement disarms me so completely I lose the next breath. He watches that too.

“You were very good at it,” he continues, his voice low enough that it does not need to compete with the hum of the room. “Standing behind the glass. Writing things down. Giving other people’s madness clean names so you didn’t have to smell it on yourself.”

“I helped people.” I splutter.

His eyebrow arches. “Did you now?”

I glance at the glass. Peter stands with his arms folded, expression locked into something unreadable. Mike stays slightly behind him. Sean is near the monitors; one hand pressed to the back of his neck.