Dark Dreams: HarperImpulse Paranormal Romance. Dawn Treadway

a high, whiny voice spoke in English. “How is it you know Nias, what business does he have with you, human?”

      Fuck, fuck, fuck, did it just say human like it wasn’t one? She only wanted to go back home. She wanted to wake up from this whole nightmare. She began crying again, and she couldn’t breathe right. The chains were too tight and she couldn’t calm herself.

      She was screaming again!

      “Stop!” It slapped her, hard. “What is your business with Nias? Answer me or I will not continue to be so kind,” it whined in a macabre, singsong manner.

      Although fearful, she felt compelled to lie. “I don’t know who that is! I have no idea who…what do you want from me?” she managed to choke out through the blood running from her mouth.

      It tore through her shirt with a razor-sharp claw, drawing down her chest, diagonally over her breast, across the chains, ripping across her stomach. She cried out and then bit her bleeding lip. The nails made a scratching noise as they pulled over the last of her bindings. Sharp pains were now emanating from her torso in concert with the continued pulsing in the back of her skull.

      “Do not lie to me, I saw you transcend in with him! You were in his home; I saw you converse. What did you discuss?”

      Her vision was hazy and she wasn’t sure what she should say. She didn’t want to make it angrier, but she had the feeling giving it too much information was definitely a bad idea. Actually, she couldn’t think of a good idea at all.

      “Speak!” It ran one of its razors slowly down her arm.

      It was horrifying, but the feeling of being trapped and powerless over the situation was starting to make her angry, despite her terror. She clenched her teeth and began to struggle again, but this time with fury. She shoved aside the pain and pushed back at it with her mind, grabbing the emotions within its head and twisting them. She attached herself to the darkness within it and it consumed her; she knew it would, but she also knew it would only last until she gained control.

      When attempting to alter someone’s emotional state, she used the opposite emotion to push it out. Her success varied. It depended a lot on how in touch with the opposing emotion she could get, and how strong the target was. Although the utter darkness and pure hatred was heavy and difficult to move, she found its self-doubt and the creature allowed her manipulate it; at least, she hoped, enough to get it to stop injuring her. She tried her best to channel pleasure until she could feel its hate dissipate, if only slightly. Unfortunately, she was finding it a little difficult to find any pleasant images to pull from. She only wished hate could move hate. She was feeling plenty of that and channeling it could have knocked the fucking thing on its putrid ass.

      Jade thought she would try to trick it into letting her go. She tried to speak evenly. “I was taken by the man you’re referring to, but I’m not sure how.” The best lies were always the ones that contain at least minimal truth. “I have no idea what he wanted from me. What is it you want from me?” Her anger and pain were starting to make her breathless.

      “I need to know what the Djinn are planning. They are a bad lot. They hurt people, did you know this?” It continued in its high-pitched, unholy melody. She could sense immediately it was lying to her but decided to play along.

      “I didn’t, but I knew when he abducted me that he had bad intentions. I was afraid for my life.” Yeah, does this stupid thing not get that I am afraid for my life now?

      “Yesss,” it hissed, “you were right to fear for your safety, you are much safer now.”

      Really? Did it really just rip its claws through my body and tell me I was safe? She had to get out of here. The pain in her head was abating, but it was starting to swim now, probably from blood loss.

      “I really can’t breathe right,” she pretended to hyperventilate; “can you loosen … the chains?”

      It made a discontented grunting sound, and called out for someone else to come and do the chore. And something else arrived, but she couldn’t see it. Its breath was rapid and short. It sounded as if it only used its mouth to breathe. Whatever it was she could feel its hand come from lower than a man’s hands would be. It seemed to be the size of a small child. It unlocked the chains to give them slack, but as it did so there was a moment it let them give a little more than it needed to, and she felt the chains fall below her knees. Jade was by no means a fighter, but the adrenaline pumping through her body made her fear and anger override her pain. Before she even knew what she was doing she had stepped out of her bondage.

      With both arms straight she clasped her hands together and, using them like a bat, she swung at the hunchbacked creature, knocking it to the ground. The child-sized thing hissed at her and clutched at her legs. She punched at it, and then grabbed at the shadow, ripping at its skin with her fingernails. Thank God for her long fake nails. She could tell she had wounded it and torn at its flesh, which is exactly what she had wanted to do to any one of them since they had flayed her own skin. She began running blindly, staggering for the light coming through the walls, hoping she had been right and it was a door of some sort. The floor was damp or slimy, maybe, and she could feel her feet almost slide out from under her several times as she ran.

      When she actually made it to the wall she crashed into it as hard as she could, trying to use her body like a battering ram. She didn’t look behind her, but she could hear multiple shuffling footsteps rushing toward her. The wall didn’t budge. As she felt up and around the sides of her prison, panic began to take over again. She heard herself starting to breathe too quickly as she became hysterical. Then they caught up with her. The first one grabbed her by her hair and ripped her backwards to the ground. She managed to get her hands behind her before her head hit the floor, but her arms burned with the impact. It began dragging her back across the slick floor. It was speaking fiercely in that bizarre language again, stopping suddenly to kick her in the ribs and yell something at her. She started to break a little. If they started in on her again …

      And then she heard a deeper voice boom through the darkness; it was right above them and it seemed to speak the same language, but with a much deeper tone. She turned in the dimness to see a figure towering over the beast, grabbing it by its neck and twisting, producing a horrible cracking noise. She could hear the sound of other monsters scatter and then pained, high-pitched moaning. Another force seemed to be beating them down.

      Jade still lay on the floor in a state of alarm and shock, turning over and trying to crawl away without being noticed, pain wracking every part of her body. She couldn’t even force herself to her feet, but still, escape was the only thing she could fathom. Then a large thing that felt warm and solid and smelled like a familiar musk picked her up in its arms and held her close. As she began to struggle, still panic-stricken and feeling the pain of the gashes that other thing had ripped into her body, it spoke.

      “Jade, it’s okay.” He, and it was most definitely he, the he she had run from, pulled her face toward his so she could see who he was. “I’ve come to get you out of here. The things are dead, I’ve got you.” Even in her shock she knew that beautiful face and his voice soothed her. She immediately sensed inside his mind; he was hyper-alert, aware and concerned; he emanated calm safety. And involuntarily, she curled in tightly to him.

      “Get me the fuck out of here, please!” she said breathlessly.

      He began walking with her toward the other side of the warehouse, as he shouted in that unusual dialect to some others she couldn’t make out in the darkness. She suspected he was calling out orders at them about going after the fleeing creatures. It sounded like there were four or five other men. But she had no intention of lifting her head to find out. She felt safe curled in her current state, buried beneath his long, dark hair, which spilled over her. He even smelled like safety. A warm rich musk mixed with sweat, a dirty masculinity. She could feel the hard muscles in his arms and the thickness of his chest, and for right now she wasn’t moving a muscle of her own.

       Damn it, why did I let her go?

      Right after she had left, Nias had