Scattered Thoughts (Betrayed by Love Book 1) by HD Kelley Read Free Book Online Page A

Thoughts of Alec filled my mind as I drifted off to sleep.
     
    • • • • •
     
    It was cold and dark. I felt someone standing over me. I turned so I could get a better look but I couldn’t move. My arms were tied above my head. I felt his hand on my face. I tried to pull away but he squeezed my checks, preventing me from moving. My heart was racing so fast I couldn’t breathe. I didn’t want him to touch me. I wanted to scream and run away, but I couldn't.
    “Feel me, Bella,” he moaned; his mouth on mine once again.
    No, no, no! I opened my mouth to scream but no sound would come out. He claimed my mouth, plunging his tongue to the back of my throat. He smelled of liquor and cigarettes and something sweet. It was an awful combination that sent a shiver down my spine.
    “No!” I finally managed to shout when he pulled away. I twisted and kicked my legs, trying to get away.
    “Fight me, Bella. I like it when you fight me.” The voice was so familiar.
    “Get off me,” I screamed as loud as I could, relieved my voice had returned. “HELP ME! PLEASE, SOMEBODY HELP ME!” I felt a sharp pinch on my neck. My eyes were too heavy to hold open.
     
     
     
     

Chapter Four
     
     
     
    I jolted upright in bed and pulled my hands toward my face. Relief washed over me when they moved. Beads of sweat covered my forehead. My face was wet with tears and my heart was still racing. I took a deep breath, in through my nose, out through my mouth; first one breath then another until my heart rate slowed.
    With moonlight shining through the window, I glanced around the room, stopping when I reached the doorway. My door was open. I was certain I’d closed it when I came to bed last night. I froze, my whole body tensing all at once. A shadow in the corner of my room moved. Heat filled my body as panic started to set in.
    “Spencer!” I screamed instinctively, momentarily forgetting he wasn’t here, and about our pending divorce. I switched on the lamp, but when I looked back at the corner where I’d seen the shadow, there was no one there.
    “It was just a bad dream,” I said out loud, hoping to calm my shaky nerves. “Just a stupid dream.”
    I lifted my phone off the bedside table; 5:11 flashed on the screen. “Not again,” I sighed. “Not another sleepless night.” My nightmares had been sporadic at first but that was the third one I’d had in the past week. Dr. Leonard said the dreams were most likely being manifested by stress and had suggested I take a few days off to unwind.
    “If you want to get rid of your nightmares you need to find the stressor,” she’d said. I knew she was right but with all the new clients I’d taken on this year, time off just wasn’t a possibility, which left me with Plan B. It wasn’t my ideal solution, as it required me to actually try to remember the dreams, but it was the only other suggestion she’d offered. I removed the spiral bound notebook from the bedside table drawer, flipped to the first blank page and started to write. All I’d managed to remember so far were a bunch of scattered thoughts but I kept doing it anyway.
    Dr. Leonard’s instructions echoed in my mind. “You’re not writing sentences here, Izzy, just words,” she’d said. “Consider all your senses.” Dark. Cold. Pain. My body tensed as I remembered the pain and I dropped the pen.
    “Breathe, Izzy,” I said out loud. Knowing I had to get through this, I took a deep breath and closed my eyes. The chanting of the bassoons and the barking of the tubas rang in my ears and I recognized it immediately. It was the first symphony I’d ever heard, Dreams of a Witches’ Sabbath . Spencer had taken me and my best friend, Valerie, to hear the Miami Symphony Orchestra not long after we met. Val had never shown much of an interest in classical music but she’d really wanted to come with us, and I hadn’t objected. She’d always been like a sister to me. We’d grown up in the same tiny town, attended