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Because now, I can feel him pounding after me, his breath teasing the nape of my neck as imaginary claws reach out to grab me.

The house bends and shifts around me. Shadows stretch and contract. The very wallpaper seems to breathe. Every corner feels like teeth, and every open doorway looks like a gaping maw, waiting to swallow me whole.

I shove past a cracked hallway table, nearly tripping on a loose rug. The main stairs up to the third floor loom ahead. There’s no rhyme or reason to my running anymore.

Now, it's all about survival.

I get to the staircase, reaching for the banister to charge up to the third floor.

Suddenly, an iron grip closes around my ankle. I shriek when my leg is yanked out from under me, sending me sprawling and crashing into the steps.

My kneecap slams into the hardwood stair, and pain flashes up my thigh. But he’s already on me.Everywhere.

My survival instinct kicks in, turning me from passive victim to a fighting demon. I lash out, jamming my heel back. He grunts and dodges, and my heel slams into his thigh instead of his balls.

He grabs my ponytail in a fist, yanking my head back so viciously that the roots of my hair scream for mercy. I jab an elbow back, and I’m rewarded with a grunt as I slam into something relatively soft. The hand releases its grip, and I start to scramble up the stairs...

I barely make it three steps.

His weight crashes into me, sending me crashing back down. I whirl, nails out, raking them over his bare skin as he roars with pain. He grabs me by the throat, but I slam my forearm into him, and when his grip loosens, my hand moves on its own, rearing back and thenslapping him.

For one silent second, horror rushes into my face, and my eyes go wide.

Then heat blooms acrossmycheek, utterly stunning me.

He just slapped me back.

…and I didn’t hate it.

This is part of the sickness I’ll never be rid of. A black part of my soul that fuckingcravesit.

Submission not because I’m submissive, but because it’s beenwrestedfrom me.

As the heat stings my cheek, an even darker one throbs between my legs.

I lash out again, but it’s futile. A pathetic whimper chokes from my throat as he easily stops my fist, flips me over, and sends me crashing against the stairs again.

I jolt, panting and gasping, my knees on one stair, my elbows two higher, and my cheek pressed to the one above that. I cry out when he yanks on my ponytail again, arching my spine.

A blubbering moan tumbles from my lips as he grabs the back of my yoga pants in his fist and yanks them down to my knees. I try to kick and fight, but his open palm crashes once, twice, three times against my ass, making me scream and yelp as heat explodes across my tender skin.

Nero spanks me again before he grabs the lace of my thong between the globes of my ass and rips it down my legs.

“That’sit, baby,” he snarls as he spanks my ass again, tearing a scream from my lips. “Struggle. Fuckingfight me. It only gets me harder. It only makes me want to ruin this pretty little cunt even more.”

My leg kicks out again, but he knocks it to the side and yanks my ponytail harder, grunting. Pain and pleasure explode through my system, making me drunk on the madness of it all.

“Uh-uh-uh, princess,” he snarls, spanking me again,hard. A squeal wrenches from my throat as my core clenches. “You don’t get to tap out,” he growls. “You begged for this. And now you'll take it like the good little whore you are.”

A sob of pleasure erupts from deep inside me as he rams two of his fingers into my pussy. I’msoaked,but even still, the words “gentle” and “Nero” have never once been uttered in the same sentence.

The breath is knocked from me as he shoves his fingers deep inside, making my eyes bulge as I choke on another cry. He starts sawing his fingers in and out of me, making sloppy wet noises that fill the darkness around us.

“You’re such a filthy, messy, eager little thing. Tell me, slut: were you already this fucking wet when you were outside, staring up at the house, fantasizing about all the bad things I’d do to you? Or was it running through the shadows like my fuckingpreythat turned this greedy pussy into such a dripping mess?”

I groan as he jams his fingers into me again.

“So…”