In Lines Of Love ~ Kimchay

5. Run (TW/Non-Con)

Anawin was running, his feet slapping against the cold pavement, each move more painful than the last. The night clung to him like a living thing, heavy and suffocating, pressing in from all sides.

His bare feet burned with every step, but he didn’t dare stop. He couldn’t. The shadows around him seemed to move, shifting and twisting, as though alive—hungry.

His breath came in ragged gasps, the cold air biting at his lungs. There was no sound but the relentless pounding of his heart and the echo of his footsteps in the dead silence of the street.

The city was empty, eerily still, as if it had turned its back on him, leaving him to whatever horror was chasing him.

But Anawin knew it wasn’t just any horror. It was him. The Demon, who had always been there, lurking just beyond the edge of his nightmares.

Damon.

Anawin’s legs gave out beneath him as exhaustion overtook him. He stumbled to a stop, collapsing to his knees, gasping for air, eyes wide with terror. His vision blurred.

And then, but before he could make sense of it, the air around him shifted, he couldn’t even draw a full breath, two strong arms locked around his waist from behind.

The grip was like ice, stealing the warmth from his skin, pulling him back against a rough, unyielding body. Anawin’s heart plunged into his stomach.

He didn’t need to turn around. He knew that presence, the darkness that engulfed to Damon like a second skin, wrapping Anawin in its straggling grasp.

“Well, well,” Damon’s voice slithered through the silence, cold and mocking, his breath hot against the back of Anawin’s neck. “Did you really think you could run from me?”

Anawin’s throat tightened, panic clawing at him, making it impossible to speak. He struggled weakly against Damon’s hold, but it was useless.

Damon’s arms tightened like a vise, pulling him closer until their bodies were flush. The darkness around them seemed to grow thicker, as if feeding off Anawin’s fear.

“You’re so fragile,” Damon whispered, his voice low, dripping with venomous amusement. “Running barefoot in the night like a scared little animal. Pathetic.”

“Let me go,” Anawin gasped, barely able to find his voice. “Please… Damon, let me go.”

Damon’s laugh was low, dark, and cruel. “Let you go? Oh, Darling, why would I ever do that? You’re mine. You always have been from the moment you tried to change my story.”

"You're tired, aren’t you, Angel?" Damon’s voice came,drapped with honey as if they weren’t in a nightmare but a lover’s embrace. “You can’t keep running.”

Before Anawin could reply, Damon knelt behind him, his movements slow like a predator, as if savoring every second of prey helplessness, Anawin’s helplessness.

He slipped off his own shoes, the sound of leather against the pavement unnaturally loud in the silence. Anawin’s pulse hesten, dread sinking like a weight into his chest.

“D-Damon…” Anawin stammered, his voice barely more than a whisper, trembling with fear. “What… what are you doing?”

Damon lifted Anawin’s feet with a twisted kind of gentleness, placing them onto his shoes, the leather still warm from Damon’s body. The cold ground disappeared, nevertheless darkness embraced him more. Damon was now bare foot instead.

“You’ll hurt yourself, Angel," Damon murmured.

"I can’t have that. Not you."

His mind screamed for him to move, to run, but his body was frozen, paralyzed in Damon’s grip. Every instinct told him this act—this twisted display of affection —was far more dangerous than the violence he had expected.