I’m running through a frozen forest, running to stay warm. It’s beyond cold, the air so clear that everything looks ultra-sharp. Every last little bit of heat seems to have bled out into space and what’s left is a deadly wasteland.
If I stay here, I’ll die.
I’m in bare feet and a long white dress, the hem of it soaked through. Freezing snow is up to my ankles. I stagger and slip but I can’t stop. Because behind me is—
I can feel him watching me. Huge and dressed all in black, almost filling the path behind me. He radiates heat—I can feel it licking at the back of my neck, melting the snow I’ve kicked up in my wake. His warmth feels so good….
But I know that he’ll be my downfall. So I run even harder.
And suddenly, he’s in front of me, so close that I can’t pull up in time. I slam into his chest and it’s like sun-warm rock against my breasts, almost too hot to touch. I try to push myself away, but his arms have closed around me, trapping me there.
I look up into his eyes: frozen blue orbs that pin me there and make me melt inside. His eyes say, you want this.
And I scream no I don’t so loudly it almost drowns out the throb in my groin.
The ground collapses and we’re falling, falling. Down into the earth and into a world of darkness and hard metal, sparks and fire. I land on my back and he’s immediately on top of me, his lips pressing to mine. At the first kiss, I feel the heat sluicing down through me, burning its way through the ice that’s gradually filled me in the three years since the accident.
I open my mouth to take a shuddering breath and his tongue slips into my mouth, silencing me. And despite my mind fighting it, I can feel my body starting to thaw, a wave of energy waking my slumbering body and making my nipples stiffen against his chest. Between my thighs, I’m aching for him.
He grips my white dress in one massive hand and shreds it, leaving me nude. He’s naked too and I have a glimpse of a thick, erect cock before he’s on top of me again, pushing my legs apart. He pins my wrists. I struggle as he tells me I want it. I struggle even as I know he’s right.
And then I feel him, big and unstoppable, pressing for entrance and—
I woke up with the covers twisted around me and my panties damp.
And then, the next night, it happened again.
When the dreams came, they held back the nightmares. If I was dreaming of Luka, I wasn’t dreaming of snow and screaming and the sensation of falling.
But I wasn’t sure which one disturbed me more.
***
This was my life. I rode the bus to CIA headquarters every morning, I listened to people’s private conversations for eight hours, and I fantasized about a man I’d never met. I rode the bus home again and read books and went to sleep. I had no social life, let alone a love life, because, ever since that day three years ago, I didn’t seem to be able to connect to anyone. My life ticked away one day at a time and none of it felt remotely real or meaningful. The only real thing, to me, was Luka’s voice.
Three years ago, I’d frozen inside, to shield me from the pain. I felt numb and utterly alone. The closest thing I had to a friend or a parent was Roberta, who I knew would never let me even get close to field work.
That was my life.
And then, the next day, my life changed completely.