[Emma's POV]
The moment Damon’s shadowy silhouette dissolved from the night, the defiant strength that had been holding me upright vanished with him. It was as if the strings of a marionette had been cut. A wave of dizziness, thick and nauseating, washed over me, and my legs simply gave out. I collapsed to the cold ballroom floor, not in a faint, but into a waking nightmare.
Jaxon was at my side in an instant, his hands on my shoulders. “Emma! Look at me. Breathe. He’s gone. He can’t hurt you.”
But he was wrong. The hurt was already inside me, blooming from a place deeper than memory. It wasn't the sharp terror of the kidnapping or the cold fear of the ritual. This was different. Softer. More insidious.
Fragmented sensations, vivid and unbidden, flashed behind my eyes.
The slide of im
