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I sigh, dropping my gaze.
I want to leave, as much as I want to stay.
If I leave, I’ll be going back to my empty dorm, and I don’t really wanna be alone. I don’t want to think of how Lynx should be there but isn’t. And even though I’m kind of by myself here too… At least there’s people. I can play pretend.
Opening the door, flicking the bathroom light off, I sigh, click the door shut at my back and I’m suddenly plunged into darkness.
I blink. Certain I put the light on when I came in. I never leave lights off.
Heart pounding, I march towards the door, slapping my shaky fingers over the light switch. It clicks uselessly, nothing happening when I flip it up then down, over and over. Gripping the door handle with a sweaty palm, twisting it hard, it does nothing, the round knob rattling uselessly as I tug on it. My other hand curling atop it, pulling with all my might.
In a panic, I spin around, thinking about the phone I switched off and left in the dorm. Eyes focussing through the darkness on the bathroom door I just exited, I start to walk back towards it and that’s when I see it.
The shadowed silhouette of someone.
I stop still, broad shoulders blocking the bathroom door, my chest heaving for air I just can’t seem to get.
“What are you doing?” my voice is loud, eyes straining hard in the dark, my brain short circuiting as I silently pray for light.
The laugh that leaves the man is terrifying, my feet are backing me up towards the locked bedroom door before I have to put any conscious thought into it at all. He doesn’t move, but I hear him breathe deep, a long, satisfied sort of sigh.
He stalks forward, slow, predatory, and despite my high, everything inside of me is screaming danger. But I’ve gotnowhere to go as he closes the space between us, stopping just a few feet away.
“Don’t you remember me, Poppy?” he chuckles, and it isn’t funny, the sound, it’s haunting.
I shake my head, my tongue not willing to work as I grip the door handle hard at my back, trying everything to get it open. The man doesn’t move closer, doesn’t try to stop me which fills me with dread, because there’s no way he can’t hear me yanking the door. But with confidence, he stands still, unmoving, unflinching, and that’s worse. It means he knows I’m not gunna get out of here.
“Oh, shucks,” he tuts, and I imagine a faux pout on his lips. “I’m hurt I made such little impact on you that you don’t remember me at all.”
His words slur a little and my head pounds with my pulse. I’ve barely spoken to anybody at this college at all, let alone guys, and I’m blinking harder in the dark, eyes slow to adjust, blurring the harder I strain them to see. But I see light skin, dark hair, and I think back to the night I first met Raiden and make an educated guess.
“Chris?”
“Ding, ding, ding, we have a winner!” he yells loudly, laughing as he does. “God, I’ll have to try harder in future, make sure I’m not soeasily forgotten!” he bellows the last words so loudly I flinch back, my spine connecting with the door with a thud.
“I’m sorry,” I rush out, still twisting the door knob at my back, my breaths a rush of hot air in and out of my lungs. “I didn’t forget you, I just, I can’t see you well in the dark.”
“You think I’m that fucking stupid?” he growls, drawing another flinch from me. “God, my dad said you were a fucking bimbo, but I didn’t think you’d be this dense.”
“Your dad?” my face screws up, confusion rolling through me.
“Yes!” he snaps. “They go way back. Your dad works with mine, he told us all aboutyou.”
My brain tumbles through everything since Christmas. Things my father’s said, done. I think of him shouting at me down the phone when I mentioned a transfer.
A very prominent colleague of mine helped secure your place at that college, Poppy, a very powerful man.
“Chris,” I say, a breath shuddering as it leaves me, I lick my lips. “Why don’t we put the light on, and we cantalk, you can-”
“You know the only reason you’re not back in the psych ward right now is becauseItold my father you were spending Spring Break with me,” he says sharply.
I stutter, trying to process what it is he’s saying, “What?”
“You think you were sent herecoincidentally?” he barks a sharp laugh, my head shaking, mouth gaping.
“You were promised tome,Poppy. All part of another successful business transaction.”What?“But then you had to fall into bed withthem,didn’t you, like a no good fucking whore,” Chris snarls and the tension in my body tightens as he takes another step closer. “I was told I was getting a meek little virgin, not some junkie slut!”
“Chris, I-”
