Chapter 23

Harper still hadn't returned. I began to wonder if he had drugged me, forcing me to ingest something so highly addictive that I was hooked from the first hit, because since then the pains had intensified. I thirsted for it. I ached for it. I thought more about my next hit than I did about the filth, the impenetrable darkness and the fact that I had been imprisoned naked and tortured by the man - no, the beast, that I had allowed myself to be fooled by. In fact, I no longer even thought about Brandon and up until that point I had consumed myself with thoughts of him whenever my mind would allow me to stop thinking about the pain. I had cursed myself for the cruel way in which I had betrayed him and I damned myself for the agony he must be feeling now, grieving for the wife who had destroyed everything we ever had just to feel her heart quicken at the touch of another man. During the times when I had sobbed into the dirt, I had sobbed not just for myself but for him also. Bu