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Belinda Freeman-Khan sobbed and screamed herself raw.
Hot, bitter vomit climbed up the back of her throat, scorching her senses, and she couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think, and the room around her seemed to warp and blacken and spin. Her knees almost buckled, and she wanted nothing better than to collapse and curl up into the smallest, tightest ball and pass out and hope against hope that this wasn’t happening and—
Dear God.
She doubled over and vomited, her insides churning, cramping.
Her husband was behind the dressing table now, his face stricken as he grunted and heaved and pushed. He was yelling at her to get up, to help him, to stay strong.
Belinda stumbled over, still puking as she went, and together, side by side, they pushed and pushed. But the table was heavy as hell and kept getting caught up in the carpet, creaking, jerking, her jewellery falling, her cosmetics falling, all her precious things falling. But she didn’t care, couldn’t care, because all she wanted to do was to keep the bad man away, and they had to hurry because he was coming, definitely coming.
They managed to shove the table against the door, and that’s when the bad man crashed against it with a terrible bang.
Belinda yelped, slipping, falling, and she scooted backwards, the carpet searing her butt through her skirt, her hands covering her face. Suddenly she found herself hating Abe for being so stubborn, so naive, so blind, refusing to face up to the danger all these months, all these damn months, and now it was too late, much too late.
Peering through the gaps between her fingers, Belinda caught her husband scrambling this way and that way around the bed, straining and panting as he tried to shift it. The sight of him made her stomach turn, and she gagged, feeling the urge to vomit, but she was all spent and thirsty as hell, and there was nothing left to vomit.
Oh God.
No, she didn’t hate Abe.
How could she hate him?
She loved him.
Damn it, she loved him despite it all.
Quitting her self-pity, Belinda rose and got beside him even though her limbs were numb, so terribly numb, feeling as if they weren’t hers anymore. But – screw it – she shook her head, snivelling, forcing away the blackness squeezing in on her consciousness, and inch by excruciating inch, with the bed groaning as it shifted, she pushed and stumbled, pushed and stumbled, her muscles burning, her lungs screaming.
Her mind was on autopilot, no longer thinking, just fighting to survive, just fighting to survive because – damn it – she wasn’t ready to die just yet.