Page 72 of Lost In The Dark

“There’s no one on this floor but us now, Addy. You’re safe. Just try to breathe, then you can tell us what happened, okay?” Eli encouraged me, but I couldn’t. I had this terrible feeling.

“Asher!” I hurried over to him, stumbling and almost falling against him in my haste.

“Easy, little dot. Everything’s okay. Just take a moment to catch your breath,” he said but I ignored him and grabbed his arm.

“Your dad…I…I need a picture!”

“What? Why do you want that?”

“Please Asher!” I cried. Asher looked reluctant to do it, but he pulled his cell phone from his pocket and started scrolling through it as he also wrapped his arm around me to steady me and hold me close.

“Here,” Asher said as he stopped scrolling. “This was taken a few months before he got ill, for a story the media were running on our father.” I shakily took Asher’s cell in my hand and studied the picture of a man in a dark, pinstripe suit, sat in a wing back armchair and looking every bit the tycoon and tyrant my brothers had told me he was. But that wasn’t the main thought rushing through my mind as I focused on those cold, dark brown eyes. He did look a little like Eli, I realized. And like me – very much like me. That was why he had felt so familiar. That was why I had thought I knew him.

“Oh no!” I cried and I slammed Asher’s phone against his chest, needing the image gone.

“What Addy? What’s going on?” Eli asked.

“Oh God!” I slammed a hand over my mouth as my stomach revolted violently. Kane instantly moved, grabbing a trash can, and bringing it to me just in time for me to lose the meagre contents of my stomach. I retched again and again until there was nothing at all left to come up. I was crying and shaking so hard my teeth started to rattle together.

“Just sit for me, Angel,” Kane said as he took away the trash can and eased me back down onto the sofa. I couldn’t have fought against him if I’d tried. I was too shaken and upset.

For several minutes I just sat trying to take in what this meant. I hadn’t seen enough in that last flashback to know for sure, but I knew enough to make me feel physically ill.

“Addy, please talk to me, sweetheart,” Asher implored as he sat on the sofa beside me and took my hand into his. I looked up to Eli and instantly he dropped to his haunches before me and took my other hand.

“Just tell us, shortcake. Whatever it is we’ll get through it together,” he told me. I looked up to Kane, relieved he was still close by. He smiled reassuringly, then gave me a nod. It gave me the strength I needed to get the words out.

“The flashback…” I began. I was breathing a little easier, but still short of breath and sounding a little hoarse. “…it was one of the parties…the sex parties. I w-was there. You were right.” I looked up to Kane and he nodded again. He had suspected Hilton had taken me to such events. It was why he and my brothers were worried for my safety.

“Oh fuck!” Asher cursed as he gripped my hand tighter. “He was there, wasn’t he?”

“Y-yes. The men from your meeting…that’s what triggered me. They…they were both there too…with him. I…I think one of them hurt me too, but the flashback…it didn’t show everything. It did show him though…he was there, a-and he…” a sob slipped free and I paused to hold any more back. “…he was t-taking me to a room, Asher. I think….I think he…oh God!”

“Who? Who was there?” Eli asked as I sank against Asher’s side and started to sob even harder. It was more than I could stand.

“Our father, Eli,” Asher answered breathlessly, and I just crumbled. “He was there. He hurt Addy…his own daughter.” That edge I had been holding onto slipped from my grasp, and I fell deep down into the darkness of that vast abyss below me.

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