Beauty In Her Madness (Winterland Tale Book 3)

by Stacey Marie Brown

  A noise came from my throat, my back arching, needing more.

  Stop this! Shove him away, Dinah. Run! My sound judgment screamed at me, but it fizzled out as his fingers drifted over the fabric of my underwear, forcing my teeth to bite into my bottom lip.

  His jaw twitched, his look peeling at my bones, watching me as his fingers pushed underneath the cloth. He dipped lower, but stopped, hovering right above, waiting for me to answer him, push him away. I should have. I knew it, but my head no longer was attached, his touch making me irrational and crazy with need.

  “Yes,” I hissed, my hips pressing into his hand. I no longer cared if the students walked by or that we were outside barely a few feet from my class. “Please.”

  A growl came from his throat before he parted me, gliding between the folds, hitting every nerve ending. A sharp gasp came from me, my back arching. The need was so intense I couldn’t even think…I only felt. My body sizzled, my core throbbing as his thumb rolled over the bundle of nerves. Every touch was electric, hot and cold, and hit me so deep my knees dipped, my muscles quaking like my system was being overloaded.

  Pushing me harder into the wall, his fingers plunged deep inside, pumping.

  “Oh god!” I heard myself cry out, my head tipping back, my hips bucking.

  “Fuck, little one.” His voice thick and coarse. “You weren’t supposed to feel this good. Fuck…so tight, wet, and warm. I can feel you.” His knee parted me wider as he went deeper and harder, his other hand sliding under my sweater, his fingers flicking at my nipple.

  Fire. I was on fire. Burning everywhere. And I wanted more. To be consumed by the flames.

  His free hand moved over my bare skin, the mix of hot and cold feeling like the most delicious pleasure and pain. His thumb rubbed into my core as he pumped two fingers into me, rubbing along my walls and curling into a spot that made my legs give out. Ramming me into the wall to keep me up, loud moans huffed from my gut, broken and wild.

  After five years of having sex with only one person, Scott and I knew each other’s bodies well, but I could honestly say sex or foreplay with Scott had never affected me this way. This was feral and ruthless, making me forget everything but drowning in the high—chasing after it like a savage beast. And this was basic foreplay stuff we did at fifteen. So why did it feel so different, so intense, it devoured me whole, leaving nothing but bones in its wake?

  Wet and needy, I felt myself gripping and throbbing around his fingers, my climax barreling for me. He sucked in deeply, grunting. The sound of him moving inside me echoed off the brick walls, arching my back and turning me on.

  “More... harder,” I demanded, the raw need not sounding like me.

  He chuckled, a smirk stretching his features, sliding out of me. A cruel sneer twitched the side of his face as he put his fingers in his mouth, sucking the taste of me off. “Fuck, you taste so good.”

  “Wait!” Desperation echoed, my thighs aching for release, my body crying out for his return. “I wasn’t done.”

  “Bad girls don’t get to finish, little Liddell.” He nipped my ear before he took a step back, his face still deep in the shadows. He swiveled and went around the corner, leaving my body aching painfully and pissed off.

  No. No. No. No. Hell no.

  “Wait!” I barked, running around the corner, his figure walking a few feet in front of me. I grabbed his arm, whipping him to face me.

  Startled hazel eyes looked back at me. Mr. Basketball Star tilted his head, a slow cocky smile forming on his face. “Knew you’d change your mind. Decided to come to the party with me after all?”

  Party? I stepped back in confusion, my hands dropping from him, my eyes peering around for another form moving away from me.

  “Whatever happens there, your boyfriend doesn’t have to know. I’m good at keeping secrets.” Everything about his attitude told me he was not talking about what just happened. That he hadn’t been the person who had just touched me.

  And I knew in my gut it hadn’t been him.

  “Dinah?” He frowned, looking around, trying to find what I was searching for.

  “No.” I shook my head. “Sorry. Mistake. Wrong person. Sorry,” I babbled, moving away from him. I walked quickly toward the parking lot.

  “Dinah?” he called out, but I didn’t turn around, my steps only hastening.

  A sob built in my gut, but I stifled it. I had no idea what was happening to me, but something was. I remembered after the scary episode with Alice when she freaked out in my room watching Gremlins. She told me later something I pretended not to understand, but I think deep down I had, and even more now.

  “But it’s real to you. You really think it’s happening?” I had questioned her. “So, did the gremlins jump out of the screen and come after you?”

  “No. It’s not like that. I wasn’t in your room anymore. I was somewhere else. It’s as real as this. It was as if I had been there before. Reliving the experience again. This sick feeling that someone I loved was dying or hurt…”

  It was exactly how I felt. It was as real as everything else, which scared me more. Was this a true sign of being crazy— you didn’t see the difference between reality and your visions?

  Cold wind blew against my face, and I tucked into my coat. A gust curled around my legs, the sensation pushing through the fabric of my jeans and licking between my legs. I sucked in sharply, my nerves reacting, still craving and aching. They sat up, begging for more.

  It was crazy, but the wind felt familiar. Intimate. Alive.

  “Dinah…”

  Fear made me tear across the parking lot, scrambling into my car. I tossed myself onto the seat, hearing my heartbeat in my ears.

  “Get it together, Dinah.” I gripped the steering wheel. “You are stronger than this.”

  I looked down to put the key in the ignition, my eye catching on something. The button of my jeans and zipper were undone.

  I didn’t know what I was more scared of—that it had really happened or I thought it had. If someone saw me, would they see someone with me, or would they see a university professor’s daughter alone, pleasuring herself against the wall at night?

  Shame and humiliation choked my throat. Grabbing my phone, I dialed a number as I put my car in drive. I was a problem solver. I didn’t like being up against something I couldn’t figure out. It went against my nature, but I didn’t know what else to do.

  “Dr. Bell’s office, can I help you?” a nasal voice answered.

  “Yes.” I swallowed. “I need to see Dr. Bell. Now.”

  Chapter 11

  “Can you tell me what happened?” Dr. Bell crossed her legs, her blue eyes watching me intently from the chair opposite me. A notepad rested on her lap, her pen tapping the paper.

  “Oh…well…uhhh.” I rubbed my hairline. My ass was perched on the sofa, ready to bolt at any moment. It sounded like a good idea when I called, but now I wasn’t feeling as confident. I mean, what did I even tell her? I think I fingered myself outside my classroom, where my father works, but don’t worry, I imagined a man doing it to me, one I made up in my head, and not my boyfriend.

  I could still feel his touch haunting my skin, my body still aching for release…for him.

  “Dinah?” She curved her eyebrows. “I can only help if I know what’s going on.”

  “I-I feel…” I swallowed, my knee bobbing. Grabbing the glass of water in front of me, I took a sip, wetting my parched throat. “I might, I mean, is it possible to have a gene run in your family that makes you crazy?”

  “A single gene, no. But it has been acknowledged mental illness can run in families.” She adjusted her glasses. Today she wore a frumpy brown suit, which looked odd against her perfectly styled white hair, fashionable glasses, and bright red lips.

  I gnawed at my nail, my leg bouncing harder until I was compelled to stand and move around the room.

  “Do you think you have it?” Her voice was calm and smooth, encouraging me to open up to her.
r />   Facing out the window, I stared at a few flakes of snow floating down.

  I know I do.

  “Dinah?”

  “Maybe,” I uttered, not able to face her.

  “Can you expand on that? Are you seeing manifestations similar to your sister? Like talking penguins and snowmen?”

  My head snapped around, my brows furrowing. “How do you know my sister saw those things?” I knew my file would contain a general overview of Alice going into the home, but I didn’t think they could get so specific.

  “It’s in her file.”

  “You’re able to see my sister’s file? Isn’t that a breach of patient privilege?”

  “Not if it helps me better understand you and what is happening in your home life. What could be happening to you.”

  I looked back out the window, my stomach sinking. “I’m only stressed. School, work, Scott… It’s just a lot.”

  “What happened tonight, Dinah?”

  I was bombarded with memories of his arctic-blue eyes, his hands running down my torso. The feel of his fingers still inside me. Everything was so real. But it was impossible.

  I had been talking to the basketball guy. How did he become the man in my dreams? Did I actually let asshole, Mr. No Name, touch me? Did my mind get confused and make him someone else? Did I cheat on Scott tonight?

  Yes, my mind hissed. And you wanted more. I suddenly felt exhausted, my head heavy.

  “Something happened, and I don’t know if it was real or not,” I whispered, my gaze locked on the flakes drifting down, mesmerized by their beauty. It was snowing like I predicted.

  “Did you see something?” Her voice felt like a prod poking at my back. “Something that should not exist?”

  My head nodded. “But it felt so real.” I gritted my teeth, trying to keep back the tears, fear ripping at my soul. “It all does, and when I return, I have marks making me feel these things really happened.”

  “Marks as though you harmed yourself in your sleep?”

  “No. I don’t think so.” Was I doing this to myself? Was I creating the wounds on my body?

  “Then tell me. What or who is leaving the marks, Dinah?” She prodded again; her tone seemed like she was leading me.

  “I-I don’t know.” A lie. I did, but I couldn’t get myself to actually say it out loud. To hear it with my own ears.

  She stayed silent for a moment before she spoke. “You claimed you used to sleepwalk as a child, stopping around seven. What happened then? Why did you stop?”

  My mind could remember the tiniest detail of a moment, how to solve a problem or break down a mathematical equation, but my long-term memory had always been bad. Alice could recall so many things from our childhood, but I was either blank or could only remember bits and pieces.

  Mom and Dad said one day my sleepwalking basically stopped. It was right at Christmastime. They said my obsession with the holiday suddenly ended, and I no longer believed in Santa. That was when my night terrors started.

  “I don’t remember, but my nightmares just got worse.”

  “Nightmares?”

  “A silly child’s monster one, but it still scares me. I’m trying to run from this creature, and I hear someone shouting for me, then I hear blood-curdling screams, and I jump awake. Terrified, crying, and gutted.”

  “Monster? What does the monster look like?” The leather chair rustled as Dr. Bell sat up.

  “It’s all hazy. It’s more an impression. Claws, horns…the typical childhood nightmare.” I scrubbed my head again, the day catching up with me, making me feel off and dizzy. When did I even last eat?

  “I think you are far from typical. You simply haven’t opened your mind yet, and I’m getting impatient.” Her voice was lower and laced with anger, whipping me around. Her lids narrowed on me, her red lips in a thin line.

  “What does that mean?” A flurry of chills coated my skin.

  “Let it in, Dinah. You are meant for greater things. Even more than your sister.”

  “Excuse me?” I stepped back, feeling wobbly and dizzy, making me reach for my head. Was the room spinning?

  Movement shot my head to the side. Two elves wearing swim trunks ran across the room.

  “Duuuudddee,” the chubbier one called after his friend. “Wait up!”

  “Oh, holy snowballs.” I inhaled, my spine slamming back into the window as a girl penguin dressed in a hula skirt stood on the coffee table, shaking her hips so the grass skirt twirled.

  A deep chilling snarl hummed in my ear, spiking instant terror in my gut. I knew that sound. Had run from it since a child.

  I couldn’t see it, but I knew it was coming for me. It had never stopped hunting me; it was lying in wait this whole time. The growls grew louder, closer, building the panic trembling my bones. I shuddered at the huff of hot air on the back of my neck, the feel of claws scraping down my spine.

  A cry burst from my chest, my legs giving out. I crumpled into a ball, trying to hide from the monster.

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to do that. I’m sorry.” Words came tumbling from me. There was no reason or logic, just fright.

  “Dinah?” A woman’s voice called to me, a blurry figure crouching in front of me. “What do you see, Dinah? What’s there?”

  “Mon-monster.” Small and chopped, like a child, my voice shook.

  “What monster? Tell me, Dinah. How did it get there?”

  The more I tried to search for details, the more they slipped from me, making me feel even more exhausted.

  “Dinah?” She reached out and touched my arm. As if a bolt of lightning zapped through my limbs, I jerked, tearing through the haze and fog. The room became clear, the sound of the clock ticking, the space perfectly unthreatening.

  Dr. Bell stared at me with no hint of her internal thoughts, but even she had to know. She saw the proof I was going insane.

  My chest clenched with shame and humiliation, and I sobbed, turning my head to the side. I tried to say something, but nothing came out, sorrow blocking my airways. I took several breaths.

  “Make it stop.” My plea came out small and cracked.

  “I’m going to prescribe some pills for you.” Dr. Bell stood up, her joints cracking as she rose, her white canvas shoes striding to her desk.

  Biting back my emotions, I got to my feet, feeling empty, weak, and ashamed, like I should have been stronger than a tiny defect in my brain. That I was inadequate by letting this happen to me as well.

  Dr. Bell pulled out a bottle of pills. “It will help you.” She handed them to me. A tiny voice wondered why she kept them in her desk, already filled and ready. “Make you see clearer.”

  Taking them, I nodded.

  “I want to see you next week, check in on how you are doing.” She pushed at her thick-rimmed black glasses. “There will be an adjustment period, so if it gets a little worse, know you are acclimating to them.”

  I grabbed my bag and jacket, stuffing the pills deep inside and headed for the door.

  “See you soon, Dinah.”

  I flicked my head in understanding and walked out, the pills rattling in my bag as if they were singing out, “Dinah is bonkers.”

  Climbing into my car, I grabbed my phone, hitting a button. I needed a familiar voice to pull me back from the abyss.

  “Hello?”

  “Hey, Mom.” My lashes fluttered. I wanted nothing more than to run home and dive into my Mom and Dad’s arms, feeling safe and secure again.

  “Hey, honey. It’s so good to hear your voice.”

  “Yours too.” I sank back into my seat, biting back the tears.

  “You okay?” Her voice was filled with concern. Must be that mother’s intuition kicking in.

  “I’m fine.” It was like swallowing glass. “Just wanted to say hi.” And I’m going crazy. You didn’t go through enough with Alice, so I decided to go insane too.

  “Dinah.” She said my name as only a mother could. “You are not someone who calls to say hi. Wha
t’s going on?”

  “Nothing. I just…” Keep it together, Dinah. My mother barely held it together with Alice and still wouldn’t fully deal with it. I couldn’t tell her about my fears. Not yet. Not until I knew for sure. We were a lot alike, and neither did well with things we couldn’t solve. “I actually was curious about my childhood.”

  “Your childhood?” Confusion twisted her tone. “Now you’re really scaring me.”

  “No, Mom, it’s for an assignment.” Lies fell from my mouth. “Just curious how I was as a kid. Do you know what made me stop believing in Santa Claus?”

  She made a noise in her throat, and I knew she wasn’t totally buying my story, but she let it slide. “As a little, little girl, you were actually more of a dreamer than Alice. I mean, you were obsessed with your pretend world, and at dinner you would tell us all you did during the day. Your father and I used to say you’d be an author someday. You were always telling us these grand, fantastical stories, so much detail for a six-year-old.

  “Then one day, it all changed. It was like a switch. You stopped playing, stopped telling stories. You got very serious, and everything had to be just so. You made me get you all these math books to work on instead of fairy-tale books. You begged your father to help change your room from the fantasy design you had, saying you weren’t a little baby anymore. It was odd it happened almost overnight, but typical of changes kids go through, I guess.”

  Was it, though? I didn’t remember being this creative little girl.

  “But that’s when I also stopped sleepwalking, and the nightmares started.”

  “Yes.” She sighed. “Those lasted for years. They went on until you were about nine or ten, I think. We took you to a child psychologist, who put you on some medication. They stopped after that.”

  How did I not remember? Ten was old enough to remember your life. I mean, it was only nine years ago.

  “I went to a therapist?”

  “Yeah, in Hartford. Nice woman.”

  Like a rubber band snapping at the back of my neck, trepidation prickled my spine. “Do you remember the woman’s name?”