Page 74 of Sorrow & Strangers

He laughs that delicious, sinful laugh, and his hands move to cup the backs of my thighs. With little to no effort, he picks me up, wrapping my legs around him. The room is still swathed in darkness, but at the far end, a door begins to glow softly.

“You know, this isn’t the first time you have dreamed of this room,” he says. “I wonder what is behind that door?”

“My way to escape you,” I quip back, and the glow on the door ­brightens.

He laughs again. “Wrong door. This one is locked down tight by your subconscious,” he says, walking us toward the door, my back to it. I have no idea what is behind it, but I do know it’s nothing I want to see, and it’s nothing I want him to see.

“Put me down.”

He ignores me, and with every step, the glow from the door gets brighter, illuminating the room more and lining the stranger’s form. He digs his fingers into my ass, and I slap him hard across the face, so hard that his head snaps to the side.

“I said. Put. Me. Down.”

He snarls softly. “You hit me, I will retaliate.”

I growl a challenge, slapping him again, harder this time. “Put me down. Now.”

He retaliates, but not by putting me down and pushing me away as I was hoping. Instead, he smacks my ass so hard that the cheek stings, and to my horror, I moan in pleasure, my core heating.

He spanks me again, and I shiver, heat pooling low and deep in my core. But as he shifts me in his grip and reaches for the knob on the glowing door, all I know is that I do not want him in that room. I don’t want to be in that room. I don’t want to be in that room with him.

I snarl, feeling my power build inside me. It surges out of me, and I rip control of the dream from him. With barely a thought, I banish him from it. I fall, hitting the floor hard with a soft gasp. I sit there, despite the ache in my ass that displaces the warm pleasure his hand left behind, staring at the door. The instinctual fear I felt dissipates as the glow from the door dims, until I’m left in complete darkness again.

The blackness of the void. This isn’t like before. What have I⁠—

I surge awake. Fighting the blanket wrapped around me, I sit straight up in the armchair. Sweat is trickling down my forehead, and I am panting, my whole body quaking.

My phone pings, and I grab it, looking for any anchor, unsure how to center myself.

Unknown

Do not do that again. You almost got trapped there.

I swallow and close my eyes, gulping down air. That’s why I feel so awful. The obsidian void almost swallowed me. After a few moments and numerous deep breaths, I’m calm enough to reply.

Summer

Then stay out of my dreams.

His reply is immediate, and I can feel his anger through the phone.

Unknown

You try my patience.

I groan when that delicious sting in my ass cheeks starts up again. I shift and lift my skirt. Pulling my panties to the side, I can see his handprint emblazoned on my skin, looking almost as if it has been branded there.

Summer

Leave me alone.

Unknown

Never. Brat.

The anger surges inside me, and I throw my phone against the wall.

Chapter Thirty-Eight