Chapter 5

 Karen Pov

I could never have imagined that my life would fall apart as fast as it had, but here I stood on the edge of a cliff staring into a chasm of hopelessness. Everything started to meld together-the fragments of some sort of nightmare I couldn't wake up from. Stephan's betrayal haunted my conscious mind every second, and his touch lingered on my skin like some stain I couldn't scrub off. And Devon. Poor Devon. Of all the terrifying transformations, Devon's was the most terrifying. My protector had been my protector but now was my jailer. His eyes were darker now, dark with something with which I couldn't name.

They longer softened when their gazes met mine. Gone was the warmth that used to attract me toward him; instead, it had just frozen into coldness and replaced itself with steely determination against which I could not break, however hard I tried. He barely listened-I pleaded with him to-and everything I attempted to say to him, to explain how shattered I felt inside, was met by the same disallowing and almost mocking response: "We're getting married, Karen. That's all that matters." Marriage-the word sounded to me like a hangman's noose, closing in around my neck, squeezing out whatever freedom and sense of control I still had. I tried reaching for the love that put us together, but it lay buried beneath layers of his brutality and disregard. His words were no longer promises but commands, and I was the puppet, pulling strings with every passing day.

It started with little things: the shadow dancing along the edge of my vision, footsteps down otherwise empty hallways, that tingling sensation of being watched even when I knew I was alone. I told myself that was paranoid; it was just paranoia born from a mind quite literally deteriorating, but the sensation of eyes never left me.

I tried talking with Devon about it. "Devon, I think someone's following me," I said one night, my voice shaking in my uncertainty. "I keep seeing things-hearing things. It is like someone's always watching me."

His eyes flashed annoyance, and his sighed, his hooking one corner of his lip up in a condescending smile. "You're being ridiculous, Karen. You're stressed. You just need to calm down.

Smooth?." Bitterness was rising, "I'm trying to tell you that something is not right here. Can't you see it?".

"I see that you are losing your cool," he said matter-of-factly. "But we have no time for such nonsense. The engagement party is next week, and I need you to focus.

I wanted to scream at him, make him understand that this had nothing to do with anxiety, that something was wrong. In the manner he now looked at me-as if I were but an inconvenience-my words went unspoken. There was nothing for me to do but to turn to nobody when he did not even believe in me.

Of course, Laura was another matter altogether. Since I'd agreed to the proposal Devon had put forward, she'd grown increasingly hostile; now it seemed as if the malevolence oozed from her pores, and she didn't even make a pretense of concealing it any longer. I found her staring across the room at me, her face screwed up in a sneer of contempt.

I once overheard her- speaking in an extremely hushed tone on the phone, yet full of poison: "I told you, she is too weak for this. It won't take much to break her."

She knew I was listening. I could almost feel her staring at me as she spoke, some sort of dare to come at her. But I did nothing. I couldn't. Devon would side with her; he always did. I was alone, caught between his viciousness and her malevolence, without any hope of escape.

Until the message came.

It came late that evening, after I'd lain in bed staring at the ceiling, gathering all my courage for another day. My phone buzzed on the nightstand, and I reached to it, expecting some kind of insane notification. What met my eyes ran my blood cold.

"You'll never be free."

That was it-five plain words, yet somehow a sort of death to my brain. My fingers were shaking while staring into the screen as my brain whirled around. Who could have sent this? Sick joke? Or warning? I didn't know, but the fear coursing through me with that thought was very alive.

I sat up in bed, my heart racing, struggling for breath as the room shrunk; the walls closed in. I could hear the beat of my heart, the thudding in my ears, deafening against the silence. Then I heard it-faint at first, unmistakable.

Footsteps.

I heard my breath catch in my throat and then froze, listening intently, as slow and deliberative footsteps seemed to grow louder with each one-came to my door. The handle rattled a little, like someone was fiddling around with the door. In that instant, panic surged through my body.

"Who's there?" I whispered, but even that seemed far too loud against the beating of my heart in my ears. No one responded, but the groaning door started to open.

I didn't wait to see who-or what-was on the other side. In one blind rush of fear, I threw off the covers and ran for the bathroom, slamming the door behind me. I locked it-my hands shaking so badly I could barely turn the key. I pressed my ear against the door, listened, straining to hear anything over the sound of my own ragged breathing.

There was one moment of silence; then that low, threateningly delivered "You can't hide forever, Karen".

I stifled a scream with my hand clamped tight over my mouth. The floor creaked as the figure shifted opposite the door, but just as suddenly as it started, it was gone-the steps retreated until I heard no more.

I was even afraid of moving or breathing, sat, and waited-what felt like a few hours. Finally, my exhaustion overcame me, and I slid onto the floor with my back to the cold tile. Immediately, my mind went into overdrive, trying to make sense of it all.

Was that Devon's voice? Laura's? Was this some other person altogether, one I hadn't even suspected? First it was the message, then the footsteps, and now the voice; it was all getting darker than what I had so far considered. But worse still, I didn't know whom to trust.

I cowered on that bathroom floor well into the morning, too afraid to emerge. It wasn't until well after the first rays of sun came through the window that I hauled myself to my feet-my body aching from tension and fear.

One thing I knew for sure: I wasn't safe. Not with Devon. Not in this house. Not in this life I'd somehow found myself in.

The reflection staring back through the mirror was barely one I knew: sunken eyes, skin as pale as it would go, lips pressed in a thin line of determination. I had no idea what was to come next; neither did continuing life this way remain an option.

The more time went by, the more Devon clung onto me, and inside Laura brewed all the more treacherous hate. That message sender had been right; I'd never be free, not if I stayed.

This was not going to be an easy getaway, for Devon watched my every move besides the walls that seemed to inch their way in and close in on me. I had to try. I needed to see some way out before it was too late and the darkness swallowed me whole.

This was only but the beginning of my fight for freedom.