Petal: A Dark Romance Read online

  Content

  Copyright

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Part 2 Fallen Petal

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Chapter 56

  Chapter 57

  Chapter 58

  Chapter 59

  Chapter 60

  Chapter 61

  Chapter 62

  Chapter 63

  Chapter 64

  Chapter 65

  Chapter 66

  Chapter 67

  Chapter 68

  Chapter 69

  Chapter 70

  Epilogue 1

  Epilogue 2

  Also by Linnea May

  CAPTURED ONYX

  Chapter 1

  THE PUPPETMASTER

  Prolog

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Also by Linnea May

  Connect with Linnea

  Copyright © 2019 by Linnea May

  No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without written permission of the publisher.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  All rights reserved.

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  “[…] Know that, like life, things sometimes must fade, before they can bloom again.”

  ~ Unknown

  Prolog

  Petal

  Is this what it feels like to be born?

  Why do we not remember an event of such significance? Our first moment on Earth, our first breath, the first thing we see, the first thing we feel, the first thing we hear.

  Our first thought.

  None of it stays with us.

  It happens to all of us, and we all bear the same pain of not remembering, bereft of that one moment in our short frame of existence when we are nothing and no one. Untainted and raw. Void of any mistakes, burden, and prejudice.

  We come into the world with nothing but the skin that protects us from it, with a set of lungs that lets us breathe through it, a set of eyes that lets us see it, ears that let us perceive its music—and a head that helps us make sense of it.

  But what if you break along the way?

  What if your system gets reset?

  Is that what’s happened to me?

  Is that why I’m here?

  Is that why I don’t dare to open my eyes?

  I’ve been awake for a while now, but I lack the courage to act on it. My head is as heavy as my limbs, resting on a surface that is foreign to me. It’s neither soft nor hard, but combines both qualities in one strange blend.

  I’m lying on my back, with my arms falling off to the sides while my legs stretch across the length of the bench. My arms are bent in an awkward position as they leap over the edges, causing my fingers to prickle when I move them, closing and opening my fists while they hold on to nothing but thin air.

  My eyes remain shut while my other senses slowly wake, one after another.

  The first thing I notice is the smell. It’s not a particularly bad smell. There’s no unpleasant stench infiltrating my senses, nothing that reeks of decay or mold. Nothing that would cause a person to crinkle their nose as they try to find a name for the unwanted aroma that is invading their space. It’s nothing of the sort.

  But it isn’t good either.

  It’s the kind of neutral in-between that’s impossible to grasp, like the air between my fingers. If someone would ask me what this room smells like, I would feel inclined to reply with: “Nothing.”

  Am I even inside a room? My vision is obscured by just my eyelids. Yet there’s nothing but complete blackness, suggesting that I’m surrounded by darkness.

  The sound of my breath is not joined by the soft whistle of wind traveling through trees in my vicinity, no voices in the distance, no feral chatter, not the slightest hint of traffic noises near or far. No breeze caresses my skin as my limbs gradually wake from their slumber, and no sunlight warms my stiff body as I loll ever so slightly, the motions traveling from the tips of my fingers and toes up to my core, as if I were making sure that I’m still there, that I’m still complete.

  And then, at last, I dare to take that final step back into the world.

  I open my eyes.

  And I see... nothing.

  Just as I suspected, there’s no illumination helping me to find my bearings. Eyes open or not, it doesn’t make a difference; the impression remains the same. Nothing but black emptiness greets me. The only conclusion I can draw is that I am, in fact, inside a room. A room without windows.

  A basement, maybe?

  I want to speak, but while my lips are ready to form the words, my voice is not. I lie there, my mouth moving like that of a fish out of water, fighting for a life that slowly slips away. A croak escapes me, but it’s all I can muster. My throat hurts, feeling sore from God knows what.

  Screaming? Did I scream?

  Why?

  I flinch when my confused pondering is interrupted by something unexpected.

  Light.

  A light bulb is switched on above my face, blinding me despite its dim setting. I squint and turn, my entire body coiling on my right side as I seek protection from something I wished for a moment ago. Clarity. Illumination.

  An explanation for all of this.

  I remain curled up on my side for a few more moments, my eyes shut as I hide my face behind my palms. Waiting. Listening. But I don’t know what for.

  There may be light now, but there’s still no sound other than my own erratic breathing. I’m still alone. Whoever switched on the light above my head is not here with me.

  Realizing this helps me overcome the crippling fear that turned me into a ball of wool, entangled in my own confusion and anxiety. I open my eyes before my body unfolds, opening up to the room and finally facing it as I sit up straight.

  The room looks just like it smells—like nothing. It’s simply a gray, dark cell. Four co
ncrete walls embrace me—no windows, no pictures, nothing. Nothing, except a stainless steel toilet tucked away in the corner to my left. A cold shiver runs down my back at the sight of it.

  This can’t be good.

  My eyes travel back over my shoulder, finding a door about ten feet away from me that has the same color as the dark gray walls. It looks heavy, and locked.

  Against better judgment, I make a move to get up and try the handle, but my body won’t let me. My legs give out as soon as I try to stand on my feet and I tumble to the cement floor, landing on all fours. I mewl in pain as I scrape my knee on the ground, my weak hands barely cushioning my fall and sending painful warnings along my wrists.

  Grimacing, I shift on the hard floor, only now realizing that I’m not even dressed properly. I’m wearing nothing but a white nightgown that ends above my knees. White lace adorns the hem around my legs and the short sleeves that partly slipped down my shoulders, almost exposing my boobs as I sit bent over. I reach up, my fingers digging into the fabric covering my chest. The material is delicate, almost see-through—and I’m not wearing any underwear. I start trembling, sitting on the cold concrete with my bare ass, just a thin layer of white protecting my frail body.

  My vision blurs as tears water my eyes when my mind is finally clear enough for the panic to set in.

  Hysteria, desperation, fright. They all overcome me at once, joined by a sequence of questions I have no answers to.

  Where am I?

  How did I get here?

  But most importantly:

  Who am I?

  Chapter 1

  Petal

  Everything I perceive lacks the reassuring familiarity I so desperately seek.

  And that includes my own body.

  Still sobbing, I lift my hands, slowly caressing my tear-drenched cheeks, following the outline of my jaw like a blind person trying to familiarize themselves with someone else’s facial features. I can feel my fingertips grazing along my face, my skin prickling under the touch as if it were that of a stranger. I lean forward, lowering my gaze, and long ash-blonde hair falls down my shoulders, trailing along the outline of my breasts.

  Holding my hands in front of my face, I turn them back and forth, wondering about the faint red lines that circle my wrists. Where do these marks come from? Did someone tie me up? What else did they do?

  I know this body. I must know it, because it’s mine.

  But I have no recollection of living in it.

  My breathing hikes, turning erratic and beyond control once again while the room starts to spin.

  No. I can’t lose it. I need to stay focused.

  My hands wander down, tracing my collarbones before they reach the soft flesh of my breasts, under which I can feel my pained heart beating furiously. I cup my left breast, pressing gently as I try to calm myself down. The hammering slows, but it’s no less violent under my touch.

  This is so strange. Everything is strange to me, even the touch of my own body. My boobs feel heavy and too big compared to everything else, and I feel terribly exposed as they almost spill out of the ridiculous gown I’m wearing.

  What the hell is this? I would never put on something like this.

  Or would I?

  How can I not even know something this mundane about myself?

  I raise my head, my eyes latching on to the only thing in this room that holds a promise for answers.

  The door.

  A deep inhale prepares me for another attempt at getting up on my feet.

  This second try is more successful than the first. There’s no elegance in the way I climb up, supporting myself on the leather-button-tufted bench and swaying like a drunk, but at least I manage to stand. I take a deep breath before I stagger toward the door like a newborn deer, pretty much falling onto the door handle. My fingers curl around it with desperate tension, as if I were holding on for dear life.

  I shouldn’t be shocked, or even surprised, but I still can’t stop my heart from sinking when I confirm that the door is, in fact, locked. The handle doesn’t even move when I work it, seemingly ridiculing me with its stubbornness to follow my intrusion.

  Now that I’m standing so close in front of it, I notice the hatch at the center of it. It’s about one foot wide and almost three inches high, located at the height of my chest. I’m not even sure if it really is a hatch, but if it is, it can only be opened from the outside. Of course.

  I don’t know what else to do, so I resort to the only thing that comes to mind: violence. I curl my right hand into a fist and bang against the door, hoping to create some commotion and noise as the door clanks in its hinges.

  But I’m too weak to leave such an impact on the heavy wood in front of me. The door remains firm, not rattling, not succumbing to my assault in the slightest. It’s frustrating, to say the least.

  Yet I don’t stop until the side of my hand starts to hurt. Gently rubbing it, I step back, glaring at the door through narrow eyes. This dumb thing. I want to burn it to the ground. There’s nothing else here, nothing and no one I could blame for my predicament.

  Though “predicament” seems too small a word for this.

  All I have is this locked, stubborn gateway—and myself.

  “Hello?” I croak, feeling dumb a moment later. Even if there were someone at the other side of this door, they probably wouldn’t hear me, because this stupid thing is sturdy enough to suggest it’s soundproof.

  But I can’t stop myself.

  “Hello? Is someone out there?”

  Seriously, what do I expect? A confused old lady, hastily unlocking the door from the other side and greeting me with an aghast look as she says: “Oh my God, dear. I totally forgot about you! Let’s get you out of here!”

  Under what scenario would this ever happen? It’s obvious that something terrible has been done to me, that I have been kidnapped and locked away by someone with bad intentions. There’s no old lady out there who simply locked me in by accident as she was cleaning the building. There’s someone evil out there, someone who wants to harm me, or someone who took me for some ransom money.

  Is that it? Am I rich? Am I worth something to someone and that’s why I woke up in here?

  I wish I knew. I wish I knew anything.

  I move back from the door, taking small and deliberate steps as I circle my dimly lit prison. Nothing has changed. There’s still no window, no cameras, no visible microphones, or anything that would provide some kind of link to the outside world. Nothing I could hold on to, nothing that could give me some kind of clue of what this is all about.

  All I have is a stronghold door, a leather-button-tufted bench—and myself.

  Myself.

  I close my eyes, wrapping my arms around my upper body as I try to dig deep within, following a trail to the darkest corner of my mind, searching. The answers must be there, hidden behind a black curtain. I just need to pull it aside and peek behind it to reveal the hidden mystery. That’s all I have to do.

  I just need to get there. I need to access my lost memories.

  But doing so turns out to be as impossible as getting anywhere with that damn door. I move in complete darkness, blind and deaf as I aimlessly wander through my empty mind, searching for even the slightest hint, the smallest light, the faintest sound, the most vague image, anything that could guide me, at least telling me what direction to look in, where to turn, what idea to follow.

  But the harder I try, the further anything helpful slips away from me. The blackness thickens, hiding more than it’s willing to reveal, pushing me away instead of calling me in. Instead, I see a wall being built right in front my eyes, brick after brick stacking up to hide the secrets of my mind.

  The attempt is painful and sickening. I’m heaving as my throat closes up and piercing flashes of light mingle in the darkness inside my head, confusing me more than they are helping. I feel like I’m choking, finding it impossible to breathe and too painful to continue my futile search.

  My eyes
open at the same time I hear a noise coming from the door.

  Chapter 2

  J

  She’s so calm.

  I expected a lot to happen once she woke up. I thought she’d scream, I thought she’d ram against the door, crawl at the walls, run around yelling obscenities.

  This just shows how little I know her.

  Or how much of her is gone.

  You never really know how it will affect them, or how they will react once they wake up. It’s always a risk, every single time. Human beings are as unpredictable as they are different, and that really shows in extreme situations like this.

  My eyes have been glued to the screen for hours, watching her as she floated in a dreamless sleep. I kept her as bare as possible, without ripping away her dignity entirely. Her face is uncovered by makeup, framed by the natural waves of her long ash-blonde hair. It’s darker than it used to be, but I doubt she ever dyed it. It was just a change that came as she grew into the woman she is now. I left her face naked because I didn’t want anything to distract from her beautiful dark green eyes once she wakes up. Those eyes have been killing me for years, ever since I saw them for the very first time.

  And now they’re mine.

  She is mine.

  I still can’t believe it.

  The white gown matches her perfectly, contrasting her summer tan and emphasizing her naturally large breasts. It’s the only place where the fabric gets stretched by her curves, while it hangs loosely on the rest of her slim body.

  The sight of her drives me insane. I have been hard ever since she came into my house, and as pleasant as the feeling should be, it’s starting to become agonizing.

  Because I know I’ll have to wait. I can’t just stomp in there and have my way with her, no matter how much I crave it.

  Fuck. I’d ravage her like an animal.

  She deserves better than that, despite the circumstances. She will need some time to adjust, and to understand her situation to the full extent. Only then can we start our little project, and only then will I be able to enjoy all of her. I’ll devour her on my terms—but not until the time is right.

  My heart hiccups when I see her move for the first time since I left her lying on that bench. It’s nothing more than a little twitch in her left hand at first, but it’s soon followed by a motion of her arm, and a simple stretch of her legs.