Nine, Ten ... Never Sleep Again

NINE, TEN ...

NEVER SLEEP AGAIN

Rebekka Franck series #5

By Willow
Rose

Copyright
Willow Rose 2013

Published
by Jan Sigetty Boeje

All
rights reserved.

No part
of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or
electronic form without permission from the author.

This is
a work of fiction. Any resemblance of characters to actual persons, living or
dead is purely coincidental. The Author holds exclusive rights to this work.
Unauthorized duplication is prohibited.

Cover design by Jan
Sigetty Boeje

http://sigetty.wix.com/coverart

Special thanks
to my editor Janell Parque

 
http://janellparque.blogspot.com/

Connect with
Willow Rose:

http://www.willow-rose.blogspot.com/

http://www.facebook.com/willowredrose

https://twitter.com/madamwillowrose

As
usual, he couldn't sleep.
It had become quite a big
problem for him lately. Henrik Fenger had never been a heavy sleeper, but the
last month or so he had hardly been able to sleep at all. He never fell asleep
until early in the morning and then, only for a few hours. It was about to
drive him crazy. He was tossing and turning in the hotel bed with the girl
sleeping next to him. She had fallen asleep after the sex. Henrik thought it
would make it easier for him to sleep if he had sex with her first. That was
the whole point, but, as it turned out, she was the only one who had fallen
asleep after three hours of him riding her in all kinds of positions. He had
been rough with her; he knew that, which was why he decided to let her sleep a
little, to recover first, before he sent her away.

Now he was having a new thought. Maybe it was
her? Maybe he couldn't sleep because of her? Could it be guilt? Did her
presence mess him up, because he felt bad for Janni at home alone with the kid
as usual when Henrik was out on his business trips?

Henrik shook his head. Nah. That couldn't be
why. He had done this a million times; hell he always brought back a hooker
from the hotel lobby when he was out on business trips.

But, nevertheless, the girl had to go.

He poked her with his elbow hard in the side and
she woke up with a gasp. "What's going on?" she moaned.

"You need to go," Henrik said.

"But it's three in the morning?"

"Grab your stuff. I’ve put money on the
dresser for you." He said with a sigh.

"Money? What are you talking about?"
The girl lifted her head and looked at him. "You think I'm some kind of
hooker?"

"I don't know what you are and I don't
care. Take the money or leave it, as long as you're out of here."

She looked at him, confused. "But how? How
… how can you think something like that after the night we had? After all the
things you said? I thought …" she got out of bed and stared at him.
"I thought you were a nice guy. I thought we were having a nice time together."

"So what? You're expecting to get my phone
number, is that it? You want to
get together
and hang out and eat
seaweed
,
drink
smoothies
and discuss
gluten free diets
? Is that it?" he
said with a shrill voice, pretending he was a girl.

The girl picked up her blouse from the floor.
"You ripped this, by the way," she said. "It was pretty
expensive."

Henrik looked away. "Buy yourself a new one
with the money you earned tonight. You deserve it."

The girl grunted and put on her blouse, then her
shoes. Henrik watched her as she bent down to get her other red, high-heeled
shoe. She had long legs and a great ass. He would do her again right there on
the floor; take her from behind, if it he didn’t need to get some sleep soon.
Important meeting tomorrow. Important investors who he couldn't blow off.

"You're a real asshole. Has anyone ever
told you that?" she said, and put on her jacket.

Henrik smiled. "Oh yeah. Lots of people.
Especially women."

The girl scoffed, opened the door, and left
while mumbling something in anger.

"Bye bye now. Take care," he yelled
after her with a grin.

Women. They all reacted the same way. How was he
supposed to know she wasn't a hooker? She looked just like one. Wasn’t that
enough for him to assume she was one? And she certainly fucked like one, that
was for sure. Oh boy, the things she had done for him. It was almost worth him
seeing her a second time.

Well almost.

Henrik yawned and put his head back on the
pillow. He really hoped he never ran into this girl again. Well, he was only in
town this one night. Tomorrow he was off to Hamburg. A new town meant new
women. There was always one who fell for his charm.

The last sucker isn't born
yet.

Henrik closed his eyes and tried to sleep, but
after half an hour he realized it wasn't going to happen on its own. Henrik
grunted and looked at the clock. He only had three more hours before he had to
get up. This was really annoying. He got out of bed and walked to his suitcase
on the floor. He searched through it, but didn't find what he was looking for.
Henrik remembered he had put his toilet bag in the bathroom. He walked in there
and spotted the bottle of sleeping pills that he was looking for. But they
weren't in the bag next to the sink, as he assumed they would be. No, they were
in the hand of a person wearing a doctor's mask, juggling the bottle, making
the pills rattle inside of it.

"Looking for these?" the person said.
"Can't sleep can we?"

"Who ... Who are you and what are you doing
in here? You can't be in here!" Henrik said angrily. Who the hell was this
person? A dream? Had he finally fallen asleep? He hadn't heard anyone enter his
room.

"Who are you?" he repeated when he
spotted a syringe in the person's other hand. Faster than he could react, the
needle was pierced through the skin on Henrik's shoulder and the liquid inside
of it was injected into his arm, while the person behind the mask said:

"I'm your next nightmare."

"Are we there yet?"

The question came from Julie in the backseat of
Peter's car. I turned to look at her. "Just half an hour more," I
said.

"I can't wait," she replied with a
wide smile. It warmed my heart to see the joy in her eyes. She had been so
happy lately, ever since her dad and I decided to give our relationship another
try.

"Me either," I said and turned to look
out the window again at the beautiful hills and forests. The corn in the fields
had just been harvested and autumn was right around the corner. We had taken
Julie out of school for a week to all go away to Peter's family estate outside
of Aarhus. Peter and I had a lot of healing to do in our relationship and we
figured the entire family would benefit from a trip away together, just
spending time with each other.

We needed it and Julie, in particular, needed
it. Her relationship with her father suffered from the fact that she was a
little afraid of him, still. Peter had lost it back when he got back from Iraq
and, along with taking too many pills, he had gone crazy and once locked us
both inside the basement of our old house. After years in treatment, he was now
doing better; the medicine was gone, and along with it, the anger. We had been
doing very well for a month and a half now and it was time to mend the broken
pieces, we both agreed.

I had never been to the estate by Lake Brabrand
before and was looking forward to finally seeing it. It had been in Peter's
family for several generations, but he and his brother fought too much to be
able to share it properly and Peter had backed out many years ago. But now, the
brother had moved to Spain and left it to Peter to take care of. Peter had been
coming there a lot to get away from everything and he had told me the place
made him feel better, the quietness, the nature, it had helped him clear his
mind and make the changes he needed to get better. It had been like therapy to
him. And, as far as I could see, it had done wonders. Peter was just like the
Peter I had fallen in love with when I first met him during my stay in Iraq,
working as a reporter many years ago. He was sweet and caring towards the both
of us and I sensed a sadness in him, as well, for having treated us badly when
he wasn't well. He felt like he had to make up for it somehow and that made him
sweeter than ever.

"I can't wait to play in the yard,"
Julie said. "You should see it, Mom. It's huge. Like really huge, like an
entire forest surrounding the castle."

Julie insisted on calling the place a castle. It
was so sweet; she was so easy to impress. "I bet it's great for hide and
seek," I said.

"It is, Mom. It's perfect. You'll never
find me."

I laughed and looked at my daughter. Her blue
eyes were sparkling. I felt a tender pinch in my heart from love. I really
enjoyed being a family again. It felt somehow so right.

Peter smiled. "We're almost there
now."

He took the exit and got off the highway. We drove
for a long time through forests. I thought about my dad. We had left him back
at the house, but he hadn't been well. I felt bad for leaving him like this,
but he had told me he was fine. I had called my sister to check in on him now
and then. She lived fifteen minutes away so it wasn't too big a request, even
if she thought it was.

"I have a life too," she said when I
called to ask if she could do this for me. "I have kids who needs to be
picked up and dropped off, I have gymnastics, swimming and soccer practice,
plus I work full time," she had argued.

"It's just for one week," I said.
"We really need to have some time alone as a family if we want this to
work. As it is now, Peter is living in a hotel and stopping by every day to be
with us. We need some time to see if we’re able to move in together. We need to
work on our relationship to become a family again. Just do it for me,
okay?"

My sister sighed profoundly. "Alright. I'll
do it for you. And for dad. Not for Peter. You know I hate that guy for what he
did to you."

"I know. But please promise me that you'll
work on forgiving him. If I can, then I think you can too."

My sister exhaled. "Well, maybe I will.
Eventually."

"We're here!" Julie shrieked from the
backseat and pulled me out of my reverie. I lifted my eyes and looked out the
front window. Then I dropped my jaw, literally. It was stunning. Placed in the
middle of the lake on a small island was a huge white mansion surrounded by
trees.

"Wow," I exclaimed. "It really is
a castle."

"I told you, Mom. I told you it was."

"How do we get out there?" I asked. It
seemed to be placed in the middle of the water.

"I have a small boat," Peter said.

As he parked the car by the shore, I spotted the
small boat in the water. I had to say I was pretty intrigued. I was looking
forward to being in a secluded area with my family with no distractions to keep
us away from each other. And I certainly got what I wished for.