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How did he find me?
Turning, I dart inside the skyscraper.
"Hanale, elevator." I barely manage the words to the doorman through the fog threatening to engulf me as I dash across the lobby.
I slip through the elevator doors before they've even opened halfway, then sink against the wall. As the numbers slowly climb, I let out the breath I had been holding. My head falls back against the metal box, my legs giving out as I crumble to the floor. Forcing deep breaths, I will the memories to stay away, yet the words refuse to leave.
Dirty. Whore.
I scream, clutching my head, but the words remain.
* * *
Tears spill down my cheeks, yet I don't wipe them away. They've been falling for so many hours, I hardly notice the wet stream anymore.My empty prescription bottle sits on my nightstand. The pills haven’t helped. Their blissful calm never came.
Curled up in my bed, I clench my eyes closed as the words replay in my head.
Dirty.
I shake my head. Black hair flies chaotically, slapping my tear-stained cheeks.
Whore.
I bite my bottom lip to stifle my cries as I ball my clammy hands into fists and beat my mattress.
A door slams from somewhere in the penthouse followed by voices yelling.
“I told you to go to the windward side!”
A muffled reply, followed by a loud crash, draws me out of myself.
“Fuck.” There's another thud. “What the fuck were you doing?” Damien's voice rattles through my door.
I jerk my head toward the sound. The response is too soft to hear, followed by a third crash.
My entire body shakes. I should stay in my room. Deal with my own demons.
Instead, my feet shuffle off the bed. I tiptoe to the door and ease it open. The voices grow louder as I sneak down the hallway and peer into the great room.
Chairs lay scattered everywhere. One of the end tables sits on its side, a broken, white vase in pieces in front of it.
I should turn back. Hide in my room. Yet I creep closer.
“What type of appointment?” Damien growls, holding his brother against a wall.
Half a dozen men surround the two, standing motionless as though the destruction and violence were just another day.
“I had foa see Zhou.”
“What. Did. You. Get?” Every word is punctuated as Damien fists Dorian's shirt tighter.
Dorian shrugs, tapping his chest beneath Damien’s hands. “See foa youself, braddah.”
Letting go of Dorian for a moment, Damien pauses before ripping his shirt open. “I said, no!” The whole house shakes with his words. A tattoo, nearly identical to Damien's, peeks out of Dorian’s open shirt. “So, that's your plan? I told you, no, so you go behind my back? Destroy everything?”
“Not destroy. Take over.”
My head spins. I crouch down farther, placing my hands on the ground to steady myself. Crawling into the kitchen, I lean against a cabinet and try to slow my breathing.
