My Stepbrother's Dirty Little Secret novel Chapter 254

Chapter 254

Gianna | Age 13 | Toricelli Estate, Chester County, PA

I was flat on my back, my arms pulled tight above my head and tied to the metal rails of the stretcher. The leather straps bit into my wrists, making my fingers feel numb. Every time I moved, the metal frame groaned under me

Doctor Vance stood over me. He looked angry today, because daddy yelled at him, called him a fake and threatened to kill if he didn’t fix me.

“The words are jumping again, aren’t they, Gianna?” he asked. His voice was flat. “Your father is paying a lot of money for results. If your brain won’t listen to logic, it will listen to survival.”

“Please,” I sobbed, “I’m trying. I really am. I promise, I’ll be better, I’ll be good.”

He picked up a thick white towel and laid it flat across my face. Suddenly, the world went dark. I could only see the weave of the fabric and the bright white light of the ceiling through the cloth. My heart was slamming against my ribs like it wanted to break out of my chest.

Then came the water.

It was freezing. It hit the towel and soaked through instantly. At first, it just felt wet, but then the air stopped. Every time I tried to take a breath, I sucked in cold, stinging water instead of oxygen. My brain screamed that I was drowning. I bucked my hips, my back arching off the stretcher, my tied arms straining against the straps until I thought my shoulders would pop out of their sockets.

He poured it slowly, a stream that filled my nose and mouth. I couldn’t swallow. I couldn’t breathe. I was thrashing, my feet kicking at the air, my muffled screams dying in the wet fabric.

Just when the black spots started to dance in my eyes, he pulled the towel away.

I coughed, spraying water into the air, gasping for breath so hard it hurt my lungs. I was shaking, my whole body vibrating with terror.

He tipped the pitcher again, and the weight of the water felt like a ton of bricks on my face. I was fighting the straps so hard the metal was cutting into my skin, but I couldn’t get away.

He ripped the towel off again. I rolled my head to the side, vomiting up the water I’d swallowed I was sobbing, my chest heaving, my hair plastered to the cold metal.

“Read the paragraph, Gianna,” he said, “Or we go for a third round.”

I looked at the page. The fear was so intense, so sharp, that it felt like it cut through the fog in my head. My brain didn’t have room to let the letters move anymore. All it could think about was the water. The letters suddenly stopped their dance. They froze in place, locked down by the terror.

“The… the industrial revolution began in the late seventeen-hundreds,” I whispered, my voice thick with water and snot. I read the whole thing. Every word. My brain was working like a machine, forced into a straight line by the threat of drowning.

stories are a blend of passion and drama that captivate readers from start to finish. Ruby’s writing style is bold and irresistible—perfect for those who crave intense, addictive love stories.