Listed: Volume IV Read Online Free PDF

held
her.
    She
buried her face in his soft shirt and felt like she was falling apart, felt
like he was barely holding her together.
    When
the tub filled most of the way up, she pulled away from him. He exuded too much
heat—it was making her too hot. And the churning emotion she sensed in him was
making her confused and shaky.
    The
bath was cool and mild and peaceful, and Paul was none of those things.
    *
* *
    She was ice-skating on
fire.
    The
whole rink was on fire, and she kept falling down, the ice burning her as much
as the flames were.
    She
struggled to pull herself up, but every time she did her ankles or knees would
buckle again. Over and over again.
    Paul
was skating too, except he was on the opposite side of the rink. He skated like
a professional, doing turns and jumps and even a couple of spins. She called
out to him frantically to help her. She was burning alive and needed his help.
    But
he was too far away or too focused on his skating. He didn’t hear her. He
didn’t save her.
    She
kept falling, kept burning, kept struggling to get off the smoldering ice.
Until she made it to the edge of the rink and stumbled off.
    But
she stumbled off into nothing .
    She
was falling, kept falling, helplessly falling through the air into a vast, blue
emptiness.
    She
was skydiving, but her parachute was burned away. And she was on fire, falling
at a sickening speed, all by herself. Her heart pounded, and panic surged
through her scorching body.
    She
was a falling like Lucifer in a ball of white-hot fire, with only hell waiting
at the end of the drop.
    She
screamed for help, and then she saw Paul. He was skydiving too, but he still
had a parachute. He was good at this. He could catch up with her, grab her,
save her. She cried out to him for help, over and over again.
    He
could hear her. He had to hear her. But he didn’t respond. He pulled the
cord to his parachute and surged upwards as it deployed.
    She
kept falling. Far away from him.
    She
should have died when she hit the ground, but she didn’t. She landed in a lake.
But the lake suddenly erupted in fire, and she was trying to swim through it
naked.
    She
didn’t want to skinny-dip in a lake of fire, and she flailed her arms and legs
desperately, trying to get herself out.
    Through
the smoke and flames, she saw that Paul was standing on the shore. But his back
was to her, since he didn’t want to see her naked body.
    She
shrieked for him to save her, but he never even turned around.
    And
then the lake turned into her old house. And it was hell . Scorching,
sulphurous, pitch black despite the fire.
    She
was burning alive, and she saw her father in the flames too, much farther into
the depths of the house than she was.
    She
cried out to him to come back to her, not to leave her alone.
    Then
she saw Paul behind her, near the entrance.
    She
sobbed for him to help her, to please help her and her father. But Paul
wouldn’t dare step into hell. Not for her.
    Demons
came to drag her farther in, and she fought them off as hard as she could. She
needed to get to Paul. She needed to get to her father.
    And
she couldn’t seem to reach either one of them.
    Then
the demons dragged her down into a molten lake, and she screamed. She screamed.
She screamed because she knew this was finally going to kill her.
    But
the lake was cool. Somehow, it was cool, and she sobbed. She sobbed. She sobbed
with relief.
    “Daddy,”
Emily gurgled, breaking out of her delirium so suddenly it felt like the world
had ripped into pieces. “Daddy, help me!”
    “Emily,”
someone said. It was Paul, she realized, not her daddy. “It’s okay. It’s okay.”
    She
was sobbing, she realized. Genuinely sobbing. It hadn’t just been a dream. She
was in the bathtub, and Paul was basically in it with her, his arms wrapped
around her tightly to control her writhing. “Paul!” she choked, overwhelmed
with relief and gratitude that she was alive and Paul was here.
    And
broken again at the realization that her