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But the idea of being alone is too much. Especially when my mind is still far too focused on the nightmare.

I need to be around Maverick. Because somehow, someway, I feel safe with this stranger that God brought into my life.

“Excuse me,” I say to a group of three women blocking the exit.

“Oh, sorry!” one says as she smiles at me and moves out of the way.

I keep pushing forward, heart hammering with the bass pumping from the speakers.

Bodies close in around me, people not at all paying attention to the panicked woman simply trying to make her way to the bar.

And then a man steps in front of me.

I stiffen.

“Hey there, gorgeous,” he says, a drunken smile on his face.

“Excuse me,” I manage and try to move around him, but he slides in front of me.

“Where are you going? How about you let Chad buy you a drink?” He points to himself, then looks over at his buddies and laughs.

“No, thanks. Please—” Chest tightening, I try to take a step backward, but hit a hard body.

Instead of taking my retreat as refusal, the man takes a step closer.

The scene shifts in my mind, everyone around us vanishing. Suddenly, it’s not a drunken man in front of me; it’s a masked monster.

I blink once. Twice. Desperate to clear the memory away. No. I’m not there. I’m safe.

“Come on, gorgeous. Take pity on me,” he says with a laugh, then reaches out and touches my hair.

Everything shifts.

A vice tightens around my chest, cold, harsh fingers ready to choke the life out of me.

Fingers brushing against my hair.

Tugging.

“You should take better care of yourself. I deserve the best of you. Not this ragged mess. You weren’t a ragged mess before.”

The memories slam into me, ripping me from reality and throwing me into that cellar all over again. Breathing becomes an impossibility as I struggle to draw oxygen into my lungs. Darkness closes in around me.

No. Please, no.

“Whoa, no need to be dramatic,” the man says as he reaches toward my shoulder.

A hand closes around his wrist, stopping it in place. That much, I can see. A bit of reality in the rest of this nightmare.

“If you want to keep that hand, I’d suggest not trying to touch the woman again,” a man growls. I don’t recognize his voice, not completely anyway. Is he here to save me? Or is he the monster marking his territory?

“Are you okay, Sadie?” the man asks.

But I can’t see his face clearly.

All I can see is a mask.

I try to focus on something—anything but this panic.