I briefly glanced at Richard, not correcting Blake.  He wasn’t my father, but he’d loved my mom very much.  If he felt half the pain I did, I understood how he felt.

“I’m sorry for your loss,” Blake said evenly before turning toward Richard.  “The contractors will start work this afternoon.  We need to keep you all safe.”

The dream shifted.

I sat in the boys’ room playing quietly with them.  The stifling sterile room echoed back even their quietest whisper, but this was the only place in the house that they were allowed to play.  The easiest place to monitor us—me.

Richard strode through the door with purpose.

“The last tip did marginally well.  Blake would like to thank you and asked me to find out what you would like as a reward.”

This was Blake’s game.  Every time one of my premonitions did well—they all did well—Blake offered a reward.  In the beginning, I had used these opportunities to ask for new toys for my brothers or new clothes for us or even to be allowed a few minutes outside.  But I’d caught on to what I was doing.  Each time I asked for something, I let them know what mattered to me.  Last night, Blake had proven my theory correct by threatening to take all outside time away from the boys if I didn’t sit down and eat with him and his associates.

“Please tell him I am happy with whatever reward he chooses,” I murmured without looking up from our puzzle.

“Michelle, he will insist that you choose,” Richard said with worry in his voice.  It was the first time in a long time he acted human.  I glanced up in time to see his fear-filled eyes rest on Liam.

He feared for their safety.  So did I.  I needed to find a way to escape.  Until then, I would pretend to play Blake’s game.  “A ribbon.  For my hair, please.”

The dream shifted.

A gag covered my mouth as tears streamed down my cheeks.  The gag didn’t hurt.  The cord tying my hands didn’t even hurt.  My head though, it throbbed and ached, the pain dull and sharp at the same time, snaking its way through every cell in my brain as the premonition repeated itself.

Blake stood over me smirking.

“I told you, you would be punished if you tried to run.”  He bent down to where I’d fallen to my side on the floor.  The premonition had been running through my mind for almost two days.  They’d let me eat and drink in the beginning, unbinding my hands and removing the gag, while they wore earplugs and earmuffs with music.  They’d tried getting me to eat and drink a while ago, but I refused. The pain was too much.

I sniffled as my nose started to run.  My eyes had been watering for hours now.  Blake reached forward and touched the wetness just under my nose.  He pulled back and showed me his fingers.  It wasn’t just a runny nose.  Blood smeared his fingertips.

“Do you understand, yet?  You need me, Michelle.  Who else can you tell this information to?”

I closed my eyes with a sob wishing the pain would end, moving my lips weakly behind the gag, mumbling the information because I couldn’t help myself.

The cord holding my wrists together loosened.  Without thought, my shaking hand flew to my mouth to tear away the gag.  I sobbed out the information, and the pain immediately stopped.  I didn’t stop sobbing for a long time.

Luke called my name, and I struggled to wake as I felt the dream try to shift.  I didn’t want to remember any more.  I wanted my own reality back.  As crappy as it was.  Someone pounded on a door, helping to pull me out of sleep’s hold.

I blinked my eyes open, cringing at the cold water hitting my face as I looked up into the spray of the showerhead.  It took a moment to remember what had happened.  Tired after a few more hours of riding, we’d found yet another hotel.  He said he’d run and get food.  I said I would take a shower.  I’d kept it cold thinking I’d stay awake.  Instead, I’d set myself up for hyperthermia.

I shivered uncontrollably and wiped water from my face.  My numb legs didn’t want to move and my tailbone throbbed painfully.

“She’s trying to kill me,” I muttered as I struggled to lift myself from the bottom of the tub.

The door flew open with a crack, disturbing the air and making the shower curtain flutter.  It stuck to my skin, and I curled my lip.  Gross.  Hotel shower curtain.  Touching me.  I frantically batted it away thinking of all the nasty things on it—and once my mind was on the subject, all the nasty things at the bottom of the hotel tub—when the curtain was suddenly torn aside.

Luke stared down at me. Rage and panic filled his eyes.

“What the hell?” I sputtered trying to grab the curtain and cover myself, no longer so picky about it touching me.  Red crept up his neck as I watched.

Flustered, he let the curtain go, but he still had the sense to reach around to turn off the water.  His eyes raked my face.  “You fell asleep again, didn’t you,” he said with soft reproach.

“Of course I did!  I always fall asleep.  Now, get out!”  Embarrassment and anger warred for dominance.  It was one thing to joke about ‘us’, to try to Claim him, to kid about my boobs, but to have him actually see me, all of me.  I wanted to curl up in a ball of shame.  I didn’t eat right and looked like hell.  The scars on my arms still stood out vividly which was why I wore clothes to cover them.  And he’d seen everything.  I’d noted the shock in his eyes before he surrendered the curtain.

“Be out in two minutes, or I’m coming back in,” he warned closing the door behind him.

“If you come back in, you better be naked too,” I shouted at the closed door, anger finally winning.

I pulled myself from the tub with shaking limbs and wrapped myself in a towel, using the one meant for him to dry my hair.  Those dreams shook me.  The first three had been the same girl.  Gabby.  No doubt the same Gabby Luke kept talking about.  The second set of dreams also involved a single star.  Michelle.  Their lives sucked just like mine.  It didn’t make me feel any better.

Taking my time, I brushed my teeth and gradually warmed enough that the blue tint faded from my lips.  More than two minutes had passed, and I gave myself a weak smirk in the mirror.

Pulling the bag close, I dug for clean clothes.  Not finding any, I settled for the cleanest.  I took my time getting dressed.

Finally, I stepped out of the bathroom.  I ran my fingers through my damp tangled hair and gave him the barest glance before I moved to the hotel’s TV guide, pretending to read it.

“Either we get where we’re going tomorrow, or we need to find a laundromat.  Everything’s dirty,” I commented.

Silence greeted me.  Stifling the urge to scrunch up my face in annoyance, I took a calming breath and turned to face him.

Luke reclined on the bed, his hands behind his head, as he watched me move around the room.  His shirt stretched tight over his chest.  I struggled to pull my gaze away.  His exposed arms flexed as he moved one out from behind his head.  On the inside, I sighed.

“Come on,” he said, waving me over.  “Get some sleep.”

He knew sleeping in a cold shower didn’t qualify as rest, but I hadn’t expected him to be on the bed waiting for me after my smart remark.  I shuffled to the bed in my stocking feet and lay beside him, not too eager to sleep just yet.

He pulled me to his side, slid an arm under my head, and tucked me under his chin.  His heat melted away the lingering chill of the shower.  His willingness to get so close while I was still awake puzzled me—he usually waited until I was already slipping into a dream.  He lightly ran a hand down my covered arm.  Right over the cuts I’d once made in desperation.  I closed my eyes in shame.

“Don’t,” he whispered.  “Not with me.  I’m not here to judge you.  I’m here to keep you safe.  Always.  Even from yourself.”