Vivian gasped, her body jolting as if she’d just been ripped from the jaws of death itself. Air burned through her lungs.
It was raw and agonizing. Her chest convulsed violently, every muscle locking up, her body jerking against the sheets. She was coming back. She could feel she was coming to reality. But f**k.
It hurt.
God, it hurt.
Like she’d been drowned, suffocated, and then thrown back into her body without warning. Like her heart had been restarted with a lightning bolt and the pain of it tore her apart from the inside out.
Her throat contracted, a weak, strangled noise escaping her lips. Her fingers twitched.
The first thing she felt was warmth. Fingers gripping her face, sliding over her cheeks, her jaw, touching, checking and, desperate.
Then, a sound.
A choked, broken
