~LAUREN'S POV~

Sleep wasn't an option. It hadn't been for hours.

I lay there in the dark, still as a corpse, staring at the ceiling with my heart beating out a frantic rhythm in my chest. The photographs were burned behind my eyelids.

Every time I blinked, they were there.

Patrick's hands on me. His face was too close.

The twisted narrative of it all. The lies threaded so neatly between each image, so carefully crafted it made me sick.

Someone was watching. Someone who wanted me afraid.

And I was. But not frozen. Not helpless.

I was angry.

Anger was something I understood how to use.

I pushed back...