It’d been so long since anyone cared.
But that was what made her doubly dangerous.
Emotions were the devil and I had no intention of falling for her tricks.
Seeing through bullshit was what got me through circumstances that should’ve killed me. I couldn’t afford to listen to anything but the whispered murmurs of hate.
It was all I knew.
The only thing I understood after what’d happened.
—Kill
Three days passed.
After Kill took me, he’d left without a word, leaving me unbound and sated to do what I pleased. Half an hour after one of the best orgasms of my life, the front door slammed and the empty house settled around me like a tomb.
He’d gone.
To deal with business? To respond to the phone call? Either way, he’d gone alone, and for that I was grateful. Relief thrummed through my blood, but my nerves wound tight with what my future meant.
That first day had been awkward. I’d showered, found a spare toothbrush in his vanity, and dressed in clothes he’d bought me from the plaza. I didn’t know what to do, where I could go, or what was expected of me. So I stayed in my room and asked every question I could think of to try and trick my brain into answering me.
That night, I waited up for him. I paced his home until well past midnight.
I stayed awake until two a.m. before finally succumbing to sleep, and when I woke, I found him in front of his computers, clicking madly, trading markets I would never understand.
We bumped into each other the next morning in the kitchen. I’d raided his supplies to create a breakfast of yogurt with berries that’d been delivered the day before in a weekly supply of healthy meals.
He’d frozen in the doorway and glared at me as if I were a stranger.
I hadn’t said a word, hoping he would shed light on his issues. But he’d turned and left, leaving the house for the second time.
I might remain in his home for now, but I wasn’t stupid to think I had unlimited time to remember. Overhearing his phone conversation confirmed that I would still be sold. Regardless if Kill was on board with that decision or not.
He was the president of Pure Corruption, but he obeyed another—the man he admitted was his boss, who was currently incarcerated at Florida State. I didn’t know why Kill had stooped to such a horrible crime as trafficking, but I wasn’t delusional to think I could make him care.
Not that I achieved any progress. Kill hated me—or hated the way I made him feel. Either way… I was on borrowed time.
The next day, he left again. No touching, no explanation—he acted as if I weren’t there. We were ghosts in the same house, drifting past one another. There was no mention of sex, or how soon he meant to get rid of me—even his questions about my memories and tattoos never came.
He withdrew into himself, becoming pensive and quiet and so damn surly, I stopped asking him the simplest of questions and avoided him.
An unlikely routine sprang up as simplistic and easy as if we were following some carefully scripted plan.
Arthur would leave first thing in the morning. To go where—I didn’t know. I would stay in bed until I was sure he’d gone, then make my way to his office and stare at the equations on the wall.
Something about them tugged my brain. Taunting me with answers I couldn’t see.
I snooped in his wardrobe, looking for some treasured mementos that might show me a link to my past or his. I strolled around his home searching… searching for something, anything.
He didn’t seem concerned about leaving me alone for so long. Was he so confident in his fucking me that I would stay? Stay for what? He’d given me nothing.
Minute by minute, my world shrank to the small circumference of his home. And in his home, I felt both safe and watched. Both comforted and unsettled.
I tried to use his computers, but they were password protected.
I tried to go for a walk, but the gate was code encrypted.
I tried to find a weakness in the property’s exterior, but it was a fortress. Every blocked avenue made me itch for freedom and I began looking for ways to run.
At night when he returned, I stopped trying to talk to him. I ceased padding down the stairs in the middle of the night to spy on him as he furiously clicked his mouse and placed trades on the flashing graphs and foreign currency pairs.
The longer we didn’t talk, the more I noticed the sharpness in his green eyes, the intelligence burning bright—the almost scary intensity that made him glow as night after night he sat at his desk and muttered the same thing over and over, while staring at an image I couldn’t see.
“I will have my vengeance. I will find my peace. I will ruin those motherfuckers and hope to God I will be free.”
I’d tried to find out what the picture was, but the drawer was locked with no key to be found.
The rest of his house gave no clues as to who lived behind his impenetrable green gaze, and I grew antsy as more minutes ticked past and I remained in the dark.
I need to remember.
I tried. Shit, how I tried. But all my attempts were in vain. I gave up harassing my brain for answers or clues. I became trapped and I didn’t care about anything but running.
I couldn’t stay any longer in the house of a biker president who no longer noticed me.
I didn’t want to live in the blank world of forgotten anymore.
I have to leave.
There was nothing for me here. Arthur had made that abundantly clear—pulling away from me so his conscience would be clear when he sold me.
I didn’t want a man like that—who could so easily walk away from what was between us.
You deserve more.
I agreed wholeheartedly, so why did my soul scream whenever I thought about walking out the door and never coming back?
Chapter Twelve
I was a weapon.
I’d been honed by the best, given the skills to excel and an empire to rule.
I was a warrior.
I’d been granted ultimate power, intelligence to succeed, and powerful allies to make my wishes come true.
I was a king.
And kings were never distracted by those weaker than them.
—Kill
“You’re coming with me.”
I looked up from where I sat cross-legged on the bed. The only reading materials in Kill’s house were trade journals, company manifests, and a book called So You Think You’re a Genius. It had mind puzzles, equations, and a bunch of very technical tests that proved in actual fact that no, I wasn’t a genius.
Last night, when Kill didn’t come home till three a.m., I found a weakness in the back fence. The stone wall was rougher there, less perfectly built, and gave just enough finger grips to climb the three-yard imprisonment.
I didn’t know what existed behind the wall, and I’d have nothing to take apart from a few pieces of fruit from the kitchen to sustain myself. The catering service Kill ordered only delivered at the start of the week—frozen, calorie-counted healthiness that kept me and him alive with no mess or joy of cooking.
Unfortunately, another order wasn’t due for a few days, and I wanted to leave tonight.
I couldn’t stay in this house another moment.
Resting the book on my knees, I asked coldly, “To where?”
His eyes narrowed at the frost in my voice. “To Pure Corruption. Time for our weekly meet, and I need to take you in. Brothers want to discuss your future.”
My throat closed. I knew this day would come—I just hoped it wouldn’t interfere with my runaway plan.
My hands balled. “You said you wouldn’t get rid of me till you knew—”
“Doesn’t matter what I said. I’m done babysitting you and I have a lot of shit on my plate.”
I’m not babysitting a traitor.
Burn, baby girl. Burn.
I shuddered as the vile voice echoed in my head. Gripping the hardcover of the book, so I wouldn’t show my fear, I snapped, “What do you propose to do with me?”
He stiffened, not moving from his place by the door. “What’s with the fucking attitude?”
My eyes opened wide. “Seriously? You have the balls to ask me what’s with my attitude?”
He stalked forward, growing bigger and bigger as his temper seethed. “Yes. I’ll ask again. What’s with the fucking ice, sweetheart?”
I slammed the book closed and threw it at his head.
He ducked, spinning around to watch the heavy volume slam against the carpet. He turned to me face me with violent, incredulous eyes. “What was that for?”
“What was that for?” I shot up from my butt to my knees, and grabbed two handfuls of my hair. “I’ll tell you what it was for. I sewed you up. You took me shopping. You made love to me three nights ago, and then you just walked out of my life! No explanation, no hint at what you mean to do with me. You’re driving me insane, and I know that there’s something you’re not telling me—a lot of things actually. But you’ve driven me so far away that I’m… I’m—”
Kill lowered his head, looking up through thick lashes. “You’re what? Spit it out.”
I dropped my hands from my hair, feeling drained and no longer wanting to fight. “I’m done. I’m no closer to figuring out who I am or how I know you than I was when I was first stolen.” Rolling my shoulders, I muttered, “I heard you on the phone. You’re still going to sell me, so everything else…” I shrugged, my voice slipping into sadness. “Guess none of it matters, because when I have an owner who’s beating me senseless and fucking me within an inch of my life, I’ll be grateful I don’t remember anything. Grateful to your coldness that I have no link to my past, because I’ll never be that person again.”